c.1902/05 Whitley engine, together with a frame and rear whe...

Hammer

£1,500

c.1902/05 Whitley engine, together with a frame and rear wheel.
Whitley of Cow lane, Coventry produced motorcycles from 1902 to 1905. Formed by Walter Hubbard, with Arthur Lewis Farmer as a director and works manager, they had been building cars since 1900.
They built their own engines, of 2.75 and 3.5 hp, some of which were water-cooled and which hung from the downtube of their motorcycles and sidecar. To help with engine cooling, the latter was fitted with air scoops. Using belt drive and braced forks, it was a typically primitive design.
Whitley engines were sold to Mills and Fullford for use in the Milford motorcycles they produced in 1903-1904. In the 1920's they built and marketed sidecars.
RM Sothebys sold the only other known example in Las Vegas in 2012, lot 688.
Provenance; Purchased from Pat Chapman Museum, Tag Island, London 1987.