I found this picture of a Ducent which is the opposite of the Vincati. That means a Ducati engine in a Vincent frame. This also gave me the idea to collect and cluster a few pictures about oddities or in general freaky stuff with the Vincent theme in mind.
Post war Vincent motorcycles production has been discontinued for more than 55 years; this a very long period of time during which, I guess, any Vincent conversion imaginable has been drawn on the corner of tablecloth and even built. However, today only a few of them can really pass the thumb-up test. Among these one can mention The Egli and The Norvin as well as some historic racers that became legendary such Marty Dickerson’s Bonneville bike. This are presented in other folders.
However we forget that in the 60s, many bikes finished in parts and bits either because of wear, crash, disinterest or complete lack of value at a period of time unlike today. After being torn down, many inportant elements like the UFM or RFM were lost and crossbreeding was a cheap way to put the bike on wheel again. So for some longtime Vincent enthusiasts which believe that “one Vincent modified is one Vincent lost”, it can trigger a feeling of offense, for less radical enthusiasts it would be skepticism, depending where you stand in the Vincent community. Let’s you decide if it worth it and perhaps sometimes it will even make you smile…
This folder will include also everything “freaky” about Vincent including what you would not expect Vincent to have manufactured like water scooter, industrial 2 stroke engines, lifeboat engines, drone engines; just thinking how much resources and money the company has sunk into these projects make me dream that this energy channeled on their core motorcycle business could have save the company
Here it is, this picture popped up recently on the web and are also as you can guess triggering serious controversy; for the story, the engine is a Ducati Monster 900 fitted in a Vincent Rapide Series B rolling frame.Look at this first motorcycle; nothing wrong with her, this is just a nearly standard (see comments below) 1939 Series A Rapide, one of the 78 ever produced before WWII. But look at the next one with this picture in mind…… in this second picture, don’t see anything? Look closer to the engine… still don’t see anything? This is in fact a Series B engine (1947) heavily modified to mimic a Series A. No need to say that there are serious polemics around.The caption for this picture was “Good Lord!” I could not say if this is a genuine Egli as the front fork suggests it, or if it is a heavily modified one… but we can say that it is rather inexpected to see Vincent wearing carbon.Yes, a Vincent engine also fits in a (heavily modified) Buell rolling frame. Either you like her or not, one must recognize the impressive work done to implant all components together in a very professional way.“No”, it is not a Moto Guzzi V8 coming back from hell, according MPH Nov ’12, this guy is Gino Cavanna an italian dealer which beated numerous speed records. This is an hybrid of Vincent engine and Guzzi frame.The Vincent engine ends up in racing cars too… this 1949 Hunt Special can be seen in the Adelaide Car Museum. It was originally fitted with a 500cc JAP engine.A weird trike based on a Comet engineRoland’s immaculate MOGVIN. look at this second helmet in the cockpit… it looks there is a just one head with no body ! The engine is 1275cc and works on methanol.Amanda, this was the name of the water scooter designed by Vincent. This sample belongs to Francois Grosset, which manufactures the electric starters for VincentThis is lifeboat engine: “a 500 cc 3 cylinder 2 stroke, 2 outer cylinders being the power cylinders, the middle being scavenging cylinder, Each power cylinder contained two slightly oversquare opposed pistons with uniflow piston-porting. Unusually for a small two-stroke, there was no reliance on the Kadenacy effect. The transfer ports though were angle-drilled to encourage swirl. Even more unusual the scavenge piston was double acting” says the comment coming along with the picture…. …. Really? Sometimes I wish that Vincent engineers were more focus on motorcycles.More famous is the Picador, a derivative of the standard Rapide engine to propel military drones. On some extent a bewilderment from the core business but this looks great.A lawn mower?… oh please !I am guilty for the next two ones, but do not freak out I did not compress a Black Price to make a modern sculpture, this is just my fridge in my garageIf you have an old Feridax you don’t know what to do with, this is an idea to recycle it. Enjoy your ride at the office.Tomo’s 4v – shown at the VMCC 1000 BikesThis one is a Comet but with a rear cylinder ! Used in grass-track sidecar, I guess there were a bunch of these in the 70-80s.Likely a Honda Monkey or a knock-off from ChinaA Trial bikeA custom made snowmobile, can you believe it !Don’t cry for me Argentina….. Argentina was one of the largest importer of Vincent as soon as 1946. Most of them have been exported starting from the 90s, but there are still a few around as this bike was for sale $30,000 earlier this year on OLX (local eBay | see link included). It is quite sad what happened to it, but the seller was intelligent enough to keep the batch of original parts. Sold with title. Anyway it would have been an excellent base to start an Egli project!Beware where you seat down if you don’t want to be sucked into the Supercharger….If you are the kind of guy who is constantly worried to be out of gas, just ask Brian Hill, he got a solution for you!Let’s shift gear and come back on those Freaky Vincents… Imagine the good father which see this vision in his mirror…..Best shot I have seen of this MogVin with a series A. It was regularly raced in the early 70s.Vincent was driven by engineers, here is one of their brainstorming ideas to be incorporated in a bike: the Rotary Cross/Rotary Valve.Some Vinnies had really a tough life…
The Egli-Vincent 
Do these qualify for this section?
Hi Bruce, yes it would, in fact I found a few more and made the “Tribute to Vincent” section. http://wp.me/p4cm0Z-a3
Thanks, Philippe