Not the end of the dirt road though…
Even though the factory had little interest in the four-strokes as production machines, Sammy Miller was still using one in the ISDT each year, though his was more HT than HS. Miller had also created a special machine from an Arrow which he used to tackle an ascent of Ben Nevis in the early Sixties. He also used an Arrow in the Welsh Three Day Trial. This may or may not have been the inspiration for Mick Burton’s Arrow-based Mxer in 1962. A quick recap on the Ariel Leader/ Arrow range in case you’re not familiar with it: it was supposedly the result of market research which ‘found’ the rideto-work buyer wanted to keep clean so Ariel designed a pressed steel framed two-stroke twin as a new concept. The ride-to-work buyer did want to keep clean but bought a small car instead. This didn’t mean the new machine wasn’t any good, just that it had missed its mark.
These two-stroke twins caught the eye of not just Sammy Miller but a lad called Mick Burton too. Like Sammy, Mick felt the Ariel chassis to be not so good but where Miller designed a tubular frame Mick Burton created a folded and welded sheet steel chassis to house a workedover Arrow engine. Using 16g steel sheet Mick created the chassis which holds the fuel too and has space for the ignition coils. Up front are BSA C15 forks which sit in a steering head machined from solid, while at the rear sits an Ariel swinging arm. Both wheels use Ariel hubs and alloy rims to C15S sizes. Mick did away with the alternator and uses coil and battery to power the ignition, there’s enough life in the battery for a race or three.
Covering the frame is a dummy tank/ seat unit which is similar to the Arrow type but slimmer and is from fibreglass laminate. Only one bolt is needed to hold the unit in place as it hinges at the rear on the damper mounts which makes for speedy battery changing.
Engine tuning followed the practices of the day and involved increasing primary compression with crank case stuffers, some port work which Mick was keeping quiet about and with no alternator to drive the engine was free revving up to 7000rpm and gave a useful 23bhp at this end of the rev range. Both Mick’s and Sammy’s working of the Arrow concept showed the UK was not devoid of ideas but often such innovators met with a less than positive response from the industry.