metisse

Or come a little further South, We have our version of Danbury / Raydon pits here with a smattering of Rocks...........

I don t know how hard or easy it is to register a bike. I have just gone through the process with a twinshock, a French bought bike with a lost carte grise. This was done using the carte gris collection, for older bikes although I dont know when the age cut off is. It might be straight forward or a can of worms thats the beauty of France ...

I would mirror the comment about looking on the Bon coin. It is awash with trials bikes of all shape,sizes and prices. I really would not buy a Uk bike as you really need one that is registered/ homologated in France. Why... well all things here have to be insured, technically any way, a French registered bike will help and it costs peanunts through the company ' Abela ' . Moving on from this if you ever progress to a trial unless your bike is insured you will not be able to ride. The only problem I see is that France is a huge country and the bike you want will be Km's away.. Hope this helps

Looks great, well done.. now to get out in some Eastern centre mud...

Hi Wobbler, I think around late spring next year is fine to start looking. We stay in a little BB a couple of kms out of the village, but the village itself is not large and I would n t recommend any last minute bookings otherwise you may be too far out. Part of the fun is enjoying the ambiance in the town on the Friday and Saturday night.

Hi Ross, The main thing to remember about this trial is that it is in fact a team trial, with a handicap system. You need to be part of a three man team all riding the same route. You can enter with two other mates or there is what they call a bourse, which is a market, whereby teams short of a rider can/ will enter the bourse to make up their team and so contact you to see if you can and or are willing to ride with them . At the end everybody riders its just the choice of language you converse in. The handicap works on age of rider and age of bike, the long and the short, the older the better in both cases. You get marks added or deducted to your individual score depending on the above. So if a load of younger riders turn up on late model twinshocks they are not going to win unless they all go clean at the very least. The bikes have to be road legal with lights fitted, up until now they do not have to work, although that maybe a requirement next year. Driving licences, insurance doc,s and the bikes legal doc,s have to be submitted with the entry and will be checked at signing on. This is strictly adherd to and no documents no ride. For French riders we need either an affliated licence or a valid medical certificate. For non French I don t know what is needed , but that investigated nearer the time. There are three routes, twinshock mainly, with a smattering of pre 65, all having gone up in terms of severity in recent years, all still very doable with a very long ride round on both days. Unless you are a very good rider the hardest is hard , the middle is tricky and the easy route I think is straightforward . Both John Bull and George Greenland are regular visitors to the trial so ask them their thoughts in the uk. The ambiance the trial / organisation is second to non, and is the only trial I would really try and sell to anybody looking to ride abroad. The town and area is awash with things to see and do and is taken over by the trial for this weekend. Its a long way down from the Uk, hence I would suggest you make a holiday of it, anybody wanting to take a little detour and get some practise in chez moi a few days before is welcome, hope that covers it.

The dates for the Ventoux classic two day 2015 have been arranged for the 10 th and 11 th October 2015. The entries will open around the middle of August, this gives potential riders plenty of time to work on Wags and or arrange brownie points... Good luck

I am riding with the bike as is at the moment, in all honesty its fine, I have never been that good at developement. Some people jump on a bike and straight away the foot pegs are too high too low, the suspension is too hard too soft.. I just ride whats under me.... excuse the pun....thats not to say that I also like the bike to be as good as possible hence the post... Changing the subject there are 300 odd riders next weekend at Sant Feliu, nearly sixty pre 65's, its getting to be 'the' Spanish trial to do ... The site is exceptional with the last sections on the beach on the breakwaters, one wrong turn or a dodgy dab and your five metres into the Med...I have my techy man as a minder so I will try and post some pictures next week. Thanks for all your help.

Thanks guys it would certainly make sense to stick with the original set up, if we could get them to work better. In all honesty I don t know the ruling here on forks , but as they are more than happy to let Rtl,s and mono yams run with the twin shocks I doubt the changing of forks will raise any eyebrows. The man who has done this on his Gunaco is with us this weekend in Spain, so I will pick his brains as well. If I learn anything of interest I will share next week. Thanks again

The betors are larger in diameter, so to use with existing yoke will require inlarging. I believe they came of a jumbo. I managed to secure the mudguard stay, spindle and brake arm, so hopefully that is the easy bit. Cheers

This subject was raised some some three years ago and to be fair opinions shared. Given the time frame I wondered if these we still valid. I have a red and white Guanaco with the mazocchi set up. Whilst its alright, they do tend to be very soft even after changing and playing with the springs. I have a nice pair of late betors including yokes / tete de fourche and my French guru is trying to convince me to go down this route. Some mentioned on the previous thread that all the works bikes had married the Mazocchi yokes to betor forks and I have since seen this recently on a very nicely prepared Belgium bike of Michel Gossiaux, again his name was mentioned in the previous posts. I understand there will be some machining to do, so the question really is, will the amount of work involved really merit any improvement. Thanks

Thats a burger you owe me from Colin if he still does all the Eastern centre trials the next time I am home.....

You need to look under ' Moto de collection piece ' Swm. I am not sure what you are after but there is quite a lot of stuff on there including a jumbo someone is breaking.

If you have a look on ebay france.. there is I think what you want, with swm embossed on them. You might need to get the google translate, but might be worth a punt . Bon chance..

Much prefer the tank , seat and side panel arrangement... whilst understand the thinking, of the all in one... to me.. it does nothing for the bike and smacks of trying to be too clever. It seems that Fantic's also are not the only bikes trying to re invent themselves. Personal preference and opinion of course.

I have used one of the new replica tanks from the chap darn south, and in the four years I have since had it , have had no problems what so ever. It never gets drained of petrol so I always speak as I find.. Touching wood as we speak.

Having become a decerning and intelligent buyer recently, to quote B40rt, I would add the only piece of advice I would add is try and buy an SWM where work has been done in the clutch area. Its well known its the bikes short fall, which with some work can be over come. I have a red and white Gunaco and its fine apart from this area. We are in the midst of getting it sorted, but if you wish to keep it strictly SWM then there is some clever work to be done to make it as good as say a Fantic. Just my two Euro's worth, but certainly a great bike. Bon Chance

Thanks for the replies, being in France its quite difficult to get castrol R, even harder at short notice. I wanted to check before I did anything hasty and I am glad I did. I have managed to source some at short notice, whether it gets here in time is another matter. Out of interest, the bike has always been run on R, its done many many trials as well as Nationals including Scotland and never missed a beat . It has been laid up for several years and after a minor fettle runs as good as ever, so I am happy to leave it as is. Thanks again to althoughs who replied. Bon Soiree

I have an Ariel that since the engine was rebuilt many moons ago run on castrol R. It has to come out for a last minute trial on Sunday and I have no Castrol, will it harm it to just mix whats left in the oil tank with a normal 10/40, or do I need to drain it all out, or does it need to flushed / cleaned throughout before I add another type of OIL. I am sure I read somewhere that it could damage the engine if care wasn t taken when changing from Castrol R. Thanks.

Wobbler you message box is full, I am trying to contact you.

Send me a pm, I am going and can possibly help

I think its always wise to do some homework before going and riding anywhere. Usually local land owners are fine if approached as long as it doesn t interfere with the chasse.. local hunt/shoot. Public areas are a grey area that I know nothing about , but my advice would be to check first. There are lots of riders of trials bikes that ride out, but never ride in competitions, ask around usually the motorbike shops will know of someone. Its a good way to make friends and learn the language. Good luck

Depending where you are in the Gers, the club at Agen may be worth looking at. They run one or two trials a year and have a good practise ground for club members. I do have some twinshock chums further south towards Dax, but dont know the club the belong to. Another trials club is at Escolotte near Duras or Albi. There will certainly be a motorcycle club near you where ever , but few, if any run trials. The South west of France is awash with trials ground and used to have a huge selection of trials to ride in that has all since stopped. You have chosen a great place to buy a house and bring your bike , but crap for competitions. Bon chance

I have driven Martin mad for the last month with various questions... He has been extremely helpful with both spares and advice I just did nt want to over do it.

Just reading through this old post as we are about to embark on a little flywheel lightening on a red and white Guanaco. We have done the calc's and we are looking to shave 400grams. We are baseing this on the burgat bible of many moons ago , but this would be for a later model. Has anybody done this on the earlier Gunaco and would 400 grams sound right. I am sure a little either way is not going to make a difference but are we in the right ball park. Also another question for the SWM officinardos here, did the frames with the flat plate around the foot rest area ie. the first yellow ones, in fact surface pre 1980 as I have come across a very nice red and white gunaco with this, coupled to an first wave swinging arm. The owner tells me its a factory bike from the 1979, just before the start of the yellow phase. Any thoughts please. Cheers