Hesketh Motorcycles

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Hesketh Motorcycles
legal form
founding 1982
Seat Daventry , Easton-Neston , Turweston-Aerodorm, Kingswood ( United Kingdom )
management Lord Hesketh , Mick Broom, Paul Sleeman
Branch Motorcycle manufacturer
Website www.heskethmotorcycles.co.uk

Hesketh V 1000 with Astralite wheels (1982)

Hesketh Motorcycles is a British motorcycle manufacturer based in Daventry , Easton Neston in Northamptonshire , Turweston Aerodrome near Silverstone and Kingswood in Surrey since 1982 .

history

The company was founded by Alexander Fermor-Hesketh, 3rd Baron Hesketh , to develop a prototype in 1980 . After two name changes failed quickly, the brand was looked after and further developed from 1984 onwards by Broom Development Engineering  - located at the Turweston Aerodrome on the border between Northamptonshire and Buckinghamshire . The brand's last appearance so far was in Kingswood (Surrey) in 2013 .

background

The project was started by Lord Hesketh, who wanted to revive the dying British motorcycle industry and had experience in Formula 1 racing at the time. Hesketh Racing was the last private Formula 1 team to win a Grand Prix. James Hunt was behind the wheel of the winning car. Lord Hesketh wanted to use the know-how and facilities built up for this purpose to build a quality motorcycle.

The Hesketh motorcycle was developed in Easton-Neston. The prototype ran in the spring of 1980 with a Weslake engine. The Hesketh V 1000 , which roughly followed Vincent-HRD's marketing pattern , but looked more like the contemporary Ducati 860GT , offered all sorts of advanced technology: For example, it was the first British motorcycle with four valves per cylinder and four overhead camshafts , even though Japanese manufacturers already delivered such a thing in large numbers.

After two years of development, the project was announced in the press and partners were sought for production. After no partners could be found, Lord Hesketh founded a Hesketh Motorcycles plc on his own . In 1982 the company built a new factory in Daventry to build the Hesketh V 1000 .

But there were a number of problems: The motorcycles were heavy, had a large seat height, the reliability left a lot to be desired and a number of other problems came with a rear cylinder that easily overheated due to insufficient cooling air. The resulting “bad press” combined with an underdeveloped motorcycle model, underfunding and a collapsing motorcycle market led to the company's insolvency after only 139 copies were made .

Cagiva managers visited the Daventry factory in September 1982 with the intention of adding the Hesketh brand to their portfolio. Sales Director Luigi Giacometti told Motor Cycle News that they would be disappointed to find that all of the components were sourced from subcontractors, that there were no manufacturing facilities other than a few carts, and that the bankruptcy administrator wanted £ 150,000 for just a pile of paper and drawings.

The Very Rare Hesketh Vampire (1984)

He was sure he could fix Hesketh's mechanical problems, but Cagiva withdrew its takeover offer after Hesketh's marketing director, Peter Gaydon, appeared in a television interview and said he feared a loss of quality if the brand was labeled “Spaghetti Special “Would end under Cagiva.

The workers' cooperative in Meriden was interested in buying the rights to these motorcycles because after the old Triumph Bonneville they had no new model to offer. There was even a V 1000 with a Triumph emblem on the tank, but the workers' cooperative also didn't have enough money to buy the rights and develop the motorcycle.

In 1983 Lord Hesketh started a new company called Hesleydon Ltd to manufacture a revised V 1000 with full fairing. The new machine should be called "Vampire". Although the new company manufactured this motorcycle with an eye to the export markets, the Vampire still inherited too many shortcomings from the V 1000, so that only 40 copies were built and the company closed its doors again in 1984.

Broom Development Engineering

Mick Broom was a development engineer and test driver in the first development team for the Hesketh brand and worked in the Old Laundry in Easten-Neston. When Hesketh Motorcycles plc went bankrupt, Broom was part of the team built by Lord Hesketh to look after the Hesketh owners. Repair and maintenance work as well as modifications were offered to the motorcycles that had already been sold. This team then became Hesleydon Ltd , which received the necessary export authorization and developed the Vampire as a touring version of the V 1000.

A combination of a general decline in the motorcycle market, the high costs of spare parts and a lack of financial resources to set up real series production caused Hesleydon Ltd to close. Broom developed the vampires further, but also carried out development work for other motorcycle manufacturers and private customers. His company was called Broom Development Engineering .

The company resided in the same buildings where development of the V 1000 began and the team began developing this motorcycle into a reliable "gentleman" touring machine. This included solving the overheating problem by increasing the oil flow to cool the rear cylinder. Broom manufactured up to twelve motorcycles a year and developed the Vulcan and Vortan concept bikes .

Silverstone

In 2006, Broom Engineering had to move to the Turweston Aerodrome near Silverstone because Lord Hesketh sold the building in Easton-Neston to Leon Max, a textile manufacturer, who wanted to set up a factory outlet center for his textile brand Max Store there. Immediately before the move, when much of the facilities were already packed, the factory was robbed, causing £ 40,000 damage. Unreplaceable records, tools and motorcycles were also gone. This of course hindered the establishment of a small series production at the new location.

Revitalizing the brand

Mick Broom sold the Hesketh brand in 2010. Since then, Hesketh Motorcycles Ltd has been reopening and the production of new motorcycles under this name has been planned.

In early 2014, Hesketh Motorcycles announced the launch of the Hesketh 24 , the first new model in about 30 years.

Hesketh 24

Tommy Hill demonstrates a pre-production Hesketh-24 at the 2014 Goodwood Festival of Speed .

The new model, designed by Paul Sleeman , owner and chief engineer of Hesketh Motorcycles, and named after the number on James Hunt's 1975 Formula 1 car, is slated to be manufactured in a limited number of 24 and sold around the world.

This motorcycle is powered by the new X-Wedge engine from the US manufacturer S&S Cycle , an air-cooled V 2 engine with 1950 cm³ displacement. This engine is also built into the recently reissued Morgan three-wheeler .

The British tuner Harris Performance Engines will modify the engine so that at least three different power levels can be offered.

The fairing of the Hesketh 24 will be painted in the colors of James Hunt's Formula 1 racing car Hesketh 308 from the 1970s and manufactured by former motorcycle racer Tommy Hill . Each of the 24 copies is to receive an emblem in 18 carat gold with its individual serial number on the tank.

Models

Surname Year of production Displacement number of pieces
V1000 1982 1000 cc 150
Vampires 1983 1000 cc 50
Forward 1985 1100 cc 1
Vulcan 1990 1200 cc 1*
Kingswood V1000 2012 1000 cc 5
Hesketh 24 2014 2000 cc 24 **

* = prototype only.
** = production planned

Web links

Commons : Hesketh motorcycles  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b Erwin Tragatsch: The New Illustrated Encyclopedia of Motorcycles . Quantum Publishing, London 2000, ISBN 1-86160-342-8 , p. 560.
  2. ↑ Italians snub Hesketh after 'spaghetti special' jibe . In Motor Cycle News , September 22, 1982, p. 3.