Vintage Thing 8.3 - A series Vincent-HRD TTR

Stephen Pate has sent me some more images of the special brakes for the A series Vincent TTR that he's restoring. Again, they are things of beauty and were sourced by the Japanese and American TTR owners working together. When I saw the pre-restoration state of the machine I thought how unnecessary but now that I realise its historic nature, I appreciate the responsibility that goes with owning something like this. Without the special TTR forks and brakes this bike was close to being "only" another A series Vincent. Now that the right parts have been sourced, just bolting them on wouldn't be right. Besides, earlier restoration work on this bike did not come up to standard. There's an opportunity here to review the condition of the whole machine and ensure its survival for many years to come.

In fact, Steve says that the condition of the special forks was a real mess and that after shot blasting he ended up building a jig and then disassembling the forks before rebrazing them together. As he puts it, "Where would I get another one?"

Another example of the lengths to which Steve is prepared to go to get things right - the wheels were incorrectly painted and striped. To get the chrome to hold the paint properly it has to be scuffed up but that showed problems with the plating. So off came the chrome an then off came the nickel to reveal further horrors underneath. As my mate Col would say, "Just right is good enough."

Steve also mentioned that he has a reservations on modern powder coating techniques. One of my mates swears by it, another won't countenance it, saying it encourages corrosion by drawing up water between the coating and the metal of the frame if the outer cover is ever breached. One mostly shows his bikes, the other rides them in classic trials. You can work out which one is which.

For more examples of Steve's work on Vincents click here.

Vintage Thing No.8.2 - The Vincent-HRD A series TTR

Of all the Vintage Things so far, the A series Vinnie has aroused most interest and I recently heard about a most interesting and very rare variant the TTR. Just before World War II, the factory went racing and subsequently built 3 A series TTRs - or Tourist Trophy Replicas - for sale. Two survive, one in Japan and the other in the US, which is being restored by Stephen Pate at Restoration Werks in Illinois & Minnesota. He's sent me these pre-restoration pictures. That's right - pre-restoration. Market value is estimated at $800k! The price of a TTR has traditionally been reckoned to be twice that of a standard A series Vincent and following the sale recently of an outstanding example at $400,000, $800k could be possible if it ever came to market - not that this TTR is for sale, however.

As pictured it features the incorrect forks and front brake but incredibly the correct pattern girder forks were found on a wall in Japanese temple. Obviously really. All that was needed was for them to be recognised by the owner of the TTR in Japan and then negotiations could begin.

I asked him about "The Snarling Beast's" Achilles heel. The Burman gearbox was on the limit of what it could take with the A series powerplant and frequently gave trouble but although he agrees that it was really more suited to a 500cc machine, Stephen reckons the main problem was one of inadequate lubrication. In fact, he's working on the gearbox right now. "There's a number of simple things you can do," he says, "but mis-lubrication (people using heavy grease) or poor lubrication (people not staying on top of the oil) seems to be a very common cause of failure."

Here's what the Japanese had been worshipping - men and women of taste, obviously. Steve explains that the the owner of the temple is a notorious motorcycle collector.