Two photos for the “Don’t touch & leave it as found brigade”, because the “patina” cant be reproduced so they say, well here are a couple of Indians that may fall into that category, I would agree that some bikes should be left in peace (the two on the top are a example), the difference between a “as found” & restored machine is huge, restore because they can deteriorate quickly, remember they looked new when they were in the showroom, otherwise people would have never bought them.
Hmm, makes you think about this firm Indian that made Bicycles, pocket watches, cigar cutters, outboard motors, oil, children’s pedal cars & toys, Snow sleds, Street sweepers, Fire trucks, suspension units for cars & Roadsters. Surely with the MotoCycles as well they had so much diversification they should have survived, after all the Milwaukee Tractor Co was only making caravans & golf buggies & air-conditioners, life is strange and management even more so, which after bad decisions had the Springfield firm floundering. As you know I like “weird” Indians the 1928 model built in the beginning of the Great Depression was going to be a “dead duck” other companies BMW,DKW(Audi) Triumph,Rover, Suzuki, Honda, Jaguar, all have & some still produce motorcycles, Indian again hit the market at the wrong time.
But probably a bit closer for some countries now, than only U.S.A. It’s hard to believe that you have been able to buy a new Indian pretty well for over 14 years now. There will be the T-shirt wearing “End of story 1953” group but most of these people are worried about theIr investment being sullied by “cheaper later versions”, sounds like bigotry to me. The next 12 months will soon see a line drawn or bulldozed in the sand, some will buy new Indian’s & bite their tongue about previous declarations or statements they made in the past, but the fact is brand loyalty this sells nearly all products today, Ford-Holden,Coke-Pepsi,Hungry Jack’s-McDonalds etc if you were looking at a new cruiser Indian would be on the shopping list.New Indian Owners will be people that enjoy riding & socialising also not spending hours in the garage restoring or tuning their bike they won’t give a “Rats” about when Indian last raced, what year the Four’s finished, what a 101 is, or that a starter was fitted in 1917, that does’nt make them bad people one might be your son or grandson we are in the 21st Century now “End of Story”
As you know your new mag is out & congratulations to Guido for another excellent read, he tells me that the hard copy will be posted after Easter. This made me think do I want the hard copy, well no, the Association has spoke about a possible reduction in annual subscriptions each year if you had the magazine electronically, worth considering. We have all seen what is happening to print media in Australia the costs are considerable & people these days have embraced tablets with a fervour, personally I read my newspaper on my IPad daily (the best 60th birthday present ever). More information on the Indian Reveal, click on the link below
Indian Reveal at Daytona
Burt Munro’s birthday is today, he was born in Edenvale New Zealand in 1899, since he died in 1977 the legend has outgrown the man. It is nice to see that Indian built a tribute bike with the new 111 Thunderstroke engine in it this will be having a run I believe later this year , wonder if it will exceed the 1920 Scout engined original. Don’t forget the meeting tomorrow night as the guys from Indian will be there to show us all the stuff about the new engine & hopefully more details on the Munro homage replica. Your Smoke Signals quarterly Association magazine is out electronically the hard copy will be produced after Easter, something about this electronic age, it is fast. And lastly 200,000 hits on our website, the Americans are well & truly beating the Indian’s with a 20% view the next is the aussie’s at 42%, most of the Yank’s are Californian’s but we have everyone of each of the States view us at some time or other, so how come we have few members from the States?
The Sitting Bull Rally was on over the week-end with 17 bikes (9 Indians) and 21 people it was enjoyed by all, although the Motel was average in Albury with a powerpoint arcing out in the night, then after a room change a large cockroach on my pillow, for awhile I thought it was a chocolate! Anyway the venue will change next year, Peter Kime deserves the hard luck award with his 1938 Chief deciding that it liked the trailer to much, he was sidelined by a new dud battery.The rides, set out by Leo Clausen were excellent thanks Leo, he even arranged great weather, I believe in Melbourne it poured
We have all heard those chant’s just add in the brand name:Indian,,Crocker,Henderson,Norton, Triumph,Ariel,Royal Enfield,BSA,Matchless,AJS,Velocette,Vincent,& the cars Mini,VW Beetle,Maybach,Bugatti,Morgan, Ford (when not made in USA) so if they are not real build one yourself & then put one of the above names on it to see what happens, in a month you will have a court writ on you to sue for thousands of $’s. Tomorrow you will see a real Indian engine produced by Polaris-Indian as real as any “clunker” that Springfield produced remember that when a whole bike is made later this year, all the narrow minded people with the “End of Story 1953 “T”shirts remember this, the “IIRA have always supported any Indian ever made whatever year”, bet there is going to be a lot of people regretting what they said not long ago. The picture above is a real Morgan as real as any with a 2lt S&S engine disc brakes & a Mazda 5 speed gearbox first one since 1939 I believe, Steve York sent the picture of the most reliable Indian he says, with zero miles, he does’nt quote hours though apparently it was originally fitted to a despatch tow
CPS (Club Permit Scheme)Renewals The IIRA has been advised that the AOMC (Association Of Motoring Clubs) has received many reports from member clubs of CPS holders NOT receiving their renewal notices or receiving them late. This has resulted in the vehicle becoming UNREGISTERED. This means that the driver of the vehicle is liable for a large fine if found to be driving the vehicle while the CPS is not valid! We understand that VicRoads allows only a short period of grace for renewal. If this is exceeded then the vehicle is considered unregistered and will need to undergo a fresh Roadworthy Test before reregistering on the CPS.VicRoads advise that the process of issuing CPS renewal notices has been “contracted out” and that renewal notices are now typically sent to owners about 4 weeks before expiry (in contrast to fully registered vehicles where renewals are sent out about 6 weeks before expiry).Clubs are strongly reminded to alert their members that responsibility for registration of a vehicle is with the owner and that they should check their renewal dates. Go check your Club Permit renewal dates NOW and mark your diary to chase up the renewal around 3 weeks PRIOR to the expiry – it is YOUR responsibility to do this! If an owner has not received their CPS renewal notice within say 2 weeks of expiry then they should take the receipt of their previous payment to a VicRoads office and request that a new renewal notice be generated on the spot. The AOMC has received reports that although the owner may have made a payment and received a receipt, the payment has not been processed in the CPS database and vehicle is recorded as unregistered hence no renewal notice has been generated for the following year. Note that changes of address need to be advised to VicRoads for all vehicles and driver’s licences. As the CPS vehicles are recorded on a separate database from the fully registered vehicles and driver’s licences these address changes need to be separately advised to VicRoads for the CPS vehicles. The above issues have been formally raised with VicRoads by the AOMC.You have been warned – what a shame that the public servants that WE pay for with OUR taxes seem incapable of performing the work we pay them to do.
Some photos taken during the 1st half of the ride yesterday. The ride was very well managed, hats off to Ian Rhook for planning an excellent ride. Speeds were sensible and I would have to give a 10 out of 10 for corner marking, well done. Chrissy York should be congratulated on here chocolate presentation, nice touch having the names of motorcycles in the chocolate.The 3rd Anniversary Run of our Association commencing was well worth waiting for, last year it was Trout Fishing, next years will be interesting, the Tour of the Master Motorcycle painter Ray Drever’s shed was great but then he took us a little further down the road to his friend Macca, this guy has a amazing collection of everything from cut-throat razors to 1950’s toys, most of the guys were amazed & were then consoled at how moderate there own sheds were Peter Kime