NORTON COMMANDO 850
Norton Commando fan Jim Hodges owned one in his youth, but couldn’t resist transforming this latest acquisition into his idea of Brit bike perfection – without destroying the essence of the beast
One man’s mission to build the ultimate iteration of the Brit classic
You would think that after 45 years the world would have run out of new ways to improve on old British bikes. Surely, anything that can be done has been done. That’s a fine theory, until you bump into this Norton 850 Commando, built by Jim Hodges. People must have put together hundreds of Commando specials over the decades, and dozens of them have featured in CB. But how many have looked as neat and tidy and true to the original idea as this one?
Jim has form for this kind of thing. A semi-retired toolmaking engineer, he’s been riding and building British bikes since he was a kid, and we’ve featured several of his creations before. With his mate Bob Thomason (another expert mechanic – he used to spanner for 10-time World Speedway Champion Peter Collins) Jim has the workshop, experience and contacts to do a full resto of, say, a standard Bonnie in six weeks. He also has the kind of welding and machining arsenal you need to build some of the most advanced Brit specials in the land. Including this Norton. “I bought one new in 1977 when I was 17,” remembers Jim. “It cost £1100, and I kept it three years. It was a really good bike. I’ve always fancied rebuilding another one. I bought this one in 2017, originally with the idea of doing it standard. But there are so many things wrong with Commandos, I realised I’d have to tweak it a bit.” With modern brakes and Maxton suspension, this Commando is about as tweaked as you can get without turning it into something else. “You can go too far with British bikes; then you may as well have a Japanese bike,” Jim observes. “British bikes vibrate, they’ve got foibles. It’d be easy to put a monoshock and upside-down forks on, but by the time you’ve done that you may as well stick a Japanese engine in it, and get the whole thing completely right. But then it’s not an experience, unless you’re going really fast. To me, a British bike has to be something you ride, something tactile. Good from 0-80mph. You have to feel things.”
In deference to the extra complexity of reimagining an entire motorcycle, Jim and Bob took a whole two months to build this Commando. But they had spent the best part of three years planning it first. “I’d bolt something on, and then I’d look at it, and take it off,” says Jim. “The only thing I knew I had to mod is the brakes, which on a Commando are truly dangerous. They were fine in the ’70s when nobody had good brakes, but now everybody’s got good brakes. And cutting off the rear frame loop, because it droops.”
The obvious starting point, as with so many Brit bikes, is sorting out the engine. The fabulous finish and total lack of leaks are standard attributes on Jim’s engines – vapourblasted cases are vibrated in walnut shells to close up the pores in the aluminium, and mating surfaces are ground flat. Even the gaskets are trick: “The side cover ones are reuseable, made in the USA using rubberised fibreglass. They don’t leak. Just wipe ’em off and use ’em again.”
Jim describes the internal mods as a light tune, with nearly all the parts coming from the USA, where they were developed for flat-track racing. “In England, we tend to go for standard all the time. If you want exotica on a Commando, you’ve got to go abroad.” Besides a full rebuild, the bike has a Stage 1 cam, beehive springs, BSA Lightning cam followers, light pushrods, longer-than-stock Carillo rods with shorter forged JC pistons, and diamond-coated gudgeon pins and valves.
“The way the gudgeon pins fitted in the conrods...
‘A BRITISH BIKE HAS TO BE SOMETHING YOU RIDE, SOMETHING TACTILE. GOOD FROM 0-80mph. YOU HAVE TO FEEL THINGS’
I can’t imagine anything fitting better. It’s perfection. It just seems a shame to hide it in an engine.” The longer rods don’t affect the stroke; they just alter the balance factor to make the engine’s smoothest range appear at higher revs.
Perhaps the most critical issue on a big twin is breathing. Jim machined two 3/8in holes in the back of the crankcases, and a recess to take a pair of two-stroke reed valves. “That way it can blow gas out, but not suck it in.” The pressurised gas vents to the oil tank, then via a pipe to the breather cylinder next to the left rear shock. A K&N puffer filter completes the route back to the atmosphere.
So far, so reasonable. But Jim has developed an understandable loathing for British carburettors, and an even more understandable admiration for Japanese ones. So he fitted a pair of Us-sourced Keihin race flat-slides, even though the frame needed modifying to accommodate them. These are not a common choice on a Commando, and setting them up took a dyno session. But, as Jim says: “They look dead smart.”
Ignition is a new-generation Pazon system which Jim discovered after fitting the older version to another Commando and noticing that it misfired at 4700rpm. “With all that heavy valve gear bouncing around, the single camshaft flexes, so at certain revs it can develop a sympathetic resonance. The ignition rotor is that heavy and sensitive.” After much head-scratching, Jim fitted a Boyer system, which worked fine but felt a bit flatter. So he contacted Pazon in New Zealand. “They’ve now developed a lighter system for Commandos. That’s what the bike has now.”
The finishing touch is a stainless exhaust built by JAC, a firm who usually do race cars.
“I drove to Nottingham on a Saturday morning to drop the bike off and the guy was dead miserable:
‘What do you want?’
‘Two-into-one, this and this. Shall I leave it with you?’ ‘No, I’ll do it now.’
“He was just wandering around, but in two minutes he’d already done a section. I was like: ‘How did he do that? I’ve been watching him!’ He had the whole thing done in four hours, all purge welded. He was unbelievable. But dead miserable. Fantastic.”
Jim added the made-in-china silencer later on. Other low-priced Eastern delights include the indicators, headlamp brackets, rear brake reservoir and latching push-button switchgear. This last is a new development which means you can have push-button operation without an expensive box to translate electrical blips into flashing indicators or high/low beam selection.
The chassis mods stem from Jim’s unsentimental assessment that the standard forks “are just rubbish, really,” and the front wheel “is probably the worst wheel ever designed”. Fortunately, Maxton Engineering make 35mm forks with a rebound cartridge down one leg and a compression cartridge in the other. They were developed for classic racing, but they also provide the highest spec available for a 35mm stanchion. The wheel issue is down to the spokes on the disc side being almost vertical to allow enough offset for the caliper. This was solved by Sid’s Wheels in Stafford, who can drill hubs to accept spokes at any angle. By crossing the right spokes to the left of the rim (and vice versa) Sid preserved the offset while allowing the spokes to work at a proper angle, and ensure the wheel is stiff enough. Maxton shocks matched the forks, and Sid built a new rear wheel to mirror the front. Jim, meanwhile, made or modified almost every screw and nut on the chassis; milled out and shortened the footrest plates; designed the front and rear caliper brackets; fabricated the seat base, mudguard loop, fork brace, breather tank and wheel spindles; reworked the footrest and control lever set-up; swapped the Norton yokes for CB750 Honda; and project managed the application of paint, electrics and seat.
He solved another Commando weakness – the electric
‘THE STANDARD FORKS ARE JUST RUBBISH, AND THE FRONT WHEEL IS PROBABLY THE WORST EVER DESIGNED!’
start – with a powerful lithium battery and Wosp starter motor. “There were two things wrong with the original electric start: an underpowered motor, and the poor quality batteries in the 1970s. You’d press the button and the motor was slow, so the starter clutch wasn’t gripping, and it wore out. Eventually it would break. This set-up is mega-beefy and the clutch grips straight away.”
If you’ve ridden a stock 850 Commando you’ll be conditioned to expect a delay while the starter decides whether it wants to stir into life. On this bike the motor is running the instant your thumb touches the button. You’re very much sat on top, with the bike small and flat beneath you. It’s a world away from sitting ‘in’ a modern naked bike, but it still feels easy, natural, and slightly exciting. Especially when you let the clutch out and feel a tug of torque which you’d normally associate with something much bigger and heavier.
As you chug about getting used to the bike, the exotic carbs whistle and rattle to you encouragingly. Pretty soon you notice that the engine character is deeply pleasing... and startlingly effective. The best way to describe it is a seamless chain of power pulses from tickover to 5000rpm, which is all I felt like using on my 30-mile ride. Repeat for two or three gears and you get a great chunk of sustained acceleration. It’s not the fired-out-of-a-cannon excess of a modern bike; it’s a tactile and aural sensation which you help to construct and maintain. It’s more than enough to deal with modern traffic should you want to. It’s also laid back enough to lope along with everyone else. Jim says the longer conrod/shorter piston combo shifts the engine’s
smoothest spot to about 90mph, but I couldn’t detect any special roughness at lower speeds.
As you can imagine, the Maxton forks and shocks aren’t cheap. But then again, they don’t feel cheap. So many specials have rock-hard springs that fire the wheels off bumps and induce wobbles. This is perhaps the best-sprung special I’ve ridden. It soaks up road shocks from 30-80mph. For the riding position and engine character, it’s just what you want.
Cornering smoothness is fine, but the steering isn’t quite neutral. As you lean round a slowish corner, it runs a little wider than you expect. You might not notice that in high summer, but on cooler autumn roads it’s something to adapt to. Jim’s since dropped the yokes 5mm, on Maxton’s advice, and says it’s improved.
By the time I gave the bike back to Jim, I had decided it was a masterpiece. It works in a way its original designers could only have dreamed of, and yet it completely respects what they were trying to do. You might glance at it and call it an exercise in spending money, but that misses the point. It’s an exercise in vision and planning, underpinned by enormous skill and experience. All the visceral thrill of a British bike without the rolling undercurrent of worry. And it looks fabulous, does it not?
‘IT WORKS IN A WAY ITS DESIGNERS COULD ONLY HAVE DREAMED OF, YET RESPECTS WHAT THEY WERE TRYING TO DO’
Thanks to: Jeff Chilton Loom build (07872 995934) Sid’s Wheels in Stafford (07855 566713) Mark Henderson Seat covering (bespokecarinteriors.co.uk) Becketts Body Shop Paintwork (01270 759189; thanks Brendon and Steve) JAC Exhausts 2-into-1 system (jacexhausts.co.uk) US Norton shops: JS Motorsport, Power Barn, Colorado Norton Works