Tech Sessions

All Tech Sessions were held at the CBE Tent and Trailer

Monday, June 17, 15:00 – 17:00

Maintenance and Repair of your Instruments

  • An overview of tricks and lessons learned dealing various speedo and tachos over the years.
  • Speaker:  George Roetenburg

Frame alignment assessment on the cheap

  • After a serious crash on his MKIII, Don collaborated with CBE to work out a simple, cheap and highly accurate method to determine frame alignment without major disassembly.  Several long rods, a digital camera and some clever software were all that was needed.
  • Speakers:   Sherb Lang (CBE) and Don Meeks

Available Popular Cycle Parts and Wheels/Tires for your Norton

  • Topics include tire selection/options, isolastic & head steady options, shock options, fork springs and damper options, swing arm stiffening.
  • Speakers:  Ashley Cutler(Andover), Chris West (Fair Spares New England). Others as available and interested

Tuesday, June 18, 15:00 – 17:00

New Hips and Knees Special:  Available Starters Overview

  • Alton Starter (France) will be installed as part of this session in the camp garage near the tech session location
    • Speakers:  Chris West (FSNE) will be leading the installation.  Jack Manning/CBE has been the primary Alton US Service agent since 2012 and can answer any questions.
  • CNW Starter (USA)
    • Speaker:  None slated but we plan on having an INOA member bring over a CNW equipped bike.  Jack Manning has installed several and can fill in as needed
  • Norvil Starter (UK)
    • New offering based upon the Old Britts design; Chris West will either bring one or review design details.
    • Speaker;  Chris West 
  • Kick Magic (USA)
    • This is a unit Triumph pneumatic starter developed by CBE;  The starter will be demonstrated on a 73 TR7 Triumph.  A modified unit was demonstrated as a custom installation on an Atlas at the Catskills rally two  years ago.
    • Speaker:  Jack Manning (CBE)

Batteries, alternators, rectifiers, generators, assimilators, POS/NEG ground, LEDs and things that go bump in the night

  • All of your questions about how to keep the juice flowing in your Norton.  Presentations can be made on all subjects, but the idea is to talk about what is most interesting/pressing to attendees.
  • Speakers:   Ashley Cutler (AN), Jack Manning (CBE),  Others as available and interested

Wednesday, June 19, 15:00 – 17:00

What’s new with some of our industry specialists

  • Nortech Anti Sump modification (via Zoom).  The AMR modification upgrades your timing cover to provide a check valve on the pressure side of the oil pump.
    • Speaker: Mike Harracourt, AMR of Tucson
  • JS Motorsports (via Zoom).  Jim will be picking 3 or 4 topics to present and is looking for an interactive session.  Jim has a long history of providing high performance parts and services for Nortons.
    • Speaker:  Jim Schmidt
  • Comstock Engineering (via Zoom) NOT YET CONFIRMED
    • Speaker;  Jim Comstock

Open White Board

  • Any and all tech questions you might have that we can cover while sipping beer and drawing on the whiteboard
    • Speakers:  As interested and available

Thursday, June 20, 15:00 – 17:00

Special History Narratives and a Look at the Future

  • Special session from a Norton employee from 1972 to 1976.  “My perspective in this talk is my experience in the Service Department at the Wolverhampton factory in 1972; the Combat engine, its successes and failures — I lived with and through it all, as it happened”
    • Speaker:  Bruce Henderson, Former Norton employee; UK and US
  • The past, present and future of Norton parts supply – the history and future of Andover Norton
  • Roundtable Q&A for Bruce, Karl and others

Our Speakers

Special thanks to the following individuals for preparing discussion materials and sharing their experiences and expertise.  We will have complete bios available at the Rally. 

Speakers in BOLD are confirmed

  • George Roetenburg
    • Norton enthusiast who has been messing with instruments for a long time and looking forward to sharing his experience.
  • Sherb Lang
    • Sherb is Shop Manager at CBE.  70% of CBE’s business has been Commandos over the past 15 years.  First a “Guild Member” restoring his dad’s 74 Interstate many years ago and, uh, just never left.
  • Chris West
    • Chris is Owner of Fair Spares New England, having purchased the assets from Phil Radford of Fair Spares America a few years back.
  • Ashley Cutler
    • Ashley is the Engineer for Andover Norton.  Check out his YouTube videos on their site with your Monday morning coffee.
  • Karl Smith
    • Karl is the Manager Director at Andover Norton, overseeing all operations.  Notably, Andover Norton has expanded greatly into Triumph parts as well.
  • Jim Schmidt
    • Jim Owns JS Motorsport which “.. is a design shop whose single mission is to make Norton Twins go faster, more reliably”
  • Jim Comstock
  • Bruce Hendersen
    • Bruce went to work for Norton right out of college in 1972 in the service department in Wolverhampton and later in California.
  • Jack Manning
    • Jack is the owner of the Classic Bike Experience in Essex, VT.  CBE’s primary business objective is to not screw it up.