Triumph of the Spirit

Triumph OF THE Spirit

One man's attempt at salvation in metal and chrome

GEOFF DRAKE

A young man, clad in jeans and a white T-shirt, watches a beautiful, twotone Triumph Bonneville 650 pass him on the street. The rumble is visceral. He feels it through his feet, and it goes from there directly to his cerebral cortex. Though the Triumph is beyond his means, in that moment it becomes his destiny. Someday, some way, he will alter his fate with a British vertical-Twin and a double yellow line. This would be his way of setting himself apart. It would be his Triumph, literally and figuratively. For all these reasons, and a host of others he could not name, he needed that bike... '35 YEARS LATER, I AM THE OWNER OF A RED 1969 Triumph-the object of my desire those many years ago. Though they cost just $1299 new in ’69, I bought this highly used one for $2500, because it is now deemed “collectible.” As I inspect the bike, time’s ravages are apparent. The finish is chipped (the bike was painted black somewhere along the way), and tatty-looking wires dangle from beneath the seat. There is a big dent in the oil tank, as if the bike had been kicked with a heavy work boot. Every bolt shows a fine patina of rust. But every motorcyclist knows that a bike has a soul that is unalterable by time or nature. When I look at my newly acquired old Triumph, I sense this. Moreover, I am counting on it. Like so many men who are growing old too quickly and saddled with uncertain futures, I hope to summon the power of a motorcycle to alter my fate. My aim is to restore the Triumph to its former glory. In this way, I will be battling 30 years of entropy-my own, and the Triumph’s. Before long, this project will take on new, unexpected dimensions, carrying me through the death of my father, a layoff from my job of 10 years and other events demanding mechanical and emotional repair.

I realize that we are alike, this Triumph and I. We both contain something vital-if only it can be uncovered and given new luster. This will take some labor. My hope now is the same as it was that day in 1969-to achieve a sort of salvation in metal and chrome, a Triumph, in every sense. Over the next five months, every nut, bolt and washer will pass through my hands in more than 500 hours of hand labor.

ÏLL ALONG, I KNEW I WANTED TO RESTORE A Triumph Twin. But I also knew that finding one would not be easy. After all, as with any collectible, only a finite number exist, as the remaining ones are acquired, crashed and destroyed, or returned to nature, corroding in a field somewhere, forgotten. I scour the papers, the Internet and local shops, following leads wherever I find them. These bikes are generally one extreme or the other. Bastardized and beyond hope, or hopelessly overpriced. One day, as I inquire at the parts counter of a local shop, a guy standing next to me says perfunctorily, “I have a ’69 I’d like to sell.” I turn to see a slightly graying man with a goatee and the hardened look of a longtime rider. This is Doug, a kind and somewhat tragic loner who will become a fixture in my life during the next year. We arrange to meet. I pull up a dirt drive in the mountains on my gleaming, modern BMW RI 100R and find a slightly ramshackle house in the redwoods. The grounds are a memorial to the British motorcycle industry. In the driveway is his own Triumph Bonneville (bought new in 1969) and the TR6 that he is willing to sell. A TR6 is exactly the same as a Bonnie, but with one carburetor instead of two. While some feel a TR6 lacks the panache and performance aura of a Bonnie, there are others who prefer it for its simplicity and rideability. In the shadowy recesses of the garage, I spy the hulks of five or six more bikes, at once recognizing the svelte presence of a dirt-worthy Triumph Cub. As my eyes adjust, I see posters, old motorcycle magazines wrapped in plastic and, most amazingly, floor-to-ceiling shelving with the cadavers of no fewer than eight British parallel-Twins stacked like cordwood. I have found a Triumph enthusiast’s Mother Lode. Doug is passionate about all things Triumph, and it makes

me feel good to have connected with an aficionado. Yet, I have some vague sense that this transaction runs deeper than money. “To tell the truth, I’d rather not sell it,” he says, with his head down. He then launches into the debacle that is his life: lost job, divorce and the loneliness of living way back in the woods with only a motorcycle shop worth of Triumphs for companionship. He is selling under duress. Talk of motorcycles clearly assuages the pain of all this, and Doug, beer in hand, starts gushing with the enthusiasm of a lifelong Triumph devotee. He speaks in the effusive, non-stop manner of one who is consumed by a thing. He lives alone in the hills. His new job is on the block. But amidst these vagaries, there are Triumphs. Down in the bowels of these machines, even amidst the rattling pistons and fickle electrics, is a strange kind of security. Life may be beyond analysis and reason, but things make sense in a rocker box.

AN I RIDE IT?” I ASK. “SURE,” SAYS DOUG, IN A WAY that makes me realize we are already at ease with each other. I strain to remember the arcane Triumph starting ritual, a precise sequence that is the secret

handshake of Britbike owners everywhere. I swing a leg over and tickle the carburetor, causing gasoline to run down the back of my hand. I finger the choke lever, pull in the clutch and kick it over a few times to free the plates and prime the motor. Then I turn on the ignition, noting the faintest movement in the ammeter-the patient showing a sign of life. One more kick, and the TR6 comes gloriously to life.

Then I shift into gear and am under way. I twist the grip and find the Triumph is surprisingly willing. I lean into a curve on the aging, wax-hard Avon tires and accelerate out with surprising alacrity, eliciting a broad grin. And, oh, that soundl While I love my modern, whisper-quiet BMW, I also harbor the base desire to rattle a few windows. The Triumph fills this need nicely. When I turn back into the driveway, Doug is there, spare beer in hand, wearing a big smile. He knew it would be so, because he’s been there himself-the well-feathered edges of those old Avons are evidence of that. Old motorcycles bring a peculiar pleasure that registers deep in the soul. Clearly, I must have this bike, and Doug knows it. He’s got the disease, too. Doug proffers a deal: If I pay full asking price, he will be my consultant and mechanical tutor for the duration of the project. My first instinct, of course, is to haggle. But for some inexplicable reason, I trust this guy. And I also have a sense that I will need all the help I can get. I decide to invest in this machine, in Doug, and perhaps in the inherent goodness of people to do as they say they will. It is not the last time this project will require such a leap of faith. On a sunny Saturday, I withdraw a fistful of cash from the bank and catch a ride up to Doug’s Triumph boneyard in the mountains above Santa Cruz. I fire up the bike without incident and ride tentatively home on expired tags, trying to be conscious of every gearchange. The bike shifts on the right, instead of the left as with my BMW. This leads to a few spastic moments as I stab the rear brake when actually intending to shift, or vice versa, with the bike lurching and grinding from my rusty inputs. Riding home down familiar Route 9, a famous local motorcycle road, is like time travel. Of course, I stall four times, in full view of 10 motorists. “Poor guy,” they must think. “He can’t afford a modern bike.” I am happy to encourage the illusion. Despite all this, the TR6 sounds positively symphonic, all its internal parts operating in a precise ballet of din and confusion. I am irrepressibly happy.

AM RELUCTANT TO BEGIN A COMPLETE TEARDOWN. jr\ Instead, I opt to refurbish small, manageable pieces of the bike and keep it roadworthy in the interim. After all, I want to ride this bit of history. Today, I spent four hours working on the four inches of the left handgrip area. I removed the old, rusted horn button. I detached, cleaned and lubed the clutch lever and its parts. I installed the new horn button I bought, cleaned that section of the bar and the cable clip, and attempted to “bring up” the mirror, before finally declaring it a candidate for the trash. So now I am extrapolating. If a tiny, four-inch area took this long to refurbish, I figure I only have, oh, about 10,000 hours to go. Good thing I am enjoying myself. Next, I decide to tackle the rear wheel. I remove it, repack the bearings, inspect the brake shoes, lube the actuating cams, replace a broken spoke, replace the tire, repaint the drum and polish every bit of visible metal. At the same time, I replace the blown rear shocks with lookalike modern equivalents. (I am careful to store away the original Girlings-they have value, even if they don’t work worth a damn.) Then I reassemble the whole thing. This rear wheel project is miniscule compared to what lay ahead, but it’s a milestone nonetheless. It makes me think that I can still spin a wrench, even after a pencil-pushing interlude of some 20 years. It’s a kind of symbolic victory, and with it comes the confidence to move on. With the Triumph back on its wheels, I take it for a ride, the refurbished rear wheel glistening in the sunlight. Once again, I am struck by how spirited this bike is. The feeling is partly derived from the visceral quality of all old Triumphs, but it is also a feature of motorcycling in general. It’s a

sport that induces a different state of consciousness, known to every practitioner but never given a name. For me, it is like being “hyper-aware.” When riding the Triumph on a mountain road, my sensory inputs are wide open. I feel every power pulse, every irregularity in the pavement. I scan ahead to the next curve, and in the mirror, to the curve behind. Two fingers lay gently on the brake, the other hand on the clutch. Amidst it all is a constant monitoring of the engine and the myriad noises coming from it-a kind of psychological tachometer. Meanwhile, the smells of the country are wafting through the opening in my helmet. I’m noting the mottled shadows cast across the road, the colors of the changing landscape. I’m wide open, and what’s coming at me feels good, going straight to my pleasure center.

AM DISCOVERING THAT IT TAKES A VILLAGE TO I restore a motorcycle. I have assembled a menagM erie of help for this project. There is Ian, a disheveled Brit with a dry sense of humor, who does my metal polishing and bead blasting. There is Danny, a custom car guy who I’ve hired to paint the tank, sidepanels, mudguards, fork lowers and headlight ears. I also have a powdercoater for the frame and associated bits. Sundry advice comes from friends, local mechanics, anyone who is willing. Their names have become as familiar to my family as those of our neighbors. They are “my boys.” In this way, a restoration project is the supreme juggling act. At most times I have four vendors working in concert, like a sort of symphony. And, like a symphony, they will all come together in a grand crescendo to create the finished Triumph-or so I hope. And of course, there is Doug, who is my guiding light for the motor, with its dark recesses and British quirkiness. Together, we develop a master plan. I’ll pull out the engine, bring it to him at his home in the redwoods, and we’ll spend consecutive weekends re-doing the top end and whatever else needs looking after. During the first weekend, I’ll make a list of parts, take away the cylinder head and rocker boxes for cleaning, and come back with an armload of parts for another Sunday or two worth of work. It will proceed in this stepwise fashion until the motor is done, at which time Doug will drop it off at my home for final installation in the freshly powdercoated frame.

As I survey the carnage that is my workshop, that day seems a long way off.

T’S NOT JUST THE PHYSICAL RESTORATION PROCESS that takes time; it is the gradual accumulation of knowledge. I know a lot more about the Triumph than I did six months ago, but I do not exist in the same universe as Doug. I may have graduated from college, but in the domain of Triumphs, he has achieved a

doctorate. He knows, for instance, that you must always be conscious of the fact that the electrical system has a positive ground to avoid pyrotechnics in the region under the seat. He knows that non-stock, \3Ainch header pipes will produce

more low-end power at the expense of high-end punch. He knows that Triumphs last had metal

shrouds over the rear shock absorbers in 1968, and that 1969 front brakes were the best ever offered. Such knowledge, more than new parts and fresh paint, is what makes a restoration.

The pursuit of this arcane knowledge is starting to captivate me, and I can understand its allure. At night I find myself reading the Triumph parts book-for fun. The following passage, from a 30-year-old shop manual, fascinates me like the climax of a good novel:

The engine is of unit construction having two aluminium alloy mating crankcase halves, the gearbox housing being an integral part of the right half crankcase and the primary chain case an integral part of the left half crankcase. The aluminium alloy cylinder head has cast in Austenitic valve seat inserts, and houses the overhead valves, which are operated by rocker arms housed in detachable alloy rocker boxes...

And so it goes, page after page. I must have fallen under the spell of this project, for I can read things like this in a state of transfixed attention, even mouthing the word, alyou-minium. My wife happens to look over my shoulder and confirms that I seem to have gone quietly insane, claiming that reading a shop manual for entertainment is tantamount to reading the phone book.

So be it. It is a sign of my newfound madness. The right madness.

One evening I go out to the garage and realize that there is nothing there you could call a motorcycle. The engine is at Doug’s; the tank and mudguards are at Danny’s; the frame and miscellaneous bits are at the powdercoater. In my garage are 50 or so plastic sandwich bags containing a jumble of parts and ID tags, with explicit instructions (written by me, to me) for reassembly. It looks like the remnants of a prehistoric archaeological dig, and is just as daunting. I can only wonder, will it ever come back together again?

It’s so tempting to take the motor to Raber’s, my local Triumph shop and reliable parts source. I could just drop it off one day and pick it up six weeks later in a pristine state of tune. How sweet! I could bring home the fresh motor, drop it in the frame and it would be a one-kick affair. Vroom.

But for deep reasons I won’t ever know for sure, I must do this myself. Maybe I want to know-just for the sake of knowing-that I have been in the deepest bowels of the machine and emerged with nothing more than the knowledge it has been done. I decide to press on and do it myself, the hard way.

AM BEGINNING TO BLUSH WITH CONFIDENCE ABOUT this project. The paint and powdercoating are done, and the motor nearly so. Feeling in a celebratory mood, I take my family out for Mexican food. Upon returning home, the message light is flashing. It’s my brother-in-law. The message says, succinctly, that my father-a lifelong fitness enthusiast and tennis player-keeled over and died of a heart attack at age 76.

My father was a surprisingly willing participant in my motorcycle transformation. In 1972, in defiance of reason, propriety and my mother, he allowed me to purchase a minibike, the type with a wheezing Briggs & Stratton engine and perennially slipping centrifugal clutch. I can still feel

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the finned grips beneath my fingers, the anticipatory thrill of twisting the throttle and, of course, the utter lack of appreciable response from the engine.

The little bike produced an inimitable slide toward bigger and better machines.

In the next few years, I marched through a steady progression in roughly 1 OOcc increments. Each of these purchases was facilitated, and financed, by my father.

Not once do I remember him expressing anger or anguish at my obsession with two wheels. On the contrary, he encouraged such forays and called them part of my “education.”

The Triumph is set aside while we make plans to fly east, attend the funeral and complete grim tasks involving paperwork, lawyers and sorting through decades of personal effects.

I was close to my father and had spoken to him numerous times about my big project. Apparently, he had been telling anyone who would listen that “my son is restoring a Triumph.” He liked the idea.

Given this fact, my project will become his project. There is no question now. It will be done.

/Bpi^HLITTLE BIT OF A CHASM OPENED BETWEEN DOUG yr / and me today. He senses that I want things to be VLJHHBI just so, for the sake of “correctness,” and that’s not his style. Though he is a lifelong machinist and mechanic, he is no perfectionist. He seems to get impatient with, for instance, my urge to polish a cylinder mounting nut before reinstalling it. He wants to slam the engine in the frame, but I want some time with it on the workbench, to detail all the nuts and bolts, and to savor it all. Just to needle me, I think, he seals the alternator wire where it emerges from the crankcase with a huge, unsightly glob of silicone. It looks as if someone pasted chewing gum on the motor. I let him do this, but resolve to later redo the whole area. Nonetheless, he’s made his statement: “Loosen up, pal.” Throughout this project, Doug has played the role of allknowing sensei. I have allowed and even encouraged his role-playing-after all, I want to learn. But unwittingly, I have fostered an image of myself as a somewhat ham-fisted, helpless mechanic. Consequently, when Doug finally arrives to drop off the refurbished motor, his eyes go wide at the sight

of the freshly painted, reconditioned and rewired chassis. He seems to freeze in his tracks. “Whoa,” he says. “It’s just beautiful. “ Did he not think me capable? For a moment, I find the implication offensive. But inside, I’m gloating. “You’ve done a great job, Geoff,” he says with pride. Now if I can just make it run.

W\l HERE ARE OTHER EVENTS, BESIDES MY FATHER’S l/ _ i death, ing in in February, that color the this company project. On human-resources a Monday morndirector is waiting in the conference room. This is odd, because she works in the main office, 3000 miles away. She is there to deliver a message: We are to clean out our desks by the end of the day, turn in our corporate credit cards and surrender our keys. I and my entire staff have been given pink slips.

Initially, this event would seem to make the restoration less important. After all, I’ll need to devote lots of time to a job search. But to my way of thinking, this event-combined with my father’s death-make it even more critical to finish the project. Each such event adds a layer of importance,

and the restoration has suddenly acquired a whole new scale.

That night, I am out in the garage againpolishing bolts. Moving the project forward. Moving my life forward.

After months of painstaking assembly, the day has arrived. Time to kick over the TR6R and see if it runs or if I have committed some grave and fatal omission-like leaving a valve spring on the floor of the garage.

I perform the usual starting ritual, and to my great surprise, the bike sputters willingly to life. Exuberantly, wearing shorts and a T-shirt, I ride it out into the neighborhood, sporting a grin so stupidly effusive it threatens to crack my helmet.

Then, with an air of inevitability, the bike dies. It seems I have remembered every critical mechanical detail-except gas.

Within minutes, a succession of wistful ex-Triumph enthusiasts stops to help. This is a phenomenon I will experience repeatedly over the coming months. Triumphs, it seems, have the power to make full-grown men grow positively weepy. Every one has a tale of Triumphs, real or imagined. For them, Triumph ownership is right there with a host of other secret desires: lusts for women other than your wife, and the barely suppressed urge to quit work, stop shaving and circumnavigate the country with nothing more than a toothbrush and credit card.

In their minds’ eyes, they are riding down the boulevard of their dreams, accompanied by the bellow of twin exhausts.

f N LATE MAY, AFTER FOUR MONTHS OF FRUITLESS searching, I am suddenly pushing all the right buttons in the job search. Three offers land on my desk in a week. Frequently, I retreat to the garage at night, beer in hand, to reflect on the journey. The Trophy is as perfect as I can make it, it runs beautifully and has looks to match. I am rattling windows daily, enjoying the music and the pulse of the 36year-old motor. Everything positively hums. Of course, there is still the distinct possibility I will be left standing by the roadside, at midnight, in the rain, hurling epithets at Lucas, Prince of Darkness. No guarantees. But this is true of life, as it is of motorcycles. For the moment, at least, I have used the tools at my disposal to the best of my ability, and the demons remain at rest. No small Triumph. □