That was a 250cc, I don't recall if it was narrow or wide case. This photo may be a clue, thinking narrow but can't be certain. https://advrider.com/f/attachments/img-2-jpg.2812573/
This one sold a few days ago at B-J for $7,700. It is genuine and looks good. Damn the bad luck, but as with all auctions if I would have been there it would not have been 7,700 because me and the buyer would have been bidding it up. Maybe the Easter bunny will bring me a 650 unit frame!
Could be, hard to say from only one side and marginal clarity. I'm thinking it is a T100C front hub with a strap brake stay set back to get slotted into the Ceriani.
Here is my 1973 Rickman Montesa. It was the first bike I ever purchased brand new in the Fall of 1972. This photo was taken the day I brought it home. I only owned it for 1 year before selling it for the VR crinkle fin model the following year. Fast forward to June 2016 when I saw it listed for sale on Craigslist. I recognized it as my old bike because I had painted a white band down the tank, seat pan and tail section. Took a couple of years to restore. I did have a donor bike to pull parts from, otherwise I don't think I could have finished it. Every part has a story. The cylinder on my old bike had a stripped exhaust where header flange should screw into. Looked like a show stopper. The donor bike looked good but when I pulled that cylinder off someone had welded the bottom of the steel liner back on. Not sure how you break that. So, I had to extract the liners from the barrels on both cylinders to get a top end that could be usable. Reed valve & Mikuni added as I had it back in the day. Has been raced a few times now so not nearly as shiny as these photos anymore. Was a fun project as it is THE old bike from my youth.
Well I’ve made a little more progress, engine is being fitted today, I have a mate who’s calling (socially distancing) to give me a hand,the engine is too heavy for one.
I was cleaning my shelves and found a folder with dealer information for BSA and it some pictures of Rickmans sold by BSA. I only took one photo but I’ll get the other photo Monday
It was after Steens, they were the west coast distributor for years and although I've read why the change I can't remember now.
Steens didn't sell the Rickman Montesa. It was first imported in 1972 by Triumph of which BSA was a division along with Norton. The dealer was required to buy a certain no. of Rickmans and AJS's (through Norton) I was the parts manager in a Triumph-Norton-BSA shop. They opened in 1972 and I was their first customer while they were still setting up the shop. I bought a 1972 Rickman Zundapp MX. A year later I opened a dirt bike shop with the Triumph shop owner as a partner
I was an authorized dealer for in the early '70s for Maico, Penton, Hodaka and Ossa. I also sold Rickman and AJS for my partner who owned the Triumph shop. This was a good arrangement as he didn't want any dirt bikes in his shop! In addition to the Rickman Zundapp, I also had a 1973 Rickman Montesa like the one in the pic, until I grenaded the engine one day with a missed shift. I now have the '72 Rickman Zundapp and a '74 Rickman Montesa with the VR engine.
I raced one of the first Rickman Zundapps that Steens imported in late 1970. Motor was ported and tricked out by Jeff Andrews. Very fast 125 for it's time.
I disagree with your statement about Steens and the Rickman Montesas. When working in the early 70's for Precision Cycles we sold Rickmans. All of the Rickman sponsored riders came out of Steens including , Jeff Wright on a Rickman Hodaka, Donny Emler (of FMF fame) on a Rickman Zundapp, Rich Thorwaldson on a BSA Rickman Westlake Thumper, and finally Briar Holcomb on a Rickman Montesa. EC Birt at Precision Cycles did all of the race tuning for the Rickman sponsored 2 strokes. I picked up Briar's bike at Steens in Alhambra and brought it to the shop where EC "breathed" his magic on it. After the build, I personally took Briar out to the track for him to test ride and fine tune it for him. I worked at Precision Cycles several different times in the early 70's
I won't disagree. My association with the Rickman Metisse started in 1972 when Triumph was the distributor and I had always thought that was the first Rickman Montesa sold as a complete bike rather than a kit but apparently they were making them in 1971 as well when Steen's was the distributor. I always felt that the Triumph association was a bad one for Rickman kind of like Buell and HD. They had some real potential to progress and build competitive bikes which was never realized. I also felt like the brothers lost touch with the MX market.