Monday, December 3, 2007

O. Ray Courtney's dream bike.

From finkbuilt.com:

Article Harvested from Popular Science - March, 1953.

"One night in March, 1950, O. Ray Courtney worked until two a.m. and drove home discouraged. He was trying to design a better motorcycle. He wanted one with the seat forward, with better cooling, better springing and a more beautiful body. Discarded sketches littered the floor of his shop.

That night in a dream he saw a streamlined beauty skim across a flowered field. Too excited to report for work the next day, he hastily put his dream on paper - and he is riding that dream cycle now through the streets of Pontiac, Mich.

FRAME is 1 1/8 inch chrome-steel tubing. Handlebars, 10 1/2 inches forward on an extenstion tube, are mounted on a second head. They connect through drag links to the fork.
STREAMLINING continues to tail. Machine is 26 inches wide. Bulges flanking sides of rear wheel are metal-covered saddlebags.

No comments: