earliest surviving Norton Villiers commando

Hey everyone just curious is there any info to the earliest commandos that are still left mine is in the first 60-80's range just wondering if any more survived

The first production Commando was said to be 126125

Quite a few early Commandos with the "widowmaker frame" have been discussed here,
including some still with their frame intact (!!).

Things to look for are the widowmaker frame, low mufflers, domed clutch housing, tacho drive on the end of the cam, either solid red or green gel coat, and circular badges on the tank and tail fairing .



There was some discussion of what seemed a terribly early Commando on the NOC forum recently,
but it turned out to not even be a Commando !, not surprising as it had a pre-Commando VIN

Mine is #123671 with a 1967 title.



Old photo as I'm currently re-painting the frame,etc.



I have owned the bike for 25 years, purchased it from a guy in Queens,NY and according to him it was sitting in someone's basement in Brooklyn for many years. It came with two sets of tanks and tail sections, with the one above being in original shape with just the regular scrapes from the seat. the other set is beat up and needs a re-paint and I assume it is the original set. The frame was modified years ago with the downtube added as per the later frames, but when I got the bike it was as original with no cracks.

Recent photo:

you got me beat at 126381 however mine has never been apart. All original ,black enamel , chrome,exhaust ,unbroken frame :shock: ,wheels ,gauges, etc. The original factory orange seat was an option, the bike came with a black one, its original on the shelf .

I owned 127900 which was a Dunstall Commando, a real Dunstall, ordered from Dunstall and shipped to the U.S.

A few months ago I received and email from the current owner who had it for sale for $25,000 U.S.

The auction has ended but click on the photo and you can see all of the photos. Nice job on the restoration.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/251703561399

This had the original frame, which had not broken but the tank bracket had broken off.

jimbo said:

you got me beat at 126381 however mine has never been apart. All original ,black enamel , chrome,exhaust ,unbroken frame :shock: ,wheels ,gauges, etc. The original factory orange seat was an option, the bike came with a black one, its original on the shelf .

Click to expand...

Nice, and with the orange seat. Yeah, I didn't want to paint the frame but with the added brace and some general nicks and whatnot it seemed like a good time to do a re-paint.

The two bikes on the stand at the 1967 Earls' Court show were silver, with the orange seat and the "Green blob"on the tank. there was no identification that they were Nortons, apart from the fact they were on the Norton display stand! Just to confuse folks, we had a Villiers of India scooter on there also. As far as I remember, the frames and swing arm were also silver.

The Commando program moved to Plumstead Road after the show, and the guys at Wolverhampton went on to other things, primarily the development of the AJS Stormer, the professional motocross team and my brief encounter with the US-built P-11 we tested.

Rohan:

In your photo, it looks like the Norton emblems on the tank are decals. I'm assuming it was one of the ones whose "green blobs" were removed but the later tank with recesses for the "real" badges wasn't retrofitted by the factory. I thought they had replaced all the tanks without the recesses.

wot said:

I owned 127900 which was a Dunstall Commando, a real Dunstall, ordered from Dunstall and shipped to the U.S.

A few months ago I received and email from the current owner who had it for sale for $25,000 U.S.

The auction has ended but click on the photo and you can see all of the photos. Nice job on the restoration.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/251703561399

This had the original frame, which had not broken but the tank bracket had broken off.

Click to expand...

Small Fastback world , I bought the Dunstall from you and sold to him

absolutley brilliant loving all the pictures and info everyone

Here's a few of mine gonna take some better pics soon once the weathers a bit better using the 650ss as every day an the Commando for best

same with mine original frame perfect condition, gearbox engine and frame all matching, the finish is all mint and as she should be on the engine really need to try and get my 650ss to the same standard



Restoring the lammy' for a friend at work right mix of bikes in the workshop at the mo

black cat said:

Mine is #123671 with a 1967 title.

Click to expand...

Did Neville Hinton explain further why its number is thousands before the 1st production commando ?
Does this make it one of the prototype display Commandos, or is there some other explanation ?
So would it have been all silver, with the green blob ?

Bit non-standard now having a 1969 paint scheme on a 67 built bike, but that is your choice.
You need another Commando !

Rohan said:

black cat said:

Mine is #123671 with a 1967 title.

Click to expand...

Did Neville Hinton explain further why its number is thousands before the 1st production commando ?
Does this make it one of the prototype display Commandos, or is there some other explanation ?
So would it have been all silver, with the green blob ?

Bit non-standard now having a 1969 paint scheme on a 67 built bike, but that is your choice.
You need another Commando !

Click to expand...

good question

Rohan said:

black cat said:

Mine is #123671 with a 1967 title.

Click to expand...

Did Neville Hinton explain further why its number is thousands before the 1st production commando ?
Does this make it one of the prototype display Commandos, or is there some other explanation ?
So would it have been all silver, with the green blob ?

Bit non-standard now having a 1969 paint scheme on a 67 built bike, but that is your choice.
You need another Commando !

Click to expand...

I have always wondered why the numbers are so off, but without anymore proof from the factory records I have no idea what it originally looked like or whether it was one of the early display bikes. But it was made along with the G15 bikes, maybe that is why they stamped it with those numbers? Yes, the later paint is not correct and I could paint the other set silver and call it an early prototype but I don't know if that's true and the frame was black when I got the bike. I certainly will not paint over the above paint, but the other set is in sad shape. Neville says that the bike was used for "experimental work" which makes it even more of a mystery.

got to love a good mystery never know when some more information might come to light one day guess there's alot of people that arn't on a computer yet from the era

My commandos # is 128231 it still has the widow frame round badges front & back and it has the dome primary cover and it has the flash chromed foot peg brackets not the newer polished type.

Black Cat I have a 70 Fast back and on the gas tank right where yours is painted silver this one is raised out about 1 1/2" I have never seen a custom tank that looks like a FB tank but has these raised areas. Has anyone seen a tank like this in their travels?

Mark

I don't think any "green blob" bikes were actually delivered to customers. Neither of the two prototypes were either. They both went to Plumstead with the other Commando stuff, I think. They certainly weren't around the Marston Road plant after the 1967 show. IIRC, only one of the show bikes was a runner at the time, the other had some engine internals missing. It was finished to running condition after the show. The one mentioned in and earlier post, with a much lower serial number may have been one of the show bikes.

I was asked by a show visitor if the stand had been funded by the Irish government. When I asked what gave him the idea he said it was the color combination of the orange seat, the green blob and the silver frame which looked like the Irish flag.

Rohan said:

black cat said:

Mine is #123671 with a 1967 title.

Click to expand...

Click to expand...

funny thing is the bike shown in the workshop manual page 35 has a number of 126672 just one digit off! but with a "6" instead of the "3" :shock:

Frankdamp, please see message, I have sent you a pm.
Lasse C
Sweden

Lasse:

i tried to send you an e-mail, but it bounced back as undeliverable. Feel free to quote anything I've posted about my time at N-V.

It was a very interesting job, even though the pay wasn't very good. Back then, UK engineering pay scales were abysmal. I was there, if memory serves well, from the fall of 1966 through to spring of 1968. I was supposed to head up a test instrumentation lab so that things could actually be measured, rather than relying on rider comments. Unfortunately, the funds earmarked for setting up the lab (including a mobile one for track testing) had been squandered on the "Green Blob" publicity campaign and I ended up as a test rider on the Commando and later the AJS Stormer.

As the AJS Stormer program was floundering in early 1968, I decided to follow up on an offer from Boeing and was hired. I left N-V after Easter and moved to the Seattle area in early July. I retired early from Boeing in 1998 (I was 57) after getting tired of being on trips to customers all the time. I had over a half-million frequent flier miles on 12 different airlines, which my wife and I made good use of after I retired!

After seeing how dangerous the US traffic was, if you weren't in big Buick, I decided not to take up motorcycling again after moving over here. At least in a car, you're sitting on the opposite side to one in the UK, so you have a permanent "cue' to stay on the correct side of the road. Not so on a bike. I didn't want my wife to answer the door to find a somber State trooper outside.

Now in my mid 70's and retired in one of the nicest small seaside towns I know (Anacortes, Washington), climate similar to the UK (Cornwall, maybe) and an average of 25" annual rainfall (about 60% of what Seattle gets). If I ever leave here, it will be in a wooden overcoat.

123669 is up for sale :shock:

Nice catch. I wondered if this is where that was leading....

If it now has a metal gas tank (and seat) then some of it is not so original ?

Did we ever resolve that 123xxx and 126xxx business ?