My First Wheels

Discussion in 'The Lounge Bar' started by papiermache, Dec 21, 2020.

  1. papiermache

    papiermache Well-Known Member

    A dark red bicycle or fairy bike with solid tyres and front brake only. Put brake on too hard and went flying over the handlebars and landed up on my chin. Had to go to Leeds General Infirmary Casualty Dept. in a taxi which stank of cigarettes and had confetti on the floor. Three stitches: can still see the scar.

    Had a good sledge ( no wheels ) but crashed into a large log so LGI again and 18 stitches.

    First time in the driver's seat was my uncle's car which must have been an Austin A70. I moved the column gear change and pushed the starter so it shot forward and nearly hit the gate of our house, and I was ejected by said uncle amidst much laughter.

    First two wheels was an £8 Vespa 125cc with half fared in handlebars in blue. ( There is a similar model in London Museum ). Never ran properly but I learnt a lot..

    Learnt to drive on a two tone blue Ford Anglia. Very rusty but very predictable. Smashing car.

    ......and your first wheels ?
     
    CL1, JohnH and Owen like this.
  2. bamboo43

    bamboo43 Very Senior Member

    Dawes 5-speed drop handle bar racer. Came off badly in my twelfth year took a large chunk of my right knee, never healed over very well.

    Triumph Dolomite 1500 (1979) in white. I had her over fifteen years, but rust got the better of her in the end. Keeping the twin SU carbs balanced was a real joy. I would love to drive The likes of her again.
     
    CL1 and papiermache like this.
  3. Grasmere

    Grasmere Well-Known Member

    The first car I learnt to drive on was a Triumph Dolomite, a light colour with a stripe down the side I think. Never mastered two wheels I'm afraid. First car I owned was an ancient 1965 Wolseley 6/110 Mk 2, which was duotone rose taupe and sandy beige, red leather interior and walnut dashboard. Fabulous to drive with a powerful engine when she wasn't in the garage, which was often! I believe they used to be police cars in the 60s. She also succumbed to rust and was eventually scrapped.
     
    CL1 and papiermache like this.
  4. Chris C

    Chris C Canadian

    When you say "solid" tyres do you actually mean tyres that don't inflate?

    My first bicycle... Honestly I don't remember. I was no older than 7 - I can remember where my mother was teaching me on a quieter street behind my house.

    I am one of those big city people that has never gotten around to driving. I really should learn, though, for a few things.

    So my current vehicle is still a bicycle, a "commuter" bike which is more comfortable than fast. Black, 15 gears, can take panniers in the rear. With a couple of bungee cords I used it to bring a small tree home to my apartment on the weekend.
     
    CL1 and papiermache like this.
  5. papiermache

    papiermache Well-Known Member

    Chris, yes, no inner tubes, so rather a harsh ride ! Tyres were black, but in 1953, when I had my first trip to casualty, pram wheels had white solid tyres, but prams had leaf springs, which my red bike lacked. My favourite current bike is a 6 speed Brompton which has a rear suspension rubber "block" between the metal bits. I once had a Moulton ( very expensive new, but mine was £10 second-hand in 1970 ) with front suspension and a rear suspension rubber block but the rear frame broke. It had a Sturmey Archer 4 speed hub which often left me pedalling thin air between the gears.

    Great to bring a Christmas tree home on a bike. In 1969 a friend bought a Morris 8 saloon ( 1947 edition ? ) for £10 to get a half-shaft for his Morris 8 Tourer ( open four seater ) and took the saloon apart and hauled most of it from Leeds to Surrey in the back of the tourer, especially the engine and gearbox. But not a Christmas tree on top: it was July.

    John
     
    Last edited: Dec 22, 2020
    CL1, Chris C and JohnH like this.
  6. Chris C

    Chris C Canadian

    I'd have liked to have seen a photo of the tourer loaded up like that!
     
    papiermache likes this.
  7. CL1

    CL1 116th LAA and 92nd (Loyals) LAA,Royal Artillery

    A Triang scooter aged 5ish

    A Safeway Raleigh with 3 speed Sturmey Archer gears aged 10ish

    A Trolley (aged 10ish) made out of wood and pram wheels (This was a 3 seater and the pusher sat at the back) this transport lasted for a few runs until the final run down the local hill the pusher who was packing a bit more timber that he should jumped on after the push but weight and dynamics kicked in and there followed a crash wherein the pusher had his white school shirt torn of his back as the cuff got caught in the large pram wheel.

    A quite few years followed on shanks pony

    Then a 1.6 Ford Cortina hand painted by a gentleman in Kensal Green in the shades of air force blue and light green
    Top half green bottom half blue
    This did well including a trip to Scandinavia.
    Once whilst topping up the oil (using a funnel ) through the dip stick hole a son of an famous agony aunt happened to be passing and commented on my mechanical skills and dexterity on managing to squeeze 2 pints of oil through a small opening.
     
    Chris C and papiermache like this.
  8. papiermache

    papiermache Well-Known Member

    Ah, the clever metal strip on the top of a can of 20/50, and the smell of burning oil. Also the wonderful aroma of Castrol "R". The 1961 Ford Anglia used a pint of oil every one hundred miles in the end.

    I had forgotten the pedal car I had, the roller skates with composite wheels which were very rough, then a friend's sister got rubber-wheeled roller skates.My sister had a triang scooter. But I also had a tricycle.

    I inherited a "trolley" but we called them a "bogey" in Leeds, which had been built by a friend's engineer father. It was magnificent with a proper vertical steering column and a wooden bar at the top. The front axle was connected by the sort of thick cord you see on old aeroplane landing gear. It also had a footbrake, and I think the "brakes" was a length of wood which just pushed against the tread or circumference of both rear tyres, not the metal rims. They worked, though. Going over too many kerbs led to the floor splitting around the hole where the steering column exited the body and I couldn't work out how to mend it.

    I can't remember losing my shirt but I did ruin the bottom of a cricket jumper by letting it fall into the chain of my Triumph Palm Beach from an overpacked saddlebag. My mother was not best pleased. The Palm Beach came without a dynamo set but with a 3 speed Sturmey Archer Hub. This is an advert from August, 1957 but I got mine in 1961. I didn't want drop handlebars and Benelux derailleur gears, or Campagnola, which were much better.

    Palm Beach.jpg
     
    JohnH likes this.
  9. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

    I had a Chevrolet Vega. The Vega had an aluminum engine block without cylinder liners. The entire casting contained silicon. The cylinder bores were acid etched after machining so that, in theory, the rings would bear on the silicon surface. It didn't work and they started drinking oil after less than 5000 miles. I just carried a case of oil in the hatchback and added a quart at every fill up. Car was very reliable and I drove it for over 100k miles. Didn't even foul the plugs. I sold it to a guy at work who's wife used it for another year. He knew all about the oil issue but wanted it anyway. He sold it to a third big guy at work who commuted 70 miles a day with two other large individuals for another year after that.
     
    Last edited: Dec 22, 2020
    papiermache likes this.
  10. papiermache

    papiermache Well-Known Member

    Was the "Vega" an automatic ? Did you have a bicycle with a curved cross-bar ? Those were rare in the UK, also the transmission "brake": very effective I should think.
     
  11. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

    My Vega had four speed manual. They also came with three speed manuals and two speed automatics. I don't think I ever had a bicycle with a curved cross-bar. The Vega had disc brakes in front with rear drums and emergency brake on the rear drums. I don't think transmission brakes have been used on cars in the states since the forties but I could be wrong. Do you mean using the engine compression to slow down? That was very useful on snowy hills before anti-lock brakes. I did that all the time when living in the NE US.
     
    Last edited: Dec 23, 2020
    papiermache likes this.
  12. Rich Payne

    Rich Payne Rivet Counter Patron 1940 Obsessive

    This was my first proper cycle with brakes and things.
    IMG_20200816_0004 (2).jpg
    I think that I went from that to a 20" Hercules, although there was an hand-me-down loop frame 18" Phillips around at one time but I think that went straight to my brother. I passed my 'Cycling Proficiency' on the Hercules and then received a new Raleigh 'Elite' when I went to senior school. No photos of that one, but it had a curved cross-bar. I was a bit of a short-arse and it was a way of getting a proper 26" wheeled three-speed with an 18"/20" frame that I could grow into. Needless to say, I had a growth spurt and it was soon too small.
    Raleigh Elite.jpg
    I then got hold of a 1958 Triumph 'Jack of Clubs' in a fetching pastel grey with with yellow celluloid mudguards which soon disintegrated....it got slung into the back of the shed when the chap next door left home and gave me a lightweight Holdsworth frame. I remember Campag hubs, but I only stretched to a Huret mech and only five speeds.

    I stopped cycling for a few years until a temporary lack of driving licence called for the trusty Triumph to be dragged out again. It's been through several incarnations since....a single speed with dropped bars at one time and seems to be progressing back to a 1950s state again. I don't cycle daily but I pop into the village or the next town on it once or twice a week if it's not raining too hard.
    Photo0346.jpg
    I'm starting to sort out parts for my dad's old '56 Lenton Tourist too...Basically the same geometry as the Triumph but a Renolds 531 frame...It's been too long for me to recall what it rides like. It'll be interesting to compare. There were seven bicycles in the shed during the summer, but two have gone back to college so I can get in and out again.
    P4161290 b.jpg
     
    Dave55, Chris C and papiermache like this.
  13. Owen

    Owen -- --- -.. MOD

    papiermache likes this.
  14. JPP

    JPP Junior Member

    My first motorised two wheels was a Honda 125 which in those days you could ride on the road when you were 16 years old.
    I passed my driving test first time having learnt to drive in a British School of Motoring Austin 1300.
    The first car I owned was a 1967 navy blue Ford Anglia which I bought in 1976 for £50.
     
    papiermache likes this.
  15. papiermache

    papiermache Well-Known Member

    Sorry, Dave, I meant a bicycle not a car when referring to "transmission."

    What I meant was a bicycle with a "coaster" brake which I confused with a modern "fixie", or without a freewheel, rather than a brake for a car, but I realise they are different. If I go on I'll just confuse myself even more than usual.

    I got the impression from the rare "Superman" comics I saw in the 1960's that all American bicycles had curved cross-bars and that you pedalled backwards to stop, having seen just one example of a US built bicycle in England.

    As to cars I have briefly driven an automatic Mk.4 Ford Cortina Ghia back in the 1970's ( that dates me ), also a Triumph 2000 saloon car in the same era , but I don't like automatics.

    I was taught to go up through the gears and use them to slow down, but not lower than second gear to slow down, then engage first gear whilst stationary. The Ford Anglia I drove had a 997 cc engine with no synchromesh on first gear. Drum brakes all round. The driving school Ford Anglia was a 1200 cc version with synchromesh on all four gears.

    John
     
    Last edited: Dec 23, 2020
  16. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA


    Hey John,

    Sorry I misunderstood.

    I certainly had a coaster brake bikes when I was young and you are right that almost all the bikes in the US were coaster brake until the mid-sixties when "English Racers" with three speed Sturmey Archer hubs and rim brakes became popular. Coaster brakes were great fun because it was so easy to lock up the rear wheel on purpose and skid to a stop.

    I have a Trek road bike and a K2 mountain bike now. The K2 is a full suspension with mechanical discs and was made back when they were still an independent company. Completely trouble free for 20 years until the rear derailleur hanger broke this summer.
     
  17. papiermache

    papiermache Well-Known Member

    Thanks, Dave, and for the bike info. I would be a disaster with a bike that brakes on a back-pedal.

    My Brompton is a heavy version ( built about 2014 ) at around 14 kilos with Shimano front light 'generator' hub and a rack on the back. Chain wears a lot. Brakes are very good and never bind.

    I've got a lightweight 20 inch wheel "foldie" no longer made: a Kansi 3/20. This weighs less than 10 kilos, 3 speed Shimano Hub which is pleasant to use but no mudguards. However, the rims on the wheels have a weakness which gave way in June. Wheel still needs rebuilding. A lucky escape. Perhaps I adjusted the brakes badly.

    John
     

    Attached Files:

Share This Page