Stories from the shop floor.

A field guide for first-time vintage Triumph buyers. What to actually look at on the bike, which model fits the kind of riding you actually do, and the honest answer to “how much should I spend.”

Modern pump gas isn’t built for old motorcycles. What ethanol actually does to an Amal carb, why we don’t recommend any fuel stabilizer, and the five-second habit that eliminates ninety percent of the spring-start calls we get.

Every customer who comes in with “the carbs are off” has tried a different main jet. We walk through the actual tuning order for an Amal Monobloc or Concentric on a Triumph twin, the throttle range each circuit controls, and the moment when a worn slide means it is time to rebuild rather than tune.

Triumph leaks have a reputation. Some of it is earned, most of it is solvable. We walk through how to find the actual source instead of throwing gaskets at it, and which leaks we would ignore for another season.

After enough Triumphs through the shop, the same problems show up in the same places. Grouped by system (oil, electrics, carbs, gearbox, ignition) so you can find your symptom and the fix that actually works.

A field guide for buyers and first-time wrenchers. We pull apart the difference between separate-engine and unit-construction Triumph twins: what changed in ’63, how to spot one in a parking lot, and which is right for the kind of riding you actually do.

A desert sled is a motorcycle built specifically for riding and racing in the desert. Where the name comes from, which bikes were built for it, and how the category got started in 1950s and 1960s Southern California.

Most of what gets called a “scrambler” online would not last twenty minutes in the Mojave. A desert sled is a purpose-built race bike. A scrambler is a broader on/off road category. A modern scrambler is a styling exercise. We refuse to let the words slide.

A period-correct desert sled is not a styling exercise. It is a specific bike with specific parts, all of which were chosen for specific reasons in 1968. We walk through what to buy, what to throw away, and what people get wrong most often.

The TR6 Trophy was not a marketing exercise. It was a 650 single-carb twin built because West Coast dealers — and the people who raced for them — kept telling the factory what off-road riding in California demanded. The story of how the original desert sled came to be.

A vintage Triumph stored badly costs you a varnished carb, a rusted tank, and a dead battery come March. We have seen every version of this. The routine we put bikes through before they go in the back of the shop.

Bill Johnson and Pete Colman ran Triumph’s West Coast operation for nearly forty years. The racers they backed, the dealer network they built, and the reason every desert sled you will see has their fingerprints on it.

Most maintenance guides are a checklist you will never follow. This is the rhythm we keep on shop bikes and on the ones we have sold to customers, scaled by how the bike actually gets used.

For about twenty years, Southern California ran the largest off-road motorcycle races in America. Most of those events are gone. The bikes, the riders, and what is left of that scene today.

Every weekend somebody points an old Triumph at the desert and finds out which parts of the Mojave love a vintage bike and which parts will tear it apart. We have ridden most of it. The routes that work.

A vintage Triumph with sorted electrics is a reliable bike. The bad reputation comes from problems most owners never bother to diagnose. The recurring failures, what to fix vs. what to paper over, and where Boyer earns its keep.

Triumph parts in 2026 are easier to find than they were in 1996 and harder than they were in 2016. The dealers worth knowing, the parts where repro is fine, and the parts where original or premium-repro is the only answer.

A poor idle on a Triumph is almost always the pilot circuit, and the pilot circuit is the hardest part of an Amal to clean. What to do, what tools matter, and how to know you actually got it clean.

A handful of period parts make a desert sled look right and ride right. Bates seats, Preston Petty fenders, Bud Ekins–style builds. What was original, what is reproduction, and which ones are worth paying up for.