Talk:Vincent Motorcycles

Why isnt there any information on Col Crothers who in 1954 achieved a speed world record of 154 mph on the salt lakes of Australia. He was riding his HRD. He also set numerous other speed records. Someone should do a movie about him. His bike is absolutely awsome and i don't even like bikes much.````

Rewritten, added to, etc

A rewrite of that material plus more. I hope it will be accepted. Seasalt 13:11, 8 October 2006 (UTC) Well I think that the year is right but the speed definately is!! Pretty impressive````

Seperate articles for Vincent Models

As part of Wikproject Motorcycling I am working though all the missing articles and stubs for British Bikes. I've just started an article for Vincent Rapide and referred to it as main in this article - but haven't removed any duplicated text as I'd appreciate views on how to deal with it. To make things easier to sort out I have also created a category for British Motorcycles. Please will you add to any British motorcycle pages you find or create. I've also linked it to the Commons British Motorcycles so you could help with matching pics to articles or adding the missing images to the Commons - take your camera next time you go to a rally! Thanks Tony (talk) 12:39, 4 May 2008 (UTC)

Just moved and rewrote the section on Vincent Black Lightning as a new article. Thruxton (talk) 20:53, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

A small, intersting piece of information has been given me by Arthur Teasdale (nicknamed 'Spoon') that the Norvin motorbike was his idea, which was passed on to Trade and Industry, as he knew it at that time, through various other persons, to be named if interested. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Moreforalltoknow (talk • contribs) 17:31, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Ownership

The trademarks for Vincent are now owned by David Holder (Coventry, UK) - velocette.motorcycle@virgin.net —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.154.39.62 (talk) 16:09, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Subsequent developments section

Were any of these specials attributed to Mike Hailwood's son actually produced and sold (apart from a press hack)? I skimmed-throught the late Kevin Ash' overlengthy, unencyclopedic waffle on the Telegraph site and gave up half way down.

Would someone knowledgeable "be bold" and correctly re-write this confusing section relating to several years ago? 62.253.80.3 (talk) 21:16, 6 September 2013 (UTC)

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"Post motorcycle manufacturing" subheading.

Much of the original text in this subheading seemed to have been cribbed almost verbatim from Grace's Guide (https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Vincent-HRD). I have moved and expanded the text on the Picador to its own subheading, but some of the other text could be reworded.

Kumboloi (talk) 19:54, 26 December 2017 (UTC)

Probably a more-likely way of describing it would be:
Much of the original text in this subheading seemed to have been cribbed almost verbatim to Grace's Guide, a crowd-sourced website with scant-acknowledgement to Wikipedia as one of its content-providers, after it was originally uploaded to WP in this revision, October 2006. Grace's guide can be very good, particularly for period advertisements, exact name-formats, addresses and similar, but circumspection is needed when choosing to use it to verify WP content due to WP:CIRCULAR.

I have now had the opportunity to skim-through your worklist which shows almost-exclusively cars. Remember, anything you write here can quickly be imported to any website, without accreditation, and they do not provide the history to establish the dates of additions.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 14:53, 31 December 2017 (UTC)

This is from where Vincents obtained their paints: Pinchin and Johnson (at Grace's guide) also at Pinchin Johnson & Associates. Put it up whilst I have the 1980 magazine near me.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 19:59, 31 December 2017 (UTC)

Rollei Free record in section 1948 Series C Vincents

This is basically copied from what I wrote at Talk:Vincent Black Lightning#Rollei Free section World Record - Shadow or Lightning?:

As I stated in this edit summary, Vintagent has previously stated that he believes it was not a Lightning that was ridden in the 150mph-record. I've checked in the house and Vincent book author Roy Harper wrote in a 1980 UK magazine that it was a Shadow.

The original upload (permalink) to the Vincent Black Lightning article was written as Lightning; the first accompanying source (deadlinked, Hall of Fame) states Shadow (archived) and the second (deadlinked, Motorcycle Daily, of uncertain ownership and origins but with a 1999 copyright notice - archived) shows an undated, poor-resolution advert or poster that could be later than the actual record. IMO, it's likely that the originating WP editor and web-site writer both chose to assume it was a Lightning due to this image content.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 19:53, 31 December 2017 (UTC)

"...the world's fastest motorcycles..."

Having now researched what I perceived to be the usual Wikipedia inaccuracy, comparing it to period historical evidence identified by the 1980 writings of Vincent book author Roy Harper, I can see the following quote was added in April 2006, unclear as to any exact sourcing (by recent standards, as they often did in the early days of WP):

It was with the introduction in 1948 of the fully race-prepared Vincent Black Lightning that Vincent emerged as the most legendary motorcycle of its time. The Black Lightning fired the imagination of motorcyclists the world over and was known as 'The World's Fastest Standard Motorcycle', a claim it could have made well into the seventies, nearly twenty years after it ceased production.

A quote still exists in this article, section History - "...the makers of the world's fastest motorcycles...".

The correct quote as seen in Vincent B Series period advertising is "The World's Fastest Standard Motorcycle", the operative word being standard. This can be seen dated as December 1945 for the 1946 MY, well before the C series Shadow, the US record where a considerably non-standard machine was used, and the subsequent very few Lightnings. The origins go back to the original Motor Cycling A series test of 1936. The Motor Cycling test from 1939 (headline) states "The Fastest Standard Machine Ever Tested By Us Proves Very Tractable". I have not yet tracked the original 1936 test. The numbers quoted in the Vincent advertising is 110mph for B Rapide and 125mph for C Shadow (non-pool fuel, I suspect) and a max of 128 by a foreign periodical. I haven't seen any advertising claiming 'world's fastest' for Lightning.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 14:08, 4 January 2018 (UTC)

Just to confirm that a few hours after I posted the above message, I found in the house a 1952 factory advert (full page small magazine format) for the Lightning, claiming it was a standard motorcycle, and proclaiming national speed records from five countries around the world, including the US 156.58mph. It is a Primary Source but just about passes muster to explain how the later writers may have picked up on it. Twice mentioning the word "standard", literary licence is evident, in the way we know that motor manufacturers exaggerate (I have 33 Lightnings made, including "two or three" for road use - 1980 mag).

I will not be citing any details, lest it should be copied from WP to recent websites. As we know, the American 150mph was not only non-standard, it was pre-production. Worse than that, it was stripped down and without any front brake. Worse still, it was running on exotic fuel - that's how they could run 13:1 compression ratio to achieve 70bhp, when pump fuel was 70-80 octane and needed 7 or 8:1. The Hall of Fame pics show him either sampling the hooch, or futher dosing the methanol with a dash of nitro. I don't think he was composing a blues song:

And all I had for breakfast was
two smokes and one half-pint

I haven't seen fuel canisters like that on American Pickers.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 02:03, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

Further to my link above showing what appears to be Nitro-Methane being prepared by Rollie Free on the salt, I have now obtained (from a contact in Australia) Vincent factory advertising, a compilation of owner-testimonials dated 1948-1949 which includes a tribute from Free himself, viz:

...I have tried to see that you received full credit as your just reward, taking care in the publicity received over here to explain that the machine used was a standard production model using alcohol. Also that no tuning was required on the machine before or during the runs. (cont...)...the Black Lightning I rode first on Rosamond Dry Lake and then successfully on the Utah Salt Flats....

The supplier of the scan is a lifelong, highly-skilled engineer with extensive experience of modifying engines including running on Methanol when racing between 1966 and 1983 in Australia where it was a permitted fuel. From the info he provided, the modified engines consumed inordinate quantities of fuel and needed extensive carburation and fuel-pipe changes; it is likely, then, considering Free's wording above, that the factory-supplied carbs were already suitably-modified (also note that Amal produced brass carb bodies for alternative fuels - a tip from Paul Dunstall regarding later Monobloc carbs is that the complementary brass Amal needle-valve assembly flowed twice as much as standard). By extension, the American folklore rumour that Free rode the bike on public roads to the venue(s) is also in doubt. There are no publication details included with the info on the scan, but it was sourced to the engineer/racer himself from his late-uncle, a Rapide owner with his own testimonial included into the compilation.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 13:04, 27 July 2018 (UTC)

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Removal of Rapide picture from Infobox

Hi Rocknrollmancer. The reason that I removed the picture of the Rapide from the Infoxbox was that this article is about the company, not one of their products, and the Infobox should contain information specific to the company itself. I let the image of the Vincent script remain because that was the company's insignia, and did not remove any of the pictures of models from the main text body because they were associated with the history of some of the company's products. I have no objection to that image's use in the article, just not in that location. Kumboloi (talk) 14:43, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

I don't see a valid rationale here except for your own preferences which is subjective, and you didn't include an edit summary for the deletion, which is courtesy where prior vandalism is not involved (it's also a Shadow image, not a Rapide). If you look at the change I made over three years ago with the edit-summary replaced duplicated racer img in lede position with better example you can see that the earlier revision had two thumbs of the same Lightning - very non-representative of 'Vincent Motorcycles', as it was a bespoke racer produced in very small numbers. Vincents are really only known for the V-twin from 1936 until 1955 which was always recognisably similar, and half-a-twin which was not really as desirable then or now.

It's a very nice image, good composition and lighting, and was placed adjacent to original prose from the first upload in 2005 that was later tweaked to read "1948" and "C series". It shows a C Black Shadow, and also keys-in with the tank legend.

As editors it's incumbent on us to provide a snapshot in the lede of both what is representative of the marque to a non-experienced reader, together with a summary of what is to follow.

It's common practice to provide a lead image in articles where possible, whether there is an infobox or not, and not unknown to include a representative image of the marque. These are a few, with Norton showing extensive product variations followed by manufacturers offering few variations similar to the Vincent product, although I can see there are plenty of manufacturers without lead images:

• Norton Motorcycle Company
• Brough Superior
• Hesketh Motorcycles
• Healey 1000/4
• Sunbeam Cycles
• Montgomery Motorcycles
• Rickman Motorcycles

  Maybe other long-established editors will come in here to explain just how wrong I am. I will ping-in Dennis Bratland who added the image to Norton Motorcycle Company for an opinion. Thanks.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 00:43, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

In my opinion, an image of a Vincent motorcycle in the infobox for the "Vincent Motorcycles" article is entirely appropriate. Omnedon (talk) 01:14, 9 January 2018 (UTC)

I apologize for not leaving an edit summary Rocknrollmancer. The truth is that I thought I was working on a sandbox article at the time, not the production one. Kumboloi (talk) 21:54, 10 January 2018 (UTC)

"..producing his own motorcycles as previously with bought-in engines"?

The above is from the article's second sentence. In American English it's very confusing; does it mean something clear in British English?

My guess at the meaning is "producing his own motorcycles, continuing to install engines purchased from other companies"; this isn't well-written, but is it correct? -- Dan Griscom (talk) 15:55, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

Dtgriscom To me it makes sense. As previously (with the HRD business per se) they both used bought-in engines. What else could "bought-in mean"? A notable instance of this was George Brough, who used whatever engines he could purchase - JAP and Matchless for Brough Superior. Subtle difference between bike-manufacturer and bike-assembler. No reason that you couldn't change it, though. My life for the past two years has been trawling through diffs, but no time presently to check as it's getting dark (9.19 noticeably changing now from 21 June longest) and I must grille my fish outside .--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 20:20, 12 July 2019 (UTC)

I've changed and slightly expanded the lede - hope that's more clear.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 21:56, 12 July 2019 (UTC) This is an example of BST - one hour in front, now 22:59.--Rocknrollmancer (talk) 21:58, 12 July 2019 (UTC)