I don’t know how it’s possible, but we’ve only seen four Bridgestone motorcycles here on Barn Finds over the last 11 years. For such an interesting brand, that’s nutso. The seller has this late-1960s Bridgestone 175 Dual Twin posted here on craigslist in Bruce, Wisconsin and they’re asking $650. Here is the original listing in case someone grabs this bike and the listing goes away. It’s been for sale for a month so it must be too much of a project for most mortals.
I have a couple of semi-vintage (42 and 60-year-old) outboard motors that I’m using as garage art at the present time – they’re in the queue to be restored – but I can’t imagine buying a motorcycle like this Bridgestone just to hang it on the wall. I’d want to restore it, or have it restored, and ride the dang thing. The seller mentions this bike is rusty, so you can either restore it or use it as a “wall-hanger.”
Bridgestone made the 175 Dual Twin along with a couple of other 175 models (a Hurricane Scrambler and Special/Racing, or S/R) for only a few years, after having been introduced at the Toyko Motor Show in 1965. The bikes hung around until 1970, even after the introduction of the bigger 350 models, and the 175 Dual Twin (DT) was, at the time, fairly groundbreaking. As two-strokers with rotary valves, they had wide engines as the carbs were mounted at the ends of the crankshaft on each side, but they turned in a 17-second quarter mile, not bad for their size. This bike weighs around 270 pounds, just for the record.
One strike against these motorcycles is that they didn’t have a tach, something that’s very nice to have with a two-stroke bike, or really any bike. The 175 DT had a unique transmission that could be used as either a four-speed rotary or five-speed with a lever on the left side of the engine case by the countershaft sprocket that Bridgestone referred to as a “Sport Shift.” Sadly, this one is missing that lever as you can see from this closeup of the left side of the engine in the photo below.
The hole in the casing in front of the frame should have a little lever that riders could use to effectively change the transmission depending on the use. In traffic, it could be used as a rotary four-speed – just keep on pressin’ down to go through the gears. But by reversing the lever, it operates as a five-speed with the fifth gear being overdrive and neutral between the first and second gears. Another nice feature is that if a rider does kill the engine at a traffic light, the bike can be started in gear – with the clutch lever pulled in, of course – unlike some motorcycles at the time. Sadly, Bridgestone was muscled out of making motorcycles by Japan’s major motorcycle manufacturers in 1970 and made a deal with them to provide Bridgestone tires rather than making such damn nice motorcycles that were cutting into their market share. Preston Tucker would not have approved, but Bridgestone isn’t exactly a floundering company today, being the world’s largest tire manufacturer with $15 billion in annual sales.
The engine is a Bridgestone 175-cc two-stroke, air-cooled, oil-injected (Bridgestone called it “Jet Lube Oil Injection”) rotary-valve twin with 20 horsepower at 8,000 RPM. You can see the wide engine cases with a carb on each end of the crank housing, covered by their own little housings, and some very cracked rubber bits that may be hard to source. This one isn’t running, obviously, but it’s mostly complete and comes with a title and owner’s manual, so that’s good, right? Have any of you heard of a Bridgestone 175 Dual Twin? 100 extra points for having owned one, and yes, we’re keeping track. Just kidding we’re not, but we’d love to hear from any present or former 175 DT owners out there.
Never owned one but the “switchable” gear box is pretty interesting. Saw a ‘67 version of this that looked pristine sell at Mecum in Vegas last January-$1750..
1st bike I rode was a 175. But it was a late 70s Yamaha DT. Had a 6 speed.
Careful what you start with this guy, folks, kidding, I can speak for many, we sure look forward to Scottys contributions. My gripe is, the posts come in too fast, and may not be seen until it’s on the 3rd or 4th page. I’m speaking of the Honda Super Hawk and that post surely spawned this one.
I never made the connection between Bridgestone motorcycles and the tires. Hardly a related industry, and we laughed at a bike with the moniker “BS” in plain letters on the tank. Bridgestones were kind of popular, I think, and usually followed by the “James Bond Smokescreen”, and oil dripping from the pipes. Didn’t Gambles sell them? I read these sold for about $580 new, $80 more than the Super Hawk. These were so-so bikes, I think a Honda 160 could keep up with one, many of these were run on moms 3&1 oil, or worse, and motors didn’t last long. That pile of junk motorcycles I mentioned on the Super Hawk post, most assuredly has a couple of these too. At the time, Honda was the king, rather than try, they just quit. Money was in tires anyway, and I had the best luck with Bridgestones on my trucks.
This is an unusual find, Bruce is in NW Wisconsin. How it got there is anyone’s guess. I’d have to think parts are non-existent. The REAL Bridgestone performer, was the 350GTR twin. That bike could almost dust a Super Hawk, but still no match for the up and coming 4 cylinders. Great find.
Oh, one more thing, can anyone ID the bike behind this? Looks Italian, Aermacchi perhaps?
It does look like an Aermacchi/HD Sprint…
Howard, it’s a Parilla Olimpia, although I’m not sure which one:
https://cybermotorcycle.com/archives/motoparilla/olimpia.htm
The seller had it listed but now both bike listings have expired, bummer. You can see the “more ads by this user” on the saved craigslist page link in the first paragraph that I always put in there. If you clicked there, you would have seen the Parilla listing before it expired. Hopefully he’ll relist it.
Good sleuthing, Scotty.
Bridgestone was asked to quit the bike building business by a few other budding Japanese bike companies in exchange for their support by buying Bridgestone tires exclusively for their bikes. Worked out pretty well as Bridgestone now owns Firestone amongst others..
You know, Nev, I never knew Firestone was part of Bridgestone, bought in May 1988. Years ago in America, it was Goodyear, Firestone, Sears, ( made by Cooper Tires), Goodrich, and many others, but we never saw any foreign tire makers. I believe they were incredibly expensive, and we just plumb never thought of buying anything but USA. Today, you’d be hard pressed to see any US tires.
Fewer and fewer USA owned brands but some consolation in that Cooper was struggling and is now part of Goodyear, in part making tires for Les Schwab Tire Centers.
At the ripe old age of 16, I used to buy Firestone retreads in 1968 for my 1964 Valiant, was all I could afford. $10 a tire, produced in a little plant across from a Firestone store that had a 10 bay shop and a retail store that sold everything from guns to appliances & toys. Buchanan Service.
I heard the same thing about Bridgestone and the other Japanese motorcycle makers. I remember the Bridgestone bikes but never had one. One thing that scared us then was the chrome-lined cylinders, which ruled out any easy overbore–something cheap and common often needed on a 2-stroke rebuild. Today we know the Bridgestone was actually a higher quality piece than most of it’s contemporaries. No wonder the other Japanese manufacturers were feeling the pressure.
I bought a used Honda 160 scrambler pipe edition in 1970, as my first bike. It had a 4 speed. I had never ridden a m/c and had to cross a busy U.S. 13 to get home from a red light start, that was not fun, but I managed to get going and made it home.
We were the Bridgestone dealer 1967-70 in 1200 pop. town in western South Dakota. I rode a 175 Sport? with the high exhaust. When our salesman traded a 90cc for a 1950 INDIAN SCOUT I had a great summer ride!!! When we got the notice of Motorcycle Schooling for Bridgestone in Denver, a short 500 miles away. I talked my dad into myself and 2 other 16 year old !! friends letting us go . The only stipulation had to take my 14 year old brother —- My 1951 Ford Flathead, made the trip, a gallon of water every stop and 1 quart of oil for 1000 miles and 1 rebuilt generator on the way!
With the high pipe down the left side, that would’ve been the Hurricane Scrambler, I believe? Nice variant.
I purchased one of these in 1995 for $80 (hocked an alto sax to pay for it), not knowing what it was. I just knew it was small enough for my mother to ride. It spent the winter in my bedroom as I cleaned it up. I had it running, but it needed a fuel valve. I got the part number for a compatible Kawasaki (I think) part, and she had that and the bike when she upped and moved from Rhode Island to Colorado. Never got the part, never rode it, and it ended up getting parted out on eBay. Heartbreaking. It was a fantastic little motor on the thing.
My first motorcycle was a Bridgestone 100. It had a rotary valve, single cylinder two stroke, and the transmission was rotary shift style. Go all the way through the gears and then right back to neutral. Next bike being a Hodaka Super Rat, it took me a bit to get used to the 1 down, 4 up scenario.
Well you asked, so….yes, I have two of these 175DTs exactly like this one, both are 1967 models. One is complete and unrestored, the other is a parts bike, rusty like this one.
The plan is make one out of two, but it hasn’t happened so far and may not at this point.
I saw a few 350 GTR bikes and only (1) Hurricane Scrambler. I’m curious as to whether the small bikes also had chrome plating on the cylinders instead of cast iron sleeves. There was a GTR in our region that didn’t make 5K miles before the chrome started to flake away on the cylinders. Wiped the pistons out, and the cylinders as well. I had a friend with a Honda 305 that cracked a sleeve around the upper flange. I replaced the sleeves for him, and the next thing I knew, this guy with the Bridgestone approached me and asked if I could put sleeves in his cylinder block. I backed completely away from that job. I will say that today, with the newer technology, It might be worth a try. I heard of a guy getting the chromed cylinder in his chainsaw upgraded to a cast iron sleeve…
Had a Mountain 90 which was a pretty good machine and of course lusted for the 350 twin. Bridgestone was a bit ahead of its’ time and well styled. A few years ago I found a 90 to restore but didn’t have the patience and ended up selling it to a vineyard in CA where it now resides on a wall. Now I have an X6 runner in the garage that I’ve been tidying up but really don’t have room for.
Never seen one. I suspect that the hard-to-find bits’ll be the perished carb rubbers and the missing chainguard.
Rare enough now that it’d be worth doing rather than hanging on the wall.
Back in the day, we thought of Bridgestones as the “Hundais” of motorcycling.
I actually, naively, drive my 90 60 miles on knobbies, going through Chicago and under the post office to Indiana to my 1st scrambles race. Pulled a holeshot but somewhere lost a footpeg. Roger DeCoster had little to worry about.