THE WAY WE WERE
Flashback to California in the ’70s – a time of pre-unit Triumphs and barefoot bike building
PHOTOS: ANDREW GRANOVSKY
Andy larking about on his Triumph bobber 55 years ago
I was surprised to see the Catalina Grand Prix sticker on the very nice Britsteel pre-unit Triumph in ‘Rick Rides’ in your wonderful April issue. I have one on my Mountain Cub to acknowledge their domination of the lightweight class back in the day. Your article also reminded me of my own ’52 Triumph bobber, which I owned 55 years ago.
The late ’60s/early ’70s was a wonderful era – motorcycles were available here in the States for reasonable prices for us youngsters, as were sport cars such as MGs, Austin Healeys and others. I traded a Honda 305 Super Hawk for a Morris Traveller, which l later traded for the ’52 Triumph. The crankshaft was broken – one of the crankpins at the flywheel. I used a unit motor to replace most of the internals and recall having the crankcase machined to accept one of the main bearings. I was a teenager and didn’t know better – but it ran very well!
His friend Stephen doing a bit of bike fettling, ’70s California style
My friend Stephen Burg didn’t think twice about installing a 650 twin in a frame we found – he had no idea what it was. The bike was built with hand-made intake manifolds, Cub forks, a Harley-Davidson rear wheel rim, and the oil tank was incorporated into the fuel tank. He was an extremely talented fitter and mechanic. Another friend installed Montesa forks, seat and tank on his ’56 650.
I went to a technical college before my first job, at a BSA dealership, followed by a period of being a technician on rotaries. I was on a team that built a car which won a national championship, winning every race in the series save one – of course, the rules changed after that! This was followed by a 30-year career as a machinist/millwright, producing parts for turbines. But I’ll never forget those carefree days of messing around with old Triumphs.
Andrew Granovsky, Ventura, California
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