I met Hopwood

The article re: Bert Hopwood’s book reminded me that I was privileged to be present at the Kickstart club when he gave a talk on his time in the M/C industry soon after he had his book published.

Yes, he was a blunt, down-to-earth man, but with the self-confidence of knowing what he was talking about. He had brought along the drawings of his modular-designed engine and the complete motorcycle he had prepared for the board of directors, only to have them rejected as they said that they could not understand them!

We have to remember that at that time they were selling all they could build (in 1960, I decided to swap my 1956 Norton 99 for a brand new one and had to wait three months for delivery, and whereas the ‘56 model had been trouble-free, the new one certainly was not! Anything being rushed through to satisfy the order book) so there would have been no incentive to retool for new models. I seem to remember that at this time Lord and Lady Docker were swanning around in their posh Daimler with gold-plated fittings and Leopard skin upholstery.

The drawings were very straight-forward and easy to read. The engine was based on a 200 or 250cc single-cylinder model which then could be married up into a twin, triple or four-cylinder unit, giving a choice of eight different combinations from a 200cc single up to a 1000cc four. I do not remember a five-cylinder example, but the four had an additional forward pointing cylinder to act as a vibration damper and also be used as an oil pump. The styling of the complete bike, I felt, was very similar to the Honda 750 four of that era.

I only felt sympathy for him as he could see what the future held, but had his work rejected by short-sighted management. Derek Fenn

Derek, thank you for this great insight to a man embedded in the history of the British motorcycle industry. Matt