The 44^th Annual Gloucestershire Vintage & Country Extravaganza

South Cerney Airfield, Cirencester 3-5 August 2018

3-5 August 2018 will see the Stroud Vintage Transport & Engine Club (SVTEC) stage their Annual Show at South Cerney Airfield in Cirencester, Gloucestershire. The show now in its 44^th year is widely regarded as one of the biggest and best Steam, Vintage and Countryside events in the UK and attracts thousands of exhibitors and visitors from across the country whilst actively raising thousands of pounds for both national and regional charities. Over £180, 000 has been donated in recent years. Whilst the show has evolved a lot, the mission remains the same - to inform, educate, celebrate and preserve our unique transport heritage.

One of the largest displays is the Motorcycle section featuring 230 registered entries representing manufacturers from across the globe. Among the marques on display are Honda, Yamaha, Harley Davidson, Moto Guzzi, HRD, AGS, James, Triumph, Royal Enfield, Rudge, Baker, BMW, Norton, Velocette, Panther, Francis Barnett, Matchless and Greeves. There will also be an abundance of Lambretta’s to celebrate the mods and rockers era plus the show will play host to the 7th BSA Bantam Club National Rally.

Section leader John Grange said ‘we always try to bring something of interest to all ages and interests, from Veteran to Vintage and Classic. From the smallest Brockhouse Corgi ‘Para’ bike to the HRD Vincent Meteor Series B, from the Yamaha FS1E (my first bike!) to the Suzuki GT750, there will be something to suit everyone’s motorcycling interests. The section celebrates 100 years of motorcycles’.

Show Highlights include

Vintage displays of nearly 700 classic cars from pre and post war, including over 70 Classic American, 30 visiting car clubs plus 300 Motorbikes, scooters, 70 bicycles from 1903 - 1980, 30 miniature steam engines, 90 stationary engines, 70 full size steam engines, model engineering, 200 Tractors, over 80 Buses and Coaches, 120 Military Vehicles, 300 Emergency and Commercial Vehicles, 60 Industrial Trucks, 50 vintage Caravans, and over 50 model Aircraft taking to the sky above.

Live Arena with non-stop demonstrations from spectacular Showman’s Engines to dancing tractors plus the opportunity to drive a steam engine and NEW – a motorcycle display team show

Vintage Fun fair with fairground organs, 'electric yachts', waltzers, big wheel, steam-driven 'gallopers' and traditional penny arcade games, plus ‘Chuffy the train’ passenger rides

The Dog Show runs over the weekend and is organised by Cotswold Dog and Cat Home. Categories include: Scruffiest Mutt, Prettiest Bitch, Handsomest Dog Quickest Sit, Best Child Handler, Best Rescue to Waggiest Tail. Come and enter your four-legged fury friend on the day for just £2 per entry per class (in addition to show event entry fee) all money goes to help the marvellous local animal shelter.

The Countryside Arena actively promotes animal conservation and features both fun and education displays from ferret racing, rare breeds, alpaca’s, shire horses, horse logging, reptiles to bee hive making. NEW for 2018 – vulture flying display. Back by popular demand is the hilarious ‘Sheep Show’ - an entertaining demonstration of shearing and sheep dancing - get into the groove with the Sheep Show Shuffle!  Plus, the children’s area has traditional vintage funfair games, face painting and Professor Colliwobble with his free regular Punch and Judy Shows.

Massive Trade stand village featuring over 100 trade stalls, models tents, 2 large craft marques, specialist displays of memorabilia from bygone days.

The showground site is sprawling, but there’s plenty of food and drink ‘pit stops’, a firm favourite is the vintage tea room with regular music and Lindy Hop dancing performances (both days). Live music with vintage songstress Betsy Harmony, performing a delightful selection of 1940s songs plus regular sets by the ‘Steamed Up Brass’.

Jump4Heroes parachute display team will descend into the arena on all three days of the event. Jump4Heroes is The Royal British Legion Extreme Human Flight Team, made up of serving and former members of the Army, to support and raise awareness of the Armed Forces charities.

FREE vintage bus rides around the showground on all three days. What more the Bedford OB hope to set a world record for the biggest gathering of vintage buses on site.

Each day at 10am the steam section will sound their bells in memory of the late arena commentator Alec Tanner. The main area will officially be named as the ‘Alec Tanner’ arena.

Chairman of the Stroud Vintage Transport and Engine Club (S.V.T.E.C) Martyn Slater, said: ‘Our goal is to give the best value for money family day out in Gloucestershire’.

The Extravaganza is organised by the Stroud Vintage Transport and Engine Club. This non-profit making organisation raises money for national and local charities and up to 30 will be represented on site raising money and awareness of their respective causes. The rally is one of the largest events of its kind run entirely by volunteers from all the corners of Gloucestershire.

www.glosvintageextravaganza.co.uk

Maybe you have been creating something special in your shed or have a rare race bike or cafe racer in your garage. If you've built a beautiful chopper or bobber or modernised a classic, let us know, send us pics - and your bike could be proudly on show inside the Cheltenham Town Hall this September.

Oily Rag Co is headline sponsor for the exhibition and showcase which takes place in the Town Hall and around the Imperial Gardens from 8-9th September.

The motorcycle showcase will feature rare specials, award-winning customs, modified classics, stunning cafe racers, old school choppers and customised scooters...

Visitors will also be able to enjoy mooching around the trade stalls and grab lunch, coffee and hang out with friends and family in the licensed bar.

The Oily Rag Co Festival of Bikes takes place 8-9th September 2018 inside and around the Cheltenham Town Hall and you can get 20% off tickets when you buy online at TheCustomShow.com

Visit The Festival on either or both days - all tickets are valid for the Saturday and Sunday. 

If you would like to display your motorcycle masterpiece at this year's Festival of Bikes please email good photos for consideration to [email protected]

June’s heatwave has seen temperatures topping 30C in many parts of the country. This has caused some roads to melt. With the Met Office predicting that temperatures for July and August could be hotter than average more roads could find that more road surfaces are getting soft and sticky.

Most roads will not begin to soften until they hit a temperature of around 50C. However, even a sunny day in the 20Cs can be enough to generate 50C on the ground as the dark asphalt road surface absorbs a lot of heat and this builds up during the day with the hottest period between noon and 5pm. With temperatures regularly reaching the high 20Cs, the bitumen in some road surfaces may soften and rise to the top. This makes the road surface sticky and more susceptible to pressure loads from heavy vehicles resulting in surface ridging and rutting.

The response from local highway authorities is to send out the gritters to spread granite dust to absorb the soft bitumen and so stabilise the road surface and make it less sticky.

“Drivers may be bemused to see the gritters out in the summer when they are usually spreading grit and salt during the winter”, said Howard Robinson, chief executive of the Road Surface Treatments Association. “However, this is effective standard practice for keeping a road surface safe during extreme prolonged hot temperatures.”

He continued: "Asphalt is a bit like chocolate - it melts and softens when it's hot and goes hard and brittle when it's cold - it doesn't maintain the same strength all year round.”

Following a heatwave in 1995, the road industry introduced a new asphalt specification introducing the use of polymer modified binders in hot rolled asphalt (HRA). These polymers raise the asphalt road surface softening point to around 80C which prevents it from softening under extreme hot weather. Other asphalt products such as thin surface course systems also normally contain polymer modified binders.

However, such modified asphalts tend to be more expensive and are generally only used on heavily-trafficked roads. Robinson estimates that less than 5% of all the UK’s road surfaces contain polymer modified asphalt. On the other hand most surface dressings which are used to seal road surfaces and restore skid resistance nowadays predominantly contain polymer modified binders which will resist softening during periods of hot weather.

“Localised melting of some roads is not surprising during this heatwave but they can be quickly treated and revert back to normal once temperatures decline,” said Robinson.

SOLID RACE FOR SCOTT WHO FINISHES IN THE POINTS WITH FOURTEENTH PLACE, JUST BEHIND HIS TEAMMATE

Both of the Aprilia machines finished in the points in a spectacular race on the Dutch Assen track, the eighth round of the MotoGP Championship It was a race that, as the practice and qualifying days had foreshadowed, was characterised by a spectacular balance, so much that Espargaró and Redding missed the top ten even though they finished only 16 seconds behind the winner, Marquez.

For Aleix it was a disappointment explained by the conservative choice of putting a hard rear tyre on for the race. Off the line well from the third row – earned thanks to a brilliant qualifying session – Aleix was eighth at the end of the first lap, but then he lost five positions due to contact with Zarco. Clawing his way back up to thirteenth place was made difficult by the poor grip conditions his tyres provided throughout the race and he finished in that position, 15.986 seconds behind the leader.

Scott rode his best race yet astride the RS-GP on the historic Dutch track. Starting from the sixth row, Scott was seventeenth at the end of the first lap. Finding a good pace, he moved up through the pack until catching up, and on one occasion overtaking, his teammate. The fourteenth place finish, 16 seconds behind the winner, is a good result that shows the progress the English rider has made in the last two races.

ALEIX ESPARGARO'
"I am not happy. Unfortunately, I made the wrong choice for the rear tyre. My Aprilia worked extremely well throughout the weekend on the soft, even if we were at the limit with wear. Precisely for this reason and after the wear problems at Mugello and the crash in Barcelona, I opted for the hard, thinking that it would be a safer choice. In reality, I did not have grip from the start, so all I could do was simply try to finish the race. A pity because we really worked well in all the sessions and then the worst came right at the decisive moment, where the points are earned."

SCOTT REDDING
"I am happy especially with the consistency I was able to maintain in the race. We made the right tyre choice. After warm up, I considered the hard option on the rear, thinking about duration, but after lapping well with the soft in practice, it was smart to ride the race with that one as well. I had fun, staying close to Pol and Aleix and managing to fend on Pedrosa's attacks. We worked well, calmly and without pressure and the results are clear. It is a small step forward. Now we need to continue in this direction."

This year sees the long-awaited re-launch of the VMCCs Festival of 1000 Bikes at Mallory Park on the 7th/8th July this Year, and with over 75% of available entries already sold there is still time to be part of the action during this fabulous weekend event.

With the support of Footman James Insurance Brokers, Bonhams Auctioneers, Mortons Motorcycle Media, Ricoh, the National Motorcycle Museum it promises to be a weekend to remember.

As in past festival years the event gives enthusiasts the opportunity to ride their own machines in multiple track sessions over the weekend. Catering for all classes of machines from the earliest Veterans through to the machines of the super bike era this is a truly inclusive event which reflects the wide range of interests within the VMCC. With lesser noise restrictions on Sunday the Festival will again allow for riders to display their racing machinery in special track sessions running throughout the day.

It was generally recognised that the VMCC Festival event had the best line up of “Past Masters” and famous machines assembled in the UK for many Years. With the assistance from Stuart Hicken of Mallory Park, The Sammy Miller Museum and the National Motorcycle Museum there will be some great riders and machines to mingle with throughout the weekend.

From the Sammy Miller Museum there will be the 498cc 8-cylinder Moto Guzzi V8 GP racer. It may not have won a race but it remains one of the technological wonders of 1950s Grand Prix racing. Sammy also brings to the festival the multi winning World Championship Gilera 500cc with its 4 cylinder, double overhead cam engine and 4 speed gearbox as raced by the stars of yesteryear such as Geoff Duke and Bob McIntyre who was the first to achieve the 100mph lap of the IOM over 8 laps on a machine such as this one.

With Stuart Hicken’s knowledge and expertise of the motor racing sport and riders, the VMCC list of Stars attending the festival already include John McGuinness, Ian Hutchinson, Trever Nation, John “Moon-eyes” Cooper, Paul Smart, Rex Butcher, Ron Chandler, Tommy Robb, Chris Vincent, Ivan Rhodes and Colin Seeley.