Apologies if you keep coming here wanting posts on art, comics or teaching. But as it's the bank holiday weekend I feel no guilt about this one - my 1950's Power Pak cyclemotor is now up and running.
The bike itself, a 1960's Triumph was £30 off eBay. This is a very mediocre frame indeed, and certainly nothing to do with the proper Triumph company.
I scraped all the ugly stickers off the frame, removed the mudguards and swapped the tyres for a new set of Schwalbe creme delta cruiser lovelies -
The engine fitting wasn't something I was capable of attempting myself, so I forced it on the magical Mel Cranmer ( - once when I told him I'd been cleaning all morning he retorted "but you don't have a motorbike do you?!"). A couple of hours later, and we've got a working cyclemotor. Which I was dead chuffed with, as I didn't really expect a 1950's piece of kit to actually still function at all (the Power Pak was one of the new products featured in the Festival of Britain back in '55). At 49cc it's not exactly powerful, but there's enough to make it fun, and it sounds wonderful. not been far on it yet, just round the block and along the towpath a bit as it's not exactly road legal - though can be once I've got it registered and certified. Though it's not a motorbike, but a bike with motor assisted pedalling.
You should get one, or one like it. It's better than comics. We could race and everything.
2 comments:
Oliver has posted a real live video of it in action on his blog -
http://trainsare.blogspot.com/2009/06/berlin-and-magnus-quaife.html
Hi there, lovely example of the Power Pak. I wonder if you know of a similar engine or complete bike for sale. That was my first mode of transport, I would love to have one again. This time perhaps I can get it to go properly. A Haywood. arh@blueyonder.co.uk
Post a Comment