{"id":12949,"date":"2021-05-11T06:57:10","date_gmt":"2021-05-11T13:57:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/?p=12949"},"modified":"2021-05-11T06:57:10","modified_gmt":"2021-05-11T13:57:10","slug":"dads-bonneville","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/2021\/05\/11\/dads-bonneville\/","title":{"rendered":"Dad’s Bonneville"},"content":{"rendered":"

I was a 14-year-old kid in the 8th grade and I had just discovered motorcycles.\u00a0 A senior in our combined junior high and high school named Walt had a brand new 1964 Triumph Tiger back in the day when the Tiger was Triumph’s 500cc twin.\u00a0 It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen (with the possible exception of Raquel Welch and one or two young ladies in my class).\u00a0 But Raquel was beyond my reach, and come to think of, so were those other young ladies.\u00a0 The Tiger?\u00a0 It was right there.\u00a0 I could stare at it anytime I could get out in the parking and it wouldn’t care or complain.\u00a0 And stare I did; so much so I’m surprised I didn’t wear the paint off.\u00a0 White and gold with a cool parcel grid on the gas tank and perfect proportions, I knew that some day I’d own one.\u00a0 Ultimately I did, but I’m saving that one for another blog.<\/p>\n

We didn’t have the Internet in those days.\u00a0 Come to think of it, we didn’t have cell phones or computers, either.\u00a0 We actually talked to people, and if we took pictures, we used this stuff called film that had to be sent off to be developed, but that’s a story for another blog, too.<\/p>\n

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My world revolved around glorious motorcycle magazines in the 1960s. Actual print magazines. It was a wonderful era.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

What we did have were glorious motorcycle magazines with even more glorious ads.\u00a0 \u00a0The BSA ads were the best, with scantily-clad women in an era when the term sexism implied a pervert of some sort and the phrase “politically correct” was decades into the future.<\/p>\n

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A BSA ad from around 1967. Life was good.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Their awesome ads notwithstanding, I didn’t want a BSA.\u00a0 I wanted a Triumph.\u00a0 It had to be like Walt’s, with those extravagant big chrome exhausts and Triumph’s perfectly-pinstriped paint.\u00a0 The magazine ads all had a snail mail address (that’s the only kind of address there was back then) and an invitation to write for more info, and write I did.\u00a0 It wasn’t long before I had amassed an impressive collection of colorful brochures from the likes of Triumph, BSA, Norton, Harley, Honda, and more.<\/p>\n

The planets came into alignment for me as several things happened.\u00a0 Dad started reading the brochures and that piqued his interest.\u00a0 \u00a0He wasn’t a motorcycle guy, but the ads worked their magic.\u00a0 It was an era where advertising worked, I guess.\u00a0 Then one of Dad’s buddies, another trapshooter named Cliff, stopped by with a new Honda Super Hawk.\u00a0 In those days, the Super Hawk was an electric-start, twin-carbed, 305cc twin.\u00a0 Cliff let Dad ride it in the field behind our house and praise the Lord, Dad was hooked.\u00a0 Between my enthusiasm and the motorcycle industry’s advertising experts, he never had a chance.<\/p>\n

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A restored mid-60s Honda 305cc Super Hawk. Twin carbs, electric start, twin leading shoe front brake, flawless paint, no oil leaks, and all for just over $600. Did I mention life was good?<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Dad was a little intimidated by the idea of starting his motorcycling career with a monstrous 305cc machine (remember all those nicest people you met on a 50cc Honda Cub?).\u00a0 He found an ad for a slightly used 160cc baby Super Hawk and that was his first motorcycle.\u00a0 It lasted all of two months.\u00a0 Dad took it for a service to Sherm Cooper’s Cycle Ranch and he came home with a new Super Hawk.\u00a0 Wow.\u00a0 I thought that would last for a while, but between the brochures, my inputs about Triumph Bonnevilles, and apparently a bit of salesmanship by old Sherm, a year after that Dad traded the Super Hawk for a new ’66 Bonneville. Wow again!<\/p>\n

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That’s what they were back in the day, and every new Triumph had a decal to remind you (and others) of that fact.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Bonneville was stunning.\u00a0 Triumph went to 12-volt electrics in ’66, a smaller gas tank in ivory white with a cool orange competition stripe, and stainless steel fenders.\u00a0 And, of course, that World Motorcycle Speed Record Holder decal that adorned the tank of every new Triumph (Triumph held the record in those days, prompting the decal and the name of their flagship motorcycle).\u00a0 I was too young to drive but not too young to ride, and on more than a few occasions if Dad noticed the Bonneville odometer showing more miles than when he last rode it, he didn’t say anything.<\/p>\n

Dad was a craftsman and a perfectionist.\u00a0 An upholsterer by profession and a tinkerer by nature, he added custom touches to the Bonneville that took it from awesome to amazing.\u00a0 He had a polishing machine in the basement and after what seemed like days of buffing (and several cloth polishing wheels) the\u00a0 fenders went from brushed stainless to a mirrored glaze that completely transformed the Triumph.\u00a0 And the seat…he outdid himself on that one.\u00a0 Remember that orange competition stripe I mentioned above?\u00a0 Dad’s seat continued it. The stock seat went from gray and black to a tank-matching ivory white, pleated with a perfectly-matched orange stripe that ran the length of the seat. The tank’s stripes were bordered with gold pinstriping; Dad incorporated matching gold piping on the seat’s pleats.\u00a0 The overall effect just flat worked.\u00a0 It looked like the Triumph had gone under a set of sprayers with ivory white, orange, and gold paint.\u00a0 Between the seat and the polished fenders, the bike had a jewel-like finished appearance that made it look like Triumph’s stylists had finished what they started.\u00a0 It was stunning.<\/p>\n

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This was not Dad’s actual Bonneville nor is it mine (I can only wish), but it is a near perfect 1966 Triumph Bonneville photographed at the Hansen Dam Britbike meet. Dad’s had a seat that continued the tank colors.\u00a0 The bike above has the stock brushed stainless steel fenders; Dad’s were mirror polished.\u00a0 I don’t have a photo of Dad’s Bonneville; all this happened before my interest in photography.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Sherm Cooper saw the seat Dad had recovered and he was floored by it.\u00a0 “Where did you get that?” he asked, and when he learned that Dad stitched it himself (after all, he was an upholsterer), Dad’s business suddenly included Triumph and Honda seats in all manner of colors, including lots of metalflake naugahyde.\u00a0 Dad was making “glitter sitters” before they became well known back in the\u00a0 ’60s.<\/p>\n

The Triumph was in many ways less sophisticated than the Honda, but it was infinitely cooler.\u00a0 The styling was way better in my 14-year-old mind.\u00a0 It didn’t have an electric starter, but that made it better to me.\u00a0 You had to tickle each of the Amal carbs with this little button on each of their float bowls until gasoline flowed out around the button, and then give it a kick.\u00a0 It usually started on the first kick.\u00a0 It was a form of intimacy with the machine, something the Honda neither needed nor wanted.\u00a0 The Triumph, though…it needed you.\u00a0 Marlon Brando, move over (Johny rode a Triumph in Rebel Without A Cause<\/em>, you know).\u00a0 The sound of a Triumph Bonneville was beyond awesome.\u00a0 \u00a0It was the perfect motorcycle, but alas, it was not to last.\u00a0 Dad lost interest in riding and sold the Bonneville.\u00a0 A few years later (when I was finally legal with an actual motorcycle driver’s license) I bought a 90cc Honda and then a CB 750 Four.\u00a0 It wouldn’t be until 1979 that I bought a new Triumph Bonneville, but that’s a story for another blog, too.\u00a0 Stay tuned, and you’ll get to read it here.<\/p>\n

\n

Never miss an ExNotes blog!<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I was a 14-year-old kid in the 8th grade and I had just discovered motorcycles.\u00a0 A senior in our combined junior high and high school named Walt had a brand new 1964 Triumph Tiger back in the day when the Tiger was Triumph’s 500cc twin.\u00a0 It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen (with … Continue reading “Dad’s Bonneville”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":13032,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[392,96,140],"tags":[2024,2023,2022,645],"class_list":["post-12949","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-back-in-the-day","category-feel-good-stuff","category-vintage-motorcycle","tag-dads-motorcycle","tag-honda-super-hawk","tag-t120r-bonneville","tag-triumph-bonneville"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/DSC_2505-900.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12949","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12949"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12949\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13096,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12949\/revisions\/13096"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13032"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12949"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12949"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12949"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}