Very Cool KTM 50

[Rocket]

What's wrong with it?  It's not sitting in MY garage!
Rocket

[TGTech]

The one thing that I was mentioning, is exactly what firstturn pointed out. The Motoplat ignitions that would fit this engine, were not created until the very late 1960's There were Motoplat ignitions made at that time, but they would only fit the larger engines, like the Bultaco's and Ossa's.

The coil that is mounted to this machine, wasn't made until the early 1980's, when Motoplat reversed the polarity of the ignitions, and went back from the "red wire" coils to the black wire again.

This machine is very interesting to me, because actually, this type of machine, (a 100cc not a 50cc) was what showed John Penton  that KTM could actually build a true race bike.

In 1969, I spend two months in Mattighofen, "working" (it's in parentheses, because I didn't HAVE to work, but I did) at KTM and lived at Mr. Trunkenpolz' house. I worked in the R&D department doing many different small jobs, but during that time, I got to meet and observe the people who built this bike.

Sigfried (Sigi) Stuhlberger was the chief engine and frame builder guy, and there were other men who built the rest of the bike. The one fellow that I was ablsolutely amazed in watching, was a sheet metal worker, who would take flat sheets of aluminim, and make gas tanks, air boxes and side panels. I don't know if he actually built the original prototype steel tank for the Pentons, but I do have a picture of one of Sigi's 175 motocross machines, that has a very similar tank on it, and I saw that guy built the tank from a flat sheet.

Sigi had the capability of doing aluminum casting as well, and I'll bet that is where the head and cylinder of this machine came from. I know that when I was there, I saw him build heads and cylinders for his 50cc motocross machines. And by the way, I think that year, Sigi won the Austrian Motocross Championship in both the 50 and 175cc classes.

Dane

[john durrill]

Dane, Can you tell from the engine bottom end what size it is? We seldom see the 50 to 80 cc motors.  Maurizio, I hope you can post things like this for us more offten. I would like very much to learn more about KTm's history and the small bikes we seldom see in this country. Thank you.
John D.

[TGTech]

John,

Back then, they didn't have 80cc engines, but they did have 73cc engines, which was the 75 class. I'm pretty sure that this would be either the 50 or 75, but otherwise, I can't tell for sure.

Dane

When I looked trough my old Swedish motorcyklemagazine's I found this picture of Torsten Hallman and a 50cc KTM at IFMA Show Germany in 1972 [8D]
Hallman said that he was very happy about the new 50cc KTM, because he wanted to sell them for the Swedish junior MX class wich was 50cc at that time.

I don't know if this was a KTM factory bike but I will try to ask Torsten if he remember anything about it and if he sold any 50cc bikes in Sweden.


Mats from Sweden

[mau10]

Hi Dandk,
the ktm 50 in the pics is the official bike of Arnaldo Farioli.
The owner Arnaldo Farioli (very famous italian rider and ktm importer for Italy) replaced the ignition afterwards.
The bike is in the Arnaldo Farioli's garage now.
Maurizio

[mau10]

I found another pic:



Maurizio from Italy

[ktmfritz]

quote:Originally posted by Chakka

I stumbled across this photo and many more of this bike a few nights back looking at European enduro sites. Any ideas what components it uses? Looks like a custom frame, conical ft hub, but standard MC style gas tank, seat & swingarm. Way Cool!

http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b60/chakka141/random%20Penton%20Pics/isny07021.jpg

Fritz Hagleitner

[ktmfritz]

I have also a picture of a 50 MC on my homepage -
http://members.aon.at/fhaglei1/page_4_17.html

//www.ktm-comet.at

Fritz Hagleitner

I talked to Torsten Hallman about the 50cc bikes that the KTM factory made. And he referred to Sigfried Stuhlberger who would know everything about those bikes.
According to Torsten these bikes were very expensive so only a few bikes were sold in Sweden for the junior MX class.

Mats from Sweden

[Paul Danik]

Mats,

   What is Mr. Hallman doing these days?  I read his book as a youngster, Mr. Moto-Cross, it made quite an impression on me.  I was later able to have him autograph it and I still treasure it very much.
 
    Do you know Sigfried Stuhlberger, or ever visit with him?

Thanks
Paul

I am afraid i don't know what sort of business Mr Hallman runs. I have only met him once or twice on motorcycle meetings. But he's a nice guy and still have an interest for the old bikes and times so you can always ask him about the Penton/KTM's.
I do not know Mr Stuhlberger at all, but Torsten Hallman seemed to know him and the others from the Penton factory very well.
Mr Hallman also told me that he knew about the Penton 40 year anniversary coming up, and was well informed about it.

Mats from Sweden

[TGTech]

Mats,

Initially, Torsten was distributing the Penton motorcycles in Sweden and when KTM began to put their own "name" on the motorcycles, he did not want the KTM name on them. He wanted to keep the Penton name on them.

I don't remember where I heard this, but I think it came out of KTM.

Torsten knows Mr. Penton well because he met him when Torsten first came to the US to race motocross over here. At that time, Mr. Penton was the Eastern distributor of the Husqvarna motorcycles.

Dane

[mau10]

Other pics:











Gino Perego (Farioli Team rider):







Maurizio from Italy

[mau10]

Ktm 50 factory team, Two Days Exxon race (in Italy, near Bologna), year 1972:



Maurizio from Italy