Dry Lakes Racers Australia

Found a blog with some photos of Burt. Looks like the film did a good job of capturing the vibe...

http://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2010/07 ... first.html

rH+

Any Burt Munro pics welcome .
Try the book that was published last year .
" The worlds fastest Indian " by Roger Donaldson . no no no not to be confused with the book brought out about 5 yrs ago called " one good run "
I only bought the Roger Donaldson book about a month ago . At a guess probably 400 + photos and is 288 pages , and you also get a dvd of the 1970s documentary " offerings to the god of speed "

Don

I haven't got that one but there are 2 other books by Tim Hanna on Burt as well. The one by Tim on his own is good, the other reads like a cartoon version of the movie.

You also get "Offerings to the gods of speed" doco in the collectors edition DVD.

Lynchy

Apparently
There are two original bikes !
The one pictured is an original that was restored by Steve Huntzinger and currently owned by Tom Hensley. This bike is in America.
the other one resides in an old timey hardwear store in Invercargill NZ.
The reason for the two bikes was that it was cheaper for Burt to leave a bike in America and bring home only the engine, which he then did perfomance modifactions to it, then test it in his NZ chassis . This did not happen straight of the bat ( I think it was about his third visit to bonneville)


The pictured bike is absolutley imaculate , the one in NZ is more to the finish that we usually see.

Rodger Donaldson had known Burt for years and in the 70's they went on a road trip around NZ . I met them in Auckland .I was an apprentice back then and my tradesman was a madkeen motorcyclist so we all went along to this meet and greet evening where we listened to Burt tell us about Speed records ,both in NZ and the USA ,in between stories of his meeting friendly American Women..
I found it hillarious that he would get jobs on freighters travelling to the US so he could make bits for engines in the ships engine rooms and get paid for it .
What must not be forgotten is that motor cycle speed trials and beach racing in the South island had a very long history going back to the early 1920's.
If anyone wants to look further into this,search out back issues of New Zealand's Beaded Wheels magazine (the Vintage car clubs official mag) from the 60's and 70's where there are lots of first hand accounts of racing early Harley's etc etc on the beaches.

I have a 1962 Hot Rod magazine that has the 14th bonneville speed trials as a feature . It will be put up at the 2011 speedweek auction . Most of the first page of the article is about Burt and his class record of 162.149 mph , at this meet a colection was taken and presented to him , the author Don Francisco says " things that happened to him between NZ and Bonneville would make a script for a movie " . happy bidding . paul

Here,s a picture of ol Burt with his Velocette and some wee tykes taken sometime in 1970
Brilliant motorcycle mechanic ....... Couldn't quite get his head around the workings of a lawnmower..

On the way home from the non event this year we went via Tamworth and stoped in at the Power House Motorcycle Museum, thay have Burts record certificates framed up on their wall, although thay looked like it,im not sure if thay are originals,