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Thank you very much NABD for supporting me back into Triking!
I am an ex-biker due to a wagon driver who had just scraped enough ice of his windscreen to almost see where he was going on a cold December morning. He chose not to see me and did a right turn in front of my old BSA. Result, me under his wheels and both of us late for work (he by a few hours, me for years). Following time in the spinal unit I returned to the road in a wheelchair and a little blue invalid carriage powered by a Villiers engine (almost identical to the one I had in an old Trails bike).
A mate visited me on his Triumph Bonneville, and to cheer me up he hoisted me onto the pillion seat, not a good idea, I had little balance and my legs kept falling of the pegs, I got off knowing that my biking days were over.
So, on with life without a bike, even though throughout my life bikes had always been present, my dad had bikes, so did his mates, my earliest memories are in his shed, a bike in bits, him fixing or re-making parts. Then going on holiday in a Canterbury sidecar, mum pillion on the BSA Goldflash my dad rode.
Many years later I started going to the Kent Custom Show and the Bulldog Bash, looking at trikes, I got in touch with an old mate Odgie, (who was then editor of BSH) he ran an ad for me and soon I was looking at a selection of trikes.
In the end I bought a rolling chassis and a Yam XS 750 US Custom engine, with the help of Preston Dave we towed it back to dad’s shed and left him to invent some hand controls! Being a genius he did, so I was back on the road!
I then got a job in Poole, Dorset, a long way from my native Lancashire so reluctantly selling the trike to a mate with a spinal injury I set off south.
I then discovered bike night on Poole quay, thousands of bikes, a few trikes, did I regret selling the trike? Then one night I saw the most beautiful trike, another Yam, this time an 1100, I overheard the woman I now know as Helen saying it was up for sale, I was very interested but what about sorting the hand controls? Sadly my dad had died recently; I was hundreds of miles from my mates. The trike was bright yellow, British Telecom yellow, my dad used to work for BT, he had left me a little money, enough to buy the trike, it seemed the right thing to do, Helen said why don’t you try NABD for advice and support for the hand controls?
So I did, they couldn’t have been more helpful, particularly Shirley in the NABD office, soon I had the Klictronic gearchanger and Helen and her partner Ian had made contact with Phil Read of MBT Custom Motorcycles of Exeter (01392 666107). He suggested fitting a link brake from a Moto Guzzi, Helen and Ian very kindly towed the trike on the two hour journey to Exeter and picked it up when the work was finished.
Phil did a great job and Helen and Ian could not have done more to help and advise me, they have also been very patient whilst everything fell into place. Helen is also a great photographer and took the shots of the trike, I think I have made two new good mates and I am looking forward to riding this summer.
I am fifty this year so I think an early birthday present is in order, I hope my old man approves!
Tony Heaton
This NABD grant of £800.00 was sponsored by donations
in memory of Stevie Dandy
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