1973 Hodaka Bullfrog - 2-Page Vintage Motorcycle Article

Description

1973 Hodaka Bullfrog - 2-Page Vintage Motorcycle Article
Original, vintage magazine article
Page Size: Approx. 8" x 11" (21 cm x 28 cm) each page
Condition: Good
THE
BULLFROG
A One-Off Trialer
From The Hodaka
Enthusiasts At Pabatco
WE ARE ALL dreamers—hope-
less romantics caught-up in a
two-wheeled vice. “It grips you
like some kind of sinin’, it turns you
from foe to friend. It seems it has
been since the beginnin’, it seems it will
be till the end.” Just like Joe Parkhurst
with his 125cc Zundapp 1SDT Replica
mounted in the rafters of his living
room, we all suffer from the same
neurosis: the kamikaze syndrome.
I caught the fever A.H. (After
Honda), in the spring of 1967. A rela-
tively late case, I had a lot to catch up
on. How do you make yourself aware of
70 years of history in a short time?
Read. I bought and thoroughly read
every magazine, book and newspaper I
could find on motorcycles. The first
magazine 1 ever purchased was the April
1967 “Special Trials” issue of CYCLE
WORLD magazine. After reading the
information contained therein I pur-
chased my first motorcycle, a 1966
Cotton 250 Trials.
Motorcycles have been my life since
that time. After becoming fairly profi-
cient, on the local level, at the art of
trials riding and owning several
machines, my interest spread to all
aspects of motorcycling. But one’s first
love is always the strongest and trials is
my love.
Inwardly, the devout enthusiast
always hopes to build his own “one-off
special,” the expression of his love for
the intangible thing that he refers to as
“the sport.” Few of us enjoy the oppor-
tunity to realize this elusive dream. Buy
a special? It’s just not the same. It’s the
involvement that we seek, seeing our
ideas, our brain-child materialize. Every
true enthusiast will do it once, love it
for what it is, and curse it for what it
put him through. So it is with the
Bullfrog, one man’s dream that is finally
a reality.
The Bullfrog was easy to conjure up,
but 90 percent of the physical act of
making it happen belongs to Curt Alex-
ander. Curt works in the Engineering
Department at Pacific Basin Trading
Company and owns one of the finest
machine shops anywhere. He is, to put
it mildly, a perfectionist. His tools and
shop are immaculate, his vertical milling
machine is 1 3 years old and the table
bears one small blemish. Eat off the
floor? Probably. Being a motorcycle
fanatic himself makes things easy. He
knows trials, motocross, frame geome-
try, porting and the rest. He knows what
is possible and what is not, and is
probably one of the world’s greatest
motorcycle machinists.
The details of the Bullfrog are not
complex—just the simple application of
proven parts with a flair of the unusual
coupled with functionality. The tires are
3.00-21 and 4.00-18 Dunlop 2-ply trials
front and rear respectively. The front
rim is a shoulderless alloy Akront
“Turismo.” The front hub and disc unit
is a Campanoglo. The disc brake caliper
is a very simple, mechanically actuated
unit borrowed from a snowmobile. The
entire front wheel assembly including
brake calipers weighs 18.9 lb. The alloy
(6061-T6) bracket floats on the lower
fork leg fender mounting lugs. The front
fender stay is an appropriately modified
Hodaka 100-B. Both fenders are acces-
sory alloy. The fork legs are standard
Hodaka 100-B+ items. The new Yamaha
AT2-MX alloy forks would have been
used, but proved to weigh only 5 oz.
each leg less than the Hodaka units. For
the expense and the hassle of the disc
brake mount they were passed over.
The frame is from a Saracen 125
Trials machine. This particular unit is
very light and has proven to be the most
successful small bore trials iron (placing
9th in the 1971 Scottish Six Days
Trial). English born, this machine is an
excellent handler but lacks in the
engine/transmission area. To maintain
the original steering geometry the origi-
nal R.E.H. fork clamps, complete with
tapered roller bearing, were retained.
Special bushings were turned to adapt
them to the smaller diameter Hodaka
fork legs. While the original R.E.H. fork
units are lighter, they tend to perma-
nently flex on occasion and the damp-
ing system is virtually non-existent.
They just sort of go up and down.
The original engine mounts were cut
and ground away. Original nickel plate
looks nice but is a bummer to weld to
and looks quite shoddy once carved
upon so the frame and swinging arm
were thoroughly sandblasted. The frame...
12661-7302-08