Norton Villiers Triumph
Encyclopedia
Norton Villiers Triumph was a British motorcycle
manufacturer, formed by the British Government
to continue the UK motorcycling industry, but the company eventually failed.
a few years earlier, the industry was deemed 'strategic' enough for financial support. The Conservative Government under Ted Heath concluded to bail out the company, provided that to compete with the Japanese it merged with financially troubled Norton Villiers (the remains of Associated Motor Cycles
, which had gone bust in 1966), a subsidiary of British engineering conglomerate Manganese Bronze
.
The merged company was created in 1973, with Manganese Bronze exchanging the motorcycle parts of Norton Villiers in exchange for the non-motorcycling bits of the BSA Group—mainly Carbodies
, the builder of the Austin FX4
London taxi
: the classic "black cab." As BSA was both a failed company and a solely British-known brand (the company's products had always been most successfully marketed in North America under the Triumph brand), the new conglomerate was called Norton Villiers Triumph—being effectively the consolidation of the entire once-dominant British motorcycle industry, thanks to the rise of the car and the Japanese manufacturers.
NVT inherited four motorcycle factories—Small Heath (ex-BSA); Andover and Wolverhampton (Norton); and Meriden (Triumph). Although Meriden was the most modern, its workers were the most militant and had the worst productivity of the four. Dennis Poore
, the BSA CEO of Norton-Villiers was made Managing Director of NVT, while through his holdings of Norton Villiers shares and the need for reliance on their engineering expertise, a shareholder and director of Manganese Bronze.
Still strapped of development cash, the company was restricted to launching developments of existing products, most notably around the popular Norton Commando
. With its classical parallel twin probably by now over developed, from March 1973 the Roadster, Hi Rider, and the Interstate all began to use a new 828 cc engine. Later NVT also produced the Easy Rider moped including a "sixteener" version with pedals and the NVT rambler 125/175 cc. This had a Yamaha engine housed in a British monoshock frame. Instruments were from Yamaha and forks, brakes and wheel parts from three Italian manufacturers. The Rambler later became the BSA Tracker. What money there was for development now had to be focused on one engine development. Deciding that the Japanese had taken the market a step forward, NVT were looking for a competitive edge, and had two products that could be developed, both from the BSA side of the company:
Concluding that the commuter market was dying, NVT chose the Wankel, and as Peter Williams
won the 1973 Formula 750 Isle of Man T.T. and Mick Grant
came in second for the Norton Racing team that year, the decision was to put the new engine in a new Norton motorcycle. However, the infrastructure of the old Norton company was itself being closed down, as the Andover factory closed after a sit-in. This coincided with the Conservative government of Ted Heath winning the re-election, and the subsidy in light of the three-day week was withdrawn from June 1974, until the Labour Government of Harold Wilson
was voted in.
NVT continued with a program of works closures, deciding to concentrate production on Wolverhampton and Small Heath. Poorly handled in communications, the announcement caused a sit-in at Meriden, which as it produced parts for other factories caused Small Heath to shut down. With the election of the 1974 Labour government, the Meriden workers' co-operative was formed with NVT its sole customer for its production of 750 cc Triumph Bonneville T140V and Triumph Tiger TR7V models. Forced by American legislation to move all brake controls to the right hand side of the bike (the standard used by most other manufacturers, including the Japanese. The foot brake lever on British motorcycles was positioned on the left hand side as it was to this side that sidecars were affixed. The brake pedal on the sidecar was then positioned alongside the brake pedal of the motorcycle allowing braking of both motorcycle and sidecar with one foot), the company reduced its range to five models: two Norton Commando's (the Mk.3 Interstate and the Roadster), the Triumph Bonneville
T140V, the Triumph Tiger TR7RV and the Triumph Trident T160. Both Nortons and the T160 were improved by the fitting of an electric starter, a rear disk brake and the left side gear change/right foot brake. The Bonneville got its own electric start in 1980 when marketed by the Meriden worker's co-operative
itself. Unlike other motorcycles of this era the kickstarting lever was retained and the electric starter on Nortons was more properly referred to as an electric assister.
recalled a loan for 4 million pounds and refused to renew the company’s export credits. The company went into receivership, and redundancies were announced for all of the staff at the various sites. Ironically slated by management for closure, the Meriden site survived on Eric Varley's predecessor, Tony Benn
's plan to exploit the Triumph Bonneville by a worker co-operative with a substantial government loan. Its Wolverhampton
plant closed on 13 October that year with some 1,600 job losses.
The Norton Wankel project was sold off by the receivers into private hands, with slow-selling and under-developed rotary engined motorcycles appearing under the Norton name for the next 15 years; while Wolverhampton having no viable products to produce was reduced to a workers sit-in and showing of an updated Commando model named Norton 76 and a 500 cc twin based on the Wulf concept. After Wolverhampton closed having made Commandos from remaining spares, the workers took the former Tong Castle gates and erected them at the former Marston site.
NVT was eventually liquidated in 1978. Even though Norton Villiers Triumph is no more, motorcycles bearing the Triumph name are still being made; the marketing rights to Triumph were sold to the Meriden worker's co-operative in 1977 and upon its having gone into receivership in 1983, sold onto a new Triumph Motorcycles Ltd company situated in Hinckley, Leicestershire. Dennis Poore became Managing Director of Maganese Bronze, until his death in 1987.
Motorcycle
A motorcycle is a single-track, two-wheeled motor vehicle. Motorcycles vary considerably depending on the task for which they are designed, such as long distance travel, navigating congested urban traffic, cruising, sport and racing, or off-road conditions.Motorcycles are one of the most...
manufacturer, formed by the British Government
Government of the United Kingdom
Her Majesty's Government is the central government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The Government is led by the Prime Minister, who selects all the remaining Ministers...
to continue the UK motorcycling industry, but the company eventually failed.
Formation
Triumph had been owned by the BSA Group since 1951, but by 1972 the merged BSA-Triumph group was in serious financial trouble. British Government policy at the time was to save strategic industries with tax payers' money, and as BSA-Triumph had won the Queen's Awards for ExportsQueen's Awards for Enterprise
The Queen's Awards for Enterprise is an awards programme for British businesses and other organizations who excel at international trade, innovation or sustainable development. They are the highest official UK awards for British businesses...
a few years earlier, the industry was deemed 'strategic' enough for financial support. The Conservative Government under Ted Heath concluded to bail out the company, provided that to compete with the Japanese it merged with financially troubled Norton Villiers (the remains of Associated Motor Cycles
Associated Motor Cycles
Associated Motor Cycles was a British motorcycle manufacturer founded by the Collier brothers as a parent company for the Matchless and AJS motorcycle companies...
, which had gone bust in 1966), a subsidiary of British engineering conglomerate Manganese Bronze
Manganese Bronze
Manganese Bronze Holdings PLC is an engineering company based in Coventry, England. Since the sale of its components division in 2003 the company has only one operating division—LTI Limited, trading as The London Taxi Company—which manufactures and retails London Black Taxis.The London...
.
The merged company was created in 1973, with Manganese Bronze exchanging the motorcycle parts of Norton Villiers in exchange for the non-motorcycling bits of the BSA Group—mainly Carbodies
Carbodies
Carbodies LImited is a British company based at Holyhead Road, Coventry. It started business as a coachbuilder, and now, as The London Taxi Company is best known for its production of London taxicabs.-History:...
, the builder of the Austin FX4
Austin FX4
The FX4 is the classic Black Cab. While the majority are black, there is in fact no requirement for them, or indeed any other make of London taxi to be black. Over the years, the FX4 has been sold under a number of different makers' names.-Design and launch:...
London taxi
Hackney carriage
A hackney or hackney carriage is a carriage or automobile for hire...
: the classic "black cab." As BSA was both a failed company and a solely British-known brand (the company's products had always been most successfully marketed in North America under the Triumph brand), the new conglomerate was called Norton Villiers Triumph—being effectively the consolidation of the entire once-dominant British motorcycle industry, thanks to the rise of the car and the Japanese manufacturers.
NVT inherited four motorcycle factories—Small Heath (ex-BSA); Andover and Wolverhampton (Norton); and Meriden (Triumph). Although Meriden was the most modern, its workers were the most militant and had the worst productivity of the four. Dennis Poore
Dennis Poore
Roger Dennistoun "Dennis" Poore was a British entrepreneur, financier and sometime racing driver,. Poore used his personal weath to bankroll the founding, in 1950, of the motor racing journal Autosport. He himself was a keen motor sport participant, and competed in two Formula One World...
, the BSA CEO of Norton-Villiers was made Managing Director of NVT, while through his holdings of Norton Villiers shares and the need for reliance on their engineering expertise, a shareholder and director of Manganese Bronze.
Operations
Norton Commando
The Norton Commando is a British motorcycle with an ohv pre-unit parallel twin engine, launched by the Norton Motorcycle company in 1967. Initially a nominal 750 cc displacement, actually , in 1973 it became an 850 cc, actually ....
. With its classical parallel twin probably by now over developed, from March 1973 the Roadster, Hi Rider, and the Interstate all began to use a new 828 cc engine. Later NVT also produced the Easy Rider moped including a "sixteener" version with pedals and the NVT rambler 125/175 cc. This had a Yamaha engine housed in a British monoshock frame. Instruments were from Yamaha and forks, brakes and wheel parts from three Italian manufacturers. The Rambler later became the BSA Tracker. What money there was for development now had to be focused on one engine development. Deciding that the Japanese had taken the market a step forward, NVT were looking for a competitive edge, and had two products that could be developed, both from the BSA side of the company:
- The 500 cc twin, stepped-piston engine, with a monocoque pressed steel frame, named internally the Wulf
- A rotary Wankel engineWankel engineThe Wankel engine is a type of internal combustion engine using an eccentric rotary design to convert pressure into a rotating motion instead of using reciprocating pistons. Its four-stroke cycle takes place in a space between the inside of an oval-like epitrochoid-shaped housing and a rotor that...
Concluding that the commuter market was dying, NVT chose the Wankel, and as Peter Williams
Peter Williams
Peter Williams is the name of:* Sir Peter Williams , former chairman of Oxford Instruments; Chancellor, University of Leicester* Peter Williams , New Zealand television presenter...
won the 1973 Formula 750 Isle of Man T.T. and Mick Grant
Mick Grant
Mick Grant is a former professional motorcycle road racer. He is a seven-time winner of the Isle of Man TT motorcycle race on various bikes, including 'Slippery Sam', a three-cylinder Triumph Trident...
came in second for the Norton Racing team that year, the decision was to put the new engine in a new Norton motorcycle. However, the infrastructure of the old Norton company was itself being closed down, as the Andover factory closed after a sit-in. This coincided with the Conservative government of Ted Heath winning the re-election, and the subsidy in light of the three-day week was withdrawn from June 1974, until the Labour Government of Harold Wilson
Harold Wilson
James Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx, KG, OBE, FRS, FSS, PC was a British Labour Member of Parliament, Leader of the Labour Party. He was twice Prime Minister of the United Kingdom during the 1960s and 1970s, winning four general elections, including a minority government after the...
was voted in.
NVT continued with a program of works closures, deciding to concentrate production on Wolverhampton and Small Heath. Poorly handled in communications, the announcement caused a sit-in at Meriden, which as it produced parts for other factories caused Small Heath to shut down. With the election of the 1974 Labour government, the Meriden workers' co-operative was formed with NVT its sole customer for its production of 750 cc Triumph Bonneville T140V and Triumph Tiger TR7V models. Forced by American legislation to move all brake controls to the right hand side of the bike (the standard used by most other manufacturers, including the Japanese. The foot brake lever on British motorcycles was positioned on the left hand side as it was to this side that sidecars were affixed. The brake pedal on the sidecar was then positioned alongside the brake pedal of the motorcycle allowing braking of both motorcycle and sidecar with one foot), the company reduced its range to five models: two Norton Commando's (the Mk.3 Interstate and the Roadster), the Triumph Bonneville
Triumph Bonneville
The Bonneville is a range of British motorcycles, made in three different production runs from 1959 to 1983, and 1985 to 1988, by the now-defunct Triumph Engineering in Meriden; and since 2001, by Triumph Motorcycles in Hinckley. It is named after the Bonneville Salt Flats, Utah, where Triumph and...
T140V, the Triumph Tiger TR7RV and the Triumph Trident T160. Both Nortons and the T160 were improved by the fitting of an electric starter, a rear disk brake and the left side gear change/right foot brake. The Bonneville got its own electric start in 1980 when marketed by the Meriden worker's co-operative
Worker cooperative
A worker cooperative is a cooperative owned and democratically managed by its worker-owners. This control may be exercised in a number of ways. A cooperative enterprise may mean a firm where every worker-owner participates in decision making in a democratic fashion, or it may refer to one in which...
itself. Unlike other motorcycles of this era the kickstarting lever was retained and the electric starter on Nortons was more properly referred to as an electric assister.
Break up and closure
In July 1975, the new Industry Minister Eric VarleyEric Varley
Eric Graham Varley, Baron Varley, PC was an English politician and former Cabinet Minister on the right wing of the Labour Party....
recalled a loan for 4 million pounds and refused to renew the company’s export credits. The company went into receivership, and redundancies were announced for all of the staff at the various sites. Ironically slated by management for closure, the Meriden site survived on Eric Varley's predecessor, Tony Benn
Tony Benn
Anthony Neil Wedgwood "Tony" Benn, PC is a British Labour Party politician and a former MP and Cabinet Minister.His successful campaign to renounce his hereditary peerage was instrumental in the creation of the Peerage Act 1963...
's plan to exploit the Triumph Bonneville by a worker co-operative with a substantial government loan. Its Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands, England. For Eurostat purposes Walsall and Wolverhampton is a NUTS 3 region and is one of five boroughs or unitary districts that comprise the "West Midlands" NUTS 2 region...
plant closed on 13 October that year with some 1,600 job losses.
The Norton Wankel project was sold off by the receivers into private hands, with slow-selling and under-developed rotary engined motorcycles appearing under the Norton name for the next 15 years; while Wolverhampton having no viable products to produce was reduced to a workers sit-in and showing of an updated Commando model named Norton 76 and a 500 cc twin based on the Wulf concept. After Wolverhampton closed having made Commandos from remaining spares, the workers took the former Tong Castle gates and erected them at the former Marston site.
NVT was eventually liquidated in 1978. Even though Norton Villiers Triumph is no more, motorcycles bearing the Triumph name are still being made; the marketing rights to Triumph were sold to the Meriden worker's co-operative in 1977 and upon its having gone into receivership in 1983, sold onto a new Triumph Motorcycles Ltd company situated in Hinckley, Leicestershire. Dennis Poore became Managing Director of Maganese Bronze, until his death in 1987.