Motorcycle or Not?? Part 4: Odd creations

In the motorcycle world there are quite a lot of strange creations that for some reason can still be considered to be a motorcycle. And.... they get more and more. We already have some of these odd creations in our catalogue here and there.

A few that we all know are the stamp with Goofy on a bull that is dressed up like a motorcycle, the space scooter from St. Vincent and the snow scooters.

The various "Funnies" stay in the catalogue, but off course you are not obliged to collect them. The StarWars hoover and similar "motorcycles" also stay included and, thinking of the flood of "footnote issues", probably some more of these will appear.

Snow scooters are a league on their own. This class of vehicles is brought under the FIM (Federation International de Motocyclettes) and therefore, although we Dutchmen don't know much about this way of transport and the sports that are practiced with it, they should be part of our area of collecting. The American Motorcycle Association (AMA) even organizes World Championship races with snowmobiles, and the strangest antics are made on gliders and tracks. I even saw a dragrace competition with snow scooters in the mud (!) and a challenge to "drive" as far as possible over water with those things. "Trackies" (or how should we call a wheelie on a snow scooter?) of 100 meters and top speeds over 100 miles per hour (160 km/hr) are certainly not exceptional. But OK, snow scooters certainly belong to it.

Water scooters also have "motorcycle handlebars", but look more like a boat than like a motorcycle. They are not brought under the FIM, but under the IJSBA (International Jet Ski Boat Association). Although I personally would like it, they will not be incorporated in the MFN catalogue. But this can change when a stamp will be issued with the already existing Quad-Ski, a quad with retractable wheels, which turns it into a jet-ski.

There are many already elaborated designs that can probably be taken in production, although the Bimotocycles and the airbike drawn by Dyson (the one from the vacuum cleaners) appear to be completely unfeasible.

This leaves 2 remaining items: motorcycles with a car steering wheel, and stamps that have just an indirect link with our collection, the so-called cross connections.
Sometimes there are motorcycle-like vehicles that do not meet the criteria, but of which we all think that they belong to our collection. What if a stamp appears with the Militaire?

Both don't have motorcycle handlebars. Or for instance the already existing stamps with the Segway?

These just earn a position in the motorcycle area.

The cross connections are a bit more complex, because everybody has its own limits. One will include stamps with tyres, while the other doesn't regard this as collectable but includes the inventors (Daimler) and other persons (racing drivers like Joey Dunlop) in his collection.

If we would include the cross connections in the catalogue, it would probably become a compilation in 20 volumes and that's not what we want. Stamps like the Dutch Willempie issue can off course always be announced in the newsletter.

Aim is to present a revised version of the MFN catalogue on the club meeting in October 2015. Whether this is possible depends on my physical condition in the weeks before. It will include the stamps that fulfill the criteria from the contemplations in the last 4 Newsletters. If it includes stamps about which you think different, you must score them out by yourself.

Hans de Kloet

This is the last article in a series of 4, in which it will be elucidated for several of these dubious cases or/when they are reckoned to be a motorcycle. These guidelines will also be used to decide whether an issue will be included in the new version of the catalogue or not.

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