A RACING commentator who has lovingly restored a vintage motorbike has appealed for Oxford Mail readers' help to find out its original licence plate.

Ex-Motocross racer- turned TV presenter Barry Nutley inherited the 1933 Velocette bike from his old friend and Oxford personality Viv Kirk following his death in 2004.

Over the past 10 years, he has restored it to its former glory, and now wants to track down its registration number.

He has asked anyone who might have old photos of Mr Kirk, the eccentric owner of Wolvercote Lakes, to check their archives to see if they have a snap of him on his bike.

Mr Kirk, a manual labourer for the Post Office, was a minor celebrity in Oxford from the 1970s onwards because of his extraordinary collection of steam-powered traction engines and vehicles which he kept largely hidden from the public on several acres of land then known as The Gullet – now the Wolvercote Lakes nature reserve.

Mr Kirk, who lived in Walton Well Road in North Oxford, was regularly seen riding his 1899 steam-powered tractor Blossom to the Red Lion pub in Wolvercote for a pint.

But he would also buzz around town on his 1933 Velocette bike which has now been restored to its former glory.

Mr Nutley, who lives in Shropshire, said: "According to local knowledge, Viv road this little motorbike regularly from his Oxford home to The Gullet where his collection of traction engines and showman’s equipment was stored.

"The bike became derelict when it was abandoned for a number of years under a sheet of corrugated iron beside his house, and was then taken to the Gullet where it lay in a tumbledown shed."

Mr Nutley discovered the vehicle when he was helping friends remove other engines at the site which had been sold off following Mr Kirk's death.

He struck a deal with the executor of Mr Kirk's estate and the rusted motorcycle was lifted to Shropshire across the back of a breakdown truck.

Back at home, Mr Nutley confirmed the bike was a Velocette GTP 250cc two-stroke, and Velocette Club records revealed it was invoiced from the Birmingham factory on January 15, 1933.

A lengthy process has seen the bike restored to original "oily rag" condition, which is how it would have been when Mr Kirk rode it around Oxford.

Mr Nutley, a popular TV voice of motorcycle racing for more than 30 years, said the bike would be a link to the time when he began his working life as an apprentice motorcycle mechanic for Great Western Motors in Reading, part of the then City Motors Oxford Group.

Viv Kirk inherited the Wolvercote Gullet from his family and from the 1950s onwards used it to store his extraordinary collection of traction engines, steam tractors and vintage fairground caravans which he displayed at fairs and steam rallies around the region.

He died on March 27, 2004, aged 81, following a stroke at home. His coffin was borne to his funeral by a 1913 steam tractor.

In his final extraordinary act, Mr Kirk bequeathed Wolvercote Lakes to Oxford Preservation Trust, which has managed the site ever since.