SD900 Ducati Darmah: An Alsatian in Tiger’s clothing
Friday night was pub night back in the seventies and early eighties. Our watering hole was the Old Commodore Hotel at Blues Point (North Sydney) where a bunch of us with a common interest in […]
Articles by Old Bike
Adler: The eagle still soars
While the production of the Adler (German for eagle) motorcycle stopped in 1957 when Grundig bought out the company to concentrate on office equipment, there remains a strong following for this 250cc two stroke twin […]
Remarkable Rex Tilbrook
There are more than 200 Australian motorcycle manufacturers scattered in the annals of history, stretching back to the earliest days of motorised transport, alas, now all gone. Perhaps the last was the Tilbrook, the work […]
Yamaha Tracer 900GT – A better Tracer
I’ve owned a Tracer 900 for 2 years and I love it; a bike that is light and manoeuvrable around town and is also comfortable cruising the highways, should you need to do so. The […]
AJW – A short lived speedway story
Arthur John Wheaton’s family company published school text books, but young Arthur was much more interested in motorcycles. Within the workshops of the printing business at Exeter, Arthur and his mate Harry Marks built a […]
BSA Bantam – One clever little rooster
Did everyone have a Bantam at some stage of their motorcycling experience? It would seem so – the ubiquitous green midgets were everywhere in the ‘50s – carrying mail, checking gas meters, shuffling backwards and […]
Ducati’s dinosaur: V4 Apollo 1260
In 2007 Ducati’s new 800cc desmosedici MotoGP racer, in the capable hands of young Casey Stoner, was the class of the grid, and its predecessor won the final race of the 990cc era ridden by […]
Altona Circuit: Short lived and sweet
Today, Cherry Lake is a pleasant expanse of water with abundant bird life, with a paved cycling/walking track running around the perimeter. Look closely at the edges of the paving and in spots, you will […]
Suzuki T20 – Six speed sensation
‘Super Six’, ‘X6’, “Hustler’ – depending on what country you were in, the Suzuki T20, introduced in late 1965, went by many names. But quite simply, it was a sensational motorcycle – the first production […]
Ken Rumble: A personal recollection of a champion
Every sport and every era has its champions. They rise to fame, dominate their particular field for a while, and then disappear. Our sport is so specialised and demanding that it is unusual for anyone […]