This is a copy of the first of our quarterly newsletter from the Lacey Engineering website. If you wish to be added to the list, just create an account (you dont need to buy anything to do this) and you will get newsletter updates.

We have now been "live" with our online shop since the Spring this year and we would like to alert you to the many new products now listed on the website. In that time a lot of people have been in touch, many to ask if we stock particular products. We have found that there is a demand for cycle parts and as we did have some in stock we have now added a section for this with over 40 items listed - and YES if its there, its in stock. We try to send goods out immediately on receipt of paid order by first class recorded post, insured if requested and appropriate.

As the product list is growing we were finding that the page was getting too long for the screen, so we have left the main exploded diagram items on the front page and added a "click here for more items" button, which takes you into a visual screen rather than a boring old list - I hope you like it. Any comments are always welcome if we can make the site better. Other products under consideration (time and finances allowing!) are 250 road pistons, (Borgo type) chains and sprockets for singles (front and rear) and rod kits for 900 bevels. Also 87mm pistons for V Twins and 450’s.

We do have a NEWS page and a few articles are posted there (including this newsletter) but we do invite you to add comments and open up discussion. You just click on “comments” at the end of the article and you may then enter your thoughts and shortly after that they will appear on line.

We have sold 2 customers' bikes and a lot of interest was expressed in these. If you have a bike which you would like to sell, please do let us know, we may be in the position of buying it for "stock"!

The second hand and clearance section is next on the list for our attention. We have added a few items, but will be keeping this topped up in the future. What you see on the website is really only the tip of the iceberg for second hand engine components, it’s always worth dropping us an e mail in case we have something lurking in the back room that you may be searching for, in fact there may be a whole 350 race engine appearing soon!

At the moment payment is via paypal, but if you do not have a paypal account, cheques are also welcomed. If you prefer to pay by electronic methods we would be pleased to give you bank details and you can pay direct. Just use the contact us form and we will arrange as required. You can of course phone or e mail us with your requirements and we will take the order that way if you prefer not to use the online ordering.

It's getting to the end of the racing season in the UK. No-one can say we have had the best of summers for racing, unless of course you like to skid about in pouring rain! Hopefully next season will be better.
We would like to congratulate all our customers who took to the roads of the Isle of Man this year. Many good lap and speed trap times were recorded. Doug Snow looked very promising with a fast first lap of 95.08 but unfortunately he later crashed in that session bringing his 2008 Manx to an early finish. Very fortunately he was not seriously injured and is making a good recovery. Congratulations go to Bob Millinship and Chris Swallow for gaining replicas in less than ideal conditions. There were lots of other good results within the short circuit racing this year. Not only Nigel Palmer who once again made the CRMC season an exciting spectacle, (especially in the rain) but amongst others, Brian Robson, Rich Hawkins and new to Ducatis, Ian Steltner all put up good performances. Congratulations also go to the ever superb John Hynes for winning the 250 Championship – a rider who prepares and builds his own engine. We recently spoke to another customer, Roger Birkenhead who also prepares his own engine and has had wins in both the UK and in Belgium at Chimay and Gedine, so congratulations to Roger.

A last word of warning - The main page of the site does say that Nigel undertakes engine tuning and rebuilds, but please be aware that at the moment he is booking major work in for August 2009. Smaller jobs such as crank rebuilds may be fitted in, but probably nothing more than that. We would be pleased to book any work after that date. If you are curious about what goes on in the Lacey Workshop, you could watch out for the next issue of the Classic Racer coming up soon. We recently had Graham Lawler here for the day, and he has written an article about us and this will be published mid December for the Jan/Feb issue. Some of you may know Graham via his appearance in various commentary boxes throughout the CRMC racing season.

We hope you enjoy browsing the website and remember we would be pleased to have any feedback or suggestions regarding other things we could include.

Best wishes

Nigel (Ducati Doctor) Lacey & Edina (Web mistress, accounts and general tea lady)

We have made a draw at every CRMC meeting this year from a full list of Ducati Single riders at the meeting (including paraders) so that eveyone had a chance to win rather than just the first bikes past the
post. In case anyone thought otherwise, it was not just from the Lacey Engineering
sponsored class!

Pembrey - James de'Raeve

Anglesey - Chris Bayliss

Lydden Hill - Tim Teale

Donington - David Walker (parade bike)

Snetterton- Nick Roberts

Cadwell - Roger Bayliss

Brands Hatch - Brian Robson

Are the lucky winners of the £40.00 voucher to be used on the parts website. Conratulations to you all.

I know we have a number of admirers of the web site who are a bit new to the world of computers and may be a little nervous of buying on line. Please don't think we want to scare you away! we would be pleased to accept any orders either by phone or e mail.

For anyone who would like to make that leap of faith into the information superhighway for the first time, I am at the moment putting together a guide to buying online and using paypal for payment. Hopefully this will help. It will be a document with screen shots etc so won't be like your normal help files so don't worry about that - you won't need a 12 year old to help

It will appear here when available so keep an eye on the site.

Best Wishes

Edina

Hi,
We have had reports that when people have tried to post comments, you get a message to say that you cannot submit entry - It should work and I think it is just "timing out". If you are taking a while to carefully constuct your thoughts before committing to publish it may do this. To get around this you can type your comments in "word" then open the screen and copy from "word" and paste into the comments box. This should help. If you have a problem, please let me know.

Thanks

Edina

The winners of the Lacey Engineering prize draw for the last two meetings:

Cadwell - Roger Bayliss
Not wanting to be out-done by his brother who was drawn at Anglesey!

Snetterton - Nick Roberts

We have just returned from yet another wet and soggy Classic Club Meeting, this time at Snetterton. There was an overall feeling of disillusionment during the long return trip home. Although Nigel Palmer was there battling away and getting some good results for us, it's beginning to feel as if Classic Racing as I knew it, is fast disappearing. Although one can only be impressed with the riding skills and speed of the front runners and the quality of some of the replicas, for me something is missing. The proliferation of the post classic classes is turning the meetings into something that looks more like my early days of racing and to my mind are just old bikes - not all classics! Some of these post classic bikes and the engineering involved is in many ways similar to the sort found in modern club racing. Someone said to me some time ago that the "C" in CRMC stood for Classic and not Cheap!!! To my mind, if you are interested in these types of bikes there are some very good modern club meetings around and the better bikes would still finish well up the placing. It's all very well being inclusive and moving the goal posts, but if things continue to deteriorate much further then we will be lucky to have a couple of races for the earlier classic bikes. I don't wholly blame the post classics or have anything against them; it's just that by including them it does give the opportunity for some to take the easy option of getting some old bike and racing. The Post Classics I suppose do have a competitive level playing field within the classes, so I guess that may be the attraction for some. Another reason I believe causing the decline is the proliferation of "replicas" being ridden very hard by non owner/riders. I have on a couple of occasions seen some of the front runners fall and not even look back at the bike - just head back for the paddock. If they owned the bike and had spent many a cold hour in a garage working on it, the attitude may be different. If this is the attitude, why are they racing classic bikes? It has been commented upon by some of my continental customers, that some of the front runners in the UK have a "win at all costs" attitude and do ride with scant regard to the rarity or cost of these machines. The stock of spare parts for genuine Classic bikes is not unlimited, as the K4 owners will soon find out! All this gives little encouragement to those who are genuinely passionate about their bikes, spending lots of time and money trying to keep their genuine classic bike racing. Many of these riders/owners wish to ride hard but not at the expense of the bike. Part of the joy of racing is in the challenge of extracting as much out of the machines as possible. Classic racing provided an opportunity for the enthusiast to race their much loved machines with restricted technology that allowed for amateur tuners and mechanics. I for one love my Ducatis to a point that I run a business keeping them on the road and track. The emphasis has always and will always be about preserving and developing these bikes and not replicating. Personally speaking if I had to create an engine from scratch with all the effort and expense that is necessary, I would not wish to create a replication of something else, but that's just me and I know everyone is not the same. As I said I have nothing against any of these bikes, riders or owners, but if that's the way Classic racing is to be, maybe the interest and passion I once had for Classic racing is now in the past.

I don't give up easily, and this years sponsorship of the 350 classes was in some small naive way, an effort to encourage fellow enthusiasts to keep the Ducati flag flying and Classic racing alive - I hope there are more people out there with all the different machines to keep the interest alive in what I know as Classic racing.

I did have all good intentions of keeping this news page updated with all sorts of information - but with the Manx fast approaching work is just taking over and there are not enough days in the week, never mind hours in the day!

That does not mean to say that I have been just building engines - The website has been very busy and lots of feedback coming in about possible items which would be useful to stock. All these things take time but we are working hard at sourcing a lot of new stock - we want to be able to supply as much as we can to help you all when working on your machines. This will include cycle parts oils, consumables etc. I am hoping to catch up with all this and launch the next batch of items in early September. For those of you who have opted in to the newsletter, Edina will be sending e mail newsletters out to keep you informed of all the changes. If you would like to be added to the list, just set up an account (you can do this without making a purchase) and tick the box for newsletter.

Will be back with another update soon

Best Wishes

Nigel

David Walker was the lucky winner of the Ducati draw at Donington, a Parade bike this time - Nice to see one of these pulled out of the hat. David chose to run the two parades on the Saturday and avoided the rain later on Sunday - Good choice David!

Hello All,

I am pleased that people are finding the site interesting. Occasionally I get e mails asking advice etc, and I am happy to try to help when time permits. I do try to reply as soon as possible. On a few occasions, even though I have clicked "reply" the emails are bouncing back as undeliverable not sure how this is happening, but I don't want people to think I am ignoring them. I cannot for obvious reasons give the whole e mail addresses but if you have a provider who ends with "xtr.co.nz" or "tdcads.dk" and have not had a reply, would you please get in touch again and let me have a different e mail address for the reply.

Many thanks

Nigel

As you may be aware we are running a prize draw for all Ducati riders, including parade riders, entered at the CRMC meetings this year. The prize at each meeting is a £40 voucher to be used on our website parts shop (no minimum purchase!)

The aim is to offer something to all Ducati riders, not just the race winners. We appreciate that some riders put in a lot of effort to their machines and riding, maybe never win, but they form the backbone of Club Racing.

The winners so far:

Pembrey - James de'Reave
Anglesey - Chris Bayliss
Lydden Hill - Tim Teale

Congratulations to all the winners.

In case you may be wondering, our own team rider, Nigel Palmer is excluded from the draw!

CRMC RACE DATES 2008


March 22/23 Pembrey

April 26/27 Anglesey

May 17/18 Lydden

June 28/29 Donington Park GP circuit

August 09/10 Cadwell Park

September 06/07 Snetterton Race of aces

October 4/5 Brands Hatch Indy. Race of the Year.

Hello fellow Ducati Single Enthusiasts!

This is the first entry of our new "News & Blog" pages. Following popular demand we have decided to add these pages just to keep you all updated with any news, information and race dates etc.

Please be patient with us, we may not get this perfect first time, but think it is the sort of thing which may grow organically with the website. You can reply or post comments which will (once processed) will appear as strings to the main entry.

Looking forward to seeing how this grows...

Best Wishes

Nigel & Edina (webmaster and typist of long e mail replies! )


  Welcome to the Lacey Diary!