Racing – and courting! – with a Reliant van!
Wow! Not one but two items stirring personal memories in the June issue of OBM!
In the Letters section Richard Miller comes up with yet another Lucas-framed racing bike. He mentions that he was able to identify it by a letter from my old mate, Peter Greig. I first met Peter G 40 years ago when he was trying to identify a Rudge-engined special he’d bought and I was able to fill him in on some of its history. I raced it in the late 1950s and was particularly impressed by its cantilever springing, similar to racing Moto Guzzis of that time.
So much for that, then I turned over two pages and you’re doing an article on my racing transport – a 1936 Reliant van with Austin Seven-based 750cc engine. It had to be modded a bit to take the Lucas. The rear doors were shot anyway, so I replaced them with a drop-in tail board and carried the bike with the front wheel taken off and the forks hanging out the back.
Surprisingly, the Reliant cornered very well; the limiting factor was that the inside wheel lifted and you lost traction.
I might say that I courted my wife in this van and regularly carried her and three or four of our mates to local functions.
Later on, I sold the racer to get engaged and we moved up to a luxurious 1946 model with proper sliding glass windows. Happy days.
Tony Lloyd, Coulsdon, Surrey