Manky Monkey Motors

Limited edition of 1100 at Firebox.com (http://www.mankymonkeymotors.co.uk/Triumph-Bonneville-T100-Steve-McQueen-Special-Editionmph-Bonneville-T100-Steve-McQueen-Special-Edition)

(http://media.firebox.com/pic/p4899_main.jpg)

Looks about as much like Steve McQueen's "Trumpet", as that looked like a WW2 German Army BMW !!...Morrag

Yes but......     I wouldn't turn it down!

The man himself............ and what's that bike he's on, could it possibly be a Triumph ????  ;D

The movie "On any Sunday" shows McQueen having fun on motorcycles, and boy, could he ride or what!!  :o

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Djcp3AQYTaE

Very definitely a "Trumpet", probably a Thunderbird Tony, but stolen from a German DR in WW2!............mmm....

Someone on Facebook said that Triumph were selling bikes to the German army prior to WW2, which I thought was a bit odd as they`d been barred from havimg any motorised army units since WW1. Any Ideas??????????

In persuit of the scramble for profit, I suppose anything is possible!, but other than a few civilian "types",I somehow doubt it, however Germany did have a Triumph manufacturer of their own, pre WW2, maybe that's where the confusion lies. The German army certainly used the ubiquitous BMW,in many forms, and the Horex, and like this country, no doubt any other that suited the situation, Morrag

Looks like a bit of a Hybrid that,

Duplex frame,Triumph only made this frame for 1961/62.
trophy forks.The front wheel is mid fifty's.
alternator motor with Ali head same year as frame,the barrels could be big bore alloy,or just painted aluminium.

As Bud Ekins in California built most of Steve McQeen's Triumphs, it could well have been a hybrid...Morrag

From                http://www.mcqueenonline.com/thegreatescapetriumph.htm

For the filming of the climactic scene in The Great Escape in which Steve (as Virgil Hilts) hijacks a German warbike and becomes the center of one of cinema's most famous chase scenes, a little bit of improvising was done, as explained by Steve to writer William Nolan: We had four bikes for this film. I was running a TT Special 650 Triumph. We painted it olive drab and put on a luggage rack and an old seat to make it look like a wartime BMW. We couldn't use a real BMW, not at the speeds we were running, since those old babies were rigid-frame jobs, and couldn't take the punishment.

Film Trivia No 943: Steve McQueen was actually riding the combination that was chasing himself in one scene.  ;D ;D ;D ;D

That's nothing,I'm chasing myself most days. ;D

Here's another bit of trivia - he was also riding a solo in the chase scene.

There's a shot of a chase solo followed by a combination coming from the right of screen. As they approch the camera, the solo stops and spins round to head away, whilst the chair cuts the corner to head in the same direction. See 3mins 40secs in the video below

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=coWCkAOkQ0U


The Times did a feature that will prob interest some of you.......... ;)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4DE3r-x7FM