Motorcycle Investor mag
Subscribe
to our free email news
Roller starters and big Kats
Sunday shed wrap
May 3, 2026 – Guy 'Guido' Allen
We're talking of a couple of years
ago. I was on the 'phone with Groff, aka
Spannerman in another life, and he offered some
unsolicited advice. That was to shop around for a
an electric roller starter.
"Your fleet is big and diverse
enough to need one," he suggested. "And it will
make your life easier. It's not just about
starting the bike with less drama, it's also more
kind to an old bike than trying to kick-start it.
What the rollers do is get the engine turning over
and remind it how it's meant to work..."
It was that last aspect that really got my attention – more kind for the bike and the rider.
That was when I still owned Winston – the lovely 1947 Sunbeam S7. Though very well sorted by that stage, kicking it into life did feel like some sort of cruelty. Unless it fired up first time, which was rare.
Winston was running low compression and was easy to kick over. But how many times if the situation wasn't perfect? Experience says that if you don't get it right in the first few kicks, you're likely to enter a descending spiral of trouble. So switch it off, walk away and have a cup of tea.
The big issue is any kick-starter gives
you at best a few of turns of the crankshaft, fighting
inertia and then surrendering. In reality, it's a lottery.
However roller starters are far more generous in what they
can provide.
And yes I have bump-started machines over
the years, which has a whole other nest of vipers
attached...
Okay, so I accepted Groff's advice and
went searching the interweb. The clear locally-made choice
was the epynomous Bike Starters brand, out of the thriving
village of Briagolong in
Gippsland. That's in the state of Victoria,
Australia.
Above is the stylish unit we selected. There are two
power levels offered: 2.2kW and 2.5kW. There was a mere
Au$100 price difference between the two and I'm struggling
to understand why the lower-spec version is offered. Get
the 'big' one.
Several stylish paint schemes are on the menu. As you can
see we went for a subtle orange, working on the theory it
was much easier than black to find in a dimly-lit shed.
Oh, and it's cheerful!
The unit costs Au$1395 (US$1100, GB£750, €860), without
the battery. They are being exported internationally.
As for power: you're looking for a 12 volt battery with a
minimum of 520CCA (cold cranking amps). A recomended
option is a AC Delco 22F520SMFDF – essentially a
commonly-found size for 'old-school' larger family sedans
in the car world, and costing in the region of Au$200 for
a sealed lead-acid unit.
So what's in the box? You get a substantial electric
starter motor, engaging two sets of rubber rollers that
are driven by a common chain. That lots sits in a very
robust chassis, with wheels on one end so it can be easily
moved. Plus there is a plug-in foot-operated switch.
With the battery removed, (a two-minute job), you can
store it on its end so it takes up little space. Weight is
under 20kg, so you can tote it around the shed.
How it works is you set up the unit somewhere with a bit
of room, drop in the battery and connect the switch. It's
best to have some clear space in front of the unit in case
you unintentionally get the motorcycle rolling off the
starter. (The pic above is supplied by the maker.)
The method is to have everything set up, then put the
bike in second or third gear. I'm leaning towards third,
having found second can be a struggle on bigger singles
and twins with strong compression.
For motorcycles with wet clutches, I roll them back and
forth a little to free up the drag. Then you push it back
on to the rollers.
From there you get into the saddle and do what you normally would to start. No throttle is a good place to begin. Pull in the clutch and hit the foot switch to get the rollers going. I allow it a few seconds to get some momentum going with the rear wheel and then release the clutch.
You can sometimes find the starter struggling and even
stalling, in which case you back off and reset. Oh, and I
have had the rollers keep turning and tearing up rubber as
the motorcycle wheel stubbornly refuses to turn. So you
need to be aware of what's going on, use a little
mechanical sympathy and reset what you're doing.
The maker sells spare rollers.
So far I've used the unit on the Sunbeam S7 (which has
since been sold), the Yamaha SR500 (below) when it's been
left idle for too long, my Ducati Hailwood Replica when I
was having some battery issues and the Series C Vincent
Rapide (above) when I had to fight with a suspect
valve-lifter.
Increasingly, I'm now reaching for the electric rollers
as a first option. Yes, I can kick-start various
motorcycles. I also know how to gut a fish and would much
prefer someone feeds me sashimi...
The Bike Starters product is robust, well thought-out,
and works. See the website
(Ed's note: In case you were wondering, this site is
not sponsored. The unit was bought at full retail
price.)
Katana catch
In other shed news, we've quietly been on the hunt for a
nice air-cooled Suzuki Katana 1100 and have latched on to
this 1990 1100 Limited out of Japan. Watch this space...
See the other
stunner Katana we owned a few years ago
-------------------------------------------------
Produced by AllMoto abn 61 400 694 722
Privacy: we do not collect cookies or any other data.
Archives
Contact