Best BSA's -of-all-time

74 B 50 M-X , they forgot .



And the Bandits . Er , Pirates ! .

These journos always think the Rocket Goldstar had a specially tuned engine. It didn’t, it just used the late West Coast Super Rocket engine as is. I don't know where the " Special engine" myth came from. The BSA produced Rocket Goldstars appear to use the same frame as a Super Rocket as well. Only the frame numbering is different.

The Super Rocket engine performance comes reasonably close to the Triumph Bonneville of that era. Both are quite far behind the Norton 650ss in power output, based on bikes I've ridden and also period testing at MIRA. The Thruxton production race showed that as well. The 650ss won the Thruxton 3 times. After that the owner was asked to refrain from entering it again so that other companies might have a chance.


I see all three bikes as near perfection from a styling perspective. They are all quite different from one another too.
The Super Rocket is very flashy, the Norton is more conservative while the Triumph is in the middle.
The Norton is the best handling bike of that 3. I would say by far. BSA might be a distant second in handling. Triumph is in third place for handling, at least until Doug Hele showed up.
Once he had reworked the bonnie and set about trying to have it win races, the bike that drove him crazy with its winning ways was his own design, the Norton 650ss. Hoisted by his own petard