Must be Crazy - C-T-C on a '46 R71

[20774]

I'm not promoting this, but this "project" sounds kind of cool...what an experience!

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/40595891/view-from-a-sidecar-the-documentary

http://www.viewfromasidecar.com/viewfromasidecar/Welcome.html

No Iron Butt awards here!!

[DarrylRi]

I hate to rain on anyone's parade, but...

There's no such thing as a 1946 BMW R71. The last R71s were built in 1941.

What is on display is a Chang Jiang CJ-750 (tacitly admitted by calling the bike a "1946 BMW CJ R71").

http://www.chang-jiang.com/bmw/welcome.html
http://www.chang-jiang.com/bmw/a2.html

However, there's no such thing as a 1946 CJ, either. The Chinese didn't begin making these bikes until 1957, which is when they bought the tooling for them from the Soviets.

When Stalin's foreign minister Molotov signed an agreement with Hitler's minister von Ribentropf in 1939, included in that deal was a significant amount of technology transfer, and BMW's R71 -- which the Wehrmacht had at that time declined to buy from BMW -- was included. It's not clear that the Soviets actually ever got the drawings from BMW; they had alread at that time acquired 5 of these bikes in Sweden and were feverishly busy reverse engineering them into a bike that they called the M72. When Hitler attacked the Soviet Union not two years later, the Soviets moved their development and production to the town of Irbit, behind the Ural Mountains.

(By this time, the Wehrmacht was waiting for BMW's purpose built "War Elephant" motorcycle, the R75 (with dual range transmission, two wheel drive to the sidecar wheel and a lockable differential) to get into production, so they did buy a number of R71s for the war effort. Even though the German army didn't like the R71, it is one of the most copied bikes around; Harley copied it as well, as the XA model.)

After the war, the Soviets continued to build M72s for themselves, and then for their client states, including China. When the Soviets released a new model, the old tooling and production line was sold to China.

Today, almost any bike you see labelled as an "R71" is actually a CJ that has been tarted up to some extent or another. A real R71 is probably worth north of $25k, but you can buy a brand new CJ-750 for about $9k. So forgeries are rife.

And the bike in the picture has had almost nothing done to it other than hanging BMW roundels on it.

[AKBeemer]

Okay then, how about a 36 Indian on it's third trip up the Alcan?

[AKBeemer]

His son rides along, but is into the newer more technologically up to date 68 BSA.

[1der]

Either way, sounds like a great adventure. Happy motoring.

[brewmeister]

So what does the "C J " stand for,china Junk?? ok I C

[DarrylRi]

So what does the "C J " stand for,china Junk??

Read post #2 above.