I was fascinated by the Norton rotary and to that end, paid a visit to their factory, a former bacon packaging plant in Shenstone near Lichfield. This is the only occasion I've ever visited a motorbike manufacturer and it wasn't typical. There were no production lines as such, motorcycle assembly took place randomly around the plant in the open spaces between rows of heavy industrial shelving. I'd come to take their Commander demonstrator for a test ride, which I did on the local roads. It was like nothing I'd ever ridden before. Like a four stroke but also like a two stroke in some aspects. Maybe it was a three stroke? The torque was immense and the power delivery silky smooth and seemingly without end. As a person that hankers after the unconventional, and unusual, the Norton suited me perfectly. I determined that I should have one. I felt loyalty to the Norton brand, having once owned a 750 Commando as my first big bike. Somehow the Norton pedigree of the Commander rotary didn't shine through though. It was too much of a concept bike born of many interelated collaborations within what was left of the British bike industry. I part exchanged my beautiful BMW R90S for a used Commander with the legendary collector Tony Page. He wanted a good example of the BMW thoroughbred for his burgeoning collection and I wanted the rotary engine riding experience. I was not disappointed. I owned my Dorchester grey Commander for a seven years, covering several thousand trouble free miles. I rode it up and down Britain and even to Venice via the French Alps. It was the perfect motorway blaster, well able to sustain high cruising speeds for hour after hour. In town, during hot weather it was a different story. The spark plugs would foul and start to break down. Idling in traffic for more than a minute would very likely cause one of the chambers to cut out or misfire. The misfires were the loudest most percussive of any bike I've ridden. To that end, rather like two-strokes, the practise was to always have a good supply of spare plugs available to get you home. That not withstanding, the water cooled version of Norton's twin rotary was without doubt the best attempt at a practical Wankel engined motorbike. Way better than the Suzuki RE5, which was single chamber and much heavier than the Norton. This was evidenced by Norton's huge success with their race versions of the bike. So good in fact, their Japanese rivals tried to have it banned from competitive motorbike racing. With money, and more technical development the Norton rotary could have been a much bigger success than it turned out. I sadly parted with the Commander, selling it to a collector in Devon. There it joined his full set of Norton rotaries along with many other rare and desirable British bikes and a WWII Spitfire aircraft which he was re-building from scratchand intended to fly. Us boys love our toys!
Those interested in the Norton Nemesis V8 should see Allen Millyard's channel where he is currently documenting his very thorough restoration of the prototype.
Interpol 2 wasn’t water cooled, they were the early R80 looking bikes used by Police/RAF etc. The first public offered bikes were the limited edition 100 air cooled classic machines in silver without a fairing. The first water cooled Norton Rotary was the Commander which actually needed very very little maintenance. The smoothest and most unique bike I’ve ever owned.
The best of British style and humour, the Wanx Norton. As classic a name as the bike. Cheers Phil you definitely pulled it off with this video, not many gentlemen of your age can still do that
Yes, it was an air compressor which was magicked into an engine with the help of some engineering fairy dust and a lot of hype. Thanks for the comment. 😊
@@3Phils but seriously Steve spray came to New Zealand where I live with the Norton rotary race bike and it went and sounded absolutely amazing even though it came out of a museum with old tyres he seriously impressed everybody by riding the wheels off it🎉
Ryan F9 sums up the Wankel engine perfectly, "The engine that kills everything it touches". A move to horizontally split engine cases, to cut down in oil leaks, overhead cams, for performance & staying relevant, & not pedantically dicking around with the Rocket 3/Trident for almost 2 year might have saved NVT. But Honda didn't kill NVT & British motorcycles, it was small, cheap cars & a failure to realize that bikes were becoming optional & no longer someone's primary mode of transport.
Yep, that just about sums it up. Ryan F9’s video on the Wankel is excellent, as are most of his videos. Personally I think NVT should have ploughed on with the Quadrant project, or gone back to scratch and tried to design a modern inline four because the Quadrant was just tacking another cylinder onto the Trident, which was already a Bonnie with an extra cylinder tacked on. In the end there was no money to do any of that, HM Gov pulled the plug, and nobody had quite yet realised that motorcycles were heading into luxury toy territory for folk who already had cars. Thanks for the comment. 😊
I remember seeing one parked in front of a bike shop in Edinburgh in 1988. I believe it was part of their stock. It had a small puddle of oil beneath the engine. Still, I did follow it's development in the press, and hoped they'd make a go of it.
More promissing and without going into iffy Wankel production was the 750 liquid cooled DOHC Norton Cosworth which died along with NVT. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norton_Challenge_P86
I had a late 1980s Mazda RX7 in the early 90s . The engine was like a turbine, the way it span up was incredible . Zero engine braking. It would roll down hill with it in gear, and the hand brake taken off ! The way it drank fuel and oil was also "incredible" . Glad I owned it for a year , it was an experience, but I went running back to some boring four pot, four stroke Ford Rep box car, which drank a whole lot less fuel but was also incredible in it's own way. It was incredibly boring , but my bank account appreciated its boringness ! The story of Norton winning the IoM with Steve Hislop, well that's a good one, but well it has been done already , I guess there's always space for another take on Hislop V Fogarty !
Interesting what you say there about the RX7. I was tempted in the early 90s but opted for the MR2 instead, which had its own foibles but was fun, reliable and more ‘mainstream’. I just had to put up with constant teasing about it being a ‘hairdresser’s car’! Thanks for the comment. 😊
I guess that wasn’t as much of a ‘thing’ back then as it is today. These days you see ‘RR’ appended to loads of consumer bikes. I agree, a Norton RR would have been very attractive, but they would have also had to have been totally reliable and consumer-friendly, I suppose.
Mr Garside is still making track based rotary engined motorcycles. They are very fast, but require the attention of a proper mechanic after every outing.
I did wonder if Mr G was still at it, and I even found a fairly recent photo of somebody who looked like him addressing an engineering meeting. But I just couldn’t find any reliable confirmation, and what we used say in the journalism trade was ‘if in doubt, leave it out’. I’m pleased to hear that he’s still going strong and thank you for confirming that.
Amusing video Phil, I have run two Norton Wankels, the factory prototype Classic and a production Classic, a great bike but it put me off with it oiling its plugs regularly not so much fun when you are out and about and run out of spare plugs.
Good to hear from an owner and thank you for the kind comment. 😊 I suppose, back in the day, I would have been so in awe of the rotary wizardry that oiled plugs wouldn’t even have crossed my mind, being so befuddled by the mechanical magic of it all. To this day, I still don’t get whether the Wankel relies on compression to initiate combustion, like a Diesel engine, or spark plugs, or a bit of both. Apologies for being an engineering doofus, they made me study Greek and Latin at school.
Another brilliant film, made with typical British sense of humour. I'm not sure they would ever get a Wankel engine by the strict emissions regulations now. I was lucky enough to chat (and film a little) of Brian Crighton. He's an absolute rotary genius and was heavily involved in turning those old Norton police bike engines into race engines. His current project is the CR700W with an amazing power to weight ratio. The engine in that fire spitting race bike is tiny. Sadly Carol and I had a run in with Mr Garner formally of Norton. How did that guy escape jail?
Lord knows how Garner didn’t get a prison Rolex too. Perhaps he will yet. Thanks for the kind comment about the video, hopefully it’s done its little bit to entertain. 😊
The `Hercules` 300cc and the Suzuki 500cc were probably the most credible rotaries. The Norton 600 seems to have had a ton of power available, but there was always the question of `was it a 600 or an 1800cc engine`? as its combustion chamber fired 3 times in one revolution. I think the jury`s still out on that one. A friend said the Hercules was a very nice motorcycle and a bit more purist maybe
I should have mentioned the controversy about the Norton 600 or 1800, so I’m pleased you’ve addressed it in the comments. I only have dim memories of the Hercules, so I think you may have inspired yet another video there - thank you!
They should have produced the Triumph quadrant and the BSA rocket 4 instead of the rotary because those they could build on the production machinery they already had and it would fit into the line of motorcycles that they were producing and not being something sticking out on a limb all by itself
@@3Phils When considering which way to move forward, the fewer parts in a rotary engine compared to a Norton twin, let alone a Trident/Rocket 3/Quadrant and the Cosworth engine, the rotary engine made economic sense to Denis Poore and his team for its potentially lower manufacturing cost. So the decision was made to focus their limited resources on the rotary engined bike. After all the development work already done under BSA, they assumed the rotary engine was on the cusp of being ready for volume production. Unfortunately for them, this was not the case, and the decision to go with the rotary engine proved to be yet another unfortunate mis-step in British motorcycle history.
Very well put. Having said that, I think a degree of arrogance was in play too. Dennis Poore was widely regarded as a ‘slasher and burner’ with a very dictatorial style. I think it’s telling that he began with eight British motorcycle companies and ended up with none. Thanks for the comment. 😊
@@3Phils The behaviour of Poore's Manganese Bronze in their purchase of Royal Enfield was nothing more than an act of asset stripping. The Royal Enfield motorcycle company was allegedly purchased for less than the real estate value of the site, and then the site was sold off.
When I looked into buying an air-cooled Norton rotary I was told I had to buy $8,000 worth of stock in the company. Dish was the same price as the bike. I told them I would not waste my money on paper that was not worth wiping my butt on. I would have rather have bought two Norton rotary than to have a bunch of worthless stock. Financial shenanigans have been part and parcel of the Norton brand since the 1970s
You’re not wrong there! Imagine if Honda made you buy the equivalent cash value of shares whenever you bought one of their bikes. You’d do exactly what you did, quite rightly. Shocking.
Yes they brought that Wankel to the market in the late 1970's and thank god the police wanted some bikes to ride, and all this after Suzuki had already brought their Wankel to market in 1975.
Whenever a British company comes up with a loser of a motorcycle it gets purchased by the police department as well as the military. Instead of attempting to build science fiction motorcycles they should just have paid more attention to the quality and reliability of the motorcycles that they were currently producing instead of pi in the sky projects
Doubtful. Nobody ever wanted that wankel thing. Suzuki tried and failed, Zündapp/DKW/Hercules tried and failed, Van Veen tried and failed. Yamaha tried and decided it wasn’t good enough. Norton tried and failed. The Wankel really wasn’t the choice of prefered engine configuration for motorcyclists ever. A few were sold - very few - but clearly not enough to maintain a reasonable production. Sporty 2-strokes was a thing in the mid-80’s but disappeared too. And when it came to pollution and being enviroment friendly, the Wankels made the 2-strokes look rosy red in comparison. I’ve always said that the Norton motorcycle range, the Commander, Classic, F1 or Sport should have had a Yamaha TDM 850 parallel-twin as engine instead of loosing money on that Wankel project. But then we wouldn’t have had the “White Charger” winn at Isle of Man. 🏆 Which gave what in future sales? 🤔
I don't think so! Experiments with exotic salutions are almost always the last straw and the rest of the money is tossed out of the window. As Hercules demonstrated with her W2000 only a few years earlier. By the by, the RE 5 nearly killed Suzuki's motorcycle division. The Wankel engine - pronounced like "uncle" with an additional "W" - killed NSU with the Wankel-Spider and the Ro 80. Velocette did not better with their Viceroy and the LE, alas!
Aha! Good to hear the proper pronunciation from a German speaker. Thank you and apologies for mangling your language! Yes, the engine seems a bit too exotic to be a good thing, and it’s telling that Herr Wankel originally designed it as a compressor, I think. It’s what we might term a bit ‘Heath Robinson’ here in the UK.
@@3Phils Don't mention it! I'm sure that English is the most mangled language on earth. In my opinion the Wankel engine was brilliant, but not in every application. In my days the German Army had electrical generators with Wankel engines, they were lightweight and rather powerful. At the beginning it may have been a bit "Heath Robinson" and most of the licence holder would not see the need for curing the engine. Except for Mazda, they had the knowledge and the funds. On the other hand, the second series of NSU Ro 80 were perfectly good and reliable cars, but it was too late. Perhaps with a second series of Rotary-Nortons they really could have puilled it. But let's face it, who would have wanted a Wankel-Norton, even a reliable one? Cobbler, stick to thy last! In the seventies and early eigties almost all of the European motorcycles looked - compared to Japanese ones - like homemade, Wankel or not Wankel. The Wankel engine was not the point. Keep up the good work!
@carlnapp4412 Aha! Vielen Dank! By the way, I’m doing a video on the Munch Mammuth this week and I can’t find that link to the Horex meet you mentioned. I’ve searched through all the comments, and I must have had it because I watched it. Would you mind putting it here in the comments please? And is it OK if I use a short clip, with a credit of course?
@@3Phils I hope it works because sometimes YT is too barmy to convey links of their own videos. Horex Regina meeting: th-cam.com/video/W_92aJG64Uw/w-d-xo.html Regina 400 with 22 bhp: th-cam.com/video/KbWKGQo-Qfc/w-d-xo.html Is it just me or does she seem to be higher than British bike from this period? the Regina's successor: th-cam.com/video/jH08-y2GN4/w-d-xo.html Unfortunately I can't find a vid of my Regina 350, though she was the most built of the family. In the early fifties every minute a Horex Regina 350 rolled of the line. By the way, when I did my military service my maintenance sergeant major was an ex- toolmaker in the Horex factory before he joined the army. He had to marry and in the army he earned more money. When he learned that I rode a Horex it was almost like BSM Shutup and gunner Parkins. Cheers!
Very nice video, like always. Like your wanking jokes. However, the ‚a‘ in Wankel is pronounced like if you’d say „Aaah!“ when you suddenly understood some tricky stuff.
@suffern63 Almost certainly, it just seemed relevant as it appears as a headline the 1978 edition of Bike Magazine that I based the video on. When I was a teenager back then, everyone was making the same joke. We all laughed.
I was fascinated by the Norton rotary and to that end, paid a visit to their factory, a former bacon packaging plant in Shenstone near Lichfield. This is the only occasion I've ever visited a motorbike manufacturer and it wasn't typical. There were no production lines as such, motorcycle assembly took place randomly around the plant in the open spaces between rows of heavy industrial shelving. I'd come to take their Commander demonstrator for a test ride, which I did on the local roads. It was like nothing I'd ever ridden before. Like a four stroke but also like a two stroke in some aspects. Maybe it was a three stroke? The torque was immense and the power delivery silky smooth and seemingly without end. As a person that hankers after the unconventional, and unusual, the Norton suited me perfectly. I determined that I should have one. I felt loyalty to the Norton brand, having once owned a 750 Commando as my first big bike. Somehow the Norton pedigree of the Commander rotary didn't shine through though. It was too much of a concept bike born of many interelated collaborations within what was left of the British bike industry.
I part exchanged my beautiful BMW R90S for a used Commander with the legendary collector Tony Page. He wanted a good example of the BMW thoroughbred for his burgeoning collection and I wanted the rotary engine riding experience. I was not disappointed. I owned my Dorchester grey Commander for a seven years, covering several thousand trouble free miles. I rode it up and down Britain and even to Venice via the French Alps. It was the perfect motorway blaster, well able to sustain high cruising speeds for hour after hour. In town, during hot weather it was a different story. The spark plugs would foul and start to break down. Idling in traffic for more than a minute would very likely cause one of the chambers to cut out or misfire. The misfires were the loudest most percussive of any bike I've ridden. To that end, rather like two-strokes, the practise was to always have a good supply of spare plugs available to get you home. That not withstanding, the water cooled version of Norton's twin rotary was without doubt the best attempt at a practical Wankel engined motorbike. Way better than the Suzuki RE5, which was single chamber and much heavier than the Norton. This was evidenced by Norton's huge success with their race versions of the bike. So good in fact, their Japanese rivals tried to have it banned from competitive motorbike racing. With money, and more technical development the Norton rotary could have been a much bigger success than it turned out. I sadly parted with the Commander, selling it to a collector in Devon. There it joined his full set of Norton rotaries along with many other rare and desirable British bikes and a WWII Spitfire aircraft which he was re-building from scratchand intended to fly. Us boys love our toys!
What a brilliant tale, and great to hear it from someone who lived with the Commander!
Those interested in the Norton Nemesis V8 should see Allen Millyard's channel where he is currently documenting his very thorough restoration of the prototype.
Yes, thoroughly recommended!
Interpol 2 wasn’t water cooled, they were the early R80 looking bikes used by Police/RAF etc.
The first public offered bikes were the limited edition 100 air cooled classic machines in silver without a fairing.
The first water cooled Norton Rotary was the Commander which actually needed very very little maintenance. The smoothest and most unique bike I’ve ever owned.
The best of British style and humour, the Wanx Norton. As classic a name as the bike. Cheers Phil you definitely pulled it off with this video, not many gentlemen of your age can still do that
Ha! Hoist by my own petard! 🤣
@@3Phils FIGJAM.
DILLIGAF! 🤣
The Wankel concept has been the kiss of death to many a motor manufacturer and Norton should have left this motor well alone.
Yes, it was an air compressor which was magicked into an engine with the help of some engineering fairy dust and a lot of hype. Thanks for the comment. 😊
@@3Phils I think your titles are bit unfair. Not all Norton bikes were wanklels. Some of them were quite good.😂🤡
@@3Phils but seriously Steve spray came to New Zealand where I live with the Norton rotary race bike and it went and sounded absolutely amazing even though it came out of a museum with old tyres he seriously impressed everybody by riding the wheels off it🎉
@malcolmwhite6588 🤣
Ryan F9 sums up the Wankel engine perfectly, "The engine that kills everything it touches". A move to horizontally split engine cases, to cut down in oil leaks, overhead cams, for performance & staying relevant, & not pedantically dicking around with the Rocket 3/Trident for almost 2 year might have saved NVT. But Honda didn't kill NVT & British motorcycles, it was small, cheap cars & a failure to realize that bikes were becoming optional & no longer someone's primary mode of transport.
Yep, that just about sums it up. Ryan F9’s video on the Wankel is excellent, as are most of his videos. Personally I think NVT should have ploughed on with the Quadrant project, or gone back to scratch and tried to design a modern inline four because the Quadrant was just tacking another cylinder onto the Trident, which was already a Bonnie with an extra cylinder tacked on. In the end there was no money to do any of that, HM Gov pulled the plug, and nobody had quite yet realised that motorcycles were heading into luxury toy territory for folk who already had cars. Thanks for the comment. 😊
The Suzuki RE 5 almost sent Suzuki broke but they had enough money to build the GS750 and that saved Suzuki
Yes, as somebody else pointed out here, nobody ever made money with a Wankel. Thanks for the comment. 😊
I remember seeing one parked in front of a bike shop in Edinburgh in 1988. I believe it was part of their stock. It had a small puddle of oil beneath the engine. Still, I did follow it's development in the press, and hoped they'd make a go of it.
Never a good look to be displaying a machine for sale with a puddle of oil under it! Thanks for the comment. 😊
Startright Motorcycles in Leeds specialise in Norton Commanders. They've often got a couple for sale.
Remember seeing them as a student in early 80,s as the police in brum used them,they certainly seemed fast from my cg125 perspective anyway
I had a friend at Aston Uni who used to see them around too! Thanks for the comment. 😊
@@3Phils thats where i was aston
More promissing and without going into iffy Wankel production was the 750 liquid cooled DOHC Norton Cosworth which died along with NVT. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norton_Challenge_P86
Thanks for reminding me, I should do a video on that!
I had a late 1980s Mazda RX7 in the early 90s . The engine was like a turbine, the way it span up was incredible . Zero engine braking. It would roll down hill with it in gear, and the hand brake taken off !
The way it drank fuel and oil was also "incredible" . Glad I owned it for a year , it was an experience, but I went running back to some boring four pot, four stroke Ford Rep box car, which drank a whole lot less fuel but was also incredible in it's own way. It was incredibly boring , but my bank account appreciated its boringness !
The story of Norton winning the IoM with Steve Hislop, well that's a good one, but well it has been done already , I guess there's always space for another take on Hislop V Fogarty !
Interesting what you say there about the RX7. I was tempted in the early 90s but opted for the MR2 instead, which had its own foibles but was fun, reliable and more ‘mainstream’. I just had to put up with constant teasing about it being a ‘hairdresser’s car’! Thanks for the comment. 😊
@@3Phils I always like the look of the Mk2 MR2 , the one that looked like a baby Ferrari . I never had one !
@@3Phils The question I always wondered about the MR2 was how to say the name .
Was it an "Em Are Two" or was it a "Mister Two" ?
@karlosh9286 Ha! Me too. It wasn’t called that in France, though, I believe.
@@3Phils :-) I think I know what the French would have said , "merde" ! 😀
I always thought Norton could have sold race ready rotarys to the public. Brian Crighton knew his stuff, but that's a whole other video...
I guess that wasn’t as much of a ‘thing’ back then as it is today. These days you see ‘RR’ appended to loads of consumer bikes. I agree, a Norton RR would have been very attractive, but they would have also had to have been totally reliable and consumer-friendly, I suppose.
@@3Phils I meant as clubman racers Phil.
Sorry, misunderstood you there. Yes, they really should have.
@@3Phils the Norton's appetite for maintenance would be less than a TZ yamahas appetite for cranks & pistons.
Mr Garside is still making track based rotary engined motorcycles. They are very fast, but require the attention of a proper mechanic after every outing.
I did wonder if Mr G was still at it, and I even found a fairly recent photo of somebody who looked like him addressing an engineering meeting. But I just couldn’t find any reliable confirmation, and what we used say in the journalism trade was ‘if in doubt, leave it out’. I’m pleased to hear that he’s still going strong and thank you for confirming that.
Amusing video Phil, I have run two Norton Wankels, the factory prototype Classic and a production Classic, a great bike but it put me off with it oiling its plugs regularly not so much fun when you are out and about and run out of spare plugs.
Good to hear from an owner and thank you for the kind comment. 😊 I suppose, back in the day, I would have been so in awe of the rotary wizardry that oiled plugs wouldn’t even have crossed my mind, being so befuddled by the mechanical magic of it all. To this day, I still don’t get whether the Wankel relies on compression to initiate combustion, like a Diesel engine, or spark plugs, or a bit of both. Apologies for being an engineering doofus, they made me study Greek and Latin at school.
Another brilliant film, made with typical British sense of humour.
I'm not sure they would ever get a Wankel engine by the strict emissions regulations now. I was lucky enough to chat (and film a little) of Brian Crighton. He's an absolute rotary genius and was heavily involved in turning those old Norton police bike engines into race engines. His current project is the CR700W with an amazing power to weight ratio. The engine in that fire spitting race bike is tiny.
Sadly Carol and I had a run in with Mr Garner formally of Norton. How did that guy escape jail?
Lord knows how Garner didn’t get a prison Rolex too. Perhaps he will yet. Thanks for the kind comment about the video, hopefully it’s done its little bit to entertain. 😊
The `Hercules` 300cc and the Suzuki 500cc were probably the most credible rotaries. The Norton 600 seems to have had a ton of power available, but there was always the question of `was it a 600 or an 1800cc engine`? as its combustion chamber fired 3 times in one revolution. I think the jury`s still out on that one. A friend said the Hercules was a very nice motorcycle and a bit more purist maybe
I should have mentioned the controversy about the Norton 600 or 1800, so I’m pleased you’ve addressed it in the comments. I only have dim memories of the Hercules, so I think you may have inspired yet another video there - thank you!
They should have produced the Triumph quadrant and the BSA rocket 4 instead of the rotary because those they could build on the production machinery they already had and it would fit into the line of motorcycles that they were producing and not being something sticking out on a limb all by itself
Good point. I think they were just overwhelmed by the hype surrounding the Wankel engine in the 1970s.
@@3Phils When considering which way to move forward, the fewer parts in a rotary engine compared to a Norton twin, let alone a Trident/Rocket 3/Quadrant and the Cosworth engine, the rotary engine made economic sense to Denis Poore and his team for its potentially lower manufacturing cost. So the decision was made to focus their limited resources on the rotary engined bike. After all the development work already done under BSA, they assumed the rotary engine was on the cusp of being ready for volume production. Unfortunately for them, this was not the case, and the decision to go with the rotary engine proved to be yet another unfortunate mis-step in British motorcycle history.
Very well put. Having said that, I think a degree of arrogance was in play too. Dennis Poore was widely regarded as a ‘slasher and burner’ with a very dictatorial style. I think it’s telling that he began with eight British motorcycle companies and ended up with none. Thanks for the comment. 😊
@@3Phils The behaviour of Poore's Manganese Bronze in their purchase of Royal Enfield was nothing more than an act of asset stripping. The Royal Enfield motorcycle company was allegedly purchased for less than the real estate value of the site, and then the site was sold off.
When I looked into buying an air-cooled Norton rotary I was told I had to buy $8,000 worth of stock in the company. Dish was the same price as the bike. I told them I would not waste my money on paper that was not worth wiping my butt on. I would have rather have bought two Norton rotary than to have a bunch of worthless stock. Financial shenanigans have been part and parcel of the Norton brand since the 1970s
You’re not wrong there! Imagine if Honda made you buy the equivalent cash value of shares whenever you bought one of their bikes. You’d do exactly what you did, quite rightly. Shocking.
Yes they brought that Wankel to the market in the late 1970's and thank god the police wanted some bikes to ride, and all this after Suzuki had already brought their Wankel to market in 1975.
They were called Wankel for a reason.
Ah more quotes from the journalist’s book of puns!
👍
Whenever a British company comes up with a loser of a motorcycle it gets purchased by the police department as well as the military. Instead of attempting to build science fiction motorcycles they should just have paid more attention to the quality and reliability of the motorcycles that they were currently producing instead of pi in the sky projects
Indeed. A Quadrant would have been nice! If it wasn’t likely to be twice as unreliable as a Bonnie and 33% more unreliable than a Trident.
Doubtful. Nobody ever wanted that wankel thing. Suzuki tried and failed, Zündapp/DKW/Hercules tried and failed, Van Veen tried and failed. Yamaha tried and decided it wasn’t good enough.
Norton tried and failed.
The Wankel really wasn’t the choice of prefered engine configuration for motorcyclists ever. A few were sold - very few - but clearly not enough to maintain a reasonable production. Sporty 2-strokes was a thing in the mid-80’s but disappeared too. And when it came to pollution and being enviroment friendly, the Wankels made the 2-strokes look rosy red in comparison.
I’ve always said that the Norton motorcycle range, the Commander, Classic, F1 or Sport should have had a Yamaha TDM 850 parallel-twin as engine instead of loosing money on that Wankel project.
But then we wouldn’t have had the “White Charger” winn at Isle of Man. 🏆 Which gave what in future sales? 🤔
Couldn’t agree more. Thank you for the well thought-out comment, it makes a brilliant postscript to the video and I wish I could have thought of it! 😊
The title make me smirl a little.....
I had a girlfriend, I called her Felix...
I don't think so! Experiments with exotic salutions are almost always the last straw and the rest of the money is tossed out of the window. As Hercules demonstrated with her W2000 only a few years earlier. By the by, the RE 5 nearly killed Suzuki's motorcycle division. The Wankel engine - pronounced like "uncle" with an additional "W" - killed NSU with the Wankel-Spider and the Ro 80. Velocette did not better with their Viceroy and the LE, alas!
Aha! Good to hear the proper pronunciation from a German speaker. Thank you and apologies for mangling your language! Yes, the engine seems a bit too exotic to be a good thing, and it’s telling that Herr Wankel originally designed it as a compressor, I think. It’s what we might term a bit ‘Heath Robinson’ here in the UK.
@@3Phils
Don't mention it! I'm sure that English is the most mangled language on earth.
In my opinion the Wankel engine was brilliant, but not in every application. In my days the German Army had electrical generators with Wankel engines, they were lightweight and rather powerful.
At the beginning it may have been a bit "Heath Robinson" and most of the licence holder would not see the need for curing the engine. Except for Mazda, they had the knowledge and the funds. On the other hand, the second series of NSU Ro 80 were perfectly good and reliable cars, but it was too late.
Perhaps with a second series of Rotary-Nortons they really could have puilled it. But let's face it, who would have wanted a Wankel-Norton, even a reliable one? Cobbler, stick to thy last!
In the seventies and early eigties almost all of the European motorcycles looked - compared to Japanese ones - like homemade, Wankel or not Wankel. The Wankel engine was not the point.
Keep up the good work!
@@3Phils
I forgot to mention that the Wankel's "W" is pronounced like the "V" from Velocette.
@carlnapp4412 Aha! Vielen Dank! By the way, I’m doing a video on the Munch Mammuth this week and I can’t find that link to the Horex meet you mentioned. I’ve searched through all the comments, and I must have had it because I watched it. Would you mind putting it here in the comments please? And is it OK if I use a short clip, with a credit of course?
@@3Phils
I hope it works because sometimes YT is too barmy to convey links of their own videos.
Horex Regina meeting:
th-cam.com/video/W_92aJG64Uw/w-d-xo.html
Regina 400 with 22 bhp:
th-cam.com/video/KbWKGQo-Qfc/w-d-xo.html
Is it just me or does she seem to be higher than British bike from this period?
the Regina's successor:
th-cam.com/video/jH08-y2GN4/w-d-xo.html
Unfortunately I can't find a vid of my Regina 350, though she was the most built of the family.
In the early fifties every minute a Horex Regina 350 rolled of the line.
By the way, when I did my military service my maintenance sergeant major was an ex- toolmaker in the Horex factory before he joined the army. He had to marry and in the army he earned more money.
When he learned that I rode a Horex it was almost like BSM Shutup and gunner Parkins.
Cheers!
Millyards waving his Brilliance Wand over the V8 Norton engine at the moment on his very wankel channel if you want quick relief watching a genius.
Hehe! Yes, I’ve seen he’s been working on the V8. The man’s multi-cylinder mad! But it’ll be amazing to see the result.
Very nice video, like always. Like your wanking jokes. However, the ‚a‘ in Wankel is pronounced like if you’d say „Aaah!“ when you suddenly understood some tricky stuff.
Thank you. I’ve always wondered what the correct pronunciation was, now I know! 😊
So...the Wanks Norton riders would be called Wankers?
🤣
Pulling off a Wankel?
Yep, a joke that first appeared in Bike Magazine in 1978. I’m very environmentally conscious, I only use recycled jokes.
@@3Phils It certainly is pretty obvious,so,I imagine a million bikers have already thought it
@suffern63 Almost certainly, it just seemed relevant as it appears as a headline the 1978 edition of Bike Magazine that I based the video on. When I was a teenager back then, everyone was making the same joke. We all laughed.
The Wanx? No, no! Not the Wanx....
I’m afraid so.