Why old motorcycles

I grew up in a family were the motorcycle interest not were so widely spread, with two older sisters and a strong mother the discussions were more into colours and design. My father had a Triumph Tiger 100 when I was really little and I only have some faded memories from this time.

The salvation came from the neighbour Gösta!
A Taxi driver with a big motorcycle interest.

He drove everything from Monark-Jawa Blue arrow, Husquarna 390 motorcross, BMW R75/5, Honda 750 four and a american CCM 500 motocross. It was fantastic to sit and watch Gösta when he was repairing or rebuilding parts for some of the bikes within the collection.

The most amazing was all of the people that just passed by his garage, friends and collegues that was curious about the latest projects.

Gösta was absolutely the favourite neighbour!

I was almost into tears when I saw the movie "The world’s fastest Indian" the situation was just the same, the little boy that looked up to his neighbour that always had his own solutions....

But why old motorcycles?

Here are some of my answers:

It is nothing you can ride just because you have the money..

The feeling of being a part of the mechanism and that everything is fixed by your own hands..almost anyway...you have taken thoughts and ideas and converted them to a vehicle, it is a part of yourself.

Then there is also some sort of exhibitionism.. I like to entertain.

Is speed a constant or is it a relative unit based upon the experience?

When I was "younger" i drove quite modern sports bike, the last I had was a 1997 Italian bike with 320mm Brembo brakes and upside down fork from WP. The tricky part with a bike that is build with modern components is that has no feeling of speed untill 160Km/H (100Mph). Then it starts to feel OK, when you are close to 200Km/h (120Mph) the adrenaline starts come in the long sweeping turns and it is just great. (This is ofcourse what I have been told from some friends that has been in contact with some that has the actual experience...:-))....

In year 2000 i was done with my first vintage bike. It was a Swedish Monark Sport 500cc from 1930 with a English produced engine called Blackburne. The gear box was a Burman and the electrical came from Bosch. It had 22Hp around 5000rpm and it was fantastic to ride it..
The Weldbase 19" rims were OK but the brakes were ridiculous.

I then noticed that the adrenaline started to pump at 80Km/h (50Mph)...and when I reached the 100Km/h (60Mph) I was so into the speed so I forgot to notice the station wagon that passed me with kids in the backseat eating ice cream in 110Km/h (70Mph).... they were on their way from the beach and I was closeing my gap towards mach1 but they were actually passing me on the highway.....still it was me that had the experience..

The bike on the pic above is the Monark 1930 500cc....the bike below is Santa´s...do you want a ride? Click here