ART DECO STYLE

WHEN it comes to pure Art Deco style, Zündapp’s K-series bikes from the 1930s were as cool as they came. Introduced in 1933 as both horizontally-opposed, sidevalve twins and fours, they bore little resemblence to the small-capacity two-strokes that the factory had been building since 1922. The flat-four K800 was the flagship to put rival BMW’s twins in their place, and 80 years later still commands respect … if you can find one.

The K stood for Kardanantrieb or shaft-drive, but the 600cc and 800cc fours had otherwise different architecture to the smaller twins and were as quirky in their engineering as their appearance. Remaining examples of what was a low-volume high-priced solo model in civilian guise are few and far between these days, especially outside Germany, but this impeccably restored Zündapp K800 flat-four is now on display in Britain at the Sammy Miller Museum after the indefatigable Ulsterman persuaded the owner of a complete such bike to part with the remains of another he’d acquired as a source of parts. Sammy then set about re-creating it together with