Rick Ferguson´s BSA B50 Racer
Rick Ferguson´s BSA B50 Racer.
Raleigh, NC USA
I raced the race bike for several seasons, but I finally gave up racing
about 1994. It was an excellent race bike (more capable than its
pilot). Great handling. Reminded me of a smaller, lighter bevel drive
Ducati. Very stable and good traction. The motor was built by Ted Hubbard,
an ex-BSA race mechanic who now lives in North Carolina.
It used a B50 MX cam, a long Carrillo rod, oversize titanium valves and
ported head with Amal Mk II. I used total loss points ignition. It was a
very manageable motor, not finicky at all; it could have benefited from a
5-speed gearbox. In fact Ted built one for his own B50 racer by sawing off
the gearbox portion of the crankcase and welding on a 5-speed box from a
Triumph! Extra breathers were added, with all being routed to the primary
case as a plenum. External oil feeds were added, as was a spin-on filter
kit intended for a Harley Sportster.
You will see I used the standard forks, but replaced the top triple clamp
with another bottom one (with a stem pinch bolt added) so the fork tubes
could then be moved up and down in the clamps to adjust the handling. This
was my idea and I haven't seen it done anywhere else - worked a treat and
easy to do (you need to replace the tapered fork tubes with straight ones).
I also used the older style twin leading shoe brake which is much better
than the conical hub. 18" rims.
In the rear we had a custom fabricated swing arm with arms from an
aftermarket racing swingarm grafted to the stock pivot tube. Thus resulted
in being able to adjust the axle position at the wheel and also at the
swing arm pivot, so quite a variation in effective length was possible. The
rear wheel is a spool flat track hub with quick-change sprockets; this is
important, because with the stock hub one is limited in choice of gearing
and the bike can't be properly geared for a high-speed track. The rear
brake is an old Triumph drum with the sprocket turned off, bolted to the
spool hub.
The frame is stock B50SS (except swing arm described above and fork mods),
and the tank is from a European Triumph T140. The seat is a custom
fabrication. As with the other bike, all of these modifications were rather
easy to make, relatively inexpensive, and effective. An ideal clubmans
racer.
Rick Ferguson
Updated 14:02 2003-11-25
© Rickard Nebrér