No "Import" Christmas

[SteveFord]

That Triumph is an oldie from 1976, it was built right after the workers blockaded the factory and wound up with a worker's co-op.  They struggled on until around 1982 and then finally went under, the rights to the name were sold and the old factory was bulldozed over.

We'll see, I'll either get it for myself or the owner can hire me to put it back together for him.  A third option is I buy it, bomb around on it for a few years and then sell it back to him.  

I had a new one back in the 70s and I'm afraid it'll prove to be kind of underwhelming.  Time marches on and I've gotten spoiled with the power and reliability of the modern bikes.  A current Triumph Thruxton makes around 90 RWHP, this old girl will probably do 42 RWHP.

The bikes I'm riding now make between 115-135 RWHP so...

[Guest]

3 hours ago, SteveFord said:

That Triumph is an oldie from 1976, it was built right after the workers blockaded the factory and wound up with a worker's co-op.  They struggled on until around 1982 and then finally went under, the rights to the name were sold and the old factory was bulldozed over.

We'll see, I'll either get it for myself or the owner can hire me to put it back together for him.  A third option is I buy it, bomb around on it for a few years and then sell it back to him.  

I had a new one back in the 70s and I'm afraid it'll prove to be kind of underwhelming.  Time marches on and I've gotten spoiled with the power and reliability of the modern bikes.  A current Triumph Thruxton makes around 90 RWHP, this old girl will probably do 42 RWHP.

The bikes I'm riding now make between 115-135 RWHP so...

There must be loads of off the peg engine tuning bits available. I know the historic racing scene for them is alive and well. Cams, rods, cranks. Port it, etc. Surely 3 figures would be in reach? Really simple engines as well. Lift it out on your own, all that. 

[SteveFord]

100 HP out of one of the Meriden Bonnevilles? Triumphs race team managed 65 HP but they blew up pretty regularly.  This is an old design, basically pre WWII.

As this one old Triumph and Norton employee put it, "You can not put any more wine into the bottle".  Norton didn't listen and came out with the 750 Combat motor  and then they spent 1973 rebuilding motors under Warranty.  That was only making 54 HP at the crankshaft, I think Norton claimed 60.  Back then, a 750 Norton with the Combat motor was about fast a bike as you could buy - the Triumph Trident, Honda 750-4 and Kawasaki's 500 and 750 2 strokes were right up there, too.

It looks like the racing John Player Nortons made 78 HP at the crank but then the gearboxes and cylinders were breaking.

The old Norton/Triumph/BSA models were originally designed to be 500cc, the US was their largest market and we kept asking for larger motors with more power.  This is a big country and you can go like hell in the Western states. 

When the British were the world's number one motorcycle supplier the management ignored their engineers (and the Japanese factories), and they squandered the money instead of developing new motors.  When the collapse came in the early 70s it happened really quickly, too.

You'd need a current Bonneville Thruxton motor with the fuel injection, water cooling, OHC and 4 valves per cylinder and do some work to it to get 100 RWHP to have something you could actually run on pump gas and be reliable.  

As this is a Buy American thread, the old air cooled Harley Sportster motor can be made to crank out 100 RWHP in a street bike.  I don't know how long they would hold together, though.  The Harley guys say a Sportster is a girl's bike but it was their answer to the British and they can be made to perform.

 

Edited December 2, 2023 by SteveFord

[Guest]

12 hours ago, SteveFord said:

100 HP out of one of the Meriden Bonnevilles? Triumphs race team managed 65 HP but they blew up pretty regularly.  This is an old design, basically pre WWII.

As this one old Triumph and Norton employee put it, "You can not put any more wine into the bottle".  Norton didn't listen and came out with the 750 Combat motor  and then they spent 1973 rebuilding motors under Warranty.  That was only making 54 HP at the crankshaft, I think Norton claimed 60.  Back then, a 750 Norton with the Combat motor was about fast a bike as you could buy - the Triumph Trident, Honda 750-4 and Kawasaki's 500 and 750 2 strokes were right up there, too.

It looks like the racing John Player Nortons made 78 HP at the crank but then the gearboxes and cylinders were breaking.

The old Norton/Triumph/BSA models were originally designed to be 500cc, the US was their largest market and we kept asking for larger motors with more power.  This is a big country and you can go like hell in the Western states. 

When the British were the world's number one motorcycle supplier the management ignored their engineers (and the Japanese factories), and they squandered the money instead of developing new motors.  When the collapse came in the early 70s it happened really quickly, too.

You'd need a current Bonneville Thruxton motor with the fuel injection, water cooling, OHC and 4 valves per cylinder and do some work to it to get 100 RWHP to have something you could actually run on pump gas and be reliable.  

As this is a Buy American thread, the old air cooled Harley Sportster motor can be made to crank out 100 RWHP in a street bike.  I don't know how long they would hold together, though.  The Harley guys say a Sportster is a girl's bike but it was their answer to the British and they can be made to perform.

 

750cc pre-war Austin 7 side valve engines left the factory with less than 8 bhp. My brother, and my father before him, tune these to well over 100bhp for historic racing.

I asked my FIL who said they got the Bonneville to 80 with water cooled heads, coincidentally at Bonneville. He did point out that 750cc from 2 cylinders Vs 4 is likely to be a much heavier piston, limiting piston velocity somewhat, which I hadn't thought about. 

Obviously they weren't allowed to supercharge them when racing back in the day, but you could!

Interesting stuff though. 

 

I'll find a video of an Austin 7 producing well over 100bhp. 

Edited December 3, 2023 by Farnsbarns

[Guest]

5 minutes ago, Farnsbarns said:

 

I'll find a video of an Austin 7 producing well over 100bhp. 

There you go, one of my brothers creations, a customer car. Around 130bhp. Forgive my screen recording of someone else's video. 

 

[Sgt. Pepper]

So as an electrician in the USA for me a HP =746 watts. What is a BHP and what is RWHP. Some other horse power term I’m sure.

[Guest]

47 minutes ago, Sgt. Pepper said:

So as an electrician in the USA for me a HP =746 watts. What is a BHP and what is RWHP. Some other horse power term I’m sure.

It's likely that when ever you've used horsepower it was actually break horsepower. Most of the world calls it BHP. I've noticed 'horsepower' is often preferred over there. Shorter, I suppose. True horsepower includes all the fixed internal losses in the engine and is very difficult to calculate. Brake horsepower is more useful and easy to measure. It's simply the output at the crank regardless of losses. 

RWHP is wheel/rear wheel HP, accounting for transmission losses. Power at the wheels. 

Horsepower is torque(in ft/lb) x rpm ÷ 5252

Interestingly that's a lot more work than a horse would be able to do. Watt was actually quite pessimistic to avoid accusations of overselling his engines capabilities compared to horses. He just wanted to create a unit. 

 

Edited December 3, 2023 by Farnsbarns

[Sgt. Pepper]

5 hours ago, Farnsbarns said:

It's likely that when ever you've used horsepower it was actually break horsepower. Most of the world calls it BHP. I've noticed 'horsepower' is often preferred over there. Shorter, I suppose. True horsepower includes all the fixed internal losses in the engine and is very difficult to calculate. Brake horsepower is more useful and easy to measure. It's simply the output at the crank regardless of losses. 

RWHP is wheel/rear wheel HP, accounting for transmission losses. Power at the wheels. 

Horsepower is torque(in ft/lb) x rpm ÷ 5252

Interestingly that's a lot more work than a horse would be able to do. Watt was actually quite pessimistic to avoid accusations of overselling his engines capabilities compared to horses. He just wanted to create a unit. 

 

Any motor I needed to order and replace was rated in HP.  I actually worked on the biggest motor in North America. It’s at the  NASA facility I used to work at. That thing at certain speeds shook the entire building. It could push enough air to get to Mach 1.2. It was made by ABB in Switzerland.

https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20120004144/downloads/20120004144.pdf

Edited December 3, 2023 by Sgt. Pepper

[Guest]

13 hours ago, Sgt. Pepper said:

Any motor I needed to order and replace was rated in HP.  I actually worked on the biggest motor in North America. It’s at the  NASA facility I used to work at. That thing at certain speeds shook the entire building. It could push enough air to get to Mach 1.2. It was made by ABB in Switzerland.

https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20120004144/downloads/20120004144.pdf

It was brake horsepower being referred to as horsepower. I can tell because you were so close to 1 brake horsepower when you said 746 watts. (It's a bit closer to 746.7 watts, of course). 

It's a surprise to me that a person who spent a career working with electric motors never heard or read the unabbreviated term. 

[Murph]

Got a few more done last night.

I found some copper rivets at an old True Value store, they're kind of a pain to work with, but look cool. I've used them before on a bass guitar strap 20 years ago.

The aluminum Chicago screws are cool, too.

[PrairieDog]

29 minutes ago, Murph said:

Got a few more done last night.

I found some copper rivets at an old True Value store, they're kind of a pain to work with, but look cool. I've used them before on a bass guitar strap 20 years ago.

The aluminum Chicago screws are cool, too.

These all look great. Folks are going to be lucky to have them! 

[Murph]

Thanks, Dog.

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Murph said:

Got a few more done last night.

I found some copper rivets at an old True Value store, they're kind of a pain to work with, but look cool. I've used them before on a bass guitar strap 20 years ago.

The aluminum Chicago screws are cool, too.

Very nice... Reminds me of a pocket knife I think was bought for me in Texas when I was a kid. One of those with the brass ends, mahogany coloured wood scales and a little divot for your thumb to unlock the blade. It came in a little sheath sown up with leather thread, just like the one your multi tool is resting on. 

I wonder whatever happened to it 🤔.

[Guest]

Much like this.

[Murph]

American built Case Medium Stockman.

American built 1912 silver dime.

[Murph]

20 hours ago, Farnsbarns said:

Much like this.

Schrade Uncle Henry.

I carried one similar to that for a decade or so...

 

 

[Sgt. Pepper]

On 12/4/2023 at 7:07 AM, Farnsbarns said:

It was brake horsepower being referred to as horsepower. I can tell because you were so close to 1 brake horsepower when you said 746 watts. (It's a bit closer to 746.7 watts, of course). 

It's a surprise to me that a person who spent a career working with electric motors never heard or read the unabbreviated term. 

You’re a stickler for details. I had the question How many watts = 1 Horsepower on electrical tests about a dozen times. 

Wasn’t James Watt from England?

Edited December 5, 2023 by Sgt. Pepper

[Guest]

56 minutes ago, Sgt. Pepper said:

You’re a stickler for details. I had the question How many watts = 1 Horsepower on electrical tests about a dozen times. 

Wasn’t James Watt from England?

Close. Scottish. 

[SteveFord]

Beam yourself up, Scotty, your playing sucks!