Triumph build video.

[Motu]

http://www.webzeum.com/VintageFilms/Triumph/tabid/56/Default.aspx

31 minutes,so have a coffee or beer while you watch.If any of you young blokes wonderd what us old farts ever saw in old Triumphs,then this might give you a clue - no robots here,just skilled craftsmen doing their job,watch the guy trueing the wheel.Love how the gearbox goes together - first time I rebuild a pre unit Triumph gearbox it took me 3 tries and ended up with 3 gears.My wife built up her own Triumph boxes,which shows she knew her stuff.ET even makes an appearance,what a charming man.

It says 1958....I reckon the bike is a 1954 T100 - opinions?

[Warr]

A very interesting watch :)
Thanks for finding that. I had an AJS500 for a bit with the "Burman" gearbox. Was rather pleased to get that back together all working too!

[Blackbird]

You beauty Motu - just watched it all the way through and laughed my head off at the marketing. The tradesmen with ties were great too. Seriously good video for ex-Triumph owners though and a good comment on social history. I think your date is spot on:rockon: . I know the young 'uns on the site are going to call me an anorak, but my 1955 model (which I didn't buy in 1955, I hasten to add :innocent: ) differs in some small respects. It had the later "Eyebrow" tank badge - the stripes in the video were a legacy of the earlier pre-swing arm models. My Tiger also had a true Monobloc carb with the horizontal float bowl. I also noticed when they were assembling it that the front sprocket of the primary drive seemed to be held in place with a spacer. I think mine had a shock absorber with a hefty spring on it, but the memory is a bit hazy on this. I think the 1955 seat had a bit more pronounced rise for the pillion too.

There - that response ought to provoke a bit of ridicule from those who think that a GSX-R 1100 is ancient history.:yes:

Geoff

[Smokin]

That movie is 14 years older than me, but that was great, things sure have changed along the way and just to see some of those tradesmen working was a sight to behold.
The frame building took me by surprize too, I had never thought about how they brazed joints before they had oxy/acetylene.

Thanks for sharing mate.

[Motu]

Yes,the lack of engine sprocket cush drive was a puzzle,I thought they may of missed it just to make the filming go easier.But we were definatly watching the build of a T100 from start to finish,and it showed a cush drive clutch hub - maybe it didn't have the engine cush drive in that case,although I've never seen a generator Triumph without one.

The care over frame aligment was a surprise too....it didn't show in the finished product!

[Paul in NZ]

I've had that and others on DVD from Duke marketting for a while - why back in the day....

[nudemetalz]

That was awesome, Motu.
Nice to see Welly mentioned there.
The speed of the wheel spoke assembly was quite a watch.

This large-scale handbuilt assembly must be a dying if not dead art, what with robotic assemblies.

A joy to watch.

[kneescraper]

You OLD guys sure know what your talking about...those were the days when bikes were very simple!

[Blackbird]

You OLD guys sure know what your talking about...those were the days when bikes were very simple!

Hahaha - it was the only transport I had when at varsity and poor so it was a case of having to know it inside out in case it gave trouble. :sunny:

[kneescraper]

Hahaha what a stud!! Reminds me of photos of my father on his bikes...you guys all had that slick hair style....kinda looks like the set of Heartbeat!

I can totally see what they were the bikes to have. Every bit of the bike was completed by man. Eye opening video Motu!

[Blackbird]

Despite being dressed in a green cardigan with football buttons (oh noooo...), an orange t shirt and suede shoes, I was still able to pull this girl from Glasgow at the 1969 Isle of Man TT. I was painfully shy at that stage and it still counts as one of life's highlights:innocent:

[kneescraper]

Isle of Mann must have been awesome back in those days, well it still is..Ive always found that era interesting. Didn't seem to have all the hang ups that this modern life has...or so I've been told.

[erik]

Cheers for posting that, Motu, it was really interesting. It makes you appreciate the amount of work that goes into bikes. The stunts were amusing, you don't see stuff like that these days. :)

I've started downloading the BSA video from the same site:
http://www.webzeum.com/VintageFilms/ClassicBSACirca/tabid/52/Default.aspx
( mms://69.64.171.16/WebZeum/Classic BSA Film Try 2.wmv for the video by itself in Windows Media player or mplayer)

I don't know what it's like yet... That last one was 275MB! If the BSA one is the same size, it'll take a while to download.
After a bit of searching I found the command-line version of mplayer (http://www.mplayerhq.hu) was able to download and save the files. (http://www.mplayerhq.hu/DOCS/HTML/en/streaming.html#streaming-save)

As an interesting comparison, the link to this 1992 GSXR750 video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0Kz1YAtFp4) was posted on the sportsbike.co.nz forum recently. It's shorter but shows some of the GSXR750 manufacturing.

[Brian d marge]

Eric , sorry how did you do that for Mplayer ??
using ubuntu , but I couldnt get that file to open

Stephen

[Ixion]

Very interesting. And not a torque wrench in sight!

I think those may have been competition engines they were assembling, the pistons look very high compression, and the cams decidedly cammy. I don't think competition engines had the shock absorber.Every dynamo Triumph I've seen had one. Old codgers decried alternators because you had to lose the shock absorber (which was actually a primitive slipper clutch!)

Quarter thou on the cranks and tenth on the bores? Hmmm. Maybe.

Interesting the wheels were trued the same way I did them - no DTI just a fingernail ! And two and a half minutes to fit a tyre. Not bad!

Interesting too that they made their own pistons ? I thought by then that the specialists like Hepolite had pretty much taken over .

I saw an 1953 EIP Vauxhall, and it was not later than 1954 when the tanks got the later badge. So, yes, 1953 or 1954.

[erik]

Eric , sorry how did you do that for Mplayer ??
using ubuntu , but I couldnt get that file to open

Stephen

I haven't ever used ubuntu.

One thing I forgot to mention is the spaces in the file name need to be replaced with '%20' when running mplayer from the command line, so instead of:

mms://69.64.171.16/WebZeum/Classic BSA Film Try 2.wmv

you should probably use:

mms://69.64.171.16/WebZeum/Classic%20BSA%20Film%20Try%202.wmv

I'm not sure if this is just a windows thing, or if it'll work in ubuntu as well. The command to type is just what they have on the documentation with different url and filename, just copy and paste:

mplayer mms://69.64.171.16/WebZeum/Classic%20BSA%20Film%20Try%202.wmv -dumpstream -dumpfile ClassicBSA.asf

as one line, and it will save the video to a file ClassicBSA.asf in the same directory as mplayer. Then you can play it with mplayer or VLC media player (the other players I've tried don't seem to work).

[pete376403]

bloody excellent movie but they missed one bit - where the young boffin comes in saying "sir, our research shows that motorcycles made in Japan will eventually take over 90% of the world market!" and the old managing director says "their tiddlers are ok but all they are doing is creating a market for our big bikes. No we'll carry on just the way we are, thanks"

That movie could have been made in 1945, or even 1935 with only a few details altered.

[Motu]

I think those may have been competition engines they were assembling, the pistons look very high compression, and the cams decidedly cammy.
Interesting too that they made their own pistons ? I thought by then that the specialists like Hepolite had pretty much taken over .

.

It was a T100,which was their most high performance bike at the time.I have seen pre unit 500 pistons like that,and they are about 8 or 8.5:1,which is very high for the period...maybe an export bike,the USA would be the only country in 1954 with the fuel to run them.My wife had some slipper pistons of about the same ratio in her 5T,and E3134 cams too.

The lack of engine cushdrive a cush drive clutch hub is a puzzle - a good friend of mine still has his 1954 T100 that he has had since it was about a year old - I'll ask him if he has a cushdrive next time I see him.

[Motu]

bloody excellent movie but they missed one bit - where the young boffin comes in saying "sir, our research shows that motorcycles made in Japan will eventually take over 90% of the world market!" and the old managing director says "their tiddlers are ok but all they are doing is creating a market for our big bikes. No we'll carry on just the way we are, thanks"

That movie could have been made in 1945, or even 1935 with only a few details altered.

But in 1954 they were still supplying Japan with the technology to build such things - supplying tooling,blueprints and patterns to build complete British cars under licence.Japan was as much a threat in 1954 as Iraq is today with taking over Microsoft.In 1964 they were blind to Japan,but 10 years earlier they were sowing the seeds of their downfall.

[Blackbird]

It was a T100,which was their most high performance bike at the time.I have seen pre unit 500 pistons like that,and they are about 8 or 8.5:1,which is very high for the period

When I bought my '55 tiger, it had been breathed on with 10.5:1 pistons, E3134 cams and tuned pipes. It would only run on premium fuel. The pistons look very similar. The attached photo is the only one of the innards of my Tiger and is not particularly clear. However, you will probably be able to see the scallops in the conrods and broken rings. I had new cylinder liners fitted at one stage of ownership and they turned in the block, with the conrod cutaways gently wearing against the rods and blocking oil galleries until the engine seized!

Whilst I was looking the photo out, I came across the other two which are attached. Blast from the past quiz: What, where, aproximately when?

[Motu]

Those are the same slipper pistons my wife had in her Speedtwin,they have no sideskirts.I don't think they were 10.5:1,I reckon only 8.5:1 max.

Dunno about the other photos,they are from England I presume - we were using a dirt drag strip at Kopuku in those days.Nero? The Alf Hagon JAP,I see the Wal Phillips fuel injector,I had a couple of those.There are very few Reliant Scimitars in NZ,not enough to cut one up for drags.I used to work for a Reliant agent and only had a couple come in.

[NordieBoy]

Eric , sorry how did you do that for Mplayer ??
using ubuntu , but I couldnt get that file to open

Stephen

Get hold of "kmplayer".

It will solve all the worlds problems for you.

[Kickaha]

Whilst I was looking the photo out, I came across the other two which are attached. Blast from the past quiz: What, where, aproximately when?

#1 Alf Hagon supercharged JAP? mid to late 60's

#2 is a Scimitar and probably Santa Pod, late 60's early 70's

[xwhatsit]

Eric , sorry how did you do that for Mplayer ??
using ubuntu , but I couldnt get that file to open

Stephen

I'm using Ubuntu too -- here's what I typed on the command-line:


mplayer "mms://69.64.171.16/WebZeum/Classic Triumph Film Try2.wmv" -dumpstream -dumpfile ClassicTriumph.asf

That's for the Triumph vid, mind you -- you'd have to find out the address of the BSA one. A tip, on the Linux command-line, any path that has spaces in it, put quotes around it and it will then parse properly.

That will just download the file into the current directory, then just type
mplayer ClassicTriumph.asf to view it. You can even do this while the film is still downloading, although if you catch up to the download mplayer will quit as there's no more file to play back at that point.

[Blackbird]

Well done guys, have a chocolate fish!

The drag engine is Alf Hagon's own 1100 Jap, the first bike in England to break 10 seconds and 150 mph for the standing quarter. The photo was taken at RAF Honington where he achieved just over 200 mph over the flying quarter. Rather him than me on that thing! The date was the late 60's.

The Scimitar is called "Whistler" and has a big block supercharged Chev in it. One of the early British funny cars and ran in the 9's on straight methanol. Creases showing low tyre pressure combined with torque stand out nicely! Again, late 60's. A guy who works for the same company as me but over at the Mount has a rather nice Scimitar. He says that there are at least 60 in NZ.

[xwhatsit]

Get hold of "kmplayer".

It will solve all the worlds problems for you.

You're a weak little shit, NordieBoy! Use the command-line! It's good for you :D

And KDE as well... *shakes head*

[Kickaha]

A guy who works for the same company as me but over at the Mount has a rather nice Scimitar. He says that there are at least 60 in NZ.

We have one that comes into work at least once a year, it is the owners daily drive car

[NordieBoy]

You're a weak little shit, NordieBoy! Use the command-line! It's good for you :D

And KDE as well... *shakes head*

I use kmplayer to play it but...

mencoder -oac copy -ovc copy "mms://69.64.171.16/WebZeum/Classic Triumph Film Try2.wmv" -o triumph.wmv

To D/L it...

[sidecar bob]

Interesting observation, During the entire assembly process i didnt see a torque wrench once, but i saw a hammer about twenty times.

[Ixion]

Yup. They was professionals. True, they were, proper fitters not assembly line workers.

[Motu]

And take a look at those hammers,not a Warehouse claw hammer in sight,or a ball pein - assembled by feel and sound,stand back and look at what you've done.All the tools a craftsman needs.

[xwhatsit]

Gorgeous stuff. The crankshaft was the best bit, I think.

You can understand why people pay such good money for those bikes today.

As a side note, no wonder people laud the reliability of modern Jap bikes -- having a hand-built bike is certainly special, but you can understand that quite a few more inaccuracies would sneak past a human eye than Mr Robot. Still, no wonder people say those bikes have a soul.

There's a company in Germany which makes French Horns, called Alexander. They're pretty much the last place who still makes horns by hand -- in much the same way as that Triumph film showed. I've played four of the same model, and none of them play the same. Each one has its own character, despite being from the same blueprint and made within the same year. I bet those T100s are the same.

[Brian d marge]

And take a look at those hammers,not a Warehouse claw hammer in sight,or a ball pein - assembled by feel and sound,stand back and look at what you've done.All the tools a craftsman needs.

ahh them the good ole days ..not a DFX file in site ...and there are still some who can scrape a white metl bearing !! ( If I mod my scrapers any more it will be pinholes only !!!

btw ( LUUUUV linux ,,now I know jack about computers ,,but its downloading from command line !!! yea

the beauty of it is i can use synaptic ,,install kmplayer delete a few other and all will be sorted inside big white box wiv on button and off thingy

Stephen

[Motu]

They were still behind the times enough that we were taught the theory of hand scraping bearings in my apprenticeship - but it was unlikely I'd ever scrape a bearing,everything used shells,and if they were poured bearings then the engine rebuilders did it.However in 1979 I was working on compressors,and some had white metal bearings.

So I was hand scraping my first bigend,pretty scary,but it was going well and just taking down a few high spots.The boss came along for a look,and I said I was pretty close,just a few high spots.''Not bad '' he said - then he grabbed my scraper and layed into the bearing,rolling off big scrapings like peeling a potato...I wasn't very impressed,the bastard just ruined all my work.''That was a quarter thou'' he said.I blue the crank again and it was perfect.Never done it since.

[Brian d marge]

One or to things made me cringe ...they STAMPED numbers on the rod ..adding stress raisers and there was some other stuff ,,but i will have to watch it again

oh what a chore

Stephen

[crazybigal]

mate your such a legend!


Hahaha - it was the only transport I had when at varsity and poor so it was a case of having to know it inside out in case it gave trouble. :sunny:

[kneescraper]

They were still behind the times enough that we were taught the theory of hand scraping bearings in my apprenticeship - but it was unlikely I'd ever scrape a bearing,everything used shells,and if they were poured bearings then the engine rebuilders did it.However in 1979 I was working on compressors,and some had white metal bearings.

So I was hand scraping my first bigend,pretty scary,but it was going well and just taking down a few high spots.The boss came along for a look,and I said I was pretty close,just a few high spots.''Not bad '' he said - then he grabbed my scraper and layed into the bearing,rolling off big scrapings like peeling a potato...I wasn't very impressed,the bastard just ruined all my work.''That was a quarter thou'' he said.I blue the crank again and it was perfect.Never done it since.


What the heck is "scraping bearings"? us young people were never taught these things ya know. We should sit around a camp fire and old Motu can tell us stories about the good old days....when men were men. :mellow:

[Ixion]

"scraping bearings" is exactly what the name implies. Before the modern Vandervell shell bearing, big ends and mains were made by casting white metal directly onto the inner surface of the conrod (for a big end). You built a little dam inside the conrod eye, and heated white metal up in a little pot and poured it in.

The result was only vaguely circular , and bumpy as hell. So you bolted the rod onto the crank pin with a bit of blue in there, and turned it. Unbolted it and the blued surface on the white metal showed you the high spots. So you took your scraper (every mechanic had his own set always different usually made by bending and grinding old files, though I knew a guy used old carving knives) and you scraped a bit of metal off on the high spots. Reassemble, recheck, rescrape. Until the bearing turned easily when bolted up, and the blue evenly covered the whole surface. Then do the next one.

Craftsmen fitters claimed to get down to a tenth of a thou. Which was pretty likely rubbish because I very much doubt that the crank pin was that accurate.

God, it was soul destroying boring work, and stressful as hell because if you made a mistake in the last bit and removed too much metal like as not the bearing was ruined and you had to start all over again.

[xwhatsit]

Talking to my dad not so long ago on the phone to Aus -- he did his apprenticeship as a fitter and turner. Now he's a businessman, but he still remembers a lot of that stuff. I mentioned my engine rebuild (yay! done!), and I told them about the camshaft bearings in the head. He said, why not just replace the needles? I told him, no, they're plain metal, you can't replace them. He then started talking about hand-scraping bearings. He's only 45 (I think?), but in marine engineering, on the huge diesels on the big ships he worked on (did apprenticeship at the Auckland Harbour Board), there were still a lot of these white metal bearings for years and years -- he said there's probably still people who have to deal with these bearings, those kind of mills don't get thrown out for decades. He said it was a right bastard to do, talked about using the blue for the highspots and all that, and being assessed during his apprenticeship to see how well he could scrape, and they'd come and measure the bearings with a vernier and fail him if he was more than a few tenths out. He reckoned he got pretty good at it, though.

Half of the time I have no idea about my father -- had no idea he had such a archaic and technical skill.

[Blackbird]

talked about using the blue for the highspots and all that, and being assessed during his apprenticeship to see how well he could scrape,

You made me shudder, talking about engineers' blue - had forgotten all about that stuff. I was a student apprentice with a bearing manufacturer in the UK and when we returned to the factory to do our practical time, the women in the Inspection dept would grab us, drop our strides and blue our balls to quote "stop us getting fancy ideas above our station". Do you have any idea just how hard that stuff is to get off sensitive areas????

And these days, it's all about women being harrassed, sigh...:shutup:

[kneescraper]

WOW! Awesome stuff, gotta love the way things were done back in those days. Makes us young fullas look uesless....well we when compaired. It would have been real cool to learn those old ways....building engines with such little to no modern age technology. Total respect to those 'old school' engineers...I wish I could learn some of those old school methods.

[Brian d marge]

Ask them ole fellas to use whip up a drawing and send the .dfx file to the machining center ,

Different strokes for folks though its a handy skill to have in case of emergency

like when the part you made is 1/2 a mil out ...

Not that that ever happened oh no never ....

Stephen