Page 21 - LHR Sept 25.

ED WRIGHT Profile

was not about grand gestures but about
cumulative care.

1967–1969: The Slow Decline
The late 1960s were tough years at BSA.
Budgets shrank, projects overlapped, and
quality control wavered. Ed found himself doing
more fixes than fresh designs, as aging tools and
stretched teams struggled to keep pace with
Japanese innovations like Honda's CB750.
He kept teaching apprentices, emphasizing
kindness in design: chamfers that saved
mechanics' knuckles, cable routes that didn't
saw through themselves, brackets stiff enough to
silence a rattle. But he also saw the limits of what the bike smoother, more reliable, or simply
could be done inside a struggling system. easier to live with.
In 1969, when BSA offered voluntary severance He never turned bitter about the decline of
packages, Ed accepted. At just over 30, he British motorcycling. Instead, he admired
retired from the factory but not from his craft. Japanese precision and Italian flair while
continuing to respect the quiet virtues of British
Life After BSA engineering. His drawer of tank badges—from
B S A , T r i u m p h , H o n d a , D u c a t i ,
Leaving BSA didn't mean leaving design. Ed BMW—symbolized his belief that good design
freelanced quietly for smaller workshops and transcends nationality.
taught part-time at a technical college. He
maintained his own 500cc twin with monk-like
discipline, experimenting with tweaks that made

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LHR Motorcycle Magazine September 2025