Why are some people who have never met and who live in different continents restoring bikes via the internet?

The story starts in the 1990s when some US BSA enthusiasts wonder if it would be possible to find and restore a Daytona BSA, a bike that has always fascinated them. But there are two problems - they can't find a whole bike and can't find anyone who knows anything about them.

Although they don't know it at the time, another BSA enthusiast in Scotland is researching twin carburettor kits sold for BSA pre-unit twins in the USA. His research also covers Daytona twins, as these were fitted with twin carburettors. He puts the result of his research on a web site.

One of the US enthusiasts Don Bradley sees the reference to Daytona bikes on the site and emails the the Scottish BSA enthusiast Myles Raymond asking for any information he has about these bikes. Myles doesn't have much and asks if Don has. Both agree that this is important information and that they should keep in touch and share whatever they find.

A year later they get in touch again - things have moved on. Don has more parts, more information and has decided to restore the bikes in time for the 50th anniversary of BSA's 1954 win and plans a celebration attended by the original BSA riders.  Myles has more information, has some leads on UK contacts who may know more about the bikes' history and is planning to create an online archive for the information.

Things have now reached a critical mass. Myles offers to help the project any way he can but thinks that because he is in the UK, he is best placed to find information or ex- BSA staff who might help. Don will head-up the restoration partly because he has the bits of bike that have been found so far and partly because Myles is by his own admission a poor mechanic.

They decide that the only practical way to share this information is to keep it all on a website where it will be available to anyone regardless of location or timezone. Myles will build the website partly because he's done one already and partly because Don is by his own admission a poor typist.

So a website is built and used as an online archive and project management tool. Early in the research stage while the team is still uncertain about the specification of the bikes the web site contains much information that is speculative. To protect against the more militant BSA enthusiasts who might interpret the web site contents as gospel and take issue a decision is made to keep the site private. The URL is only circulated among the project team members or trusted individuals who are helping.

In practice the website works spectacularly well, bridging the difference in distance and time and the restoration proceeds.

There are still problems to solve and questions to answer but by April 2003 the team is confident enough that they can complete the bikes to the original specification and the website finally goes public in April 2003.