Crackly Menace, Yum-dubber-dubbing And Flatulence: "Use Your Classic" They Say - And Many Do

The time was right, but the noise was different: Yum-dubber-dum-dum-dum-dum-dum... 

There's three bikes go through my village to near watch-setting time accuracy between 830 and 845am just about every weekday. Automotive journalist Iain Macauley explores the topic further.  

There's the thrum of a new-ish BMW R1300GS, the fruity burr of a Triumph Speed Triple with a slightly cheeky non-standard exhaust, and the turbine whine of a Honda CB1000R. 

I can hear them cogging down the box before a right turn into the road that takes them past my house and out into the country as a local-knowledge alternative route to avoid the parallel dual-carriageway-into-single-lane anger-fest that can be the A-road into Manchester. Even bikes avoid it. 

The engine sounds are set in my sub-consciousness, and I'll flick a glance from my upstairs office window as each bike passes. 

But this was supposed to be Triumph time. Instead, the yum-dubber-dubber n-wooored by. Rider was wearing his same bike gear, but the bike was a V-plate - 1979 - MZ150 two-stroke. They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder. I'll let that hang. 

Photo curtesy of H&H Classics

But there's something about that bike. In the same way a functional van can excite a bloke, after a bit of Googling the MZ suddenly started to press the buttons and appeal as a functional, bomb-proof, no-nonsense and no-excuses potential additional to the Macauley bike fleet that I'm trying to at least cap or maintain, but inevitably sees new arrivals and swaps. 

When the mid-June rains hit, I didn't expect to see it again. But I did, for the entire week. I'd love to talk to the owner and find out whether it's his bad-weather disposable bike, or an enduring novelty. 

The following week my ears subconsciously picked up another slightly different exhaust note. Definitely BMW, but definitely different. 

It was usually-GS rider, but on a deep red BMW R80/7, 1980. I knew it was the R80/7 because I know where the GS usually parked up outside offices near my closest supermarket, and it was in that spot. 

Both are flat twins, barely a washer likely to be interchangeable between them, but the same fundamental thrum, the R80's perhaps a bit more, well, flatulent. 

You notice funny little things, and that the rider changed up a gear right outside my window was  consistent with the GS gear-change timing. Sure enough, there was the trademark lifting of the rear as power was reapplied after hooking it into third.  

That gear-change rise was something I'd first seen as a kid, watching legendary racer Helmut Dahne at the Imola 200.  

It was early in my bike-geek formative years, but it confused me as to while other bikes squatted under acceleration, his BMW lifted its back end. It's a trait I've never really understood, but has stuck with me for decades. I once test rode an R1100RT to get a sense of the feeling of the movement. 

One day, though, the CB1000R didn't whine by. Regardless of which bike he'd be on I'd recognise him. Big lad who'd somehow obtained and squeezed into Marc Marquez-style Repsol Honda leathers from a few years back. 

Must have changed jobs - or route - because I saw him on the M56 motorway on one of my rare forays into rush hour traffic in a car. 

The following Monday, summer sunshine having returned, and another rare rush hour car trip, I eased up behind a 1972 Kawasaki 750 H2 three-cylinder two-stroke on that same stretch of M56. First I noticed the noise - a crackly edge-of-menace sound - then the two-stroke haze, then the big lad in the Marc Marquez leathers. Except he looked bigger because "big" 1970s bikes look like 2025 250s. 

  

Photo curtesy of H&H Classics

If there's one line I continually hear from the experts, it's "use your classic" - which is precisely what I see if three commuting bikers are to go by. 

But while they may say that as part of an urge to give them longevity, perhaps we should consider another aspect. 

When I ride my classics I ride them differently, not sparing the rev-range to enjoyment of a swooping country road ride, but being that little bit more observant as to what's going on around me - whether it's potholes or idiots. 

That's a sometimes overlooked satisfaction arising from riding old bikes.