Racing Rudge motorcycles in Australia in the 1930s - photos please!

[cardan]

I've been researching Rudge racers in Australia in the 1930s. Over the past year or so I've been digging a 1932 racing Rudge from a pile of Rudge parts. So far it has been identified from its engine and frame numbers as a Works bike, one of four 500cc machine built for the 1932 I.O.M. Senior T.T.  It was shipped to Melbourne in October 1932, and raced in events such at the Australian G.P. and Australian T.T. (at Phillip Island and Bathurst, but not on the circuits used now).

As well as this bike, there were 6 or 7 other "Works" or "Special" Rudges here. I'm now desperate to find photos of Rudges racing in Australia in the 1930s, particularly photos where the bike can be clearly seen. Riders were people like George Hannaford, Don Bain, "Reg East" (Norm Osborne), Les Sherrin, ...

The photos are needed to help sort out who rode what when!

Here's a photo of "Reg East" on his 1931 Works Rudge on which he won the 1932 Australian GP and the 1933 Australian TT, both held at Phillip Island. In 1933 it was muddy! ALso a photo of the 1932 Works Rudge.

Thanks in advance,

Leon

[33d6]

Hi Leon,
The State Library of Victoria has a good selection of early photos and a lot are on line so may be worth an entertaining hour or two. When my then girlfriend now wife was attending lectures and tutorials up the road at Melbourne Uni I spent many hours in there ploughing through the whole collection looking for vintage Matchless photos. It was surprising what I turned up.

You'll know of Frank Pratt the early BMW dealer in Geelong. You may not know his brother was involved in the early days of aerial photography and also took many motorcycle related photos of his brothers doings. A fair number of these are in there. These include a fair few pictures taken at race meetings where Frank raced both BMW and Sunbeam.

Sorry I can't go and look myself but a nice man is giving me a new hip on Tuesday so I won't be mobile for a month or so.

Cheers, 

[cardan]

As a Geelong boy (originally), a portion of my youth was spent hanging around Pratt and Osborne Motorcycles at the top of Moorabool St. Pratt was the BMW connection, while Norm Osborne, father of Alan and Graham, was a dutiful Rudge rider in the period 1932 - 1936 or so (riding as Reg East), whereafter he rode HRDs and various other things. Many of the Reg East photos I have come up with come from Mick Kingwell's motorcycling history book that has a strong Geelong content.

I've spent hours searching the on-line photo collections of Australian libraries, but for some reason there are few 1930s racing photos. I've found photos in the newspapers, but over here in South Australia we don't have a collection of 1930s Australian Motor Cycling magazines. Maybe a visit to Victoria is warranted.

Good luck with the new hip! Lucky those little Villiers things don't kick back.

Leon

[33d6]

I think you'll find our State Library has about the broadest range of Australian motorcycle magazines around.
Nowadays they are a mixture of microfilm and archived stuff so to make your visit worthwhile you need to be a registered user before you come? You can then order up archived stuff to be on hand when you arrive. This is easy on line beforehand. The microfilmed stuff is usually available off the shelf.

Have a browse through their on line catalogue. It's fascinating what they have.

[wink]

Try this  from Spain

[cardan]

Still going with the 1932 Works Rudge. The photo shows the bike, and an illustration of one of the 1932 Works Rudges from Motor Cycling in 1932 for comparison. I suppose I've done another 100 hours research since I've last posted, including a verification part-by-part on the bike as assembled. It's a good thing.

I'm still searching for photos of Works Rudges in Australia - the final count was 10 Works bikes out here between 1928 (when Graham Walker won the Ulster Grand Prix at just over 80 mph) and 1935 by which time the Works bikes were no longer built in the race shop, but were more "over the counter" racers. Don Bain rode my Rudge in at Bathurst and Phillip Island in 1933, but I'd love to see any Australian photos of racing Rudges. Riders like George Hannaford, Don Bain, Alec Kerry, Les Sherrin et al. are of great interest.

Leon

[murdo]

Looking good there Cardan.

[Jane Wolf]

That's a great looking bike! Good luck with the research.