I Bought a Paratrooper Bike hasn't Run in 40+ Years

so I'm about to buy one of the rarest motorcycles I've ever seen it was tucked away in the owner's Personal Collection but first I got to get him to sell it to me what's up guys how's it going how's the movie start this is go he goes to Harley-Davidson dealership and one of the coolest motorcycle and car collections I've ever seen outside of a museum you have a bike I want to buy your Indian Papoose I'm gonna ride it home no way I'll celt it but you're no way you're gonna make it home I'll make it home I'll make the cheese more Bundy how much you want one since you're going a thousand bucks a thousand bucks if I get it home all right cool all right we'll do it all right so it's a beautiful day outside [Music] and gov gave us keys to his um where the papoose is we're gonna go pick it up throw the back of the truck bring it back in here and hopefully we'll get this thing fired up I actually thought that it it had run in the past five years six years gov said he's never ran and knows it no one's even looked at surprise no one's even ever kicked it so yeah the odds are kind of stacked up the golf doesn't think we can actually get it started nor uh right at home so let's go prove them wrong foreign this is one of gov's secret garages the papoose is somewhere in here but while we're looking for it we may have gotten a little sidetracked such a nice car this looks like something that George Jetson would ride I can hear the sound like the like the bubbly sound like imagine picking up your gal in this I'm scared to burn I don't want to break it and then we found it conveniently in the same spot it was last time this is the Indian a papoose if I learned anything from the road trip I took with my family and we listened to um Little House on the Prairie a papoose is a baby Indian like not a baby Indian motorcycle and maybe that's why they call this the papoose I'm assuming that's a two-stroke it's as big as my fist it's a humongous tank so the purpose of these bikes they're so goofy they're silly looking they were made for one reason these were uh military paratrooper bikes they dropped the seat down fold this thing down and then put them in a in boxes and throw them out of airplanes and stuff like that they had parachutes and they drop them the military guys put the forks back put the handlebars back up put the seat up and cruise around fighting fighting Germans and stuff like that which is exactly what we're going to do oh no I'm German are you yeah defenbach I didn't know what book correct state was okay so these latches here so this is a latch for so it's visible for this yeah let's load this thing up we'll put in the back of the truck and then we'll get it to the shop first thing we got to do is we got to see if it has any compression I'm kind of scared to find out but I want to find out we're over at the shop and this thing's cool it is I'm gonna be the Envy of like the whole town cruising around on my new motorbike cruising Along on my Papoose bike the problem is where's where's Craig gonna sit um [Music] foreign [Music] tank straps the only straps we use when tying down are Papoose so we got back to the shop where our best friend Chad could give us a hand in case we needed it and we were gonna need it can you blow it up with my mouth why not my tongue's not strong enough to hit the Schrader valve it's hard to tell the only the old triumphs and the new triumphs the new ones actually have a fake carburetor and that's a real carburetor how old is that 67. wow yeah you can air the tire I did it held so since this is the first time we ever saw one we were excited to see what this thing was and how it was built and how it worked so so check this out even though it's an Indian I didn't think that they were actually made by Indian I thought some other company made them and you took up the engine look who it is Excelsior Excelsior made in England so it's not unusual for a company to take another Brand's product and then Rebrand it themselves and put Indian badges on that happens all the time so we when this is down you're riding it but when it's up Craig thinks that's disengage in the clutch you want to show how that's happening crew so when this when that pedal is up when that Peg is up on the other side there you go see how it disconnects that Lovejoy okay see that yeah but the first thing we want to figure out is whether this bike has compression or not because if it doesn't we're in trouble so we got we got good compression oh oh we're spinning tires too boys okay grab that spark plug see if we got Spark ready yep [Music] yeah we do we got some work all right so we're in pretty good shape yeah looks like it takes cleaned it out it's not locked up it's got good compression yeah we have spark we should put some fuel in and try it so this is how you adjust the seat pop that open oh wait hold on hold up there we go okay disconnect then you got to pull this out look it's gonna oh I'm kidding it probably came off the bike I was thinking because you would it would mean when they shipped it would be when they cried up it would go down like this or something like that so where did this come from it was here before my time now to give you a little more history of this motorcycle the Indian papoo started out life in 1942 to be used during the second world war known as The Well bike and it was originally designed for the British paratrooper units then it was redesigned named Corgi under the creative Ingenuity of a guy named John dolphin who changed the engine to the Excelsior Sprite built under the license of brockhouse engineering brockhouse was invested in the Indian company and began to re-badge the Corgi with the with the Indian Papoose decals along with repainting the little folding motorcycle identifiable with Indian colors to market the papoose as an Indian in the United States in 1948. not very many of these bikes were made this little bike weighed only 95 pounds and claimed to be able to carry a 200 pound and get a whopping 120 miles per gallon the papoose was not considered a scooter though it was considered a motorcycle [Music] [Applause] [Music] these come in and then they get pulled in give a little Tapper so to everyone's surprise this motorcycle fired up this ancient little tiny bike it actually the engine's good and which potentially doubles if not triples its value but now we need to get this bike to run there's a lot of variables that need to be working in order for that to happen but first we wanted to see if we can get the handlebars to fold down like they would have when they were shipped and stored in crates and then thrown out of airplanes so good you could see it work how do you like that worker a little bit now this one's kind of oh they turn oh great look tip them in beside the tank look how look how tight this thing would fold up that goes in there there's some Papoose expert he's like that's not how you do it read the manual hey I'm Sean I'm not sure if I Met You Yet Justin nice to meet you hold on let me get I you sure shook me I was all like so we checked the tank and we were surprised with how clean it was and the next step is to see if the fuel delivery system is intact considering that it's 80 years old most likely it's got a leak somewhere and that is exactly where we find the next problem maybe it got jammed up yeah what is that something is that a scroll through screw back in [Music] oh what's just a little is that a catch so you turn it now it can't go but you can't push it in you know it's like a quarter turn and that's the golden nose repair that the fuel system was working good except for the petcock it was leaking pretty bad we needed to find a way to stop building and then Chad wanted to remind Greg of some motorcycle Basics gas goes in this and the oil tank well gas and oil go in this like the last Indian we had yeah because the oil were separate and somebody goofed up somebody goofed that one up it wasn't as low as I thought oh no I put it oh shoot so stupid this is made by e-worts patent number three four two six six zero if you were wondering if you were wondering what patent number was Dan take a whiff Mega memory whoops classic classic Craig no I I it it I knocked it on from run into my elbow what we discovered was that there was a slide and at the end of it was a cork that was used to seal the gas from dripping we tried soaking it in hot water to try to get it to swell up but it didn't work we were able to borrow another cork from another rare British bike that was sitting around we're gonna have to give it back but now it's time to see if this thing can run on its own fuel friends foreign pretty close so quiet here oh yeah foreign do you think Sean's gonna make it home in this thing I'd be willing to bet money no and then for the big moment it's very possible that this motorcycle has not been ridden in over 60 years the big question now is will it ride now [Music] foreign [Music] sure acts like it's running out of fuel foreign and for a moment you get to feel the same sensation as someone in the 1940s felt when they were riding this little proposed [Music] what we felt was pure joy I drive it through that water and I didn't like it very much I learned from my mistake so this is the motorcycle that the paratroopers Road and these things flew out of airplanes and they drive up to fight the animation World War II they were tiny little bikes that put them in boxes they cut on the Indian Papoose and they look like this what was fun has reminded me of one of my favorite Bible verses Nahum won seven the Lord is good a stronghold in the day of trouble and he knows those who take refuge in him that has got to be one of the coolest little motorcycles I've ever ridden in my lifetime that is awesome and then who knows who knows when the last time the things ran I know gov's had it for at least seven years I said they never started it or kicked it at all that is amazing wait what is that Pedal brake rear brake oh I didn't know it had a rear brake and all we got to do next is drive it on the six hour trip home that's pretty incredible subscribe we'll see you guys next time

Channel: Bikes and Beards

Views: 1,400,041

Keywords: bikes and beards, sean, motorcycles, srkcycles, srk, beards, bikes, indian motorcycle, ww2 motorcycle, harley davidson

Id: EGmcI4vWGLo

Length: 13min 46sec (826 seconds)

Published: Fri May 20 2022