Historic Motorcycle Brands
Lewis
The Lewis motorcycle brand, produced by Vivian Lewis Ltd, in South Australia, was one of the country’s earliest; operating between 1901 and 1925. It featured a water-cooled engine option from 1905.
Trading from 1892 as the Lewis Cycle Works, the company initially specialised in bicycle production. However. Like many other bike makers around the world, Vivian Lewis experimented with motorised vehicles, developing his first ‘triplet’ motorcycle in 1899.
In conjunction with Adelaide horse carriage and tram builders Duncan & Fraser, Lewis produced the first petrol-driven motor car made in South Australia, in 1900.
State Library of South Australia
At the 1901 Adelaide Spring Show, Lewis displayed a 1.75hp, air-cooled motor bicycle and a De Dion-powered motor tricycle. The South Australian Register newspaper reported: “The whole of the designing, construction and finishing of these machines being executed at the works”.
Lewis motorcycles were branded ‘The Lewis’, not just ‘Lewis’.
1906 Lewis 350cc Minerva – Bonhams
From 1902 to 1904, Lewis motorcycles were fitted with Minerva engines, followed by a variety of other makes, including A W Wall, De Dion-Bouton, Stevens, Precision, JAP and Villiers, plus a 1902 one-off, powered by a large Excelsior engine.
Cycle parts were commonly from Chater Lea, with Brooks saddles, Millenium rear carriers and stands, Longuemare carburettors and Bosch and Eisemann magnetos.
Competitions were popular and Lewis enjoyed early successes, winning at the Automobile Club’s hill-climb event in 1904.
Back again, in December 1905, over the same course, a prototype 2.75hp, water-cooled Lewis was the fastest of the motorcycles. This prototype was developed into a production engine.
1910 Lewis – note the radiator and water tank ahead of the petrol tank – Onbekend
HV can’t find a factory-written justification for the Lewis in-house, water-cooled, 3.5hp, 380cc, side-valve engine, but it’s most likely the first Aussie initiative to cope with the ‘colonial’ problem of cooling engines in high ambient temperatures. An inability to cool their UK-designed engines plagued most Pommy bike, car and truck makers for many years.
The water-cooled Lewis bikes were easily distinguished by having a combined radiator and water tank, sitting in front of the frame-mounted petrol tank.
By 1914, Lewis motor cycles won many events and, in an Australasian first, J G Ramsey set a 24-hour, endurance ride world record. Four machines completed an Adelaide-Melbourne reliability trial without losing a point.
Lewis 6hp V-twin – State Library of South Australia
Lewis continued to produce cycles and motorcycles, but opted to import cars, rather than gear up production to make them in South Australia.
Post-WWI, Lewis Cycle and Motor Works was hit by a triple-whammy: a serious economic slow down; a glut of imported motorcycles and the untimely death of its founder, at the age of 54, in 1919.
The company was taken over by Mann’s Motors that was owned by Fred Mann, formerly of Duncan & Fraser, who held the South Australian agency for GM cars.
Lewis Motor House in 1925 – State Library of South Australia
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