Never a fan of the roller chain as an efficient power transmission device, in the early 70's Bob converted a BSA to belt primary drive. His ultimate dream was to develop the belt drive and offer it to Triumph for production. In 1978 he built a 750 Bonnie belt system which piqued the interest of Triumph in the U.S. and the Meriden factory. At the invitation of Triumph, Oswald and his wife Betty were off to England where Bob demonstrated the reliability of his belt drive on a race track. This was the first of three trips to the U.K. but Triumph and the British motorcycle industry were in their last days and sadly shut their doors before a deal could be struck.

QPD's work for Triumph didn't end with the belt drives. In 1979 Triumph asked him to engineer a prototype electric start system in record time. Bob based it on an effective system he had already created for a T140 using a lightweight American Bosch snowmobile starter motor. Unlike the complex and unreliable Triumph timing-side arrangement, Bob's design used the proven Bendix drive mechanism and spins the primary. This eliminated an ugly bulge in the shapely Triumph timing cover and set Bob's course for future electric start retro conversions.