RATIER C65
Think continental boxer twin and you think BMW. Maybe Zündapp. Alan Cathcart reveals the French alternative…
‘My Ratier is better than any BMW!’ proclaimed my new friend Marcel as he knocked back what surely wasn’t his first shot of marc that morning (it’s the French version of grappa) as another little helper to get him through his day. Marcel worked as a delivery rider in Paris for the French sports daily L’Equipe, starting at 4.30 each morning as the first edition rolled off the presses in that pre-internet era. ‘It may resemble a BMW, but it was created with French style, and Gallic passion. Anyway, Monsieur le Président’ – de Gaulle, back then – ‘personally chose the Ratier for his Garde Républicaine to escort him with. Vive la France!’
I got to know Marcel in life before bike journalism by occasionally sharing with him the zinc counter of the little café across from my Paris apartment just off the Rue de Rivoli – he for another shot of marc, me for my early morning café-croissant breakfast before heading to Orly Airport to meet another group of American tourists for whom if this was Tuesday, it must be Paris. I’d got interested in the flat-twin engined bike bearing the Ratier name that I’d often seen parked in the little cobblestone triangle outside the café, attached to a sidecar float stacked with bundles of the latest edition of L’Equipe which Marcel dropped off at newspaper kiosques around the city. It looked like a BMW with its shaft final drive and cylinders sticking out on either side; it sounded like a BMW after he’d stood beside it to crank it into life via the rear-mounted kickstarter, and it looked as lusty and robust as any of the similar BMW sidecar floats ridden by his colleagues working for rival newspapers, who’d park up alongside the Ratier outside the café. For this was indeed something rather different – while selfevidently of German heritage, it was Made in France, not Germany.
It was an improbable legacy of WW2 that the rugged 746cc boxer-engined sidevalve BMW R12 introduced in 1935, of which 36,000 examples were built by 1942 to equip the Wehrmacht, and its later R71 sidevalve and R75 ohv derivatives, should spawn such copious descendants around the globe. These ranged from the American Harley-Davidson XA (a direct copy of the R12, of which 1000 examples were built in 1942) to the Russian Ural and Dniepr, and Chinese Chiang Jiang (all still manufactured today, 80 years on),
Think continental boxer twin and you think BMW. Maybe Zündapp. Alan Cathcart reveals the French alternative…
via the Swiss Condor – and the French Ratier. This evolved from the 1940-44 German occupation of Paris, when the Wehrmacht established a massive stock of spare parts there to keep its numerous BMW motorcycles and sidecars running.
Known simply as HPK 503, this warehouse was located in an old bus garage on the Avenue Mozart near the Bois de Boulogne, the park in which they staged road races postwar – that must have provided a convenient venue for post-service road testing! After the city was retaken by the Allies in August 1944, a factory was established nearby at Neuillysur-Seine under the CMR / Centre de Montage et Réparation label. Operated by the former HPK 503 workers, this was tasked by General de Gaulle’s new government of liberation to assemble complete motorcycles from the huge BMW spares stock, with Jacques Dormoy appointed Directeur Technique on January 1st 1945, to oversee this.
Under his aegis CMR built around 300 examples of the 18bhp R12 – with verticallysplit crankcases – and the later 22bhp 746cc
R71 with one-piece crankcase. Both were sidevalve twins carrying a tricouleur BMWCMR badge with a red quadrant in the trademark blue-and-white BMW roundel to denote that these bikes were produced under new Free French management. A further 80 units then followed, obtained by fitting considerably more powerful 38bhp ohv R75 motors in R71 frames, splitting the difference in terms of designation to call the result the R73! The Prefecture of Police was sufficiently impressed with its 150km/h top speed to order 100 examples for the Gendarmerie, but only those 80 could be delivered before stateowned CMR ran short of components to build them and, having fulfilled the reason for its creation, shut down in 1947.
However, the CMR managers had anticipated this, and in 1946 five of them including Dormoy had collectively founded a new private company called CEMEC / Centre d’Etude des Moteurs à Explosion et Combustion to continue the construction of cloned BMWs using what remained of the old German spares stock, mixed with new components commissioned from French suppliers as these became increasingly necessary. So BMW’s rigid pressedsteel frames and square-tube chassis were replaced with a round-tube frame produced by Ets. Michel in Paris, now with plunger rear suspension. New crankcases were cast in a stronger monobloc format, to create the CEMEC L7 (L for Latérale, or sidevalve), since while this 78x78mm 748cc design producing 22bhp – now transmitted via a foot-change four-speed gearbox rather than the R12’s hand-change item – was still closely based on the BMW R12/R71, it was increasingly made from French components. Thus a single Solex carb replaced the twin Graezins on the German-built bikes, and a French-made Wageor magneto with manual advance replaced the CMR’s German-made autoadvance Noris mag.
Production of the L7 began in 1948 at Bièvres, 20km south of Paris, and lasted until 1954, when CEMEC was wound up, having produced just 1289 motorcycles in six years. This proved insufficient to fund the development of a more modern engine to replace the ancient sidevalve design, which even the various branches of government –
CEMEC’s main clientele – deemed inadequate for their needs. Many preferred to buy BSAs or BMWs instead – the latter including a certain number of brand-new Munich-built R51s compulsorily supplied free of charge by BMW under the guise of ‘war reparations’!
Even so, the CEMEC L7 equipped the CRS / Compagnies Républicaines de Sécurité acrobatic display team, then a firm favourite with the French public at galas and gymkhanas. It was also successful in the annual Bol d’Or 24-Hour marathon, with Druet / Boucher – both CRS policemen - winning the Sidecar class in the 1952 version’s return to its traditional Montlhéry home. Moreover, 19 specially-designed CEMEC C8 machines were supplied to the Garde Républicaine to escort newly elected President René Coty on his inauguration in December 1953. These were created by mounting copies of the ohv cylinders and heads of a Zündapp KS750 on the crankcase of a CEMEC L7, to produce an engine delivering 40bhp at 5000rpm, and capable of a top speed of 160km/h / 100mph. Around 200 further such engines were delivered to the Panhard and Rosengart car companies to produce their respective answers to the all-conquering Citroën 2CV! But this was insufficient to ensure the commercial viability of CEMEC, which duly died a death in September 1954.
However, soon after the ashes of CEMEC were taken over by Ratier, founded in 1904 by woodworker Paulin Ratier to fabricate wooden propellers for the pioneer French aircraft industry, as the French air force expanded during WW1. To meet demand, Ratier opened a factory in a sawmill at Figeac, 200km NE of Toulouse, chosen for its abundant supply of raw material in the heavily wooded region. Post-WW1, metal propellers came onto the scene and Ratier patented a variable pitch version, of which his company became the world’s leading producer. By 1939 Ratier employed 500 people making propellers equipping 90% of French Air Force aircraft, and which held 63 World aviation records. However, with
the occupation of France in 1940, demand plummeted and the company resorted to producing bicycles, with the workforce falling below 100 people. After rejoining the aircraft industry post-war Ratier made a comeback, employing 1000 workers by 1960 – the year in which it was purchased by booming French electronics giant CSF. Today it’s a key supplier to Toulouse-based Airbus, making the wing elevators for the A380.
Back in 1954, Ratier had opened a subdivision named RAM / Ratier Aviation Marine in Montrouge, on the southern outskirts of Paris, where it manufactured a two-stroke tractor, while looking for work from the French government. Ratier was thus charged with assuming responsibility for maintaining the fleet of CEMEC / CMR flattwin motorcycles run by various government departments, including manufacturing new parts to keep them going, and restarting production of the venerable sidevalve L7. The first Ratier L7 was produced on April 12, 1955, and was the first such motorcycle to be 100% French-built – this time around, no BMWmade parts were used in its construction. Eight different variations on the same basic model, each subtly different one than another (eg. twin Gurtner carbs vs. a single Solex) were produced between 1955 and December 15, 1959, totalling 1035 examples in all, marketed under the slogan ‘Aviation technology applied to the Motorcycle’, even if the somewhat venerable design dated back to 1938, and the BMW R71.
During this time Ratier management decided they needed to produce a motorcycle which would allow the Gendarmerie to keep up with increasingly speedy modern vehicles like the slippery, avantgarde Citroën DS launched in 1955. The Ratier C6S employed an all-new 594cc ohv flat-twin engine, measuring 72 x 73mm and producing 32bhp at 6500rpm, fitted as before with shaft final drive and a four-speed gearbox. This was housed in a double cradle tubular steel frame, but instead of the Earles fork by then ubiquitous on current BMWs, the Ratier C6S featured a
very well-made telescopic front end, with twin Lelaurin rear shocks. The cast aluminium brakes were Ratier’s own, and very effective at that, with the 200mm 2LS drum matched to a same-size SLS rear in stopping a bike weighing 195kg dry.
Ratier management had based the business plan for this new model on the 1200 bikes ordered by the Ministry of the Interior with which to equip the CRS police, envisaging another 7000 bikes for the Gendarmerie who, they reasoned, would be so impressed by the performance of the C6S and its proven 160kmh / 100mph top speed in CRS testing, that they’d cancel their orders with BMW and switch to the Ratier, complete with a wave of the tricouleur national flag. Indeed, on re-assuming office in 1959, the newly re-elected President de Gaulle did indeed decree that his entire Garde Républicaine squad of motorcycle escorts should henceforth be mounted on Ratiers, with their cream side panels on the black fuel tank representing a successful attempt at some added chic. This larger 27-litre fuel tank permitted the 280km journey along the N19 between the presidential Elysée Palace in Paris and de Gaulle’s private home at Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises to be accomplished without stopping to refuel!
But the Gendarmerie remained unconvinced, and maintained its allegiance to the new-generation BMW R69S, which reduced Ratier’s annual production to just 500 bikes a year – insufficient to be profitable. Indeed, between the start of C6S production on July 13, 1960, when chassis no.40001 rolled out of the Montrouge factory, and the end of production in December 1962 with chassis no.41065, just 1057 complete examples of the C6S were produced, plus some spare frames. 230 of these were indeed acquired by the Gendarmerie, with most of the other 800odd bikes destined for the CRS and a handful of private owners. In 1964, the Presidential escort squad abandoned its Ratiers in favour of a BMW R69S fleet. Game over.
The obstinacy of the Gendarmerie had forced Ratier management to make a special effort to sell the bike to private customers, which neither CEMEC nor CMR had ever really done, given the appetite back then from government departments for every bike they could build. This retail push included
an attempt to grab a slice of the flourishing American market, which had now discovered foreign motorcycles – including the BMW.
Ratier therefore developed the C6S America, three of which were built with a higher compression ratio and more sporting riding position, with two shipped to the USA for promotional purposes and unveiled at the Laconia Rally in New Hampshire in June 1961. But despite Ratier management’s best efforts nothing came of this. A C6S was also displayed in Russia at the 1961 Moscow Trade Fair, perhaps as a result of which several Ratier lookalike components later appeared on the locally-made BMW-derived Ural!
Ratier also tried to imbue its products with some sporting flair by developing a series of bikes for long distance racing – then as now a popular means of demonstrating a marque’s dependability to French audiences. Eleven examples of the specially developed 499cc ohv Ratier C5 were constructed, with engines sleeved down to 66 x 73mm to meet the Bol d’Or 24-Hour race’s 500cc capacity ceiling for solos. In June 1958 factory-supported riders André Nebout, alias ‘ Tano’, and Pierre Charrier started the Bol at Montlhéry aboard a C5, but they retired during the night after covering 147 laps of the 6.3km banked circuit and infield.
The following year they tried again, but retired after just six laps, as did the second Ratier entered that year with Charrier’s son aboard teamed with ‘Agache’ – pseudonyms were commonplace in French racing back then, mostly to ensure their mother / wife / girlfriend (delete as appropriate) didn’t know! They completed 188 laps before their DNF, but in 1960 Papa Charrier and Nebout got the closest yet to a finish, forced into retirement on Sunday morning after 276 laps of a gruelling race which saw only ten of the 30 starters finish.
In shorter races the Ratiers did well, with Nebout winning the Two Hours of Montlhéry in 1962 at an average speed of 124.579km/h on one of a pair of 500cc Ratier C5 GS prototypes with a ‘square’ 68 x 68mm motor producing 40bhp. But this was a final defiant salute by an ailing marque, with CSF ceasing production of Ratier motorcycles in December 1962 to allow the use of the Montrouge factory’s available space for the radical expansion of its aviation electronics business, after securing the contract to supply its Cyrano radar system for France’s new Dassault Mirage jet fighter.
As the CRS gradually divested itself of its Ratier fleet, these ended up in the hands of private owners, and during my two-year stay in Paris in 1968-69 they were still relatively commonplace on the streets of the capital. But the sight of one on British roads was always a rarity, making the example of the C6S to be found in the Sammy Miller Museum (alongside a BMW R69S of the same era) a fascinating exhibit. I’d never had the chance to ride one before – my mate Marcel did once offer to let me ride his, but I didn’t fancy doing so with a few dozen kilos of newsprint strapped to the sidecar float! So the chance to take Sammy’s Ratier for a canter along the lovely New Forest roads around the Museum answered something I’ve been wondering about for the past fifty years: what’s a Ratier like to ride?
Judging by its chassis, no.40416, the Museum bike is a 1961 model into which an earlier engine no.40184 has been transplanted to create the bike which British enthusiast Ian Munro purchased from a French visitor to the UK’s Beaulieu Autojumble 30-odd years ago. It was in running order with mostly correct parts, including a pair of brand new exhaust silencers. After restoring it to the condition it’s in now and adding more kilometres to the odometer in the Jaeger speedo, which now reads a probably accurate 92,497km, he sold it to Sammy Miller in 2011.
Ratiers were very robust and long-lived – I remember being impressed that Marcel’s had been round the clock once, according to him – and this C6S shows no sign of old age. After lifting the tall knob on the back of the headlamp (which also works the lights) to turn on the ignition, I eventually succeeded in firing it up. Even with the low 7.9:1 compression ratio the rearwards-mounted foot-starter is an acquired skill as well as a nuisance – you have to stick it on the stand to be able to operate it, and I resorted to run and bump once the engine was warm, taking care not to knock the left-hand one of the two 28mm Bing carbs fitted to the bike, presumably sourced from a later BMW.
Once lit up the Ratier sounds, feels and performs exactly like the BMW R69S of similar engine capacity and performance which my American flatmate Jeff Craig ran while living in London during the 1970s. Its flattwin engine is just as smooth and torquey, and it has the same slightly heavy albeit reassuring handling, so that even with the quite compliant tele fork fitted instead of the BMW’s Earles front end, it feels very stable and planted in faster bends, as I suppose it should be with its low build and that long 1430mm wheelbase. The comfy 760mm-
high seat with a toolbox beneath it delivers a fairly low but relaxed riding stance, though the right carburettor’s inlet pipe does inevitably get in the way of your foot somewhat – it’s the rearward of the boxer motor’s two cylinders.
The one-piece handlebar is quite tall, resulting in a fairly upright stance – ideal for presidential escort duty, though it’s strange Ratier didn’t retain this for its America variant. The 200mm brakes are excellent, especially the SLS rear, though with the shaft final-drive it’s wise not to use this too hard. But the Ratier-made twin leading-shoe front drum is effective as well as good-looking – the quality of the aluminium castings is very good, contrasting with the rough-looking crankcase casting of the engine.
The C6S’s four-speed gearbox’s single-plate clutch has a light action, making it ideal for town work and especially escort duty, but the shift action of the left-foot gearchange – remember that the Germans were first to put the gear pedal on the left, and the Japanese copied them – is rather slow, and you will miss a gear if you try to rush things. It’s also hard to find neutral, which presumably is why Ratier copied the short lever topped by a round knob sprouting out of the right side of the gearbox casing, just like on a BMW of the era, for you to find neutral by hand when necessary (as in, often!).
However, the Ratier’s engine is so torquey that once you get it in top gear you can pretty much leave it there at anything more than walking pace, though it does gallop along nicely in fourth, and must have been a great ride along the straight, fast French RN roads of the 1960s. The Ratier was publicised as being one of the first bikes you could cruise at 100mph, and I have no reason to doubt that, with its wind-cheating low overall build taking full advantage of the low-slung flat-twin motor.
The 19-inch wheels give welcome extra ground clearance, with the low cee of gee delivering good stability over the bumps and lumps of 1960s highways, aided by the Lelaurin rear shocks which seemed quite effective on the Museum bike. Looking at the serious lean angles that works rider André Nebout was able to achieve on his racewinning Ratier, the C6S evidently has sporting handling which I wasn’t however prepared to try to sample on Mr. Miller’s beautifully fettled museum-piece!
The Ratier C6S is more than a footnote to WW2 and what came after in two-wheeled terms. It’s a fine French flag-bearer for a Gallic motorcycle industry that would soon be no more. If only a company with better resources and more commitment to making a success of it had been manufacturing this bike, it might well have led to greater things. For sure, it’s a missed opportunity.