ALBANY VINTAGE & CLASSIC MOTORCYCLE CLUB

February 2010 Club News

Bring Out Your Oldest Bike Ride

The call was to bring out your oldest bike - and out they came, from the very old to the very new, didn’t matter as long as it was the oldest (that that person had - geddit? McWebedit).

And there were over 45 of them at the assembly point including four veteran bikes: Neil’s Rover, Jeff’s Triumph, Colin’s P & M and Andrew’s Excelsior. All these bikes were made before 1918. My 1924 AJS was out for a run, as was Bob’s 1000cc V-twin Matchless (inaugural ride).

There were various other brands including four BSA Gold Flashes, Ducati, DKW, BSA singles, Ariels, Sunbeam, Harley and plenty of early Yamaha, Honda and Suzuki not to mention Ron’s Voskhod, Moto Guzzi and other makes.

These were complemented by modern Japanese, Harley and European and British bikes.

A great turn-out, and at the end of the day after completing nearly 100kms not one bike rested on the back-up trailer, towed by Robin Bromilow's car.

Having said that on the way to Youngs Siding I had a bit of trouble with debris from the petrol tank in my AJS carbie. The tap I was using started leaking when I turned it on so before the run I swapped it for a priming tap - which I never use. Unfortunately the priming tap didn’t have a filter so a lot of the flotsam in the petrol tank ended up in the carbie. Having stopped twice I decided at Youngs Siding to swap the taps back so a filter was once again in place - this worked and as a bonus the tap stopped leaking!

Neil’s 1915 Rover ran out of petrol entering Albany but Robin and the back-up vehicle was able to supply enough to keep him going. The rest of the bikes on the run seemed to run like clockwork.

On a nice sunny day lunch at Emu Point was an ideal place. The Squid Shack was popular, although most brought their own.

Thanks for going back-up Robin.