I'll be there although I'm still stinging from the £40 camping fee for me and Lizzy.

I'll pop in and say hello, so let's hope some of you pop over to say hello to us who's BSAa have more than 2 or 3 wheels

What a fantastic day we had at Stanford Hall, AGAIN!
Great to see you!
Right in the middle of the site was a magnificent display of BSA cars. As usual, Phil had organised a magnificent event for BSAOC - apart from all the preparations and setting up and clearing away, he doesn't stop all day.
The banter was well up to standard, although comments about my camping water bottle were hurtful. You see, last year the tap leaked at the show, so this year I fixed it with a couple of o-rings - 2 leaks - only for the handle to break into 5 pieces the first time the bottle was filled. That's life. But the unkind observations of an intermittent (typical BSA) drip and some wag putting a 2 gallon bucket underneath was just too much. I've decided not to bother bringing it again. I'm very sensitive, you know.
More membership enquiries, more new visitors & as usual existing members doing a brilliant job of telling people about the club. There was a lot of interest in the Internationals & the well-travelled sidevalve outfit adorned with trophies of places visited was a big draw. Geoff & Sarah also had a B33 on display.
Angus had his shiny OIF attracting much attention & (the other) Phil's glorious bike was too good to miss and was loved by the crowds at the parade ring.
From another exhibitor we got a line on a nicely restored B40 available for not much money in NI.
Having a look around with a fan & owner of old Nortons, we were amused to hear a expert announcing a fully restored Manx to be a not-quite-right ES2.
Maybe it indicates a change in the market, but I've never seen so many petrol tanks on offer. Even more intriguing was that most seemed to be BSA tanks, round badge and tear drop types, some of them in very reasonable condition.
Another change this year was so much stuff on sale with no price tags. Asking a few stall holders I have dealt with before, the answer was the same. They want/need to shift stock this Summer, don't want to hold it over the Winter again, so make an offer, walk away if not accepted & try again later nearer closing time...
Is there someone doing good quality and economical retoothing of worn out gearbox and rear wheel sprockets - not the unavailable ones, but everyday classics? There were boxes of absolutely shot examples on sale. And who would want to buy a BSA/Triumph bare clutch basket fit only for weighing in, cracked across the centre, slots hammered after previous filing oversize? Someone did!
Looking forwards to next year already.

The reason I enquired as to your opinion was solely on the basis that you have much more contact with the various guys connected with the manufacture and sales of the bike. In this instance I would have thought that your opinion was actually likely to be more value than mine as I have contact with any of the foregoing. If I have upset you, which seems likely, I apologise as it was inadvertent although I don't understand why you should be so sensitive!

Hi, I'm not in the least upset; I'm sorry if I gave that impression through rushing a response.
Phil Bull & I have been under strict commercial confidentiality agreements since the first meeting we attended at NMM, as reported at Members' Meetings & AGMs. This means that anything we are told cannot be circulated until cleared. This is standard business practice to avoid misinterpretation or excessive speculation. That tends to happen anyway.
What I try to do is to communicate the potential effects on the BSAOC and our members, resulting from the introduction of a cracking good bike (from early impressions, including the brief rides at Brooklands). A good mate, Mark Fielder, volunteers at Brooklands and facilitated BSAOC in encouraging BSA to be there. Chris Golby & I did the honours for the Club. Brooklands have invited BSAOC along with our own club stand next year, we'll just need some local volunteers to get involved.
Anything to do with the running of the company, the appointment of the distributor or the production and import of bikes is announced by the founders. They are the only people who know everything, so it's best to watch out for anything they put out. Lukas Distribution seem to be releasing their own related announcements.
I get a number of enquiries privately and via various groups, but as a volunteer who still has a more than full time job running my own businesses, I can't deal with them all individually. However, as a significant number were asking questions, like yours and capturing their perception of what was going on, I try to answer with generic answers relating to the bigger picture of manufacturing and industry and trade, that from experience I know will be influencing BSA. Combining our thoughts will help us and others build a better informed picture of how the new BSA project is developing.
Out of interest, how this might work is shown by a number of studies, based on the fairground game of guess how many ball bearings/sweets are in a large glass jar. If you collect a couple of thousand guesses the mathematical average of them all is consistently near the truth! Weird!
Note that I tend to prefer perception to opinion when referring to informed and thoughtful comments like yours. As Club PRO, I fully understand that perception comes from the messages from the organisation and how they are communicated. Opinions are more commonly just founded in prejudice. That's not judgemental, it's just the way it is.
These are exciting and positive times for BSAOC, not only is there the new bike, but The Star confirms what we see elsewhere, that there are a number of bikes and projects being released into the market.
There's no secret that I believe we should encourage every new BSA owner to also acquire a classic BSA, if they don't already have one. There's a whole side of the Club and BSA ownership that delights in fixing bikes, which new vehicles don't offer.
One final point - you won't upset me, I'm too thick-skinned after all the abuse I get from BSAOC whenever I sing You'll Never Walk Alone (YNWA).
Keep smiling, share the joy, we are the Happy People

Very helpful, thanks Dave.

Hi,

Yes.  It was my understanding that Birmingham was the intended production base.  I would think that if BSA had stayed in production then this model would already be from 20m years ago so definitely a retro/nostalgia trip.
For me there needs to be a really comprehensive trashing test over 25,000 miles to give this bike credibility. 

Dave.

Thanks Dave,
I answered the Birmingham question as far as I could above.
As for a long term test, maybe not 25k miles, but certainly 4 seasons high mileage would be an essential stress test, way beyond what most owners would be doing. As such, it can't delay launch and sales, but regular reports would certainly build confidence in the brand.
It was so funny to see the reaction when I had a father & adult son, both riders examining "my" bike at Brooklands. The son was lay down reporting on the underneath. It raised a laugh when I asked if anyone had a toolkit so he could take it apart.
When I get another bike, I have to confess to partially dismantling and checking it, before I clocking up the miles for work.
You're right, credibility has to be earned.

Great report John!
Well done for overcoming the problems. A 1/4" plywood spacer between the carb & the head should solve the vaporisation problem. I've used plywood on bikes and Minis (when I had them) for years, since being shown it by a former Nascar race mechanic.
Sorry I had to miss another rally.

And they'll make a serious profit. The start price here is a bout £1500 above the projected/rumoured sale price in India.

Mike

Mike, Good observation, but they don't have 6 weeks shipping costs to India, nor import duties, nor UK taxes, nor currency exchange rate risks...
Even at £7k there's not a lot of profit in it, if any, certainly not until the volumes are shifted. On top of that, rumours are never reliable, or else we'd all be locked up just for owning bikes, let alone being subversive BSA types! 

Mike
That's it in a nutshell!
Let's just be proud that it has been the BSAOC that has kept the brand and the spirit and the passion alive for 50 years, not the intervening owners of the business.
The new owners share our passion and fully recognise the part played by BSAOC in keeping BSA alive.