26 :OLD BIKE AUSTRALASIA
Charlie enjoyed life in the bush, and was keen to
further his racing career. “I had to join a club so I
joined Narrandera Club and they had a perpetual
trophy going that Bill Wicks had won ever since it
started, but as soon as I won it they removed the
perpetual trophy so I never got it. I said I would like
to know how to get into the Australian titles and
they said I’d have no chance – the whole club
revolved around the Wicks family. West Wyalong
club heard about this and invited me to join so I did
and they were a fantastic club and were delighted
to have a rider who wanted to go to the Australian
titles, whereas Narrandera was terrible.”
One of the major drawbacks in racing a Bantam
was the three-speed gearbox, so Charlie made his
own five-speeder. This used two coupled Bantam
gear sets, the second one mounted upside down,
mounted on the left side. To take the drive from the
main gearbox through to the auxiliary box, the
middle was bored out of the sleeve gear that
normally carries the countershaft sprocket. The new
bore was then splined to drive a transfer shaft reach-
ing into the auxiliary box, and the sleeve gear of that
box now carried the drive sprocket. The two selector
mechanisms were connected by a heavy duty cable.
A complex sounding but ingeniously simple method
of gear changing was achieved with much work, and
only two of the extra three ratios were used. The
mods even attracted the attention of famed jour-
nalised Vic Willoughby who wrote it up for the
English Motor Cyclemagazine in 1966. The 5-speed
Bantam, which used Charlie’s own hand-made
conrod, head and barrel, is still in existence and
owned by his long-time friend Len Norris. However
despite the many hours of work and experimenta-
tion, Charlie found increasing difficulty in keeping up
with the Spanish Bultacos that were being imported
by Bert Flood and ridden by Bert and his mate Ray
Owen with great success, so Charlie decided to join
them. “The last time Ken Rumble rode my 5-speed
Bantam at Romsey Grass Track, he was passed by
Bert Flood on his newly-imported 125 Bultaco, so
that night I detoured via Bert’s home and purchased
a brand new 125 Bultaco engine that he was going
to use as a spare.”
Once again, the standard product was not good
enough for him, and he began playing around with
extra transfer ports in search of more low and mid-
range power. At the same time, Flood was doing
similar work, although concentrating on the top
end, so by pooling their thoughts they came up
with performance figures that attracted theattention of the Bultaco factory. “Bert brought Mr
Bulto from the Bultaco factory up to see me and I
showed him what I had done, and they brought
these extra ports out some years later. These were
loop ports, a Bultaco’s got two lots of transfer ports
but we heated up the barrel and dropped the cast
iron sleeve out, then because there was enough
metal in the alloy barrel we just put these extra
ports in and marked these on the sleeve, and cut
them out. Then we put the barrel in the oven and
quickly pushed the sleeve before it cooled so we
could move it around to line everything up and then
put it in the press while it cooled to stop the sleeve
lifting out of the aluminium. Bultaco had been
trying to work this out so they were very
appreciative. They presented me with a silk woven
overlay of all their models in appreciation of our
success in racing and perfecting the Loop ports that
they used in their motors.”
Charlie worked at Burrabogie for ten years, and
has remained in the Riverina ever since. His duties
as head mechanic at the station, which ran 20,000
sheep, kept him busy, but there was always time for
flying and working on his growing stable of bikes. In
addition to the 125 and 250cc Bultacos, both in
Hagon frames (the first frames built to take two-
stroke engines by Alf Hagon), there were also 350
and 500 Hagon/JAPs, plus a ‘big 500’ for use in the
All Powers/Unlimited class. That big JAP was sold to
Len Norris from Griffith who became an Australian
Champion in 1980. From the early ‘sixties until the
mid ‘seventies, Charlie, often in company with Les
Lewis and his son Leslie, plied the Short Circuit
tracks across the country, from coast to coast.
Charlie admits to crashing a lot; “I had 24 fractures
during my racing career; broken ribs, chipped spine,
broken legs and an arm, but I am happy to say
that all the wire, screws and plates have been
removed.” Charlie’s first Australian Championship
came in 1966 at the Old Bar circuit at Taree, NSW
where he won the 125cc class on his Bultaco. HeCHARLIE EDWARDS
TOP The glow plug with its platinum winding.
ABOVE CENTRE The CE carb with its side-mounted main
jet. ABOVE The five-speed Bantam engine.
RIGHT Bantam conrod.“The mods even attracted the attention
of famed journalised Vic Willoughby...”
Nigel Boocock on the
Edwards 350 Yamaha
at Bendigo.