P.V. Motorcycles, Perry Vale 1911-1924

[P.V. Motorcycles]

George Elliston and son were cycle makers at 93 Perry Vale up to about 1910, and in late 1910 they secured a patent (10,179/1910) for a rear springing (suspension) system, which they went on to use on the motorcycles they made.
Rear suspension did not come into widespread use on motorcycles until the 1950s, so this really was quite an advanced feature for many years.

George Elliston was joined by Sidney Fell, and they traded as P.V. Motorcycles, taking their initials from the road in which they were based.
They had premises at nos. 93 Perry Vale, and 72 Perry Vale up
to 1914.
They then moved to 'Number 1, Exchange Buildings, Perry Vale'.
I understand this is through the arch on the end of the parade of shops
on Perry Vale, opposite the end of Siddons Road.

Like lots of manufacturers at the time, they bought in engines, carburetters, front forks and other fitments, and built frames to house them in.

Their motorcycles were first announced to the press in September 1911, and they initially sold single-speed belt-drive bikes with different sizes of engine.
The range developed through 1912 and 1913, with the introduction of 3-speed hub gears, by Sturmey Archer and Armstrong. Engine sizes ranged from a 500cc single-cylinder to a 976cc v-twin, all made by J.A.P. of Tottenham.
For 1914, a flat-twin engine by ABC was an option.

The firm continued after the outbreak of WWI, offering just a 269cc two-stroke lightweight (using the popular Villiers engine), with a two-speed countershaft gearbox.

After WWI, they continued with the lightweight bike in a slightly re-designed form, and gradually expanded the range to include more-or-less every size of engine, from 250cc two strokes, 350cc and 500cc four-stroke singles, and a range of v-twins from 500cc up to 1000cc. J.A.P. engines were most commonly used, but engines by Bradshaw and Barr and Stroud were also listed.

The works entered the Isle of Man TT Races in 1923 and 1924, with a 250cc machine taking part in the Lightweight race of 1923, and finishing 12th.
For 1924, a 350cc machine was entered in the Junior TT, and was running in an amazing fourth place on the fourth lap (of six), before being ordered to retire.
I believe that this was because rider R.V. Crauford (a local lad, maybe?) had crashed and damaged the machine, breaking off a footrest.

I'm not sure what happened after the TT - there are a couple of press reviews of bikes in the second half of 1924, but the edition of the Kentish Messenger dated 24/11/24 carries an advert for an auction of machinery, tools etc for the company, which seems like the end of the road.

If anyone has any local area photos showing the works, or period adverts in publications, I should be grateful to find out about them.
Below are a couple of pictures - a bike from 1912 430cc v-twin single speeder (top), and a 1923 1000cc v-twin, complete with PV sidecar.

Nick

[Rebelmc]

I can't add a great deal of information, other than that published in the Red Book of 1917; according to that publication, there is a suggestion they ceased (or, at least, severely curtailed) production from 1914, which wouldn't be unusual, as many of their suppliers would've been otherwise engaged on war work, so they probably couldn't get enough componants to offer a consistant supply of completed machines.

According to the Red Book, in 1914 they were offering a choice of three machines, all with JAP engines:
250cc single, 3.5hp
650cc V twin, 4-5hp
750cc V twin, 6hp

All came with belt final drive and were offered with a choice of a fixed gear or 3 speed transmission, with a price range from £48 10s to £72, approximately £3500 - £5500 at today's prices.

Hope that helps.

[Willy]

I'm not surprised they went out of business if all they could get out of 650cc was 4-5 bhp!

[P.V. Motorcycles]

Thanks Rebelmc - I found a copy of that somewhere about on the internet.

I'd like to find an original works catalogue from the time for more detail, or any pics of the bikes they made.

Nick

[Rebelmc]

willy - that's RAC standard 'tax hp', calculated using the equation D x D x n / 2.5 where 'D' is the bore size (in inches) and 'n' is the number of cylinders, which bears no relation to the actual power output of the motor, but I'm sure you knew that

Nick - I can't help you with any pictures, but I'm pretty certain the National Motorcycle Museum in Solihull had a PV on display at one time, so they might be a good place to start.

[P.V. Motorcycles]

They certainly did (and still do) - but they know very little about it, particularly what colour they should have painted it.

And the accompanying blurb says that it was made in 'Perivale', which has got to be worth a and a and ultimately, a

The original PV sidecar also seems to have 'vanished' since the machine came into their care...

Thanks for explaining the horsepower point - I simply couldn't be bothered.

Nick

[Rebelmc]

Ha, funny you shuld mention that.

It's a long time since I was last there, but I remember seeing a write up on a bike made in Perivale and thinking what a coincidence it was, because I lived near Perry Vale!

I guess I never made the connection (I didn't know about Messrs Elliston and Fell then) but it didn't strike me as odd, because there were so many small bike factories at that time and Perivale wouldn't have put them a million miles away from JAP, who I did know about, mainly because they were still the motor of choice when I started going to speedway, in the late 60s/early 70s.

I suppose it must be really difficult to keep on top of archiving all the information about these tiny cottage industries; the very few original pictures that survive would, almost certainly, be monochrome, so getting colours correct during restoration must be a nightmare.

Interestingly, the NMCM don't list the PV among their exhibits and it's a shame about the lost sidecar, I wonder if it was damaged in the big fire.

[P.V. Motorcycles]

The Perry Vale/Perivale point is 'unfortunate' as there is some info available - the Museum could have done some research with either Beaulieu Motor Museum, or the Vintage Motorcycle Club, both of whom have 1920s catalogues from the factory.

Not especially difficult to do, snd pretty shameful for an institution which bills itself as preserving this stuff for future generations.

The point about colours is valid: about the only detail that is routinely not in articles on machines from the 'black and white' days is what colour they were.
However, PV had their own 'PV Grey' (a beige grey), which was the standard colour from about 1921 to the end - but they had an optional green - a reseda green (grey-green).
The bike in the museum should be green - the owner prior to the NMM had matched the colour from the sidecar.
The 'going' of the sidecar is a sore point for me: I'm not sure it went in the fire.

Other local-ish makes:

BAT - Kingswood Road, Penge (1901-25) - generally v-twins
GB Motor Co. - somewhere in Sydenham (1905-08). Run by a F Claasen, offered a long-wheelbase single cylinder solo, or a sidecar.
Superb Four - Anerley (1920) - one litre in-line four cylinder, ohc, dynamo lighting - probably priced itself out of the market
Matchless - Plumstead (1899-1945 - later AJS & Matchless until 1969) - early racing successes in the TT and at Brooklands, kept a high profile for most of their years

Doubtless there are others - particularly around the turn of the century, when lots of folks added a small engine to a heavy cycle frame and had a go at the motorcycle production business.

[Rebelmc]

I must admit, as someone who's involved in the restoration business, I do find it very frustrating when I see basic things, like colours, being messed up, particularly when the original isn't entirely unknown.

I also find it odd that these institutions don't work much more closely with each other; they're all supposed to be in the business of preserving history and it's not as though they're in direct competition.

As for the other makes, I'd be very surprised if our resident historian, Steve Grindley, couldn't give you a steer on GB Motor Co, and I love the idea of the Superb being a bit too superb for it's own good.

[P.V. Motorcycles]

What do you do in 'the business'?

Sometimes there just aren't any clues to go on for the finish, and if your machine is unique, you're relegated to 'best endeavours', with the minor crumb of comfort that it's unlikely that no-one's going to come up to the bike, adopt a pained expression, and come out with "oo, they never painted them that colour ...".
The PV colours match well to RAL standards - 7006 for the beige grey, 6011 for the green.
I found an accurate tracing of the 20s tank logo in a collection left to a motorcycle club I belong to, complete with colours described.

It would be nice to see if there's anything on GB - my area of interest remains with PV stuff though - apparently they originally made bicycles from 1906 to 1910, so I'd be interested also to see what they did right at the start.

It was a funny time, post-war - manufacturing had gone over to the war effort (although surprisingly late - manufacturers confidently listed models for 1916), so there were lots of folks about in 1918 with war gratuities to spend, and little to spend them on.
Motorcycle journalist of the time 'Ixion' recounted selling quite undesirable machines for vast premiums, simply because the market was desperate for them, and factories hadn't tooled up to commence production again.
There was also a busy trade in renovated ex-DR machines - Triumph even did a version of their tank transfer bearing the word 'Renovated' to distinguish those machines.

PV only re-commenced in 1919 themselves, and in a pretty modest way - with a two-stroke lightweight only.

BTW- slightly further afield, Pearson-Cox of Shortlands made a steam-powered motorcycle in 1912!

[Rebelmc]

We're a general mechanical/body repair business for cars, but we also do a lot of classic stuff and we've recently done a few bike jobs (not quite as old as PV!) including repairing and painting the bodywork on an early 70s Honda trial bike and a Zundapp Bella scooter from the 50s (a fantastically engineered piece of kit).

Personally, I've been into bikes since I was a small boy (see my earlier reference to speedway) and I favour older Japanese stuff to ride these days, but I've always had a fascination for the early days of motoring, on two wheels and four, mainly because I like to see the various ways the pioneers tried to engineer their way out of, what would have been, never before encountered problems.

I particularly enjoy some of the overly elaborate blind alleys that you often see, and some of the ideas that are suddenly introduced as being recently modern, that actually appeared years before.

So, the idea of the 1912 steam powered bike really intrigues me, since it was obviously attempting to adapt a technology that was extremely popular at that moment, but would ultimately fail, not long after.

BTW, if it's ever useful to you, I've just looked up those RAL numbers in an ICI reference book (how sad am I, having an ICI book at home!) and they do match up with references that might be more familiar to most UK paint suppliers.

[P.V. Motorcycles]

Pearson-Cox were mainly car makers as I understand it - there were certainly steam traction engines and some steam lorries about, but it's not really a technology that translates well to motorcycle use.
I certainly wouldn't like to have been perched on top of a paraffin-fired boiler.

I think there's one still about.

There was a 'Cox Gas Trailers' around WWI (I think), which, as I understand it, basically worked like the episode of Dad's Army where they modified Mr Jones's butchers' van to run on gas.

You're right about the various 'blind alleys' - PV's rear springing was one of the neater attempts to add rear springing. Other things like valve timing, crank balancing etc can look very naive these days, but pretty much all of this was new, and 'cutting edge' in a way, at the time.
It's pretty well guaranteed, though, that the engineering and execution will be extremely competent, and in some cases, very difficult to replicate today.

My 1913 (or so) bike will eventually have a hub gear in it - just like the Sturmey Archer bicycle one, but bigger and with a multi-plate clutch in it. Sturmey made them for motorcycles in the day (as did Armstrong). Loads and loads of precision small parts, compared to a standard countershaft gearbox (which replaced the hub gear by 1915 or so).

Interested to see what the RAL matches are - a guy up north has a 1924 PV, which he'd simply painted 'grey' about 20 years ago - I've given him the RAL colour as he says he wants to re-do it, but any other info would be welcome.