Sprints at Bonneville

When I recently went to the Antique Motorcycle Club of America national meet at Denton, N.C., a few of us rode to the American Classic Motorcycle Museum in Asheboro, N.C.  It was strictly H-D, with Knuckles, Pans and Shovels, and a couple of Sprint road bikes.  But, it had some good race posters and two that intrigued me featured a Sprint powered streamliner at Bonneville.

As you can see, in 1964 Roger Reiman went 156mph and a year later George Roeder went 176mph in what appears to be the same streamliner.  I wondered how they gained 20 mph in one year.  All things being equal, it would take a lot more horsepower to gain 20 mph at those speeds.  I spent a little time researching it, going first to Allan Girdler's book 'Harley Racers'.  This has a photo of Roeder with the streamliner which the caption says was built by James 'Stormy' Mangham.  Stormy had built a streamliner powered by a Triumph 650 twin, a Cub, and a 500 Tiger 100 and ridden by Johnny Allen first in 1955 and last in 1959 when Allen crashed and destroyed the 'liner.  In the '60s, Strormy built three streamliners: one similar to the on that was destroyed (and maybe using some of the original), that had a Sprint motor; one larger with had a Sportster motor; one with a Chevy V-8.  Harley got involved and built the Sprint and Sportster motors, with Reiman riding them in '64 and Roeder in '65.

I called my friend John Stein, who wrote the book 'World's Fastest Motorcycle, The Day the Salt Stood Still, Mike Akatiff vs. Denis Manning vs. Sam Wheeler'.  John didn't know any particulars of the Sprint effort, though he believed the Roeder family still owned the Sprint streamliner.  John is very friendly with Denis Manning and suggested that I call him.  Manning built the streamliner powered by a Sportster based motor that Cal Rayborn rode to absolute motorcycle speed record in 1970 of 265.492.  This is featured in the film On Any Sunday.  Manning wasn't involved with the earlier Sprint record, so didn't know any particulars but suggested that the difference in speed between '64 & '65 could have been fuel, but I pointed out that both posters say the times were set with pump gasoline.  Manning thought the difference must be down to the weather and/or salt conditions.  I asked him if there was any way to find out what the weather/salt conditions were in '64 & '65 and he told me that the AMA lost all the Bonneville records and when he ran his BUB event at Bonneville they had to reconstruct old records from magazine articles and the like.  Manning suggested that I might talk to Clyde Denzer, The Harley race department number 2 man to Dick O'Brien, and someone involved in that '70 effort.  I called Peter Zylstra, the man who designed/drew  the XR750 motor, also retired from the Harley race dept.  Peter arrive at H-D right around 1965 and didn't know anything of the earlier Bonneville effort.  I suggested that in '64 the streamliner might have been powered by the long stroke, wet clutch motor and in '65 might have had the revised short stroke, dry clutch motor, but we both questioned that as we thought the short stroke motor came out in '66.  Peter gave me Clyde Denzer's number and I called him.  He was in the H-D race dept. in '64 and was aware of the Bonneville effort, but hadn't gone there as he did in '70 with Rayborn.  Clyde also didn't think that the short stroke motor was used in '65 and thought part of the difference in speed was just down to more experience and a refined effort, though agreed that weather/salt conditions could well have contributed.  Then I called Keith Martin of Big D Cycles, as I understood that he had the molds for the shell of the Stormy Mangham Triumph streamliner and was involved in the restoration of the bike for the National Motor Museum in England.  He also didn't know anything specific about the Sprint records and thought it had to be down the weather/salt conditions and that sometime you just get lucky. I re-read the caption on the photo in Girdler book and it says that Reiman used the long stroke motor and Roeder the short stroke.

From Allan Girdler's "Harley Racers"

Then I found Mick Walker's 'Classic American Racing Motorcycles' which states: "As a way of extra publicity Harley-Davidson began to take an active interest in Bonneville.  Their first attempts were with a specially prepared short-stroke 248cc Aermacchi road racing engine enclosed in a 14 ft long alloy shell.  Ridden by works rider Roger Reiman this device averaged 156.24 mph for the flying mile and 156.54 mph for the kilometre in 1964.  The records were approved by the AMA but not the FIM as no recognised observer was present from the latter organisation.  Hence the speeds constituted American records only.  However Harley achieved its ambition the following year when George Roeder piloted a revised version of the sprint streamliner to a new world speed record at the breathtaking speed of 177.225 mph-sanctioned by the FIM."  So Walker claims that a short stroke motor was used in both '64 and '65, which doesn't explain the 20 mph gain.

From Stephen Wright book American Racer 1940-1980

I just got a hold of George Roeder's son, George II.  He thought that Reiman had run a long stroke/wet clutch motor and his dad the short stroke/dry clutch motor as a way of introducing it, as it was what was supplied in CR Sprints in '66.  He still has the streamliner at his museum at his shop Roeder Racing in Monroeville, Ohio.  When his dad was a franchised H-D dealer starting in 1972, he used to drive up to Milwaukee to pick up new bikes from the H-D factory to save on shipping.  He'd drop into the racing dept. to see his old buddies.  One time someone told him that the old streamliner was in a warehouse and in the way and why didn't he take it with him.  However, the machine has no motor in it, so it doesn't answer if it had a long or short stroke motor.  George II, also known as 'Joe' to distinguish him from his dad, told me that Bill Millburn had some information on the streamliner, so I called him.  Millburn is a collector and a bit of an historian on Class C racing in the '50-'70s.  Bill told me that he has the build card on the motor that both Reiman and Roeder used, a long stroke, wet clutch unit.  He says it was run at Daytona in a road racer with a 5A, 5 speed gearbox, 5A being the closest ratio option.  The gearbox was changed to a 5B, wider ratio, gearbox for Bonneville.  This would make some sense as with the super tall gearing needed at Bonneville, a lower 1st gear would be useful for getting going.  After Bonneville '64, the motor went back in a road racer with a 5A gearbox, then back in the streamliner with a 5B for Roeder at Bonneville in '65.  Millburn is convinced that it was the same motor in '64 & '65.

Finally, I talked to Herb Harris, a collector and former sponsor of Roeder Racing, and a lawyer who represented Roeder when, after Harley built their museum in Milwaukee, decided that they wanted the streamliner back.  According to Herb, it was a Davidson who gave the streamliner to George and therefore Roeder was the rightful owner, and that he decided to keep it and respectfully declined to return it to H-D.

This is one of the ways I spend time during 'lockdown', researching bit of motorcycle history arcana.  There is just about no one left who was there at the time and I guess we'll never know the details of effort, but I find it fun jogging peoples memories and getting their opinions.