More on Douglas

More on Douglas

Over the last few weeks I have had an enforced rest and during that time I been researching, still did ever Bosch make Douglas motorcycles under licence from 1919 to 1923. It has kept me busy reading and going over some old books like the “Best Twin” by JR Clew and, the more recent Douglas, The Complete Story by Mick Walker. I found the re-read of the Best Twin quite entertaining as there are descriptions of some of the leading lights of Douglas that are amazing Characters in themselves among them Freddie Dixon and Cyril Pullin and Walter More. There are many others who helped make the Douglas brand in trials and on the racetrack however my interest lies in the technology that went with this and during World War One Douglas was testing a leaf spring suspension frame and was in production until 1921 when it was withdrawn it possibly because there was an infringement on the Coulson B patents. In the research I found the Coulson B patents and also a reference to the Cushion Frame patented by Charles Travis in 1899. Spring frames have been around forever and a good site to look them up is at The Online Bicycle Museum. Moving on to the hey day of Douglas and 1927 and the “first” Speedway event was organised by Camberley Motorcycle Club near Camberley that was on a hard surface and a difficult track to ride around the same time Lionel Wills had seen Speedway in Australia and thought it would do well in the UK so he organised the first dirt track race at High Beach in Epping in February 1928 and at Easter there was one at Greenford Park. There is a Pathe News film of one such event. Greenford Park, not far from the Museum, was the site for horse racing that had ceased to become a “Gentlemans' Sport” and had become the Gypsy domain with horse and buggy racing. This did not go down too well with the local population and when dirt track racing arrived it was received with open arms as bringing a “Better class of people to the area” (Somewhat different from the current thinking about motorcycling). Speedway was an instant success as was the Douglas dirt track bikes based on the RA model, first used in Australia and up until the early 30's when the reign was ended by JAP engined bikes. The Douglas had been ideal having a long wheelbase and excellent handling it was the bike of choice. At the outset the art of broadsliding was new to Britain and was aptly demonstrated by a New Zealander Steven St George winning everything he entered. By the end of 1928 the Brits were getting the hang of this technique and Jack Barnett got his Douglas up the front and started winning too!

After the this golden era for Douglas finance and family problems got it the way of producing motorcycles, but that didn't stop some very interesting bikes being produced. By 1935 Douglas had come up with their first transverse flat twin, the Endeavour although not a success at the it set the trend time at what was going to happen later. Even during World War Two development did not stop even though Douglas did not produce any motorcycle, they still did other things for the war effort that included 100cc engined portable generators and pumps, some used in Halifax and Lancaster bombers as a standby power source in the event of a failure of the hydraulic system. Also the bigger engined generators that were used for portable radar equipment used on the south coast as the first line of defence and such was the reliability of those systems. Post was things looked up and Douglas had an opportunity for a military motorcycle contract. An equivalent to an ISDT held at Aldershot for Triumph, BSA and Douglas. Douglas's entry was the DV60 a 600cc transverse twin and not unlike the Endeavour, however on the day the DV60 failed as did BSA's entry leaving the Triumph the only survivor and that as the TRW! 

In the 50's Douglas's fortunes, as with many other motorcycle manufacturers, were not too good and just after their new bike the Dragonfly was introduced the official receiver came in, the company was bought by Westing House and all production ceased with any remaining motorcycles being assembled from parts by Pride and Clarke and sold on at silly low prices. This is not the end of the story Douglas Vespa come on the scene and keep Douglas in the picture for a few more years. Now it is time to read Robin Spaldings book about British Scooters!