Happy New Year everybody, well it is for me. After an epic drive from Rob, from the South of France, i met up with him and Royce on Bristol services, as he handed over his now abandoned and dismembered front end off his FF project, whilst the back stayed firmly in the van, to be delivered elsewhere. I now have a head start, and no excuses, and the best front end available, and Royce's support, so it's now just a simple matter of sticking a back end on, ( electric of course ) and i am on my way.

The summer weekend gathering at Mallory in 2023 is scheduled for 14,15,16th July.
This is not named as the VMCC Festival of 1000 Bikes; instead it is the Mallory Bike Bonanza, which does not quite have the same ring to it.
Track time form is here:
https://www.eastmidlandracing.co.uk/bike-bonanza
Format is identical to previous FOTBs - although I hope organisation is better - and I have applied for a BFF stand in the club section.

There are better things to do and better places to spend my time......

Reaching the unlikely age of 78 I recall that 1978 is the year I engaged in FF development - an attempt to rescue the Powered Two Wheeler from the dying hand of the motorised bicycle and exploit it's unbeatable efficiency in a world where that quality had suddenly become relevant.

Hi Just a few pics to show my eventual success, or at least I am now on solid ground, and though no expert, I can now hopefully reproduce further examples without to much trauma, as required. I would also like to apologize in advance, to Dave Lochead regards the 3 wheel reverse, trike photo, but I am seriously hoping to go into production, and despite my earlier offer on this site, to produce an FF vehicle at virtual cost, had no takers.

As the photos show, I have been making a pigs ear of producing the canopies for my Monotraceresque type vehicle, and i am only now, confident of any success, and although i have somebody who may want a few, i am also offering the rest to site members for free, hoping they can be of use to somebody for their own projects, if nothing else the 6mm sheet is £120 a pop, and it may just fit the bill for somebody's own project.

As legend these motors were removed from an abandoned project, and we have been told, they have been set up and run on a dyno, unfortunately we have been unable to glean any further information from either Yasa or Sevcon regards these units, and although we have been able to communicate with the controller, are unable to make any adjustments, despite my engineer having vast amounts of experience, on the low voltage Sevcons, without further firmware, he is unable, to go further, and as nothing has been forthcoming from Sevcon, I have decided to sell, preferably in one lot at £7000 plus vat.

Hi As legend motor and controller now sold, on its way to the States, sadly, not going into an FF, but a KTM 990 Adventure.

Never mind - there are other things to do - carry on....

1) Motorcycle Mechanics. September 1977: https://davestestsandarticles.weebly.com/uploads/4/8/4/5/4845046/mcmsep77quasarspx500.pdf

2) Cycle. June 1978: https://davestestsandarticles.weebly.com/uploads/4/8/4/5/4845046/cyclejune78quasar.pdf

3) Bike. August 1978: https://davestestsandarticles.weebly.com/uploads/4/8/4/5/4845046/bike_august_1978_quasar_tt_1978.pdf

4) cycle guide. December 1979: https://davestestsandarticles.weebly.com/uploads/4/8/4/5/4845046/cycle_guide_december_1979_quasar.pdf

An Alan Cathcart article on the POWA Design D-10 mentions an FF Yamaha and (?) another semi-enclosed moped. Never seen any pictures 'til maybe now:

POWA Book? Catalog? (Bottom 2 illustrations on cover...) http://files.homepagemodules.de/b17661/pictures_u142_b1ec36.jpg

Different Alan Cathcart article .pdf file: http://davestestsandarticles.weebly.com/uploads/4/8/4/5/4845046/motorcycle_international_november_1989_powa_el_tox_citybike.pdf

PS: I'm not on FB, but Bottpower is - as is their "Torpedo" : https://www.facebook.com/bottpower/photos/5437620896256251/

One Ashwood motor, and Sevcon controller, approx 50HP peak, as removed from a low mileage Ford Transit van. I bought this for an FF motorcycle project, but found the wiring was beyond my capacity, and so i just sold the batteries on, and the rest of the stuff was put on a shelf, till i got a better understanding. 5+? years later, i accepted i am still uncomfortable, and so sent it off to an expert, who got it running in 5 mins. I have now gone in a different direction, and with other plans, and so the motor and controller are now surplus, but still located in Bath with Jozztek.

OK, so where is the ‘Vert-Voyager’ project now? (see previous blogs for the why and how)

They all do that sir

Just realized that this video was never shared here - just made the video public on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tb0jtYGOw2s

Discovery Canada produced that - they were fun to work with.

Looking forward to a lot more fun (And video) of the next one...

Readers of todays (Wedensday 11th. May) MCN will be presented with photos and a typically fact-free article on the Monoliner track day race prototype I delivered a few years ago. It'll be at the Peterborough show soon apparantly. Hopefully someone will put up some photos here - could be you if you go to the show.

This is a lengthy series of comments and identifications regarding RyanF9's (Ryan Kluftinger's) video on FFs on the FortNine YouTube channel: 'Feet Forward Motorcycles are Technically Better' which was uploaded on 16th April 2022. This one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uk2ou5gt_94
I’ve watched RyanF9’s FF video a few times now, and there really is a lot of good stuff in it. Amazingly, it was viewed more than a *million* times in just four weeks and 4,607 people had commented on it!

After scrolling through these thousands of comments it was obvious that a reference to Bikeweb was needed. So using an established Youtube log in I submitted such a reference. Twice. With no result. So props to Blez for getting one in, regrettably without mentioning that this site covers All Ffs, not just the Monotracer. So it's not just 'bikeweb' being censored, there's clearly a trick we've missed there somewhere. Maybe someone will tell us.

https://youtu.be/uk2ou5gt_94

(Thanks to Ian for this link)

"Body of blog too short needs at least ten words".

OK. BMW, Honda (Specifically), . I accuse you of corporate cowadice for ignoring FFs. OK?

https://ottonero.blogspot.com/2022/02/ducati-recumbent-dalincibe-design.html

https://www.dalinci.be/feet-forward-motorcycle-design/design-competition

It is already over:

https://www.dalinci.be/design-competition-winners

Funny how interest and enthusiasm for innovation and invention comes from outside the industry...

Some more ancient history. links provided by Rob Horn, the only guy to have actually raced an FF this millenium. Sorry it's not in English, engineering is international.

https://motorollos.blogspot.com/2022/03/quasar-phasar-y-el-movimiento-pies-por_0384871992.html#more
https://motorollos.blogspot.com/search/label/FF%20movement

Self-indulgent? me?!