"Ok, so we know the mainstream bike industry have been co-opting the custom scene for years now. Our Gary Inman, valued contrib, Sideburn supremo and Dirt Quake impresario, pointed out as much in our recent feature thread on the custom "
Vintage Bike Crush: Rudge TTR 350 Radial Head
pre-war Rudge beauty floats our boat...
Having our head buried in the world of pre-war motorcycles these last few weeks, we’ve been slowly turned on to the whole world of the vintage thumper.
Theirs is a strange, basic beauty – especially for someone like me who grew up lusting after the burly superbikes of the 1970s and 1980s.
We’ve thought for a long time that the bikes to which one naturally aspires over a lifetime are those that date from the era in which you discovered your manhood. Not wanting to entwine motorcycles with teenage sexuality too tightly, you understand – but nevertheless, there’s something in the theory and everyone needs a hobby.
We stumbled across this beautiful machine while typically mind-shopping for something to go in the dream garage.
Like many of the sought-after pre-war bikes, it’s a single cylinder overhead valve. This one is a 350 and comes from Rudge – a brand of motorcycle that became defunct just after the war.
They specialised in TT racers and replicas and were known to issue a favourable dirt track racer too. We posted a little bit before about the brand.
We don’t know a lot about this bike except for the fact that it looks simple and beautiful – and remarkably ‘modern’ in its stripped-down lines – especially that view from the bars. Looks like something you might find in your average custom shop.
Strikes us too that this sort of bike would be a beautiful investment – especially in a world increasingly manic for driverless cars and other necessary madness.
See it for sale here…
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