Front wheel drive BSA

[Bob B]

Can anyone supply any info about the outfit below please? Suspect that it did not originate in the southern part of the country but I may be wrong.

A brave piece of engineering methinks, can certainly see the logic of it but traction and understeer could well have been a big problem especially in the wet

[Bill Lymburn]

Bob, fantastic, I've never seen that photo before. The photo I've seen was only of the front. However, there was another that I saw at the TT in about '75ish and the BSA engine sat at an angle about 15 degrees to the left if you looked at it from the riders position.

[Bill Lymburn]

Bob, when I wrote the post above I hadn't read your other post in the Boret Topic. That's news to me I never knew about the Kurth/Schiedigger machine. With the front wheel drive you've totally lost the passenger assistance to get max drive, but it would be interesting seeing the passenger try it, straddled over the front wheel. Again, I am positive there were two of these BSA front drive machines but they were so similar they could both have came from the same pioneering brain.

[graham p]

There was a front wheel drive BSA A65 outfit at the 2010 VMCC 1000 bikes festival.I do not know if it was this one.

[Bill Lymburn]

There was a front wheel drive BSA A65 outfit at the 2010 VMCC 1000 bikes festival.I do not know if it was this one.

That's very interesting Graham, so one at least is still around and possibly raceable. Wonder if the owner would like to race it. That would create a lot of interest in the classic scene.

[tonybsa2008]

I believe I read an article in an old classic racer about the a65 that was at the 1000 bikes(it was there this year as well),apparantly it was built for the 1974tt.

[paul33]

there was a long thread here about the front wheel drive BSA which I cannot find now. I do know the bike belongs to Dave Skinner now, there where two built the second being built from the first so only one exists now.

[Bill Lymburn]

there was a long thread here about the front wheel drive BSA which I cannot find now. I do know the bike belongs to Dave Skinner now, there where two built the second being built from the first so only one exists now.

That's one problem I've also found, finding old posts, maybe Steve could help, I'd love to read that.
I take it from what you say, "Paul33" Dave Skinner was not the designer/builder of the FWD BSA, but would he want to race it?

[paul33]

Dave Skinner runs the BSA at the 1000 bikes and used to use it at some classic hillclimbs in the 1980s. its a shame we cant find the older thread which had a lot more detail.

[666]

I think this bike was banned by the ACU on safety grounds,If i am right I would like to know the reasons,it's a very interesting bike. If i am wrong I would like to see it racing in the CRMC.

[Bob B]

Safety grounds John? Hmm, probably due to potentially unpredictably directional stability, i.e. handling probs! Personally I do not see any logical reason for disallowing such creativity. Did it race unfaired? If so then the parallel thin king to having the Greenwood Mini have the open front driven wheels 'covered' may have been the issue.

Let it race say I

[steve-e]

Or maybe... just hide all the steering in a zip up bag

[Bob B]

Now there's an original thought Steve

[steve-e]

If it was a long time ago and not had a reply within a year it's probably in a backup somewhere. We have to prune the forum to keep it running smoothly, so we backup and prune at intervals any thread that hasn't been replied/read in ages. Most stuff will be in backups somewhere, but it takes a while to restore to a local machine when looking for things.
This is one of them Saturday morning jobs.. back up the site, update any plugins etc on the front, back up the forum and update the core/modifications, then prune back and backup again.
This morning's Saturday job is trying to get the front of site to work on mobiles properly..

[petercaughlin]

I remember seeing a front wheel drive BSA some years back at Brands,might have been when they had the 1000 bikes there, the first thought was it must have been so heavy with the Forth Bridge engineering by the front wheel