OutdoorKing Repair Forum Forums Finding and Swapping Rare Finds & Donations Almost a set.Twin,Lightweight & Compact

Hi all just thought you would like to see an almost set of the Twin, smaller brother and sister,or maybe around the other way.How do you tell?









They will be a bit happier after they are restored.Will be a while before that is done.There are many in front of them.

I hope you manage to find the other two, particuarly the green supreme, that would add nice balance to the picture.

After looking through what little I can find, I have a feeling the Green supreme is a twin with a revised coil, while the gold supreme is the same as the green, but with hight compression heads, and a suitable adapted muffler.

The coild revision came about due to the high failure rate of the Twin coil, due to this high fail rate, there is a good chance the twin engine you have would count as a supreme engine, as back in the late 70's, if the coild died (whitch it often did) the repair shop relaced it with the new, revised coil.

So many twins are in fact defacto Supremes.

When you say gold supreme, do you mean this one?

http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/2608/img0381ee.jpg

if so, what was the production of these compared to the rest of the twins? (were there less produced/ more produced etc?)

That's the one (it's the exact Image Jeffery sent me too)

They are pretty hard to get, I'm not sure what there numbers are compared to the other supreme, they both seem about as rare as each other to me, but there is certainly less of these than the Red twin.

I think the twin had a quick boom at first release, but the ignition issues soon killed of interest, and people were far more skeptical by the release of the supreme.

that image is my image, the mower is in my back shed.

Was it on ebay a little while back.

I have just compared the image, and it matches exactly eith the one from Jeffery, I also recall sing this one on ebay, I think, It stands out due to the fuel cap.

That fuel cap looks to be an old Ryobi to me.

Does it run?

i never bought it on ebay and i never sold it on ebay. i am the person who originally took this photo. Anyone who used the photo and told you it was their mower is ...... well, telling porkys!

The fuel cap is an old ryobi, what fuel cap should be on there (im guessing one of the square type with the clear fuel gauge but im not sure)?

The mower runs perfectly, there is an old post of when i initially bought it (pay a hefty $50 it!), bought it from this lebanese bloke who was in the country for 5 years and tried to tell me that he had it since new I checked the flywheel and the cylinders at his place and when i saw that they were in excellent nic, i decided to relieve him of his mower.

The carby just needed a clean out and the spark plugs replaced and away she goes! The only thing is now, if i remember, i replaced the 2 plugs with the same type but i think i overheard that the spark plugs should be different (from cylinder compared to rear). anyone can confirm?

Oh no, Jeffery was not trying to say it was his, He simply sent this pic to show me which one he was referring too.

I swear i have seen one before with that fuel cap though.

To my knowledge, it should have either a standard square victa one, or the dip-window type.

UPDATE:
I just did a bit of hunting on google to work out where i had seen this suprememe with the wrong fuel cap before.

I found it...

Turns out i saw it here, when you first posted it up, when you got it...

Man, I dont feel like the brightest bulb in the shop right now, i can tell you that!!!

hehehe

it all makes sense now

What years are the green and orange ones, which came first and second etc???


Would be good to put an 18" in between them.
Say a G3 sports in with the orange ones and maybe even a series 80 mustang with the green ones. The G3 (VC) mustang probably wouldnt look right as its a different green.

Just a couple of things here.Johno I found the picture through a Google search of Twin photos.Don't know if it still there.Never said it was mine.(I wished.If you decide you'd like to see in live in Canberra just let me know).
Now Rodeobob.Still not a lot of information on these twins yet.What I do know is that they started in 1975.The Red was the first and not sure of numbers but there was a fair few of them.Then when they discovered the problems with the back cylinder it was revised.The Supreme was born (green).Now again don't know of the numbers but I do believe it was a lot less than the first model.Not sure of what year.Then to end the series the Gold Supreme was born.Now still don't know but I do believe even less numbers of these again.Also it was believed that the engines where made in Canada and shipped here to Australia.I'm am currently still tying to find out more information on these,but have found nothing more as yet.The idea behind these was to release these guys around the same time as the VC-160. Basically to lunch the idea of mowing when the lawn was wet.Also due to having 2 cylinders there was less wear,less vibration and cheaper to run(Fuel wise).I will if I find out more about these guys I will let you all know,but unfortunately very little information on them at this stage.

I can tell you, even if they intended to line it up with the VC-160, they were certainly not in line.

I thought the Twin came out in the second 1/2 of 74, as the flagship of the first line up to run the new G4 carby.

The line up being 500 Twin, VC-Mustang, VC-Sport, and VC-Auto Drive, as well as the utility and so forth.

The Mustang and sport would have been in there second incarnation, the Auto in its third, along side the first run of the Twin.

THe VC-160 was phased out during 1973, it never made it to the G4 carby era.

Well as I said not much known as yet,but the date I have is 1975.They weren't to be opposition for the VC just part of the cut wet grass advertising theme.With more torque at lower rev's bigger base and I guess quicker mowing.I guess it may have appealed to the people that hate mowing and wanted it over quicker.Even if the grass was damp.

Ok then. How about if Blumbly shoots for a nice Power Plus to go in between.

Im tipping that the power plus did not come along till a couple of years later but its not green and its not orange and it is special in its own little way.

They would never have been in competition with themselves, think of it like cars, they had a full range at one time, to make sure they could cover as much market as possible.

The twin sat in a premium position all to its own.

Underneath, sat the Auto drive, being a self propelled model.

Bleow that, was the premium single cylider, the Mustang (and before the mustang, the VC-160)

Going down a peg, was the Sports, during the time of the VC-160, this mid ranger was the corvette.

And for smaller lawns, there was the Imapla, a 125cc mower, that replaced the VC-125.

And for a budget cut, the Utility was down the bottom.

Alongside this, there were also the professional machines, such as the Imperial, the Super 600 and of course, the professional. Also, you had the store brands and the department victa's.

The Power Plus would fit in quite nicely Bob, although it was a little later than the twin, the Seris 70 power plus, was styled from the Sports, and looked like a silver/grey variant of the sports.

In fact, if you were to get the Purple, the Green, And The Red sports, I would also reccomend the Power Plus, and the 74 VC-125 along side them, to complete the picture.

I always thought the twin mowers came out in the mid 70's, but this youtube video states 1972. Maybe the the video has the wrong date on it??

That would most definatly be the wrong date mate, the carburettor used on the twin did not even exist in 1972, let alone the twin itself.

The twin came out somwhere between mid 74 and mid 75, the exact date I am unsure of, it ran for a year or so i beleive, then came the supreme.

As you can see in the add, even the utility shown has a G4 carby, I would put this add at somwhere between 1975 and 1977.

Yeah I agree.

Still, it's a very interesting add, helps to show the full range at the time, and how they were marketed.

The first mower to introduce the 'Cut in wet' idea was the VC-160, back in 1970, as it ran flagship for the introduction of the Hi arch base.

The Vc-160 was flagship the following year, for the introduction of the Zip start principal, which coupled a recoil starter with an automatic decompression vlave, to acheve faster starting speeds.

The next big thing was the G4 carby, Whitch I am fairly sure the Twin ran flagship for, however if not, it would have been the Mustang.

If that was the case, then the G4 would have been introduced backwards!

Also when you unload to you-tube you can put whatever name you want.Doesn't mean it's right.Let's just say for example they put 1962.People would go around believing that,but it wouldn't be correct. Al-thought the Lightweight and compact where exactly have the Twin.So much so it even is the same crankcase and cylinder etc.It wasn't released until 1977.It was 83.195cc.They just called it an 85cc.It also had the pointy cap on the air filter housing as well as the twin.So if anybody has any and would like to see them go on the right mower.Please let me know.