Latest Triumph photos

Here are the latest photos of the Triumph.

The image above (posted last time) shows the bottom ends intact on the frame jig.

Here they are broken down and ready to start procuring the needed parts for freshening and reassembly.

This is what is left when a 29 pound block (from this post)  is machined to make the blower manifold.

These photos show the blower, manifold and head set together to verify that they do in fact fit as an assembly.

Second Bonneville Project Officially Underway

Having run the 1967 Triumph T-120 Bonneville on the salt last fall and run afoul of a cosmetic technicality, the suggestion was made by the tech officials to return and compete in a less-constrained class.  Being the free-spirited types we are, the decision was made to go back with a similar bike in class to the Ducati we ran last year and are returning with this October.

The first question was “what”, then “how” and then “why?”   Jim Haraughty was the principal of the project, so he elected to stay with the 650cc pushrod format.  The logical choice was to stay with the Triumph 650cc pushrod platform.  This answered the “what”.

The record he opted for was the A (special chassis construction) Pushrod Blown Fuel.  This will involve a chassis built by guess who (the “how”).  The Blown part caught my attention as I had just found a cute little 2-lobe Roots-Type supercharger and didn’t want no stinking mufflers or exhaust restrictions (turbos) on this one.

I haven’t built a blower bike in many years and the thought of blown Methanol with a whisper of Nitro sounded sort of fun.  Poor Jim’s eyes got about as big as pie plates when the mention of Nitro came up and a visit to Arnie Heller’s shop on a billet aluminum buying spree didn’t help.  Arnie is my frame of reference on turbo/gas/nitrous used on the Ducati project but he has always had an aversion to Nitro as being unpredictable and destructive (coming from a guy who replaced cases and cranks every two races with the gas/juice combination that made enough hp to go 219 mph).  Discussing his current project and his exposure to Nitro got Jim going, but at the end Arnie did admit that “there isn’t anything like it”.