brrm

Meandering through Youtube tonight, I've happened upon quite a few silly instruments [Youtube link].

But I think this one takes the biscuit:

Brrm brrm brrm [Youtube link]

Today, I went to the Vintage Motorcycle Club's 'Festival of 1000 Bikes'. And, as last year, got to run my dad's 1962 AJS 7R 'Boy Racer' round the track at Mallory Park. If there's anything that beats normal motorcycling, it's riding a purpose-built racing machine round a track. Being able to rev an old single-cylinder to 7000rpm is somewhat frightening!

Plenty more pictures in this flickr set - including a Brough Superior (cf. Lawrence of Arabia) and a Vincent, estimated at 90-110,000 pounds and 125-150,000 pounds respectively. Ouch!

In other news, I finally caved and bought an iPh*ne. It is every bit as shiny as expected.

Today marks nearly 1 year, or 2800 km since I bought the Enfield. 2500km was the point where the final running-in-period service was due, so I took today off and rode down to F2 Motorcycles (where I bought it last year). Handed it over at 10am, and took the bus to Banbury, where saffie1981 drove up to meet me for a day's lazing around in Banbury.

At 4pm, it was time to pick up the bike, so we drove back and saffie1981 headed off back to Oxford. Dave of F2 said of the bike that it was "running very sweetly." I said "So I didn't screw up the running-in, then?"
"Quite the opposite!"

*smug*

And he's right. When the bike is idling, you could set your watch by the regular thump-thump-thump.

So now the running-in period is over, and the world is my oyster - or at least, the bits of it that I can reach at ~65mph.

Brrm brrm!

I can't really coherently put it into words, but the riding today was awesome. The track was very soggy on my first session, which gave me a chance to get to grips with things rather gingerly before letting loose a bit more. The seating position takes some getting used to, especially when the flexibility of newish leathers is somewhat limited.
The bike, for those who didn't make it through the Wikipedia article linked in last post, is a 1962 AJS 7R "Boy Racer". 350ccs, no kickstart or electric start (run run run run jump clutch-in VROOM), no silencer (OK, a minimal silencer). No speedo, just one big rev counter. Apparently my reaching 6krpm in 3rd gear on the straights translates to about 85mph.

But I must say, very little beats the pure experience of riding a bike on a track. Brrm indeed! And now I flop. Tired, and a little achey. :-)

A snippet or two of video will follow once I can get the tape dumped at work, but in the meantime, have some photos.