London Classic Bike Show May 2024
Following on from the Observed Sunday and the
handing out of vehicle passes for the show I had tidied up the paint work on
the Valiant engine cover to remove the petrol damage to the paint all was
looking good for the day. Friday was set up day and get the Valiant on the
stand ready. James’s BMW outfit was there already. Gita came to pick me up and
we had a nice pub meal at the Admiral Hawke in Sunbury. The Admiral Hawke was
the meeting place for the LE Club pre Covid and is under new management. They
have transformed the pub but have still kept the range of ales. Much
appreciated. Saturday turned out to be a fine day. Gita delivered me to the
show before eight in the morning and nearly everyone was there. Chris was the
last to arrive with his T100. We were now set and ready for the day with a
Harley Softail Slim, a Norton Fastback, two Triumph’s a Bonnevile T140Vand the
T100SS, two BMW’s an R60/7 and the K110 outfit and finally the CanAm Spyder. The
view of the stand was similar to the last show but enhanced by a giant cardboard birthday cake. The theme
for this year was the fortieth birthday of Wey Valley.
Quite a busy with a stream of people interested in the club. Chris Arthey was selling his book “Highway 35” the story of him and his wife’s’ horrific accident and their road to recovery. Late morning I wheeled the Valiant to the start up area for the obligatory fire-up to make as much noise as possible to entertain the assembled crowd. I took three videos of the walk round of displays featured on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. Why call a platform X?
The afternoon was consumed along with homemade cakes. Denis Frost was around doing the question time with the man who has progressed development of the Norton rotary engine. For me this was most interesting doing some major rework of engine components. As always the Rumi stand is a joy to see along with scooters and their racing bikes. Some very nice Italian machinery shows how far they were ahead of us in style in the fifties. Ducati, Gilera and MV leading the way. For the club there were no prizes to take home but we did have a record number of people interested in joining the club.
Once the prize giving concluded it was time to pack up and head for home. The day had warmed considerably which the Valiant did not like. I had to stop several times to let the engine cool. The engine was so hot at times I could hear the big ends rattling. The time is coming for a big rebuild. I will have to wait for the club engineers to come up with someone who will take on the role of crankshaft repair and rebores. I understand oversize pistons will soon be available for the Valiant but I won’t hold my breath.
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