What is it?

Basically it is a 1938 designed BMW R71 which was assembled in China in 1962 for the People’s Liberation Army where it was called a Chang Jiang M1.  During its restoration in 2004 it was upgraded to M1M specifications (6V → 12V, reverse gear added, higher compression ratio, better lights and wiring, etc.)

Since I have owned it I have replaced its wheels with Chang Jiang M5 wheels to improve the braking.

In November 2014, I also fitted a new electronic ignition kit consisting of rotor, stator, computerised ignition timing unit, solid state rectifier and voltage regulation unit, and all the necessary wires and fittings to install it and set it up. I wrote a manual for anyone else who might want to purchase a similar kit from SidecarPro.

How did I get it?

1964: I picked up a copy of El Popola Cinio, a Chinese magazine published in Esperanto language, because I saw a motorbike and sidecar on the front cover.  I read the article about the Chang Jiang sidecar bikes being used by the People’s Liberation Army.  That night I dreamed that I owned one (my current bike at that time was a 1951 BSA C10 250cc side-valve single solo bike).  The dream wouldn’t go away.  Perhaps it was a vision from God?

1967: I discussed this dream (which still hadn’t gone away) with my fellow members of the Ballarat Rovers Motor Cycle Club while we were standing in the Stunt Team shed surrounded by the tools of the trade (stunt riding accessories) while sheltering from the rain.  The general consensus was that I was absolutely crazy to even think of getting such a bike (too slow for modern roads, impossible to import or register, impossible to get parts, etc., etc.)  So, I tried to get rid of that vision.

1968-1989: At times the vision kept coming back to me: I’d consider it a little each time and then put it right back in the “Too Hard” basket.

1989: While living in Hong Kong, my wife Wendy and I went for a weekend trip to Guang Zhou (Canton) in mainland China.  This was immediately after the Tiananmen Square incident and there were hundreds of well-armed soldiers everywhere we went.  Our train was stopped by the military and soldiers with machine-guns searched our carriages.  While this was going on I was amazed to see “in the metal” the exact bike I had been dreaming about for a quarter of a century – and there were dozens of them circling around our train.
The next day there were military personnel everywhere and a sidecar carrying a general stopped only 15 feet from where I was standing.  I talked to him for about 20 minutes about his motorbike. I specifically asked whether it would be possible to buy a used one when the army had finished with it and ship it to Australia.  He told me there was no way the government would ever, in our lifetimes allow the export of one of those machines.  Oh come on Lord, why do you keep giving me a vision that is impossible!

2003: I was eating fish and chips in a park near Sai Kung in Hong Kong, when I heard what I knew to be the sound of a CJ.  I heard it stop not far away and I ran and found it parked in front of a pub. While I gave it a very thorough inspection, the owner came out to talk to me.  He had bought the bike from a vendor in Beijing.  So it was now possible to export these bikes from mainland China. Praise The Lord!

2004: Early in 2004, every time I knelt down to pray I was seeing videos in my brain of me riding a CJ sidecar outfit. As it was invading my daily prayer time I approached my pastor to discuss the problem. His response was: “I reckon God wants you to buy that motorbike.”

I still had my doubts, since Wendy was basically not in favour of me owning any motorbike (“Think of the children!”).

During the annual holiday of the Senior Pastor of our church, Pastor Jackie Pullinger from Hang Fook came as our visiting minister.  After two of her sermons, members of her visiting ministry team, who had never met me before, singled me out and asked me to stand up in front of the church as God had given them visions for me. On both occasions the visions described exactly the surroundings of that meeting in 1967 when I had discussed owning a CJ sidecar one day.  I had never described that meeting to anyone in my life, but these Chinese guys described in perfect precision two different items, tools of my trade (Stunt Rider), that were hanging in that shed that day.  I was blown away!  God really was telling me to get going and purchase that bike!  But what would Wendy think?

I rang Wendy, who was then in Brisbane, and started reminding her that for many years I had been talking about getting a Chinese motorbike. She said, “You should buy a motorbike providing it has a sidecar on it!”  Praise the Lord!

To cut a long story short, I ordered my bike from Long River Motorworks in Beijing.

It was almost forty years to the day since I had first got the vision.

2005: In January, I went to Beijing to look at my partly restored bike. It was very incomplete at that stage but it was beautiful to see it, touch it, feel it! I also observed many other partly restored bikes in the same factory.

By about mid-year the bike was ready so I asked Gerald to ride it to and from work for a week or two to give it a shake-down and make any setting up adjustments.

The shipping was sorted out and it arrived in Brisbane in September 2005 while I was working in Hong Kong.

I came home to Brisbane and registered it in November 2005.

The bike I like to refer to as “God’s bike” was finally on the road!

2005-2014: God’s Bike has been to church most Sundays. It has also attended a number of rallies, concours events and, of course, the annual Sidecar Circus conducted by the HMCCQ.

When people ask me why I bought such an unusual bike, I usually start my answer by saying, “God gave me a vision to get it …”

Many don’t want to know about God at all, some want to hear more about my bike, a few, a very few, end up asking me more about my God.

©  Phil Smith 2014