1932 Norton M40 Internationals - SOLD

As advertised on the Car and Classic website.

Quoting the seller: "Norton International Model 40, racing specification, delivered in 1932 to Hans Soenius from Cologne. He then was the best the best German road racer and he raced the bike in 1932 and 1933 before he joined NSU as a works rider. Matching frame (46538) and engine numbers (1594). The frame was modified to rear suspension at one point. The black and white photo above shows Hans Soenius on this Inter in 1933. Priced at 15.700 GBP"

and another one from the same seller: "Norton International, Model 40, engine no.1596, sold in 1932 to C.J.Hands from Birmingham in racing specification. The frame is not original and probably left the works part of a CJ, CS1 or ES2. The girder fork is correct for 1932. Front brake with cooling rings, drum is original. Priced at 12.400 GBP"

Both bikes are in the Czech Republic.

Bennett's 1925 TT Norton again

By Roger

I have found a picture (above) of Bennett and his Norton at the end of the 1925 TT which shows the braced Webbs that he used in the race. I wanted to confirm that he did use the braced ones as I had read elsewhere that they were so still that they caused frame breakages on the sidecar outfits. I am most interested in the design as the brace appears to be in line with the fork's front tube rather than midway between as on the Druids. I think that the 1925 TT was the first time that braced Webbs were used and this may also be true for the Druids because of comments in The Motor Cycle; developments tended to be "shared".

Max's 1931 Model 20 Norton

An email from Mike Slater

"Thought you might be interested in this pic; this is my great uncle Max's bike, pictured in 1939 (at least the license plate makes it pretty easy to date the photo). I don't really know much about the bike, apart from the fact that it seems to be a Model 20, with what looks like an aftermarket suicide shifter fitted and the tool box removed."

JdK: It's a 1931 Model 20 Norton. Note the twinport exhaust, the position of the magdyno behind the cylinder, the Enfield hub at rear, the Horton hub at front and the early Norton forks (without the typical Webb wing nuts). An interesting feature is the instrument panel mounted on the front forks. The gearbox lever for the Sturmey Archer box is original, as is most of the rest of the bike.

It's a Gale indicator!

-Roger- Here is an answer to the question posed in the blog on 29 June. Despite the detailed description I am still not quite sure why it would be needed. Normally indicator diagrams are used to determine power output but this one seems to require a dynamometer to verify it! At least we know what it is and that once again I have proved to be wrong - my motto is: often in error but never in doubt. The other snippets are also of interest as they show that in 1926 crash helmet design was quite advanced and chromium plating was being advocated.

-JdK- "And below more information on what it does..."

Twelve men and a Norton

The following amusing clipping was sent by Roger...

Viktor's 1927 Model 18 Norton

Viktor (above) got this Model 18 from his very good friend Vratislav (below, on the right) but it took him 10 years to persuade his friend to part with the Norton's remains! He had to help him out reproducing quite a few parts for Vratislav's other bikes before he could carry the Norton project home.

Viktor has now dismantled the engine and surprisingly, it looks in quite good shape still. The head is marked 29-1-27 and the engine number is 35036 which confirms 1927.

Rebuilding the frame will be the biggest challenge but Viktor is making progress, see this earlier blog entry for more info.

Improvements in the valve mechanism of internal combustion engines

A patent application written by James Lansdowne Norton in 1919. It describes a balance lever and valve springs at the position where you’ll normally find the pushrod check springs on your vintage OHV Norton. In the invention, opening of one valve puts more pressure on the other valve resulting in that valve to seat more strongly. A further benefit as described is that the valve springs would be remote from the heat of the cylinder head, in a period when valve springs were still prone to break.

Does it work? Perhaps, but problems with valve springs were overcome by use of better materials and longer springs and further, the construction looks rather complex to me compared to the normal setup. It would be interesting if someone could give it a try though!

Removing the pinion from the crankshaft

How to remove the pinion from the crankshaft of your vintage Norton? It's a tapered press-fit and there is not enough room behind the pinion to use a normal puller. Clumsy attempts to use the weight of the crankshaft invariably result in cracking of the thin wall between the bearing and the pinion. The Norton manual suggests to give the pinion an almigthy blow with a hammer and a soft metal drift...which works OK but I need a stiff drink before I dare to abuse the delicate pinion in that manner.

Viktor found a much better way and the pics below explain it all. The puller was made from grained steel grade 600 MPa.

R J D Burnie's Nortons

Pics sent by Steven, words by Simon

Steve: "This is my grandfather R J D Burnie (in the pictures) and most of these photos were taken at Pendine as this is where he was from... but he did also race at Oxwich, Brighton, Southport, Shelsley Walsh, Ulster and others... he was the chief accountant at Fort Dunlop and raced purely for fun. I have two scrap albums of his with newspaper cuttings from the thirties and fourties which is where I have managed to get most of my info from and then in '47 he get tranferred to Durban as internal auditor in a new Dunlop factory. Before leaving he was one of the most successful amatuer racers of his time..."

 Simon: "Some pics were obviously taken at Sand events and some seem to be road races but just where I do not know. It is not easy to be too sure about which models are which from the action photos. However, both bikes in the top photo are from 1928/9. The one on the right is an ES2 model and the one on the left may be an ES2 or a CS1 (they looked the same from the drive side!). I would think the photo was taken two or three years later - perhaps in the early thirties - as the front brake lever on the r/h bike has been changed to a later design.

The machine with telescopic forks and plunger rear suspension is a post war Manx Norton - as sold to the general public in the period up to the early fifties when the featherbed framed models came into the picture.

The machine with riding number 31 looks to be a just pre-war CS1 model - note full chain case over the primary chain and detachable front brake drum on left hand, while I think the other shots are all of the same machine (riding numbers 1,15,23 and 45) and this looks like a Model 30 (the 490 cc OHC racing model) from about 1933/4."

The V-twin is a New Imperial

Stanley Woods and a 1928 CS1 Norton

Words by Simon

Stanley Woods on a CS1 at the 1928 TT - Stanley's riding number was 27 and he finished fifth. The number plate colour indicates a race day photo. The CS1 still has a left hand exhaust port, but it has the special 7 inch front brake which first appeared on the works bikes that year. Below the same Norton on a page from Motor Cycling, page 202, June 18 1928.

T.T Toffee again!

Sent by Edrick from Ireland

"Here is a pic of a Stanley Woods sweet box that I bought at an auction a few years back. Our TV station here in Ireland did a programme on Stanley and in it Murray Walker speaks about as a youngster eating a full box of T.T. toffees that Stanley gave him."

Bennett's 1925 TT Norton again

By Roger

The attached pictures are of interest in the discussion about the 1925 Bennett TT Norton as the main picture shows it (above, on the right, number 11) as part of a group photograph. The registration number can be seen as can the braced Webb forks. Interestingly all of the sidecar outfits were equipped with braced forks but these were all side sprung Druids (see second illustration below). Both Bennett and Woods won TT races on Nortons which had been supplied by the works but I believe that their status was different to the exclusive team contracts that we know today. Bennett had won the previous year so was likely to have been given the machine which is why he registered it through his dealership. He is likely to have received a retainer for the ride together with a bonus for finishing. Certainly a couple of years later he offered to ride a Velocette in the Junior on the basis of a handsome bonus if he won which he did easily. The reason for this approach was that, like the other riders, he was contracted to suppliers (tyres, chains, oil, fuel, magnetos, plugs and so on) which might conflict with the standard Norton supplier. In this way he would benefit from both the Norton and all of the other bonuses.

The team picture is interesting as Mick Woollett in his book disparagingly describes it as the Norton camp and hangers-on as he only identified Walter Moore, Joe Craig, George Tucker and Alec Bennett. I believe it is a picture of the whole Norton team in both the Senior and Sidecar races. The ones I can identify are from the left: Pat Driscoll, Tommy Simister, Bert Taylor (second in Sidecar race), ???, George Grinton (third in Sidecar race), Joe Craig, Walter Moore (Team Manager), Ralph Crauford, ???, Joaquim Vidal, George Tucker, ???, Cliff Juggins (Pat's "hanger-on"), ???, Alec Bennett, ???.

The other riders were: Ignacio Macaya, Billy McVitty, JA Stuart and Ernie Searle and the hangers-on:
G Hammond (George Tucker's passenger), CR Hurst (Bert Taylor's passenger), AW Kinrade (George Grinton's passenger). Jimmie Simpson finished fifth in the Sidecar race on a 350 AJS with George Rowley as his passenger!

1925 Model 18 Norton

From the September 2010 issue of the Dutch VMC magazine

This photo most probably shows mr A. Veelenturf from Bodengraven in the Netherlands on his 1925 Model 18 (the registration H-44233 was issued in May 1925). The machine is fitted with electric lights and the headlamp may be Bosch. The carburettor is rather special for a road going machine as it is a Binks Mousetrap.

Roger: "The carburettor looks identical to the Binks three jet Mousetrap on a Zenith at Brooklands. The front part looks like the conventional two jet Binks with with addition of the variable venturi flap at the rear controlled by the second cable (both cables can be seen in the picture). The two jet version is indistinguishable from the three jet one as the other components are the same but the internal jet block has an extra hole for the third jet. The two/three jet Mousetrap was a vast improvement over the single jet version which supplied a rich mixture at anything less than full throttle - acceptable for dope but much less so for petrol. I suspect that best results would be obtained from the three jet version by leaving the venturi flap wide open. In this way it would function as a normal three jet carb and the flat could be closed for enrichment for hills."

Simon: "Several OHV Nortons are shown in the despatch books as being fitted with the Mousetrap during the mid twenties and although the specific version is not mentioned it is reasonable to assume the current type at the time would have been fitted.  'Several' is perhaps an overstatement - only four are shown up to Autumn 1924. The three jet version of the Mousetrap came in in 1926 so the one fitted to this 1925 Model 18 may have been the earlier type or, if fitted after delivery, one of the later type. Below is an extract from the 1925 Lucas instructions and the one on the bike looks similar althought the advance and retard is on the back rather than the front (ie tight wire advance - the usual Lucas arrangement at the time) and the arm holding on the contact breaker cover is above rather than below."

Roger: "The picture I have of a 1925 Lucas magdyno (below) looks rather different. The Maglita is much squarer and I also have found a picture of the CAV and none of them look like the one on the machine. So perhaps it is a Bosch system."

For sale: 1929 Norton Model 16H - SOLD

This tidy looking 1929 16H is SOLD for sale at eBay. It appears to be quite original except for few minor issues: wrong carburetter, no front stand, front brake arm plated (like many others!), later knee grips, wrong magneto and cover, wrong silencer and clutch cover on the primary chain guard. Tank gear change makes one think of 1930 but a few late '29 models may have had this on them. The saddle springs look enormous!

Sturmey Archer gearboxes fitted to Vintage Nortons

By Simon

Until the cradle framed CS1/ES2/CJ/JE models were introduced in the late twenties, the vast majority of all Nortons produced from 1915 up to and including 1930 were fitted with the Sturmey Archer CS type gearbox. The exceptions are the single speed belt drivers (before anyone picks me up for not remembering them!), the four speed models with the cross-over drive box introduced in the mid twenties, and the few, mainly racing, machines fitted with the Heavyweight (HW) LS type gearbox.

The CS box (above) was Sturmey Archer’s first motorcycle gearbox and was designed by ‘Ike’ Cohen. Although there were changes to the gearbox casing, gear pitch, clutch, final drive bearing and kickstart over the next fifteen years, the basic design remained unaltered. Having worked on quite a few CS boxes over the years, I can say with certainty that they seem to last surprisingly well, and certainly better than the later LS design. Their disadvantage of the CS is their sheer physical size in that the kick start gear and mechanism is housed in the casing extension to the rear of the box. One of their advantages to Norton restorers lies in the fact that all CS boxes including those fitted to machines made by other manufacturers, have the same method of attaching to the frame and the same chain line, so for instance, a gearbox casing from 1928 will fit a machine from 1918.

The earliest examples used by Nortons were all chain or chain-cum-belt, depending on the model, and an illustration from the 1916 Sturmey parts list (above) shows what they looked like. The clutch was a six spring design (taper fitting to mainshaft) with 30 teeth 5/8 x 3/8 and the gear change was mounted on two lugs on the casing. According to S-A literature, in 1916 and 1921, there were detail changes to the clutch and in 1920 changes to the gearbox casing – see illustration 1 which shows a 1927 example – which co-incided with the introduction of the disc type gear-change mounted on the seat tube.

For 1926, the gear pitch was changed from the original 12 to 10. This had the effect of strengthening the gear teeth and radically altering the number of them. With the earlier gears, the teeth on any pair add up to 50, while with the later type the teeth on any pair add up to 42. At the same time the single spring clutch originally designed for the LS gearbox was fitted. This had 34 teeth 5/8 x 3/8 and continued in use until 1928 inclusive. Its use necessitated a change to the mainshaft as it is a spline fitting clutch. The diameter of the k/s axle was also increased for 1926, going from 5/8” to ¾”.

1929 saw the next alterations, with a change to the clutch – still single spring but now ½ x 5/16 42 teeth - and to the clutch worm/housing – increased in size and given a felt seal. At the same time the gear change mechanism was simplified and re-located to an inverted tee shaped bracket fixed to the top of the gear box casing. Final drive sprocket changed at this point also to 5/8 x ¼ from 5/8 x 3/8 previously used.

Then we come to the final year of CS gearbox production – 1930. The casing was slightly changed in that the letters of the Sturmey Archer name were now recessed into the end cover casting rather than raised. The kick start axle diameter was again increased, this time to 1 ¼” , and the kick start mechanism internally strengthened and improved. The kick start axle fitted to Model 20 twin port machines was extended to clear the right hand exhaust pipe. Many 1930 Nortons were fitted with the same type of gear change as for 1929 but the fashion for tank mounted gear changes meant that many more utilised this latter system. This did not affect the gear box itself except that the two studs on the upper casing to carry the ‘change on box’ mechanism were omitted and the actual change lever on the gearbox was a different length.

Without going into too much detail, it is worth mentioning that a racing version of the CS box was used on a few Nortons in the early twenties. This had no rear extension housing the kick start mechanism. I have never come across any literature about this gearbox although it appears in the earliest catalogue illustrations of the Model 18. It is recognisable in that, although it resembles the HW LS gearbox, the filler plug is on the left of the end cover rather than the right. I know of but two of these – one fitted to the decidedly pseudo racing 16H outfit built back in the sixties by the late Bill Fruin which carried number CSTT11 and another in private hands (no, the owner doesn’t want to sell it!) bearing number CSTT298. There may well be a few others but the despatch records do not give any clues as gearbox numbers were not inserted in the ledgers at this period.

The HW LS gearbox (above) fitted to certain racing machines from about 1923 onwards was far more compact – it contained six pinions to provide three speeds (and a kick start when fitted) while the CS type contained eight. A change from the four stud top mounting method to the familiar top and bottom pivoting system (below - a Norton patent incidentally) meant it could be used for the cradle framed models when they came along, as mentioned in my opening paragraph. (The CS1 box below is missing the pivot stud which fits into the gear- change disc and on which the upper clevis should pivot. This is part number 4652 in the CS1 parts list and quite an important little item. Its official description is 'gearbox control quadrant stud.' Also the rod which links the g/change to the arm on the box has a bend in it rather than being straight as appears in the photo). Regrettably, the LS box does not last well with dog wear often causing the box to jump out of second gear at inconvenient moments.

The clutches used on these cradle framed machines differed – the ES2 and CS1 models being fitted with a four plate clutch (1/2 x 5/16 42 teeth) while the CJ and JE used the same three plate clutch as fitted to 1929/30 Model 18s etc.

Much more information has been gathered over the last fifty years as regards the different gear sets which were available and other technical changes which took place. If desired, these could form the subject of future easily digestible screeds!

Find out more about assembly of these gearboxes by following this link.