Norton Dominator Videos

Norton Dominator Videos


Another Norton movie... The summer of 2014 in my remote corner of the world cut down to six minutes. I've been trying to eliminate wind noise and there's no background music drowning out the twins roar. I think the exhaust sound came out rather descent, especially with headphones.

The bike is originally a 1960 Dominator 99. I bought it in 1995 so next year we're celebrating happy (well...) 20 years together. Since it wasn't very original when I bought it I wen't down the café road from the word go. A couple of years ago I slotted a 650SS engine in the frame. Big difference compared to the 600's rather sluggish performance. The bike's no show winner but then again it has really been used during the years.

The speedo is in km/h but it hasn't been calibrated for the 18" rear wheel and I believe it reads 10-15 km too much.

Well, bike movies might only be of real interest to the owner himself but here it is anyway:
[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaPMuDror-Y[/video]
 
Is the bike as smooth running as it appears to be? The bars look to be very still.

Glen
 
Very nice indeed, they say the 650s were a smooth motor, better than the Alas motors, my 1960 Manxman project has been on hold for some time now and now I just want to get it back on track after watching these videos, just love the looks of the old style caferacers.

Ashley
 
Yes, the 650SS had about the best balance factor of all the old solid-mounted twins. It was certanly MUCH more comfortable to ride than the Atlas. My ride to work was a rather tired old 650SS, owned by the company which had over 130,000 test and develpment miles on it (if the odometer could be believed). I liked it just about as much as the Commando prototypes. At least it wasn't as temperamental! I had a 45-miles each way commute, all on 2-lane backroads and it was a blast every day.

When it was needed for some other work, I got some really weird stuff to ride. One was an Italian "MOTOM", 50cc 2-stroke "racer" style. It had a scooter type twist-grip shifter and was on full song so much of the time, the gas mileage was worse than the 650! The other memorable POS was a scooter, made by Villiers-India. It was intended as a product to be built in the UK by the N-V group. It even appeared on the 1967 Motorcycle Show Norton stand but I don't think anyone noticed.

It came from India with a 175cc engine. but we changed it to the 197cc Villiers 9E with electric start. It looked quite smart, nicely styled, well equipped, but it was a structural disaster. The front and back ends weren't proerly connected to each other and it was a scary, squirrelly ride. I rode it to and from home for about 4 weeks and was scared most of the time! It never made it into UK production and I'm not sure the indians built any either, other than the one they sent to us..
 
Thanks for feedback!

Yes, I think think the 650SS is rather smooth. I run a single Mikuni carb on the bike which I think means a lot to cut down vibration. I used to have a BSA A65 and nothing I ever ridden came close to that bike in terms of vibration when you revved it a little. I've ridden an Atlas once and it vibrated a lot more than my 650 in speeds above 100 km/h but was not even close to the vibrationlevel of the Beeza.

My 650 is not as silk smooth as my Commando but it isn't bad. No numb fingers and mirrorvision stays clear. The 650 engine in my bike also vibrates less than the 99 engine I had earlier.
 
Stephen Hill said:
What size Mikuni are you running on the 650 SS? What did you do for a manifold?
Stephen
Click to expand...

Carb is a VM34S. I ordered a complete kit with carb, wire, manifold and a K&N air filter. The K&N was way too big though so it had to go.

Norton Dominator Videos
 
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