Allen Millyard’s one-of-a-kind masterpiece, a bright red motorcycle powered by a full eight-liter Dodge Viper V10, sold at H&H Classics on July 22 for a final price of £149,500. When fees and premiums are included in, the total comes to almost $201,500. The hammer dropped for £130,000, or around $175,000, right in the middle of the pre-sale estimate.
Millyard’s project began in his Berkshire garage in 2004, with little more than a used Viper GTS engine. After five years of meticulous crafting, a road-legal machine made its premiere in 2009. The massive beast under the hood is a 20-valve 10-cylinder pushrod engine that generates an impressive 507 horsepower and 525 pound-feet of torque. The bike weighs a whopping 1,300 pounds overall, with the engine accounting for nearly 700 pounds of that total. The front suspension is supported by 75-millimeter stanchions taken from JCB hydraulic cylinders, while the rear suspension is supported by a set of heavily modified Yamaha R1 shocks. To keep up with the heat, he even created ceramic-coated exhaust headers by hand. As expected, this beast does not have a multi-speed transmission. A fixed ratio allows the massive low-end torque to do all of the work, with the rear sprocket selection dictating whether the bike is geared at roughly 160 mph or over 270 mph.
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During testing at Bruntingthorpe, Bruce Dunn of Motorcycle News reached 207.101 mph. Years later, in May 2023, Millyard and Henry Cole (a TV celebrity) achieved 183.5 mph on the identical bike at Elvington Airfield, breaking the Guinness World Record for the fastest tandem motorcycle. It has driven approximately 10,000 miles on public roads and race circuits, including a lap of the Isle of Man TT course, visits to Guernsey and the Isle of Wight, and a few trips across Germany. Honestly, only a few people have sat on it throughout the years.
Millyard had decided that he’d done enough with it because the machine was getting increasingly difficult to handle due to his declining muscle strength, and he thought he’d checked off every box he set out to do with the bike. He described it as a painful decision, but the proceeds from the sale will free up some space and finances for other projects. When the audience requested to hear it run during the auction, he started the engine and ran it for them while TV cameras were filming a future edition of The Motorbike Show.
Tim Whittaker, a local collector and engineer, submitted the winning bid. He’s been eyeing this bike for years, and believe us, he didn’t want it to end up in some private collection and never see the light of day. Whittaker plans to ride the bike himself, starting on runways and progressing to public roadways as he builds confidence. He has already agreed to loan the motorcycle to the National Motorcycle Museum in Solihull for the winter months, allowing visitors to see it up close.
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