Words: Roland Brown
Photographs: Roland Brown
Single-cylinder models from famous old British marques are among the best selling motorcycles these days. From reborn BSA’s Gold Star to Royal Enfield’s 350cc Meteor and Triumph’s Speed 400, they’re delivering enjoyable and economical transport with a touch of nostalgia to riders of all ages.
A spin on a genuine mid-Fifties classic like Velocette’s MAC makes it easy to understand why Brit singles were so popular the first time around. On a busy Hampshire A-road I’m riding in a stream of traffic, but the old Velocette still makes it a trip into a long-ago world – and it’s holding its own remarkably well.
All around me, the cars are modern, colourful, crammed with sophisticated technology, and built in countries as far apart as America, Germany and China. Their occupants are isolated from the countryside outside their windows, but reliant on far-off satellites for directions, entertainment, even control.
It’s very different for me. The little Velocette is finished in the marque’s traditional black, with an obviously hand-painted gold pinstripe. With its aircooled, 349cc single-cylinder engine, traditional chassis and elementary electrical system, the Velocette is an infinitely more simple device than all those surrounding it.
That basic feel is a big part of the fun of riding the old Velocette. I’m conscious of the piston’s up-and-down motion, due to the gentle vibration that comes through the handlebars and footpegs, plus the thudding sound from its exhaust pipe. I see and feel the forks’ movement over bumps in the road. I feel the wind, and smell it too – sadly, more often traffic fumes than more natural countryside odours.
The humble MAC typifies the British motorcycles of the Fifties, with its emphasis on economical, unglamorous transport. But although this Velo dates from 1954, the firm from Hall Green, near Birmingham, built bikes that looked and performed much like this from the early Thirties all the way until its demise in 1971.
Velocette was best known for singles. The firm made its name with the exotic overhead-cam 350cc bikes that won a string of Isle of Man TTs in the 1920s, at the hands of star riders including Alec Bennett and Freddie Hicks. Bennett’s first TT winning machine of 1926 was a production road bike, the K model, tuned and fitted with a stronger clutch. It was good for 85mph, and averaged over 66mph at the TT despite a last-lap crash.
Velocette brought much of that performance to the street with the sporty KSS single, and also produced a pure-bred racing model called the KTT. The “cammy” racer, so called because of its bevel-driven overhead camshaft, introduced itself by taking the first eight places at the 1930 Manx Grand Prix, and remained the ultimate privateer racer’s bike for years.
But although those K-series singles were fast, they were also very expensive to produce. What Velocette needed was a model that could be built more cheaply and sold more profitably.
Velo boss Percy Goodman set designer Charles Udall to work, and in 1933 the firm released the MOV (“OV” standing for “Overhead Valve”), a simpler 250cc single with a single camshaft that operated the valves via pushrods. It was considerably cheaper, and a big success.
A year later, in 1934, the engine was enlarged to 349cc (with a longer, 96mm stroke) to create the 349cc MAC. This shared its styling with the smaller bike but added a striking fishtail silencer that echoed the famous “Brooklands can”, as used to keep noise down at the banked Surrey racetrack. The MAC had a higher price and cost barely more to produce, so rapidly became Velocette’s most profitable model.
Development was slow, apart from the creation of a military version called the MAF in 1940, but Velocette had introduced some notable upgrades by the time this bike was built in 1954. Front suspension changed from girder to telescopic forks in 1948. In 1951 the engine gained a new aluminium cylinder and head. Two years later the “hard-tail” frame was redesigned to incorporate twin shock absorbers.
The frame was made from the high-quality Reynolds 531 tubing, and featured sliding shock top mounts, designed by Australian engineer Phil Irving (later to find fame with Vincent), with which the shocks’ angle, and thus the rear end’s stiffness, could be adjusted. At around 160kg the new MAC was 15kg heavier than the old unsprung bike, and maximum output was still only about 15 horsepower, but the sprung chassis gave the model a new lease of life.
This well-preserved black MAC seemed to have an engaging blend of engine and chassis performance. It also started satisfyingly easily, at least from cold, after its carburettor had been tickled to provide some fuel, and a couple of fairly gentle swings on the kick-starter had brought it to life with a restrained chuffing from the big silencer.
Moments later I was rumbling down the road, pleasantly surprised by the little single’s torquey feel and lack of vibration. The black-faced Smiths speedometer, calibrated to an optimistic 120mph, felt as though it was reading rather high. But the Velo pulled crisply from low revs, and chugged happily along at an indicated 65 to 70mph without its vibration being too annoying.
At a more leisurely indicated 55mph the single was very comfortable, its relaxed riding position helping to explain how this model was regarded as a “tourer” in its day. The MAC’s unusually smooth feel (by single standards) was credited to Velocette’s engineering precision, in both assembly of the motor itself, and the drilling of mounting plates and frame holes.
Having heard that Velocette clutches (which contained no fewer than 16 springs) were an Achilles heel I was half expecting trouble with this one, but the MAC’s well-adjusted unit was light and gave no trouble. Likewise the four-speed gearbox, which worked smoothly once I’d got used to changing up with a downwards prod of my right boot.
Some things were not so clever, though. By single standards the Velo’s kickstarter turned the engine over quite easily. Unfortunately that didn’t always result in the motor starting when it was hot.
This gave me an opportunity to discard items of clothing all around the bike while I leapt ever-harder on the kickstarter (and cursed louder) in traditional fashion, followed by confirmation that the MAC’s light weight makes it fairly easy to bump-start. Velocette never quite managed to make the engine oil-tight, either. This one leaked like all the others.
Even all these years later it was easy to see why the MAC’s chassis had been rated highly. For a bike with big 19-inch wheels and old-fashioned geometry the Velo was easy to manoeuvre, yet it handled as though wobbles and weaves had not been invented. Despite my mistrust of the narrow and ancient Avon front tyre, the bike’s stability encouraged me to ride hard enough to get the stand grounding in corners.
Sure, the forks and shocks crunched rather crudely over bigger bumps, but the ride was generally comfortable. The one chassis part that really showed its age was the single-leading-shoe front brake, which juddered enough to suggest that the drum had gone slightly oval. At least the rear brake responded to a stamp of my left foot with sufficient enthusiasm to get the rear Dunlop squeaking.
Despite its lack of outright speed the MAC was a very capable performer by mid-Fifties standards, which helped make it a success despite being more expensive than rival singles. It survived until the end of that decade, but in 1960 was dropped from the range in favour of the sportier 350cc Viper and its better-known 500cc derivative the Venom, both of which had been introduced a few years earlier.
By this time the MAC had been in production for a quarter of a century, and had become Velocette’s longest-running and best-selling model. From 1955 it had even been offered in Willow Green as well as black. It had outlasted the smaller-capacity MOV and its 500cc derivative the MSS, if not the ill-fated flat-twin LE commuter bike on which Velocette’s management had rashly gambled the firm’s future.
The infamous LE, plus the KTT racers and the rapid Venom Thruxton of the Sixties, are the bikes for which Velocette remained best known after production ended in 1971. But in many ways the less glamorous but supremely competent MAC summed-up the firm’s singles best of all. Quick, smooth, reliable, agile and competitively priced, it was everything a single-pot roadster should be – then and now.
Velocette 350 MAC
Engine: Aircooled pushrod single
Capacity: 349cc
Maximum Power: 15bhp @ 6000rpm
Weight: 160kg without fluids
Top Speed: 70mph
