From our Old Bike Archives – Issue 93 – first published in 2021.
Story and photos Peter Drakeford
The International Six Day Trial was the pinnacle of the off-road world in the 1970s, capturing the imagination of every enduro rider around the world. The country everyone feared was the awesome Czechs. They had the all-conquering JAWAs and the Army-trained robots who piloted them. While the German Zundapps cleaned up the smaller classes, the Czechs mainly did battle with perennial rivals the East Germans MZs, who dominated the 1960s.
The JAWAs were exceptionally engineered. One-piece crankcases, cassette gearboxes, cranks able to be removed with the engine in the frame – but that wasn’t the whole story. Fantastic metallurgy, tight tolerances, great brakes, solid handling designed to be ridden sitting down, turbine-smooth, powerful motors and unbreakable cycle parts. Other countries clamoured to get the production JAWAs for their national teams. Not just Eastern Bloc countries, but British, Swedish, Canadian and even American riders got lucky. German Importer Neckermann ran a team of ‘Banana’ framed JAWAs in the 1970 ISDT. The problem was these hand-built bikes were in short supply. Of the bikes in this article, only 20 of the 1970 ‘Banana’ 350 were made, 25 of the 1974 402, and 41 of the 1977 360. They were a tool you set and forget. None of this worrying about what will break or fall off. The motorcycle that let you rise to your personal best.
The respect these motorcycles have is measured in the huge prices models of all sizes are bringing now. Just to gaze on the pure functionality of the machine inspires awe. From a time when legends of the ISDT ruled, we bring you these three examples.
1977 360cc JAWA (type 654-03/04)
This motorcycle was built and delivered to Motokov Export, Czechoslovakia on 9/12/77 for export to the USA. It was passed to Westcoast Motors, Florida (marked as such behind the headlight), was last registered and plated in 1982 in Michigan and then sold out of Houston Texas to me in 2012. It is one of 41 360s made that year and 1977 was the last year that JAWA made these general production motorcycles for sale to the general public and the satellite Communist Bloc nations. Thereafter, only factory enduro motorcycles were produced for the Czech and Eastern Bloc riders until JAWA’s demise after the wall came down in 1989.
This particular bike caused me a lot of stress getting it here. After I missed out on one in the USA, I was resigned to never getting the bike of my dreams as so few came on the marketplace (absolutely zero now – although a 1975 UK Team one sold for $A17,300 recently). When one came up in December 2011, I paid up for a sniper to get it. The action was hot, and I sweated with anticipation. I was living in a dodgy area for www reception and was running around with the laptop to keep up with the best signal. I won it in the last second literally – and whooped it up. $6590. Now the hassles began. The Texan bike shop got hassled by the US guy I beat, and tried to cancel my bid, but I managed to get their phone number and threatened them with dire consequences if they overrode my win. Now was the scramble to get the money to them. Now it was Boxing Day; no banks open. Finally, the money was on its way. Two days later I call the shop to see how it’s going. They are cancelling the sale as the money hasn’t arrived. Much bad language. More threats and pleading for time. I start searching for transport to LA where I had a contact who imports muscle car parts in containers into Australia. Finally, I pick one, get back to the Texan shop in the New Year and the money is in. Now I have to convince them to wrap the bike and drain fuel and oil. The shop is not happy. Obviously, they haven’t done an overseas sale before. Luckily the transport gets there on time and the bike is loaded and away. Huge sigh of relief. Now, the bike is delivered to a warehouse awaiting a full container to leave. By the way, the transport guys said the shop didn’t wrap it! The freighter didn’t want to do it either, so I impressed on them its rarity and my concerns.
Anyhow, months later it arrives, and I go to a dockside warehouse to collect it. The guy there knows nothing about it. Oh, oh. I see it a few rows back just leaning against some car parts. That’s it I sez. He goes inside to check. I go and collect the bike (despite being told not to enter) and load it onto the ute. The tank has been scratched pretty heavily too! Guy comes out with some papers, shuffles them around, gets me to sign them. It’s mine! I get it home, but when I’m wheeling it up the drive I hear a sloshing sound. Whip the tank cap off and the smell of US fuel hits me. Oh no, they didn’t drain the tank! What about the oil? It’s still got its oil! What would have happened if customs had checked the container and found the fuel? I can’t bear to think about how close I came to having it confiscated or crushed.
Oh well, lets see if she fires up. Flood the Jikov. Third bloody kick! Rip up the road – whoa this thing has some grunt, smooth-as, too. When I get back there’s rubber flecks all over the rear end? Shredded tyre? No, shredded cush drive rubbers. And so begins the costly cycle – spend – fix – repair – repeat. While the bike was in original condition, it was missing the speedo and cable, side number boards and minor stuff. All rubbers were perished, and it looks like it has been crashed as there is a dent in one of the downtubes where the bottom triple clamp has hit it. The steering stop was sheared too. I think the tank has been replaced as it doesn’t have the embedded JAWA lettering common on sister bikes. I intended riding the bike so I fitted Magura controls and new cables, got the wiring sorted, fitted an OSSA skidplate, rebuilt the standard shocks but they still had minimal rebound, so fitted Stacker specials. I fitted Gold Valves to the forks which improved the action from atrocious to just awful, replaced the rear steel rim as it was square, rebuilt the seat, rerouted the rear brake lever above the footpeg and welded a disc on the end of the footpegs to keep my feet from sliding off the smooth originals. I also fitted new repro Czech guards simply to save the originals and while the Jikov carby was spot on jetting wise, in sand it pinged too much and as I had no jets, I fitted a Bing.
How does it go? That motor is a gem; the power graph would read as a straight 45-degree line, it never runs out of revs and is as smooth as silk. It is designed to drive; first gear is high and poking around single trail stuff isn’t nice; too much clutch work. The dry clutch feel is so light, most are surprised. So, it’s suited to more old-fashioned open courses, and grass track. Hence, entering the Vintage Class of the Australian Four Day Enduro in 2018 seemed possible. Assurances of vintage-friendly trails were promised. Nope. We ran the same battered, rutted sections as the moderns. I thankfully ran out of fuel before the first refuel. I could see irreplaceable bike parts getting damaged.
Overall, it puts a smile on my face when I ride it and just chilling out looking at it. No, it’s not pretty, it shows its wear, but it wears it well.
1974 402cc JAWA (type 654-03)
This was one of 25 built and delivered to Motokov, Czechoslovakia on 12/12/1974 for export to Australia. It was delivered to Fraser Imports, SA, and then to Victorian distributor Frank Mussett in Brunswick. It sat in Frank’s window for ages, lusted after by Alan Darlison, proprietor of Darwil Motorcycles, when he did his weekly parts run for his business. The price was too much for a struggling businessman, but Alan was still disappointed to see it go. It transpired it was bought by Malvern dealer John Burrows; just returned from the Italian ISDT.
JB was impressed enough by the Czech riders’ tough attitudes and bikes to try one for himself. However, he wasn’t too impressed by the raked-out handling, especially on gravel; something to do with the one-inch shorter Konis and oversize front tyre he fitted, we think. The bike was tested in the October 1975 Trail and Track magazine and of course the testers were overwhelmed by the performance and rugged simplicity. It transpired JB sold it to a nineteen-year-old down Alan’s way, ironically, and on one of his parts runs found it for sale on consignment in a shop in Elizabeth Street, Melbourne.
It wasn’t going to escape this time. It seemed the kid wanted the money to go overseas and had the bike in the Trading Post for six months with no replies. Luck!
1970 350cc JAWA (type 653-02)
This one was built and delivered to Motokov, Czechoslovakia on 19/9/70 for export to Australia. It is one of 20 350s built in that last year of the ‘Banana’ frames. It was delivered to Fraser Imports, SA, and then to Ron Gill, WA distributor. Ron used it and then sold it to a friend who moved to Sydney and from there, joined the Army and was posted to SA. He sold the bike to another mate, Temple Eyre who used it in rallies in the Northern Rivers region of NSW until it became too much effort to haul it up on its centre stand and so he advertised it in the Trading Post. Now this is where Lady Luck kissed me.
Loafing around at work I was searching JAWA images when a new one caught my eye. It was a ‘Banana’ framed JAWA with an alloy tank, high yellow guards, road tyres and other non-standard bits. Unusual, so I clicked on it. What? It’s a Trading Post ad! It’s in Australia! Oh, must be old, no! It’s current. Whoa, I hit the phone and got through. Temple expressed surprise as he had just put it in the TP and the print edition hadn’t come out yet. I had to have it, so I got him down to $6500 and the next hurdle was the wife.
“You said that after you bought the other JAWA that was the ultimate and you weren’t going to buy any more bikes!” Much tooing and froing later the phone call ended with “Well I suppose you’re going to buy it no matter what I say!” Click. Was that permission? Near enough. So, I begged a time extension, sold an OSSA Phantom and it was on its way to me. I stopped adding up the receipts when they got to $10K so God knows what it ended up costing. NOS tyres, new paintwork, the alloy tank is a replica of the rotted fiberglass one, re-chromed rims, rebuilt engine, many parcels from Etovar.cz, etc etc. Now the only missing piece is an original compressed air bottle.
JAWA ISDTs overall
The 1965 ISDT on the Isle of Man was notable for the atrocious weather, MZ’s dominance, the ACU’s insistence on the use of trials tyres and the launch of two totally new enduro motorcycles. CZ introduced its refined single exhaust port enduro model. The prototype had been used by Joel Robert in the 1964 ISDT; single exhaust port top end on a twin exhaust port bottom end, clutch on the crank. By scrapping the ‘twin port’ bottom end for one moving the clutch off the crank end to the gearbox and using refined production castings, this motorcycle was the forerunner to the motocross bikes that came out two years later.
The next surprise was JAWA unveiling their totally new production enduro model – ‘Banana’ framed, single one-piece centre-case magnesium engine with the top end, the clutch and cassette gear box removable and the crank able to be pulled out the other side – all with the engine still in the frame. It made the old JAWA street bike-derived enduro models look positively antiquated. A prototype was ridden in the 1964 ISDT by Czech rider Cespiva based on the 1963 JAWA MX prototype. This motor in its air-cooled guise was used in the factory bikes for the next 21 years. That must be some kind of record and testament to the brilliance of the original design.
It almost appears that the powers at Motokov decided that JAWA should stick to enduro and CZ stick with motocross, as no CZ motorcycles were thereafter entered in the ISDT and JAWA were usually the Czech choice in all European competition. The progression of the model years was slow gradual refinement. The ‘Banana’ frame lasted until 1970 with its magnesium cases changing to alloy ones on the later models, when they went to the full cradle frame (first seen in the 1970 ISDT in Spain) it was carried through to the end of the production run in 1977. Little changes went from early Smiths Speedos to Pal units of diminishing size, rectangular Prague bus foglight headlights to round conventional units, and then a plastic integrated light.
The engines differed only in the mounting points and the head finning going radial in 1975/6. Carburetion went from the old style Jikov with a separate float bowl, to the bolt-on float chamber in line with the carby body and then to the Bing-like late carby with the snap-on bowl. Triple clamps and forks followed CZ and were beefed up in 1975. The rear rim on all JAWA ISDT models from the start to finish was steel but an alloy front rim (made by MZ and were fitted to the CZ wheels front and rear) was introduced in 1975. These rims were very soft and didn’t take too much punishment. The rear steel rear was almost worse. So, nothing much changed on the production models and the 1975 one was very similar to the 1977 in frame design and engine spec. JAWA dropped the maroon colour in 1974 for red (like on the factory bikes introduced in the 1973 USA ISDT) on the tank and frame and continued this colour until the end. Tank size reduced from 13 litres to 10. Tank material went from fiberglass to steel to alloy. Factory bikes were very similar to the production bikes but got a smaller rear hub in 1975 and the shocks moved forward marginally – but factory bikes changed little to the production bikes until the standard bikes ceased production.
Only three ISDT JAWAs were sent to Australia by Motokov, (rumours of a couple of 250s cannot be verified). The ‘Banana’ model shown here, Alan’s 402 and another tested in Trail and Track in August 1974 (and Two Wheels) was a 1972 402 model, registered in SA and ridden by Mussett-sponsored Karel Morlang in the 1975 Sunraysia Desert Rally, the solid footpeg breaking his leg badly. This bike was sold and disappeared to New Zealand.
Gearbox removal
When the barrel is taken off it reveals a rectangular rubber bung that seals a slot in the rear crank case mouth. When the bung is removed the conrod can be lowered until it lines up with the conrod cutout milled out of the LHS crankcase. To expose this cutout the magneto and then a side plate have to be removed. Once the clutch is removed from the RHS the cassette gearbox can be withdrawn.
