Interesting 4c Triumph Motorcycle & Sidecar

[Tinman]

Apologies if you think I may have misreported you, Joe - no offence intended.

By no means am I offended and I'm not even sure what the exact wording was in my post (I tried to find the thread but no luck). I just wanted to make sure that the essence of my thoughts had been correctly expressed. It's clear that a tiny handful of these exist in copper with the larger wheels. Those combined with the one Greg has shown is evidence that such a thing can be produced. My thoughts are that no one would attempt to combine the triumph and the larger wheels on purpose.

I'm wondering whether simply using the axle peening machine on the front axle might not have been enough to force the bottom of the forks back into shape.

It might have, but the problem is that you have to force the wheel into the forks and far down into the fender to align the hole in the wheel with the holes in the forks. Once the wheel is pushed in far enough, the forks are spread too wide for the axle to fit through both forks.

You have to get the axle through one fork, push the wheel towards the first fork and force the axle through the poorly aligned hole in the wire hub and then it does not align with the hole in the other fork. Everything has to be bent over towards the loose fork and then the loose fork mashed down to align with the axle.

So here's the process that would have to be repeated over an over on an assembly line: Force the wire wheel & tire deep into place, insert the axle in one fork and force it through the wheel, bend the first fork and wheel towards the loose fork and mash that fork down into alignment with the axle ... after all this forcing, bending and mashing of the forks and wheel, then the axle end can be tooled. Not in any way is the union of this wheel and this body casting a simple or quick process. Then, as noted by many, the model will never roll.

The rear axle suffers as well. The tires have to be forced deep into the body to get the axle to align with everything. It takes a bit of forceful adjusting to get the axle aligned with the holes in the body and wheels (since both rear tires are jammed in and are not easy to move up or down). Of course, the rear wheels will never roll either.

This is what I have a hard time understanding; it's simply not logical that experienced assembly people would work this hard to force parts together in an obvious way that is unacceptable. I can only see it happening few and far between and then only as an error.

So, if the story is true and a triumph bodies were mistaken for Harley bodies and painted copper, then went to assembly with bins of "Harley" wheels ... how many awkward mashed together models were slowly assembled (with wheels jammed into place that would not roll) before someone:
A). Noticed the line had bogged way down and each model was taking far too long.
B). Noticed that none of the wheels would roll.
C). Noticed both of the above and called a halt to the assembly.

Since examples of copper Triumphs with "Harley" wheels are ultra rare, my guess is the error was quickly discovered and halted. IMHO, that makes these models negative variations (a mistake) and they should not be coded as a valid variation.

[Idris]

Joe's description of the effort it would take to fit a 4c Triumph with 66b Harley wheels is such that I can only agree with him. It seems inconceivable that anyone who was spending their working day wheeling 66b Haqrleys would expend all that time and effort without looking just a little more closely in order to work out what was wrong.
(Interestingly, the light metallic blue, i.e 4c Triumph-coloured, 66b Harley shown in Houghton's catalogue has the correct wheels, which rather begs the issue of what it is. If it were the exact opposite of the copper 4c Triumph, it would be reasonable to expect it to have 4c wheels. The fact that it doesn't is, to me, a strong indication that it was not assembled as part of the normal manufacturing process.)

[kwakers]

My opinion would be the same as yours on that one Idris. Once a body mis-painting had been discovered (or done) on a group of 66 Harley cycles, the proper wheel/tire combination could have been used on all the blue bodies. My gut feeling on these would be that they were factory produced models done perhaps not entirely by mistake. Whether they were part of a small group of color trials, or a special group of 'Customs' produced in the factory for collectors, we will never know unless a factory worker remembers them.

Greg's model would be an absolutely gorgeous 'error' in my mind with a single wrong wheel in the bin being forced onto the front of that Triumph body. Purposefully done as a 'variant'? I really doubt that, just a very stubborn assembly worker who kind of made it work, KINDA, on this one model. I absolutely love that model Greg, It may be the only one ever produced like it, and I have lusted over it many months now from the Kernel. (I made another choice on a very Mint open step Harvester BIN (instead of your bike) from him a couple of months ago). It just amazes me that the cycle lasted so long before one of us just 'Had to Have it!'. The best man made a great move.....

Thank you for your pictures and the description of it's final characteristics. Yet another very interesting RW survivor that has been in an old time collection many years now comes out of the darkness. Any info Bob can provide on the history of this beauty would be worth recording by you, and keeping with it now that it is in it's new home. Thanks, Cheers, kwakers

[nickjones]

The bronze Triumph had Harley paint, Harley wheels and tyres and Harley axles which are longer than those fitted to the Triumph, So it most likely came about because of a stray triumph casting was put in to a box full of Harley castings and it went down the Harley production line unnoticed.

[Tinman]

The bronze Triumph had Harley paint, Harley wheels and tyres and Harley axles which are longer than those fitted to the Triumph, So it most likely came about because of a stray triumph casting was put in to a box full of Harley castings and it went down the Harley production line unnoticed.

Are you saying that the model Greg has shown was placed in with assembled and painted Harleys? If so, how did the correct rear wheels get on the model?

Or, are you describing how a handful of Triumph castings became bronze and then fitted with Harley wheels?

[nickjones]

I was describing the bronze painted model(s) only, I think Greg's model was just a stray wheel that got put on an otherwise perfectly normal Triumph.
The factory workers used to assemble oddities like this to ease the day to day boredom of an extremely tedious job. I think that most of the 'error pieces' we find today were probably not 'errors' at all.

[Tinman]

I was describing the bronze painted model(s) only, I think Greg's model was just a stray wheel that got put on an otherwise perfectly normal Triumph.

I think so too.

The factory workers used to assemble oddities like this to ease the day to day boredom of an extremely tedious job. I think that most of the 'error pieces' we find today were probably not 'errors' at all.

Interesting comment!

[nickjones]

I don't know if you remember seeing a 44a Rolls Royce 'error' piece, it was I'm sure 100% original, but fitted with 4 metal rollers from an 8a Caterpillar Crawler, It was certainly not an error piece.

[kwakers]

I think the 'error comment' that Tinman quoted above is both interesting and profound enough for Nick to add as a footnote in his 'Error' section at the site. How many of us have ever thought seriously about how human nature figured into the Lesney factory worker's everyday job? I had never thought of any intentional seeming 'error' piece as more than a 'Custom' possibly done for an outside collector long ago. Easing the boredom of repetitious assembly would certainly be a better explanation for some of the more extreme examples we have seen pictured on our Forum over the years. For some errors to have survived near Mint, (or at all over all these years,) then sometimes sell without fanfare for pennies in an E Bay lot today, or perhaps out of a beater box under a 'stall' at a show, still gives we collectors the thrill of 'The Diecast Hunt' all these years later. kwakers

[nickjones]

I have also seen a few dennis refuse trucks with an extra wheel rattling about inside the cab, I'm sure they cant all be accidental.
By the way, I do know of one ex-Lesney employee that told me he deliberately used to fit the wrong wheels etc through mischievousness, -My Brother Ed!