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Doers Builders and Positive People

Drysdale 1000 V8 Will be Rebuilt in New Form After Theft Recovery

By Paul Crowe

Drysdale 1000 V8 Sports in Ian’s shop after recovery will live again in a new and different form

After the article on the Sutton radial, I was contacted by Ian Drysdale. Ian has been a busy guy with a lot of amazing projects currently underway. Among the many things he mentioned, one really got my attention, the Drysdale 1000 V8 sportsbike that was stolen some years ago, was recovered and it’s back in Ian’s workshop, though, unfortunately, it’s had a rather rough life since it was last seen. On the bright side, Ian once again has it in hand.

I knew the backstory would be of interest to everyone here and I asked him if he would provide a few details, and he responded with this incredible tale. Here’s what Ian had to say.

1000-V8 Sports – the Kindness of Strangers

by Ian Drysdale

The last 1000-V8 I built was a “Sports” model – the customer requested “Ferrari Yellow” – but it turns out there are 2 Ferrari yellows, both with the same name ! They changed the spec in 1966 but kept the same name ! Anyway, it did look good in “post ’66” Ferrari yellow.

Image removed due to legal dispute in Australia

Fast forward to 2017 and it was stolen from the owners lock-up under his condo in a beach-side suburb of Melbourne. 3am one Tuesday morning, 3 masked guys in a van got thru a kick-arse security gate and loaded it up – all done in a couple of minutes. He had it chained to his Harley, which they left, so the 1000-V8 was definitely stolen to order.

Nothing was heard of it for several years, then the cops found it in a garage beside a house in the western suburbs of Melbourne when they were looking for some stolen dirt-bikes. It was in the process of being carefully stripped – the odd thing is, although the garage was clean and tidy – there were no signs of the many missing parts ( bodywork, rear sub-frame, fuel tank, airbox, front exhaust / muffler, number plate holder and various other bits ). Where the other parts got to is anyone’s guess – my best guess is that the bike was being shipped overseas, one part at a time so as not to raise suspicions.

The owner contacted the insurance company with a request to buy the wreck back but was told in no uncertain terms that “All stolen / recovered bikes go to auction.”

So it was a matter of twiddling our thumbs until it turned up at auction. I then started getting friends sending me photos of the 1000-V8 sitting out in the weather at the auction yard. So naturally I contacted the auction house and asked 1/- when was it scheduled for auction & 2/- could they please cover up the open engine. Whilst outwardly helpful, they said that they couldn’t find it in the yard until the insurance company sent them a “consignment number”. I contacted the insurance company, but I first contacted a friend of mine who knows everybody in the industry, to get a name at the insurance company that I could contact, someone who had some degree of common sense. I rang this guy and he promised to find out what was going on …….. a week later I rang him again and that’s the last time I heard from him, despite “gentle” reminders once / week. He couldn’t have cared less.

Drysdale 1000 V8 partially stripped and sitting in the rain

The 1000-V8 sat in the rain for 13 weeks with the engine open to the elements, with various friends calling me regularly asking WTF is going on ?? Then I was called by a woman I didn’t know from Eve – Carolynn from Tasmanian Motorcycle Transport – asking if she could buy the 1000-V8 ( she had seen it sitting there for 3 months ). I explained that the auctioneers were still waiting on a consignment number from the insurance company – her reply was unprintable ( lovely lady but no shrinking violet ) – she promised to get me the consignment number, which she did on the next day. So armed with this number, I rang the auctioneers and they told me the 1000-V8 was marked as “CASE CLOSED, VEHICLE COLLECTED”.

Drysdale 1000 V8 partially stripped and sitting in the rain

The insurance company had simply lost it in their system. Had I been less ethical, I could have bought some $100 wreck and when picking it up, literally wheeled the 1000-V8 into my van and driven out the gate – because it was already marked as collected.

So, now it was back “in the system”……….. we were back to twiddling our thumbs waiting for it to turn up in the regular Friday listing, when I got a call from a chap called Andrew, who I didn’t know from Adam. “Are you aware your 1000-V8 finishes in 4 hours?”. I reassured him that it wasn’t listed yet, to which he replied “Are you registered with the EPA ?” ( No I wasn’t, never heard of such a thing ) The insurance company, in it’s infinite wisdom, had listed it as an “End of Life” vehicle – usually reserved for pre-production vehicles brought into Australia for emissions certification and the like.

Mad panic ensued – I called the auctioneers – yes it finishes in 3 hours, yes you can register with the EPA, takes about 2 weeks. So I called my new friend Andrew back and he said “No worries, I’ll bid for you and just send you the invoice” – which he did and everything ended happily, if you count an engine with 3 cylinders full of water as “happy”.

The original owner wanted the 1000-V8 back but his wife said ( paraphrasing ) “What do you want with a 180 mph bike at your age………”. So the plan is to build a naked Cruiser spec bike with spoked wheels and 8 mufflers – the motor will be de-tuned and the pipes won’t be joined, so it should sound fantastic ! If the original owner can’t get the stamp of approval when it’s finished, it will be offered for sale on the open market – I may even be able to be talked into building replicas, we’ll see.

So I am very thankful for the kindness of ( 2 complete ) strangers.


What a great story! And so much dependent on good people just being good!

Yes, Ian, I have a hunch there may be more than one or two potential clients for replicas of what comes out of this. We’ll be eager to see it.

Posted on November 1, 2023 Filed Under: Motorcycle Builders Tagged With: Ian Drysdale


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Comments

  1. Justin Belshe says

    November 1, 2023 at 1:23 pm

    I’m not sure which I despise more, thieves or bureaucrats…

    • John Kalishek says

      November 1, 2023 at 7:48 pm

      give them equal treatment . . . into the chipper, feet first, side by side.

  2. todd says

    November 2, 2023 at 7:31 am

    So, apparently it’s illegal. To recover stolen property?!? Why would you have to buy it back? Who profits off this scam?

    • Mike says

      December 4, 2023 at 11:33 am

      The thing with motor vehicles and insurance claims is that, if the vehicle is wrecked or stolen and the owner files a police report, the company investigates and if they can’t find fault of the client, the insurance company will pay the client a sum for the current market worth at the time of incident. This effectively closes the case of the vehicle and ownership then defaults to the insurance company.

      The client can make an offer to buy the vehicle back, but this is at the discretion of the insurance company. They don’t have any obligation to do so. If the vehicle was only stolen and in good condition, the insurance company stands to make more money at auction.

      If it’s a wreck and/or old, then they may say it’s end of life and/or beyond economical repair, which again means they think they could stand to get more for it by selling it for scrap worth or parts.

      Who profits off this scam? The insurance companies of course. Insurance is a game of chance that the insurance companies play. You pay them a fee to protect yourself from personal loss, they calculate the odds and will do everything in their power to avoid making a payout.

  3. todd says

    November 2, 2023 at 7:37 am

    I can only surmise that the auction house didn’t contact the owner or Mr. Drysdale because they knew that, once they joined the auction, all other bidders would have stopped out of respect. With an anonymous bidder on Ian’s behalf, bidding resumes feverishly for such a significant bike and the premium and the profits keep growing. What a crock of ….

    • Al says

      November 3, 2023 at 11:21 am

      Great article, both of you. Good luck Ian.

  4. BikeMike says

    November 7, 2023 at 8:52 am

    Makes my blood boil.

    While should not habitually assign malignance to what is probably ignorance or incompetence, it is entirely within the realm of possibilities that malignance is the cause. Occam’s Razor is only valid when it is.

  5. hoyt says

    December 14, 2023 at 6:27 pm

    This is as good as a dog finding its way back to its owner through a war zone.

  6. Ted Shannon says

    December 30, 2023 at 2:45 pm

    I’m left wondering how the guy who had the bike, where the police went to investigate stolen bikes, has the minerals to try and buy the bike back from the auction house. Something doesn’t add up here, any chance of Ian posting up how the person living at the house where the bike was found wasn’t charged with theft? Or, if he didn’t jack it, how did he wind up with it? Huge gap in this story, glad the bike made it home but I can’t be the only guy wondering about this. Absolutely bizarre how this played out.

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