The company's last new bicycle was the 'Revelation' small wheeler, released in 1965. Royal Enfield produced bicycles at its Redditch factory until it closed in early 1967. While Norton Villiers acquired 33 per cent of Enfield India the assets of Enfield's diesel engine division and pedal cycle and spares divisions were not picked up. After his death Enfield was bought by investors E & H P Smith who sold Enfield for £82,500 to Norton Villiers in 1967. Appointed joint (with his father) managing director in 1914 he took over the full responsibility when his father died in 1933. Starting in 1957, Enfield of India acquired the machines necessary to build components in India, and by 1962 all components were made in India.įrank Walker Smith (1888-1962), eldest son of Robert Walker Smith, joined Enfield Cycle Company in 1909. The first machines were assembled from components imported from England. In 1955, Enfield Cycle Company partnered with Madras Motors in India in forming Enfield of India, based in Chennai, and started assembling the 350cc Royal Enfield Bullet motorcycle in Madras. Enfield Cycle Company took over the Hunt End premises. The business of Enfield Autocar, that is to say the plant and stock, was sold to Birmingham's Alldays & Onions Pneumatic Engineering. But there were still minority Eadie shareholders alongside BSA in 1957. The new combined BSA and Eadie business manufactured "military and sporting rifles, (pedal) cycle and cycle components, motor-cars etc." "BSA and Eadie cycle specialities". Albert Eadie and Robert Walker Smith had been appointed directors of BSA before the proposed sale had been put to shareholders. However Enfield Autocar after just 19 months reported a substantial loss and, aside from Eadie himself, shareholders were unwilling to provide more capital so in early 1907 Eadie sold his control of Eadie Manufacturing to BSA. The motor department was put into a separate subsidiary, Enfield Autocar Company Limited incorporated in 1906 and established in new works at Hunt End, Redditch. In 1896 they also incorporated a new subsidiary company, The New Enfield Cycle Company Limited, to handle much of the cycle work and in 1897 Enfield making complete cycles as well parts for other assemblers took all the cycle assembly work from Eadie.Įnfield diversified into motor cycles, 1901 and motor cars, 1902. January 1897Įadie had won contracts to supply precision parts for firearms to the government's long-established Royal Small Arms Factory at Enfield, Middlesex, with its offshoot in Sparkbrook and had assumed the brand name Royal Enfield. Enfield Share of "The New Enfield Cycle Company", issued 11. Eadie still retained a separate identity when Raleigh bought BSA's cycle interests in 1957. Years later, the BSA chairman was to tell shareholders that the acquisition had "done wonders for the cycle department". Later, in 1907, after serious losses from their newly floated Enfield Autocar business, Eadie Manufacturing and its pedal-cycle component business was absorbed by Birmingham Small Arms Company (BSA). Then, in 1892, the firm was re-incorporated and named Eadie Manufacturing Company Limited it was based in Snow Hill, Birmingham. Rudge & Co, were chosen by Townsend's bankers to run the business. Albert Eadie, sales manager of Birmingham's Perry & Co Ltd, pen makers who had begun to supply components for cycles, and Robert Walker Smith, an engineer from D. This business suffered a financial collapse in 1891. By 1886 complete bicycles were being sold under the names Townsend and Ecossais. In 1882 his son, also named George, started making components for cycle manufacturers including saddles and forks. George Townsend set up a business in 1851 in Redditch making sewing needles. Enfield's remaining motorcycle business became part of Norton Villiers in 1967 with the business eventually closing in 1978. Royal Enfield's spare parts operation was sold to Velocette in 1967, which benefitted from the arrangement for three years until their closure in early 1971. The Enfield Cycle Company is responsible for the design and original production of the Royal Enfield Bullet, the longest-lived motorcycle design in history. The first Royal Enfield motorcycle was built in 1901. Enfield Cycle Company also used the brand name "Enfield" without the "Royal". Royal Enfield was a brand name under which The Enfield Cycle Company Limited of Redditch, Worcestershire sold motorcycles, bicycles, lawnmowers and stationary engines which they had manufactured. Royal Enfield Clipper, Crusader, Bullet, Interceptor, WD/RE, Super Meteor
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