TT Sidecars

Absolutely fucking mental.

Other than the fact that they're three-wheeled death-machines, why
on earth are they so rare on tracks these days?

If Rossi fancies a change, get him in an outfit and crank up a
new GP series. I'd buy it!

 

Bad form, but jesus. A 112mph lap? On a 600cc three-wheeler?

 

Platty and I drunkenly discussed getting an imp engined outfit on the
classic circuits. Fortunately I have no money.

 

I always found them to be good to watch on club race days.

 

Don't know; Platy was going to be the passenger.

 

Dunno. Sidecar racing is one of the best spectator events in *any*
automotive sport, IMHO.

<thinks>

Perhaps the supply of willing loonies to act as passengers has been
exhausted?

 

On Tue, 7 Jun 2005 22:29:45 +0100,

I did once fancy having a go but after reading the report from a
journo who fell off the back at speed... perhaps not.

Besides, I am dimensionally challenged for the position.

 

Why not just weld the Ural and the Dneipr together? Easy, with the two
chairs acting as outboards.

You could have the world's first catamaran outfit.

 

Using the patented Mavis Beacon "Hunt&Peck" Technique, Grimly Curmudgeon

I rather think you'll find the Spagthorpe Co. beat you to that idea by
some considerable time, old chap.

--
Wicked Uncle Nigel - Manufacturer of the "Champion-105" range of rearsets
and Ducati Race Engineer.

WS* GHPOTHUF#24 APOSTLE#14 DLC#1 COFF#20 BOTAFOT#150 HYPO#0(KoTL) IbW#41
ZZR1100, Enfield 500 Curry House Racer "The Basmati Rice Burner",
Honda GL1000K2 (On its hols) Kawasaki ZN1300 Voyager "Oh, Oh, It's so big"

 

<cudgels memory> Nope.

<googles>

Ah. The Imperator-Holdworthy endurance outfit. Some described it as a
true test of endurance to even look at the thing, never mind ride it.

Born of a desire to carry four sacks of pheasants instead of the normal
two and two ghillies, the design team at Spagthorpe set about their task
at the request of Sir Giles Holdworthy, who needed a conveyance with
good cross-country capabilities on his million acre estate in the
Highlands.

The simple idea of attaching two sidecars to an existing model, the
Imperator, came to naught as the 4Litre triple-compound expansion engine
wasn't up to the job and there simply wasn't enough room to fit a larger
powerplant. Obviously there needed to be more power, and the geniuses of
the Spagthorpe drawing room soon came up with the idea of two Imperators
in parallel.

Another Great British Idea sadly let down by the metallurgy of the time.

In an effort to cut costs, the factory employed a team of highly trained
monkeys to carry out the production line welding; each monkey working
from a punch card - as a frame came in front of it, a large automated
boxing glove punched the monkey until it welded the necessary pieces of
steel together. Such a welding system, though wonderful in trials, soon
showed its fundamental weakness - the desire of the monkey to avoid
being punched. Monkeys, being smart little creatures, simply attached
the welding electrodes to the boxing gloves and scampered off to the
canteen. The resulting heaps of metal, though art, were not considered
suitable for automotive use, and a salvage operation yielded a grand
total of 5 useable Imperator frames.

4 of these were converted to Imperator-Holdworthy specification and the
remaining frame was turned into an attractive poolside decoration and
cocktail cabinet at the home of Jeremy Spagthorpe's mistress, Fenella.

In use, the ghillies of Holdworthy's estate found the
Imperator-Holdworthy a tempermental beast; sometimes reluctant to start
until the sun had warmed the condenser tank - the mechanic on the estate
was reluctant to venture near the vehicle, owing to the unfortunate
design decision to place the fuel tank directly over the firebox, so it
was left entirely to the ghillies to fettle the vehicle. This noble band
of men, though entirely adequate at their chosen profession, had one
fatal weakness - they were not, and could not be expected to be,
mechanics and unfortunately did not realise that the monkey welding was
under severe strain as it held the mighty power of 8litres of engine in
place.

Things came to a head one day when Sir Giles himself was piloting the
vehicle back to the lodge after a successful day's shoot. Laden down
with 8 bags of pheasants, 3 ghillies and a small boy, the vehicle was
trundling along at its maximum speed of approximately 84mph when the
final monkey weld cried its last.

The results were too horrific to contemplate; two ghillies went one
direction, one ghillie and the boy went another and Sir giles went both
ways. The whole incident was hushed up at the instigation of the
government, for fear of shaking confidence in a British industry which
provided employment for up to 10 workers in the grim unemployment
blackspot of Spagthorpe.

It was never recorded what happened to the pheasants.

 

Sorry to harp on about the old days but to watch Florian Camathias, Fritz
Schiedegger and Chris Vincent etc at Brands back in the 60's was pure
magic.

And now the modern generation are still defying death as they put an outfit
round the IOM at incredible speeds. Heros every one of them...

 

Oh yes, absolutely.

Does anyone else remember those two *splendid* TV clips? One was of an
outfit running *very* wide and onto the grass for miles and miles until
it suddenly disappeared - SPLASH! - into a water-filled ditch that,
unaccountably, you didn't see coming.

The second was, I think, at the Island. The passenger fell out on, IIRC,
a right-hander. You just got the time to see the pilot look down at his
empty chair, think to himself: "Where the **** did he go?" before you
saw the bubble floating above the pilot's helmet: "Christ, I'm not going
to get round this next bend, am I?"

And, indeed, he didn't )

 

<snip>

Excellent. Bike magazine is trying to do something similar in their back
pages. I've told' em it's been done before and done better. You've
reminded me.

 

[/QUOTE]

That was Webster and Hewitt, at Assen

 

My mate's amature sidecar racing career went something like:

First race: pile-up at the first corner, sidecar finally stopped after
t-boning a fallen rider in the back. Outfit too damaged to race any
more that day.

Second race (a few months later, following a rebuild): Broke down after
a few laps.

Third race: Crash on third lap. Mate died in a singles race at the same
meeting.

He decided to give up at that point.

 

Oh, yes, I remember that.

 

Don't remember.

<fx:crackle. Dim picture drifts in and out of focus>
Hmm. Now you've got me thinking. I was originally remembering a very
slow speed crash at a wet Assen, on the first lap, where several
people all went down like dominos. But, I've now got a very dim
memory of Lawson losing it at speed in the wet there, and yes, it was
similar to the W&H crash.
<fx: crackle. Picture fades>

Sorry, that's the best I can do.

 

Unrelated...

There's a quite famous bit of footage of an outfit setting sail sideways
across the infield in the piss pouring rain and coming to rest with an
almighty splash in a ditch.

Brief pause then a mass of marshalls and bystanders leap in to rescue the
passenger trapped under the bike; underwater.

 

You think?

Yes, yes, yes - that's the footage of Webster and Hewitt already
identified up there ^. Do try and keep up.

 

It is? Sorry, it'll not happen again.