Tales of the brilliant CB400F, racing the train and an ‘Alas, poor Yorick’ encounter
Pete Kelly brings more reflections on the troubled British bike industry of the 1970s, with two bike outings to remember from his years at Motor Cycle.
Honda’s light, fast and stylish CB400F sportster, which was road-tested exclusively by John Nutting in a 40-page advertising supplement in the March 22, 1975 issue of Motor Cycle, created such a sensation that, with the help of Honda and the services of Mocheck Ltd, the magazine entered three of the machines in that year’s Isle of Man TT production race.
I always liked the imaginative writing style of some of the younger staff members and John’s exclusive first road test of the CB400F, in which the little bike achieved a fastest one-way speed of 105mph at the MIRA testing ground in Warwickshire, began: “It cruises at 45mph with the serene grace of a Royal garden party. It purrs and coos with the soft innocence of a pair of doves – but drop down two or three gears and gun it and Honda’s new four is transformed into a tyre-spinning, screaming 10,000rpm reincarnation of a grand prix bike. “Either way, the CB400F marks an important turning point in the Japanese company’s policy, for they’ve actually gone and done it! Honda have made a super sports bike worthy of the title, in every aspect of its performance as well as its exciting appearance. With looks that scream ‘racer’ from every sparkling highlight on those distinctive four-into-one exhaust pipes to the scarlet works-style tank, mini side covers and folding setback footrests, it feels so unarguably right it’s almost unbelievable. “Smooth as a turbine and quiet as any car, the CB400F offers nimble, secure handling whether in dense traffic or wafting down country lanes. It is also very compact and light for a four-cylinder machine, and the performance figures make immensely refreshing reading. At 104mph, its two-way mean top speed is only one mph down on the 500 fours, and the standing-start quarter-mile acceleration figure of 14.9 sec is only fractionally down on the bigger models too.”
As that bulky Honda supplement proved, with full-colour single and doublepage advertising spreads from Honda UK especially printed on glossy paper, and small ads from every Honda dealer in the country, motorcycling was enjoying one of the greatest boom times in history, and I found it heartbreaking to contrast this with the gloomladen situation to which the remnants of our home-spun industry had sunk.
Forlorn hope and utter despair continued to arrive in equal measure, as evidenced by the issues dated August 9 and September 13, 1975.
The first had a cover photo of three pickets soaking up the sun at the gates of Norton Triumph Villiers’ Wolverhampton plant as union leaders from the area pledged their support in the event of another workers’ co-operative being put forward, with the jobs of 1200 people hanging in the balance, and the cover of the second announced: ‘Wolverhampton men unveil new two-stroke’ with a photo of a 500cc Hooper-Farrell machine and an inside feature about it by Midland editor Bob Currie.
How sorry I felt for Bob, who for years had enjoyed a close relationship with every motorcycle factory in the area, and had enthusiastically road-tested the products of them all, and was now having to watch everything crumbling away.
Bernard Hooper and John Farrell were responsible for the design of the Villiers Starmaker engine of the previous decade, and the ‘secret’ of the new engine could be found from the design of the fuel tank panels
– a symbolic rendering of a pair of double-diameter pistons. We’ll return to story of this machine and the unfolding NVT drama next month.
Racing the train
In the early 1970s Tom Kinnaird, whose sheep farm in the lee of Fife’s Knock Hill boasted a narrow farm track and a disused railway line, had the brainwave of linking them together and creating an exciting new race circuit which we now know as Knockhill.
Within easy reach by road from Edinburgh, Glasgow and Aberdeen, the 1.3-mile long circuit hosted its first motorcycle race meeting in the autumn of 1974 and, a year later, anxious to get from behind my editor’s desk at Motor Cycle for a day, I rode the 785 miles to Knockhill and back on a BMW R90/6 demonstrator to appraise the new venue for myself.
Back in 1937, the year of King George VI’s coronation, it took the steam-hauled, streamlined ‘Coronation’ express just six hours to reach Edinburgh Waverley station from London’s King’s Cross. So, just to make my ride more interesting, I wondered whether I could beat that on the crowded roads and motorways of 1975. The booked time of ‘Coronation’ wasn’t bettered until 1973, when massive track improvements and 3300hp diesel power enabled the time to be cut to 5½ hours. Such a ride would give me a tremendous opportunity to demonstrate the high-speed reliability of the big BMW tourer, which proved the best possible choice for the journey by combining long stretches of flat-out riding with the ability to swerve briskly along the more twisty roads further north – and I reached the Scottish capital in 5¾ hours – 15 minutes better than the ‘Coronation’ express’s time, but 15 minutes slower than the fastesttimed trains of 1975.
The bike was something of a one-off, incorporating the familiar top fairing, electric clock and ammeter of the more glamorous R90/S model and the big twin perforated-disc front stopper, and for my money it was the perfect compromise. Finished in stately black, it had the classical BMW look and, despite long bursts of highspeed running, it returned an overall fuel consumption of a fraction under 50mpg.
The big motor was tireless and unburstable, capable of showing an indicated 100mph before clicking into fifth gear, yet remaining as docile as a kitten at 50mph in top. It was unnecessary to change down at any speed above 60mph, for the massive torque of the flat twin provided sharp acceleration right up to the maximum indicated speed of around 117mph.
I had never yet sampled a BMW that hadn’t given me that ‘as one’ feeling, and after the first 100 miles or so, the R90/6 just became a part of me. I felt I could ride it for 1000 miles at a stretch without ever getting tired. It had been exactly the same three years previously during BMW’s Maudes Trophy adventure, when two teams rode R75/5 machines around the Isle of Man TT circuit for a week, doing stints of three or four laps at a time in the pouring rain.
The first leg of the journey to Scotland, along the M1 as far as the Sheffield link, comes back to me as a hazy blur of wind roar, lane markings leaping from the horizon and passing like tracer bullets, and the almost turbinelike hum from the high-revving motor. In no time, it seemed, we were on the A1, snaking briskly past the massive Ferrybridge power station in Yorkshire and heading towards Wetherby and Scotch Corner. Another 35-mile stretch of motorway, the A1(M), saw us travelling through County Durham in heavy drizzle.
Suddenly we were passing through Gateshead, and there ahead was the legendary Tyne
Bridge joining County Durham with Northumberland. We’d been on the road for just 3½ hours. From Newcastle, the A1 developed into a good dual carriageway towards Morpeth, and even the historic town of Alnwick, once a serious bottleneck, had been by-passed.
To the left were the rolling Cheviot hills, and to the right the unspoiled North Sea coast. A few miles before reaching Berwick-upon-Tweed came a magnificent view of Holy Island and Lindisfarne Castle, and after crossing the long, wide bridge across the River Tweed, we were hugging the coast again. The North Sea was a beautiful blue, with long white rollers pounding the coast near Burnmouth – a reminder of the fury it could unleash in more extreme weather conditions.
Change down one… and another. Touch the front brake, bank over with your boot tip just skimming the road, open up again. It went on and on, the horizon never still for a moment, until we crossed the border into East Lothian.
Here and there, parallel to the road, I spotted the main east coast railway route over which the Coronation once ran – and the
BMW felt more like a train than ever, sticking faithfully to its chosen line at any speed as we navigated a magnificent stretch of the A1 through long, wide, gently curving bends and forestry on both sides.
The North Sea came into view again near Musselburgh, and we entered a more built-up area stretching as far as Edinburgh itself. How slow it felt after all that fast riding! We might just have beaten the streamlined train’s timing of almost 40 years previously by 15 minutes, but how I would have enjoyed the luxury dining and other sumptuous facilities aboard that
Art Deco masterpiece!
It was time to get on with the rest of the journey, across the 1964 Forth road bridge, with the massive 1890 railway bridge next to it, as a train seemed to crawl across like a tiny, slow-moving caterpillar! After filling the riding glove on my left hand with an uncomfortable assortment of coins, I discovered that there was no toll for motorcyclists on the graceful road bridge, so I had to stop at the other side to put them all away again!
Near the Naval Dockyard at Rosyth, where a nuclear sub squatted like a fat black pencil, a police officer came up behind me on a 500cc Suzuki twin as I was asking directions for Knockhill. He stopped and glanced at the R90/6.
“That’s a hell of a bike you’ve got there,” he said with enthusiasm. “Bet it’ll move!”
“What’s the Suzuki like?” I asked. “Oh, it’s okay, but the vibration’s terrible,” he answered.
“I’ve always found Suzukis to be pretty smooth,” I said – then we found the trouble. His right legshield was touching the cylinder barrel. Problem cured, we exchanged farewells and I headed for Knockhill.
Nestling in the hills above Dunfermline, I could see straight away that the picturesque little circuit was going to become one of Britain’s favourites. There was still half an hour to go before the start of a practice session, and after greeting our Scottish contacts Alistair Black and Andrew Shaw, I did half a dozen laps on the BMW.
I could see straight away that, although not very long, Knockhill was an extremely demanding course, with most corners approached uphill, and some tight, off-camber bends as well as a tricky hairpin. There were big plans for further development, and during the intervening years Knockhill has indeed become the venue it always promised to be.
Passing through Edinburgh on my way back to London, I glanced up at a clock tower in a busy Princes Street to see that it still wasn’t 3pm. As I stopped for petrol at Pencraikhill, a smiling German tourist got out of his car and eyed the big black BMW. “Made in my country, yes?” he said proudly. “You like?” I gave the dirtencrusted tank a gentle pat. Oh yes, I liked all right…
By 4.50pm we were mingling with football crowds in Newcastle, and a mere half hour later I took a break in Darlington before setting off on the last leg home at 6.15pm. The nights were already closing in, and by Ferrybridge I’d turned on the lights. The journey along the M1 was completed in total darkness, and it was getting colder, but after so many miles I seemed to be just sitting there as if in a dream.
This totally detached feeling became more evident just south of Newport Pagnell when, for the first time all day, the heavens opened and we were speeding through an impenetrable mist of spray and heavy rain. Shrugging my shoulders I just carried on, with no reduction in speed whatsoever.
After finally arriving home at 9.15pm, wet and bedraggled, I pushed the bike that had just taken me on an unforgettable 785-mile journey into the garage. There was nothing left but a hot bath and deep, deep sleep…
Alas, poor Yorick!
When you take a sleeper train for the first time in your life, there are all kinds of wonders to behold, like the corner slab in my compartment with the notice: “This cabinet is not designed for solid matter.” Better not leave my bulging handgrip containing my helmet, boots and other riding gear on top of it, then, I thought – and in the middle of the night I discovered that the cabinet opened outwards to reveal a beautiful white chamber pot!
British Railways had run its last steam-hauled train eight years before my article appeared in the May 22, 1976 issue of Motor Cycle, but much of the rolling stock from that era, like my sleeper train, would remain in use for several years to come. After leaving Euston station at 10pm on my way to the Scottish Six Days Trial, it was a heady experience to draw back the shutters the next day and see the thickly wooded hillsides, mountain streams and heather-covered slopes of Scotland, all bathed in the bright white sunshine of early morning, passing by. If I’d seen Martin Lampkin and his Bultaco there and then, I don’t think I’d have been surprised!
Breakfast was unforgettable. As the diesel laboured up the merciless inclines of the single-track West Highland main line with its mixed train of sleeping cars, newspaper vans and ordinary coaches, magnificent panoramas opened up, from craggy mountains, perfectly reflected in the millpond-like lochs below, to streams and waterfalls which foamed and cascaded beneath the railway and continued on their glinting paths down to the valley bottoms. Here was a wood, carpeted with clusters of primroses, there a dead stag beside the railway, and caramel-coloured Highland cattle grazing on the mountainsides. Sheep ran panic-stricken as the loco thundered on.
As the train stopped at Corrour station, the Italian chief steward, the Scots head waiter and the galley cook all jumped on to the platform looking for something underneath the restaurant car. “It’s on-a-that-aside,” said the steward.
“No, it’s on the other side, I’m tellin’ ye,” answered the Scot.
“I just want the ruddy water pump to work,” chipped in the galley cook, in his full white uniform.
Then the station porter appeared, his pockets bulging with spanners. He quickly found the box they were all looking for and replaced a fuse before walking away muttering: “It mak’s a wee bit o’difference when ye know what ye’re doin.’” The train departed nearly half an hour late.
Further on, as it crawled along a marshy glen bottom, the sun suddenly appeared from behind a snow-capped mountain ringed with mist, and the rays formed the perfect composition of light and shade.
All too soon, we crept into Fort William, where colleague David Wilcock, who’d joined Motor Cycle from MCN, and had been covering the Scottish Six Days from the beginning, was waiting in a Leyland Sherpa van with two trail bikes in the back. At the hotel, I changed hurriedly into my motorcycling gear and took over a Yamaha DT175.
The previous night someone had pinched its ignition key, which also opened the petrol filler cap and the seat under which the oil tank was situated. Sammy Miller, who’d been trying out the bike, and Alec Wright had helped Dave jury-rig it to start without the key, but when I got on to the Yam it ran out of petrol almost immediately, and we had to fiddle the cap open with a screwdriver.
We set off from Fort William alongside Loch Linnhe for the Corran Ferry. The sun was warm, the smell of sweet new grass was in the air, and the sky was a beautiful pale blue. I soon got used to the
Yamaha thanks to the twists and turns of the A82 from Fort William to Corran and, as I followed Dave, on a 175 Kawasaki, I was quickly impressed by the Yam’s easy handling as we swept into bends flat-out.
The minor single-track roads on the other side of the loch were a motorcyclist’s dream, with superb surfaces and a fine view around every tight corner. I did start looking for the mint sauce, though, when Dave almost had a head-on collision with a sheep, but it bounded away at the last minute, so I didn’t even have the pleasure of seeing him go down. He’d have laughed just as much if it had been me!
We arrived at the Liddsdale section, a cruel climb in a narrow gulley, before the first riders were due, so we took the trail bikes a little way up the mountainside. Neither machine was happy in the boggy ground. Among the spectators were Sammy Miller and Mick Grant, who swore that he’d ride in the ‘Scottish’ the following year. I still have fond memories of riding trials bikes with Mick on top of a spoil heap overlooking a huge railway marshalling yard in his native Yorkshire.
Sam, always ready for a good laugh, dared Dave to have a go at the section, but he got into all kinds of trouble even before the ‘Section Begins’ card, so we reckoned he wasn’t quite in the Martin Lampkin class yet. At least he had a go, which was more than I dared to do with all those people watching!
The trickle of riders began to arrive, among them veteran Les Crowder from Liverpool, who struggled to the top on his 250cc Ossa and was offered a drink of lemon squash by a woman spectator. “Is this Phyllosan?” (a well-known health product) quipped Les, who put down his heavy losses so far to eating the wrong food and concluded: “Should be on Marmite butties, you know.”
On the road, the Yamaha would rev freely to 7000rpm, or about 64mph, but I had to get my chin on the tank to see 70. The Kawasaki had about the same top speed, but a bit more mid-range poke, although the Yamaha’s sweet and close gearbox enabled really quick changes to be made without using the clutch.
By the time we moved on to Rubharuadh section – better known
to spectators as ‘Rhubarb’ – my chin was feeling the effects of all that tanking! Along the way, I discovered that the Yamaha’s oil tank level was getting low, but as I couldn’t raise the seat properly because of the stolen key, we decided to press on gingerly.
We turned left on to the crudest single-track road I’d seen, with tufts of grass growing in the middle and loose chippings strewn all over. A couple of trials boys came screaming past, legs out, bikes broadsliding on the chippings and nearly blowing us into the boggy weeds! Every kink and corner along this road, which headed in the general direction of Kingairloch, was a terrifying challenge bristling with grisly possibilities including juttingout crags of rock just in line with our left ears.
I was growing more concerned about the oil tank level when divine intervention came to my aid, for there in the middle of the road was a plastic bottle of Shell 2T oil that had obviously fallen from a rider’s pocket, and it was filled to the brim with the precious green liquid. Unable to get at the oil tank, we opened the Yam’s filler cap, mixed the oil with the petrol and got back on our way. We went haring around one corner on full song only to find a man flapping his arms about furiously, and we found the cause of his frantic ‘slow down’ signal at the next bend – a JCB excavator digging a hole in the road!
Soon we found the tell-tale signs of another section: cars and bikes parked up for the best part of a quarter of a mile. It was ‘Rhubarb,’ and the sun was so warm that spectators were walking around shirtless. We stayed for about an hour before returning, via the
Corran Ferry, to the Fort William paddock and all the day’s gossip and news.
The first day of my visit to the ‘Scottish’ had given me a taste of the irresistible atmosphere that brings people back year after year, and it had struck another ‘Scottish’ firsttime visitor, Mick Grant, in much the same way.
The Friday dawned wet and miserable in sharp contrast to Thursday’s weather, and after an early breakfast of porridge and kippers (what else?) we quickly got on to the bikes and headed towards Pipeline, that long, rocky climb alongside six rows of massive water pipes. By then we’d become really used to our trail bikes, and I was treating the Yamaha just like a racer, revving to the limit in every gear and using the beautiful little gearbox to the full. For more than 20 miles it was kept on the boil in third, fourth and top gears only, and tight bends were just laughed away.
At Pipeline, we’d just missed Martin Lampkin making his clean pass, but we watched for nearly two hours as rider after rider came a cropper. The section was so hard that year thanks to a slippery ledge in the middle of the climb that the crowd was not reserving the claps and cheers for cleans, but for almost anyone who had a serious try.
Down at the bottom, where onlookers parked their bikes, was an immaculately turned-out AJS trials iron. With its imposing black and gold fuel tank, massive four-stroke single-cylinder motor and rakish, slightly raised silencer, it looked a treat.
On our way to the next section, we came across Mick Andrews by the side of the road dismantling his Yamaha’s carburettor. He’d lost a few marks, and was now becoming concerned about the time factor, but within five minutes he’d unblocked the jet and rejoined the chase.
The biggest test for the DT175 Yamaha came after the rock-slab killer of Mamore as we followed the trials riders’ route along the ancient road up in the mountains above Fort William. Even ‘path’ would have been too good a description for the broken-up trail, which consisted of loose shale, boulders, deep puddles and numerous stream crossings. For mile after mile the Yamaha bounced along, following Dave’s Kawasaki at a safe distance.
I was far from sure of myself, especially in places where the track suddenly dived downhill, but the little Yam was surprisingly surefooted in such going, and even made short work of a trip along a rocky stream bottom near a deserted farmhouse. Another ‘plus’ was the fact that, despite the water splashes that drenched me from head to toe, no water got anywhere near the ignition system.
After several miles, the track joined a single-track Tarmac road which led back to Fort William and the paddock again. There was still Saturday’s dash to Edinburgh to get through, but sadly it was our last opportunity to ride the trail bikes. We’d have to load them up into the Sherpa van and start the long journey back to London, and the office. A journalist’s work was never done…
At the Crianlarich lunch stop, after riders had completed their final sections, we could feel the week’s tensions melting away as they clustered around the snack bar for cups of tea, bacon sandwiches and hamburgers – and there, in a corner and looking as resplendent as it had at the bottom of Pipeline, was that self-same 1957 trials Ajay.
Its owner, Bill Muir of Ayrshire, who was service manager at Harry Fairbairn’s Honda ship, offered me a ride and his pudding basin helmet to go with it, but unfortunately it wouldn’t fit, so I donned my own full-face helmet for a quick hop down the road and was greatly impressed by its quiet and remarkably smooth engine and its really solid feel. I mean, what Velo fan like me could resist anything that was big and black and had a singlelung power plant? Best of all, Bill said he’d originally picked up the bike for a quid!
When we finally reached Edinburgh’s Cattle Market, the greatest trial in the world ended in total anticlimax as bikes were strapped on to the back of cars as if their riders had just finished a Sunday morning club trial.
I’d always said that you couldn’t beat the Isle of Man TT for atmosphere, but I quickly learned that, in the ‘Scottish,’ there was something at least to equal it!