Ariel 500

Did you know that at a distance it’s very difficult to tell red from yellow? How do I know this astounding fact you may ask yourself? Well, when you're stopped on the side of the Brussels to Ostend motorway having run out of fuel, and are waiting for one of the (yellow) motorway breakdown patrol wagons to appear on the scene, the colour of approaching vehicles becomes of paramount importance.
 
At first you can distinguish red or yellow (and, I suppose, orange) vehicles from the rest, but it’s not until they get closer that you can be sure of the exact colour. Anyway, after about an hour’s wait a little yellow Renault came into view and a patrolman sold me a few litres of precious petrol at double the going rate, thereby enabling my companion and I to continue our journey to Ostend. No doubt, these days, the Brussels to Ostend motorway has service stations dotted along its length, but the year was 1963 and the motorway had only just been opened. I knew as I swung onto the motorway at Brussels that I was low on fuel but I thought that there would be at least one place to fill up. I was wrong.
 
At the time we were returning from a holiday in Austria, using for transport my 1950's Ariel 500 single and Garrard S90 sidecar. I dare say many readers are familiar with the Ariel Red Hunter singles - well this was the cooking version - a VG not a VH. The S90 was a large single seater sidecar encased in a loop frame of generous proportions and with provision for a Dicky seat in the boot.
 
The Ariel I had purchased about a year previously. The bloke I bought it from said he had just done it up, but things did not go well to begin with as it broke its crankpin on the way home. This was no doubt due to the aforementioned vendor not having aligned the flywheels properly. However, this was my first bike and I was ignorant of such things at the time.
 
All I knew was as I accelerated away from a corner there was a loud bang and the engine became a lot rougher. It still kept going and so I continued home at a reduced speed. You see, the crankpin had broken exactly in the middle and so the big-end eye of the con-rod prevented the assembly from actually falling apart altogether. The flywheels had wobbled about horribly, scooping a lot of metal from the inside of the crankcase in the process. I duly obtained a new crankpin and a brand new set of ex-WD crankcases from Pride & Clark for around £3. After about a years work, I reckoned that I had got the Ariel pretty reliable and fit for the rigours of a Continental trip.
 
The sidecar came from a different source - or I should say sources because the body came from George Clarke’s emporium in Brixton Hill and the chassis from somewhere in the north of London for a fiver. I knew, of course, that the body needed a fair bit of work, but when I had stripped out all the rotten wood I was left with the nose assembly and just two aluminium side panels about four feet long attached. All the rest I threw away except for the boot lid which was in reasonable condition. As it happened it was the Easter holidays and I had a two week break from my studies, so I was able to put the time to good use. Carpentry and upholstery made a welcome change from engine rebuilding, anyway.
 
I was quite pleased with the result, but the original nose portion wasn’t exactly as stiff as it should have been. No doubt all the glue had dropped out of the joints enabling the assembly to adopt various lozenge like attitudes. I solved the problem by bracing it with an inverted U made from welded up 2x2” steel angle. Possibly a bit of overkill but it never moved after that.
 
To return to the story of the holiday. Two weeks previously my friend and I had set out to make for Austria. I can’t now remember, after more than 25 years all that happened on that trip, nor the exact order in which events took place, but that which follows is an account of some of the more memorable incidents.
 
I must have been having trouble with the scavenging right from the start because I can recollect an English motorist gesticulating at me at the docks in order to bring to my attention a fact which I knew quite well namely, that there was oil dripping out of the timing chest onto the exhaust pipe making little sizzling noises and enveloping the outfit in a kind of blue haze. This was due to the return side of the oil pump not working properly and thus allowing the crankcase to overfill with oil, which then tried to find its way out of any weak spots.
 
It must have been about the second or third day when we spent the whole time in the car park of the hotel taking the oil pump off, wiping everything clean, tapping the little balls onto their seats, reassembling the pump, etc., going out for a test run only to find there was still nothing coming back up the return pipe to the tank - and then repeating the process all over again. We set off the next day not at all sure that the problem was cured.
 
Nor was it. Once on the Autobahn and heading south, frequent checks on the oil tank showed the level to be steadily dropping. About 20 kilometres short of Ulm, I brought the outfit to a halt with virtually no lubricant left in the tank and phoned the breakdown services. After a while, a motorway patrol turned up. It transpired that I had stopped not far from a tunnel under the Autobahn used for getting cattle from one side to the other. And on the other side of the Autobahn, a little distance back, was a filling station. I set off on foot and returned shortly afterwards clutching three one litre cans of oil. Two of these I poured into the tank, and off we set intending to review the situation in Ulm.
 
There I stopped once more to inspect the oil level - miracles of miracles - it was about a quarter inch from the top. The pump had suddenly decided to start working properly, and had even scavenged all the excess oil out of the crankcase. I never had any more trouble with the oil pump after that.
 
It must have been wet at one stage on the journey south. Not possessing the money to purchase any decent riding gear, and in particular boots, I had bought some ex-naval elasticated plastic sleeves which pulled on over the top of shoes and trousers. Whilst these items were not particularly effective at keeping water out, they were extremely efficient at keeping it in. I shall never forget the look of astonishment on the face of a German bystander when we stopped at some village and I solemnly removed my footwear, pouring approximately a pint of water from each. Why the English should wish to ride around with their feet immersed in liquid he obviously could not comprehend.
 
The only other incident I can remember on the outward direction was suffering total and complete brake fade whilst descending the pass into Inn valley. We had unfortunately not followed Jerome’s advice in Three Men And A Boat - and took everything we thought we might need, rather than what we knew we couldn't do without. Consequently, the sidecar was laden with all manner of items including a large holdall of tools. And with just 7” toy brakes front and rear, I suppose it was not so surprising that the front stopper got so hot that the grease from the hub began to burn off, pouring smoke over the Austrian landscape.
 
It is about 750 miles to Iglis, our destination, and it took us six days to get there. Even allowing for a complete day wasted on oil pump maintenance, the average was clearly not very good. Things would have been better on the way back as we set ourselves a three day target. In the meantime, we had a pleasant five days wandering about the area having as little to do with motorcycles as possible.
 
Indeed, we made a much better average on the return journey, the old outfit being good for about 50mph cruising with the odd burst up to 60mph. That is, until the rear chain broke. I had been ignoring the clanking sound from down below for some time, but eventually the lower chain guard dug into the chain and flipped a link out. The remainder of the chain very quickly packed itself neatly up behind the primary chain case where it resisted all efforts at dislodging it. But it had not reckoned with the resourcefulness of the local German garage mechanic. Placing the machine on a couple of wooden orange boxes he then disappeared underneath armed with a lump hammer and a large chisel. He recovered the chain by the simple, if risky, expedient of belting the gearbox sprocket around.
 
Our enforced stoppage was now made more memorable by the appearance of Rip Van Winkle in person. At any rate this strange character arrived in a pre-war DKW car (the two cylinder version, not the later three cylinder) and skidded to a halt, although one of the hub caps kept on going and had to be retrieved by my companion. The DKW owner was the only man I'd ever seen who had a beard which reached below his waist.
 
Somewhere else on the way back I observed my friend gesticulating wildly from the chair. As the bike was obviously running superbly at the time, I merely told him to shut up and let me get on with the driving. But he would have none of it, and so I brought the outfit to a halt yet once more. What had happened was that the strap retaining the dynamo had broken and the retaining nut had fallen off, allowing the dynamo to travel out sideways, where it hung swinging on its leads.
 
Hence the reason for my passenger’s excitement. I re-fixed it with insulating tape which appeared to be just as good as the original method of retention. Apart from running out of fuel in Belgium as previously recounted, the return journey was made without further incident and we made the ferry terminal in good time. Once on the boat we met another motorcyclist who had ridden overland from Malaya on a Royal Enfield Bullet. I couldn't help but feel it put our little trip into perspective.
 
Peter Godwin