MOTORCYCLES – THE HISTORY III
The original Indian motorcycle company was founded in 1901 in Springfield Massachusetts USA, by bicycle racer George Hendee and Swedish immigrant Oscar Hedstrom. Some people wonder why it was called the Indian Motorcycle Company instead of Indian Motorcycle Company. In Italy, all motorcycles have names beginning with "moto" e.g. Moto-Guzzi, Moto-Ducati, Moto-Laverda, so perhaps Hedstrom was familiar with that. The earliest Indian models looked like mopeds (bicycles with small single cylinder engines) and only 3 were made in 1901. Indian made 143 motorcycles in 1902. Interestingly, Triumph began production in 1902 and Harley-Davidson the year after (1903). So the order was Indian, Triumph, Harley. This "Big Three" are still around a century later, while many other brands which started later died off years ago.
The V-twin model of Indian
engine came out in 1907. In 1914 Indian had been the first with both electric
lighting and an electric starter. All very advanced but they did not continue
with the electric starters longer than six years. Indian's next major development
came in 1916 when Hedstrom's former assistant Charles Gustafson developed the
1 liter "Powerplus". It
made 7 horsepower. The middle of WW I (1916) was the
first year for the Power Plus, and the first engine not designed by Oscar Hedstrom.
Both Hedstrom and Hendee had left the company by 1916, being unable to agree
with the Board of Directors.
In 1918 the company offered
for sale to the public its own new factory racer featuring OHV and 4 VPC (valves
per cylinder). This was many years ahead of the competition. Considering that
3 or 4 VPC only began to show up on a few street V twins bikes in the late 1980's
and mid 1990's, and Harleys are still built with only 2 VPC, it can be said
that this V twin was 70 years ahead of its time. Top speed was 120 mph, but
the racers were very light and had no brakes, lights, fenders, suspension etc.
The high price of this racer resulted in very few sales and it did not last
long. Two years later, the Power Plus street model was offered in a 74 CID (1200
c.c.) version for sidecar owners. 1920 was also an important year as the Scout
was "born" then. Originally it was only 600 cc. (37 CID) but was enlarged in
1928 to 45 CID (750 c.c.) and called the Scout 101.
The 1920 Scout was the brainchild
of one Charles B. Franklin. When European sales collapsed after WW I, Charles
Franklin, who had ridden for Indian's winning 1911 Isle of Man team, emigrated
from Ireland to join Indian's engineering department in Massachusetts. Working
with Gustafson's 1000cc Powerplus design, Franklin developed the Scout. Like the
Powerplus, it was a side-valve design, but it featured semi-unit construction,
with the transmission bolted to the engine (like the Royal Enfields of the 1950's
up until around 2010) and driven by an efficient helical gear drive. The
Scout became the basis for other bigger V-twins. In 1922, it was enlarged to 1000
cc (1 liter or 61 cubic inches) to become the Chief and to 1200 cc or 74 cubic
inches in 1924 to become the Big Chief engine. These early Chiefs had gear driven
primary in aluminum casings, in oil bath. (English and Harley motorcycles were
still using leaky pressed steel primary cases decades later.) The 1928 Scout 101
(750 cc.) was and is regarded as Indian's best handling if not best-ever motorcycle.
It won many races (in its early day its main competition was Excelsior-Henderson)
and it and the later Sport Scout was often hopped up for racing and street-fighting
with Chief 74 CID flywheels and connecting rods. Ironically, Soichiro Honda rode
a 101 Scout for a number of years and it inspired him to build motorcycles, and
later the Honda company built cars.
In
1927 Indian purchased
the Ace Four, the brainchild of W.G. Henderson, which became the
Indian Four.
(The first year it was called "Indian Ace".) The first improvement
Indian did was
to add two more main bearings (5 v. 3). Meanwhile Mr. Henderson hooked
up with the Excelsior company. Neither the Ace nor Indian fours should
be
confused with the Henderson-Excelsior Four, although all three derived
from the
same design by Mr. Henderson and thus look similar.
