A new profile has been added to the list of Triumph motorcycle models on this site: The Daytona T100D (1973). In August of 1973 Triumph started pre-production on the successor to the T100R Daytona, the T100D - D being 'Disc' or 'Development' or 'Daytona' depending on who you talk to. The factory themselves were going to call the machine the 'Daytona Series 2'. In total only 25 were built on the 20th August 1973 (according to the factory records - but who knows whether you can trust them from that era), however the fate of some of those 25 is unknown as it has been suggested that some were dismantled to make up T150Vs. There are at least 10 surviving models that are known about.
The T100D took parts from the more recent T150V and T140V models to reduce the number of different parts that the factory needed to stock. It featured a disc brake at the front and indeed used pretty much all of the T150V's front end. The engine itself was modified from the T100R to improve oil-flow and reliability but didn't really improve on the performance at all. Standard silencers for the model were the cigar shaped ones found on the T140V. The bike also had the rear conical hub. The front forks were the standard Ceriani type (Italian design) with light-weight aluminium sliders.
Alas Triumph was going through problems due to the parent BSA group going bankrupt in 1972, and the new owner NVT's decision to close the Meriden factory so that production could be concentrated at Small Heath to reduce costs which caused the Meriden workers to stage a sit-in. What looked like a rather promising machine for the time was unceremoniously dumped and the pre-production machines sold off.
