Retrobike

WITH GEOFF SEDDON 23,000 kilometres over four months on a 1959 Velocette" I MET Stuart Hooper at Speed Week on Lake Gairdner last year, as he prepared The World’s Fastest Velocette for what would be a record-shattering 193mph run. That’s 310km/h in t

WORDS GEOFF SEDDON PHOTOGRAPHY CAM ELKINS “I WANTED TO EXPLORE DIFFERENT OPTIONS, EVEN IF I WASN’T SURE HOW THE PUBLIC WOULD TAKE IT” I WANTED to build something ‘unrealistic’, something that looked like it came out of a comic book,” Wenley Andrews s

WORDS GEOFF SEDDON & DANIELLE GITTOES PHOTOGRAPHY JEREMY HUDSON WHEN Grant Jarrett had a hankering for a new bike 16 years ago, he was thinking cruiser but nothing caught his fancy. “I’m not into Harleys,” he says, “and then Triumph brought out the A

WORDS GEOFF SEDDON PHOTOGRAPHY SIMON DAVIDSON “200MPH IS NOT THAT FAR AWAY BUT THE MOUNTAIN IS GETTING VERY STEEP” ONE of the many great things about land speed racing is the sound. There are no decibel limits nor audio barriers as riders and drivers

WORDS GEOFF SEDDON PHOTOGRAPHY ALASTAIR RITCHIE “ROLAND IS CLOSE TO THREE-TIMES WORLD 500 GP CHAMP KENNY ROBERTS, WHO OFFERED HIM THE KEYS TO HIS RACE WORKSHOP” ONE thing we’ve noticed at runs and shows lately is the growing number of air-cooled two-

WORDS GEOFF SEDDON PHOTOGRAPHY MOTOR RAUSCH “NO-ONE REALLY CARES WHO WINS OR LOSES. WE ONLY DEMAND THAT NO-ONE DIES” ONE of the many things we like about Deus Ex Machina is the names they give their workshops. In Sydney, it’s the House of Simple Plea

WORDS NIGEL CROWLEY PHOTOS BEN GALLI WHEN I was a kid in England, still trying to work out how to not fall off my moped, a guy in our village bought a new 750cc Triumph T140. My mates and I were drawn like moths to a flame. In a time of CBX1000s and

WORDS ALAN CATHCART PHOTOGRAPHY KYOICHI NAKAMURA AT the final GP of the year at Valencia, newly-crowned MotoGP prince Marc Márquez was slated to make a lap of honour aboard his Honda RC213V alongside former GP racer Sammy Miller on the sole surviving

WORDS & PHOTOS VIV CANINI “THEY STEPPED OUT OF THEIR COMFORT ZONES AND TOOK THEIR FUNDRAISING TO A WHOLE NEW PLACE, 18,380 FEET ABOVE SEA LEVEL” REGULAR readers will know all about the Distinguished Gentleman’s Ride (DGR), a worldwide phenomenon that

WORDS & PHOTOS STUART ‘TANGLES’ GARRARD A NICE thing happened to me after finishing Seddo’s Norton. Old mate Pete asked me to help out at his motorcycle workshop on a casual basis. Now who would knock back the offer of moving from their home garage t

WORDS PAUL HUTCHISON PHOTOGRAPHY ALEX GARDNER & PAUL HUTCHISON “I WAS VERY HAPPY WITH HOW IT RODE; THE SUSPENSION AND BRAKES ARE FANTASTIC” TOWARDS the end of my BMW K100RS build (The Hornet, Retrobike #24), my cousin Lukas gave me a Kawasaki GPz750.

WORDS GEOFF SEDDON PHOTOGRAPHY LUKAS MAGERL “MANY CUSTOMS LOOK THEY ROLLED OFF THE SAME CAFE RACER PRODUCTION LINE. THERE HAD TO BE MORE TO IT THAN THAT” TOM Konecny and Pablo Steigleder are a pair of 20-something university students who, while pursu

“I HAVEN’T INSTALLED OR KEPT ANYTHING THAT I DON’T NEED. IT’S ONLY THE ESSENTIALS” THE goal was clear from early on. It would be a pure and classic Italian cafe racer. After having searched for several months, Johan Orrestedt, co-founder of 6/5/4 Mot

WORDS GEOFF SEDDON PHOTOGRAPHY FRANCOIS RICHER & PIERRE LE TARGAT “MY WORK FOCUSES ON THE AESTHETICS, THE HARMONY OF CURVES AND ATTENTION TO DETAIL” TALK about take no prisoners! This insane custom from Ed Turner Motorcycles in France is as warlike a

WITH JAMIE McILWRAITH “The 50cc Suzuki RP68 GP racer of 1968 had 16 gears” SOME of you may not know this, but back in motorcycling’s earliest days — more than a century ago — there were no gearboxes on motorcycles. None at all. To get going on a bike

“Racing is dangerous, but it can be far safer than it is at the moment” RACING, what a wonderful thing to do. Racing motorcycles is even better, perhaps one of the best sports and pleasures for a rider to do in his or her lifetime. It’s one of those

WITH JIMMI WALKER “I didn’t need some plum saying tyre plugs were illegal and dangerous” A FEW years ago I ran a motorcycle rescue and transport company based in NSW and it occurred to me that you lot are an eclectic bunch. I hauled everything from a