Brough Superior

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1926 Brough Superior SS100

George Brough named his new machine the Brough Superior.He wanted to mak sure it was different to the Brough name used on father William Edward Broughs machines . George used his own frames and bought engines and various other parts to produce exciting, exclusive, and expensive bikes.

The source of the Father-Son disagreement was NOT concerning cylinder angles. W.E. Brough had become an advocate of the flat twin, producing his own engines totally in house ( which he had done with all the earlier productions) , capacities of 496cc to 810cc. The reason that the break between the two men occurred was COST . It was post WW1 and father William was short of funds, He had been attempting to raise capital by selling redundant factory stock,complete engines, bits of engine frames ,even a Brough car. Adverts had been regularly posted in the press. Independently son George had been going out on a limb with his own sports development of the 500cc Brough flat twin engined machine..

It would have the engine carried in a detachable duplex cradle, so it could easily be removed. The frame lugs tapering down to the tubes, with a toolbox astride the top frame tube. The 500cc OHV engine was a new type that had already been made and undergone bench testing. The crankshaft ran on roller bearings with its mainshafts and wide roller big ends drilled for heat treatment.Two camshafts instead of the single previous one.Figures on test were 14 bhp at 4200 rpm and 13.2 bhp at 5600 rpm.The press were duly astonished at the high engine rpm attained.George said he was prepared to stand by the design to the tune of £100.

When George wanted to put his new Brough engine into production the cost was more than his father would contemplate. Father & son relationship could be mercurial to say the least,Best friends one minute, daggers drawn the next.

William Edward Brough was actually a rather Superior engineer, much better than his son George.

When George Brough started on the 1927 V4 engined machine,it was his father he turned to , William did all the patternmaking , casting & machining ,including the crankshaft , ,


George's bikes did prove to be good and not just against his father's bikes. In the 1920s and 1930s George had wins and records. Located in Nottingham, England the firm was thought to produce some of the best bikes in the world. The Motor Cycle claimed they were essentially "the Rolls Royce of motorcycles", and Brough used this quote as a slogan in advertising - Rolls didn't object.

George was well known as a competitor in motorcycle racing, highly regarded as a technician and understood the value of marketing. He successfully utilized all of these talents in elevating his machines to being objects of desire, items that did more than simply provide transport.

His flair for marketing, permission was sought and secured from the illustrious carmaker to describe his machines as "The Rolls Royce of Motorcycles", combined with his insistence that only the best components were used in the creation of the motorcycles bearing the Brough Superior script and that they were then assembled with a level of care and precision beyond that of other manufacturers ensured that the motorcycles leaving his premises were more than the sum of their parts. His competition background resulted in machines that handled and went as well as they looked, whilst the "bespoke" nature of the machines ( although a catalogue was published the machines therein represented a starting point for the would be owner, in 1930 the range consisted of the 680, SS80 and SS100, which would then be tailored to your specific requirements) attracted a clientele that included the "a" list celebrities of the day.

For the 1930 season, when the example offered was built, the SS80 represented the middle machine in the range, for those with deep enough pockets there was the overhead valve SS100, whilst the more impecunious would look to the pretty, but slightly small (in George Brough's eyes) 680. Those seeking a machine that balanced performance and stamina would opt for the SS80. All three machines utilised JAP powerplants, however, the SS80 (so named because 80 mph was guaranteed to be attained by the machine by the manufacturer) employed a side valve engine instead of the over head valve units fitted to its larger and smaller siblings. The engines used all chain drive to the rear wheel via a three speed Sturmey Archer gearbox

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