Triumphrat

zighawk

Wanting to start a bike and am thinking of using a late '50s - early 60's T100 motor. Any suggestions on the year or anything else? Any suggestions on possible alternatives. I like the 500 but I'm also concerned with locating compatible parts and overall availabilty. Your discussion is appreciated to someone relatively new to Triumphs.

DAGAD

Hi Zighawk, unit or pre-unit 500? There is a big difference! Next question is , what do you want to do with it and what are your expectations?
There is lots of choice out there, so be clear in your requirements and you will get the one for you. Roy

zighawk

Not sure about the 500 but weren't the 650 preunits used until like "62? Whatever, I'm thinking unit just to make my life easier. I'm also looking at the TR6, but I'm in the stage before preplanning. Just trying to get an idea so I can formulate a plan, know what I mean. The end result should be a nonraked bobber type, but once again, I am still in the idea phase. The engine to me is the foundation of a bike and the type I use will determine a lot of other things. Thanks for your feedback.

oilyboot

If you plan to do much long distance riding, a unit 650 or 750 might be a better choice, IMO.
You can gear up enough to make crusing at freeway speeds tolerable, and still get decent performance around town.

A well built 500 can run right with (or outrun) the bigger models, but has to work harder to do it.
It'd make a real nice barhopper, no doubt about that.
I'm not real sure how it would fare on long hard highway runs.

Opinions or experience, anybody?

There's nothing wrong with pre unit models. But parts are getting kinda scarce, to put it mildly.


Here's a good source of model and year info:

http://www.ianchadwick.com/motorcycl...ph/models.html

panda

I converted a 1960 5 TA to T100 and a bit specs in 1962. with a pair of wal phillips fuel injectors 9:1 pistons it would run to 9,000 rpm. but i had in an emergency to revert to the original 7/8ths inch amal. with slightly higher gearing ( 20 tooth gbox sprocket) it turned back about 90mpg and near cost me the bike. up till then it was doing 55-65mpg. and i spilt fuel allover a hot engine thinking i would need to fill it. fortunately it boiled away and did not catch fire. I used to ride to an d from where i was stationed in norfolk to cornwall. 423 miles each way. I did this 3 weekends in a row, then the following weekend would be maintenance weekend. Cruising speeds then were usually around 65mph, with the odd bits of 85-90 when the roads were quiet . note this was before motorways only real hassle i had was it had a tendancy to rip all the teeth off the clutch sprocket ( made by qualcast) until i got one made of gear steel. with todays fuels i would be tempted to use original 7:1 pistons. and 3/5 TA camshafts. Note the unit is small and therefore easy to fit into custome frames. and being unit construction from 1959 all you had to do was line up the gearbox sprocket with the rear wheel sprocket.
I have to say my 1970 650cc trophy was a much nicer touring ride. wish i still had it.
my next bike will either be an old similar trophy, or maybe even an enfield as find i tend to use backroads these days.

__________________
A wise man learns from his mistakes..
A genius learns from other peoples mistakes.

zighawk

This bike will be more for around town with maybe an occasional 50 minute jaunt to Tucson. I really like the single carb 650 but I think the 500 may be the smarter choice for what I want. Anybody got any frame ideas?

DAGAD

For information:
PRE-UNIT 5T Speedtwin was made up to 0200074 - 28/08/1958.
The T100 was made up to 030424 - 25/10/1959.
All these were SINGLE DOWN tube, NO DUPLEX 500s' were built.

The first UNIT 5TA Speedtwin was H5785 - 25/09/1958.
The first UNIT T100 was T100A H11512 - 01/10/1959.

So, history tells us that BOTH pre AND unit ran together. Roy