My comments on a new "Penton"

[TGTech]

(After the writing of this post and prior to it's posting, Mr. Everett called me on the telephone to have a conversation. The conversation lasted for nearly an hour.

When I heard that a fellow by the name of Terry Everett was going to have a new Penton motorcycle built, quite honestly, I thought it was funny. Not that it wouldn't be sort of a neat idea, but because I know what it took to build the quality machines that were built by KTM from 1968 through 1977 as Pentons and as KTMs to today.

Keep in mind, John Penton had been riding off road since the 40's, had won many National Enduro's, rode the ISDT a half dozen times, and won a National Enduro Championship. These experiences gave Uncle John, the knowledge and experience to create a machine like the Penton motorcycle.

John Penton grew up in a farm family as one of 7 children, through the Depression Era, with out a father. That situation demanded that he learn how to work and work hard to survive. That gave Uncle John the necessary drive and work ethic to handle a project like starting the Penton motorcycle company. And it was a good thing that it did, because without those skills and that drive, the Penton motorcycle may have gone the way of the Puch.

Think about this, the Puch motorcycle was already being made, before KTM began to make off road motorcycles. The Puch motorcycle company, was a much larger company than KTM, actually a division of Steyer, Daimer, Puch, and had far larger resources than KTM. The Puch motorcycles were imported into this country, but they just didn't achieve the level of the Pentons. Why do you suppose that happened?

Very simply, it was because the management of the company, just didn't have the drive and the experience to make it a success.

I have been involved in off road motorcycling for 37 years, and in the most recent era, with my son, racing motocross. From those years of experience, I've met many people in the sport, locally, nationally, and internationally. Many of the tracks that we frequented here in our area, are in the New Phildelphia, Ohio area, where Terry Everett lives. When I heard about this project, I began to do a little investigating, to try and learn a little about Mr. Everett. None of the motorcycling community that I know, had ever heard of this man. I talked to a number of people in the New Phildelphia area, and nobody knew him.

In my mind, if Mr. Everett was going to build a motorcycle, let alone a Penton motorcycle with the reputation that it has, I would think that he ought to have an extensive background in the motorcycle sport. Doesn't that make sense?

Dane

[dkwkid]

Just last night I dug out a Cycle News article about the ISDT. It was an interview with Ted Lapadakis, the western distributor for DKW/Puch at the time.John Penton assembled a Puch team that year. Now,according to the article, Ted sent a letter to the AMA in support of a Puch or DKW team for the 6-Days. He was ignored at the time. the problem was that it takes a factory months to build ISDT bikes that will hold up. the big players prepare bikes for the event.Putting our team on stock Puchs was a huge mistake and a waste of time for the team.
 Look at the results back then,Puch did very well-winning the 125 class.According to the article Penton only got 4th place by having Lars Larson go around a few times on a borrowed bike while his frame was being rewelded. Lots of broken frames were reported.
 Ted contacted Hercules and they were willing to build special DKW's for a U.S.team.
 What makes this interesting is that Pentons competed against Puch in the marketplace as well as DKW.
O.K. you guys that were there,weigh in.I will try to scan the whole article for the group.

[TGTech]

dkwkid:

My comment about the Puchs wasn't about the ISDT, but rather the whole US market.

The works Puchs were absolutely fantastic, and even though I'm not directly involved in vintage racing, of all the bikes that I've given some consideration, a works 175 Puch, would be one of my desires. I rode with some of them at the ISDT more than once, and the were really neat.

And by the way, the Penton's that were ridden at the ISDT, were almost the same machines that you could take out of the box over here. With the exception of the colors. In the 9 of the 10 years that I rode the ISDT, all of the bikes we rode, were blue, no matter what displacement. The one year that the bikes were not blue, was '76, when we built our own machinery over here and shipped them to Austria. In that year, all of our bikes were orange like the production units.

Dane

[dkwkid]

Dane, thats O.K. I don't like Puchs myself. Remember the 6 speed gearboxes made of glass? Tell us sometime about the Penton 6 days bikes. Were they G S motors? What happened to them after the event?
The pictures I have show big KTM stickers on the tanks. Did you run Motoplat or Bosch Mags?
 Anyone can look at pictures from those times but I find it interesting to hear the inside stories from the people who rode the bikes.one more thing, how did your 100 run against the 125's?

[Rain Man]

I dunno about the rest of you Poggers, But personally, I get a lot of satisfaction out of owning a garage full of Antique Penton Dirt bikes... That my friends and I reconditioned.
  Theres just a real special feeling about ressurecting a trashed out old bike into something that you can ride and show off and brag about, and oh yes... win some Vintage races as well !!!  
  .02

Raymond
 Down East Pentons

[sixdazed]

good point Dane-refreshing my memory-thanks

ric emmal

[dennis brown]

when i was riding enduros and c.c. in the 70s.we saw a few puchs around. every one was riding pentons or huskys. a couple of years ago i rode a 1974 puch in ahrma events and did very well, the next year i let  rick lillie the the puch in the c.c races, he won the championship on the bike. we had no problems with the bike at all. we tore the motor down to rebuild it all it needed was a set of rings! we put a new piston an rings in it and it is doing well.the bike was down on power to the 175 penton but the bike handle very well in the woods. we never had shifting problems or any thing else.i'm sure not knocking pentons, my first one was 125 steel tanker bought fron chuck bolher in james town ,ny and have had 3 jackpiners am restoring one now. i just think the puch is under rated dennis brown

dennis l.brown

[Merlin]

..............perhaps the new bike (Penton) has Marin-Tex cases.............

[socalmx]

In District 37 desert racing, the Puch 175 carried the number 1 plate as well as other top ten numbers in the early 70's. Tough to argue that point.