Vintage Thing No.150 - Sprite motorcycles
The children's TV show Rentaghost had a Sprite in it, called Timothy Claypole, but he was nothing like this... I am partial to Villiers two stroke 250s and so is my mate Colyn. When he mentioned he was restoring a Sprite, I initially thought he'd gone into bug-eyed British sportscars but then an ancient memory stirred of a thin-tubed trials iron and we were able to talk properly and not at cross purposes. Simple but effective. I also like the lines of the GRP tank Sprite motorcycles are very rare. They have their origin in a special built by a plumber called Frank Hipkin who was a successful scrambler. His machine featured a duplex Cotton frame with an extra down tube running from headstock to engine mounting, effectively making it a triplex frame. With Norton front forks and an Alpha bottom end with a Greeves head and barrel, it proved a winning combination and requests for replicas soon followed. The salient feature of this trials iron is the lightweight duplex fram...