harley eight valves

[Tommo]

I've got a copy of an article that Jeff Clew did on Maldwyn Jones that I'll try to attach.
I think it is a very good read but to how factual it is will be up to you guys to judge.
Wish me luck and here goes.

[Tommo]

Well at least they are up there but the quality is not that flash. The site had me reducing the size and resolution by about half before it would allow me to post them.
If somebody is interested I can send them lazer photocopys of the article and maybe they can get better quality images up.

[Chris Haynes]

I looking at Maldwyn's bike and the factory photo and things are different. They have different front forks. Look at the bottom of the fork and see difference. Maldwyn's bike has a separate oil tank under the seat. Of course Maldwyn's engine is at a different angle with different mounts and runs a rear rather than a front cylinder. I would still like to know the vintage of these machines. The factory machine doesn't say Harley-Davidson on the engine cases.

[HarleyCreation]

Earliest multi-valve SN?

Here is the serial number from Maldwyn's bike.

Could you enlarge the photo so the number is readable?

Or if that doesn't work, can you read the SN for us off the original photo? I know what Jerry said in his book, but your take on the number/letter combo would be very useful and here's why.

The Maldwyn Jones special first appeared on the racetrack in this form on June 18, 1916 so this bike is dated. This may be the earliest Harley multi-valve motor number we have. So this serial number is very important to see how the first "Fours" and "Eights" were numbered.

[23JDCA 808]

http://home.ama-cycle.org/forms/muse...age1.asp?id=47
...bill

[23JDCA 808]

http://books.google.com/books?id=4gI...ed=0CDgQ6AEwAg
...bill

[23JDCA 808]

more Maldwyn Jones

http://books.google.com/books?id=lCT...=0CEcQ6AEwBjgK

http://books.google.com/books?id=06p...=0CCsQ6AEwATgU

http://books.google.com/books?id=K49...=0CDQQ6AEwAzgU

...bill

[Jerry Hatfield]

I just had another look at the motor number on the Maldwyn Jones low-slung dirt-tracker. The print is from a high quality 4x5 copy negative, which was about as good as one could do in the pre-digital age. Using a 16x lupe, I again see "M402J". The "M402J" is very clear -- no interpretation is needed for these characters. The breather tube may obscure one or more characters at the right end of the motor number.

As to the factuality of the Jeff Clew article, all the information came from Maldwyn Jones. Maldwyn taught himself to touch-type. He was a prolific letter writer in the 1960s and 1970s. His pen pals included Ted Hodgdon, co-founder of the AMCA, J. L. Beardsly, and Geoff Hockely of New Zeland, each of whom wrote magazine articles. Copying machines ranged from non-existent to poor. Fortunately, Maldwyn had the foresight to make carbon copies of all his letters. When I met Maldwyn and Frieda in 1980, he loaned me his entire collection of letters and photographs. I remember that he stacked the time-worn scrapbooks on a table, then wrapped burlap cord around it as though the stack was a Christmas present, and then tied a knot. I carried this pricelesss treasure on the airplane for my flight from Phoenix to Los Angeles. A stewardess couldn't resist grinning when she saw me carefully holding in my lap what looked like a stack of dirty, worn, and worthless stuff.

Of course when I got home, I ran all the letters and news clippings through a copying machine. I made two copies of all documents, and I sent the extra set to Jeff Clew in England. I had 4x5 copy negatives made of the 20 or so sharper pictures. Using a 35mm camera, closeup lens, and copying stand, I made 35mm color transparencies of all the two-hundred-plus images, mostly pictures also some news clippings. When Jeff Clew told me he wanted to do an article on Maldwyn, I had prints made of the images I thought he would need, and mailed them to Jeff.

I still have the audio tapes from the Maldwyn interview. I'm going to pursue having all my audio tapes digitized. What's a few hundred bucks when history hangs in the balance?

[exeric]

Jerry, I think I speak for a lot of people who love that era of motorcycle racing and general industry history and of course Maldwyn Jones. There must be a book there and you are certainly the one to write it. Maldwyn Jones and Erwin Baker directly witnessed more motorcycle history than anyone else that comes to mind; but M.J. seemed to be more aware of the importance of the people, machines, and places that he was associated with.

[HarleyCreation]

looking at the 15? and 16 side by side can tell a little about the clymer bike. i noticed that the compression release on both bikes was the same frame mounted direct cable setup.both have the rubber band return spring on the release lever too.actually all the lines and wires are very similar on both bikes as far as routing goes. the gas lines ,linkage and cables all look clean and orderly on the clymer bike. another thing i noticed was the pedal crank sprockets. they both have round holes. the only two harley's i have ever seen with round holes in the pedal sprocket. also the only two years they used pedal crank sprockets on 8 valves. as far as we know. another thing about the clymer bike is the front fork .it is a harley factory race fork. the same fork used on the 15 wrecking crew bikes ,and the 16 eight valves. we shouldn't overlook the background and angle at which both pictures were taken either.

Good info. When I saw the 1944 Clymer photo years ago and discovered that a 1915 Harley eight-valve really existed it perked me up too. Clymer 1944 photo looks like what we'd expect the '15 eight-valve to look like and no mistake. But it remains a cliff-hanger until a clear period 1915 photo shows up.

Unfortunately Clymer himself mis-captioned the 1944 photo as the eight-valve he rode at Dodge City in 1916 and we know that isn't right. He also marks the photo as "Clymer" which suggests it came out of his personal photo collection.

I notice that like the 1916 8-V pix, the Clymer 8-V does NOT have a support bracket for the rear exhaust pipe. The "Model 17" (1917) 8-V does have a rear exhaust pipe support bracket. That also suggests earlier rather than later.

[HarleyCreation]

Jerry, I think I speak for a lot of people who love that era of motorcycle racing and general industry history and of course Maldwyn Jones. There must be a book there and you are certainly the one to write it. Maldwyn Jones and Erwin Baker directly witnessed more motorcycle history than anyone else that comes to mind; but M.J. seemed to be more aware of the importance of the people, machines, and places that he was associated with.

I second the motion. Jerry should compile the Maldwyn Jones's material into a book. He did a great service by preserving that archive and Jones was an interesting guy with his Merkel and other connections.

Another guy who had a real inside track on the early Harley eight-valve and teens racing was Otto Walker. He was really in the thick of it, going from winning at Dodge City in 1915 on the pocket-valve to riding the first eight-valve at Chicago-Maywood in Sept. 1915 where he set that 100-mile board track record. He was tapped to ride the eight-valve at Dodge City in 1916 too, but was injured shortly before the race. He would have known how the term "Chicago Harley" originated.

[HarleyCreation]

I've got a copy of an article that Jeff Clew did on Maldwyn Jones that I'll try to attach.
I think it is a very good read but to how factual it is will be up to you guys to judge.
Wish me luck and here goes.

I'd love to read that article, esp. now that we know it came from Jerry's Maldwyn Jones research. But those pages aren't readable for me. Thanks for trying tho.

[HarleyCreation]

As usual more questions than answers

http://home.ama-cycle.org/forms/muse...age1.asp?id=47
...bill

This is good: "During World War I, Jones worked in aviation engine research and development at McCook Field in Dayton..."

That suggests that the photos of Jones on the 4-V Harley/Merkel special proabably date to 1916 as American declared war on Germany on April 6, 1917 and the boys went to Paris while Jones went to Dayton.

This would probably have removed Jones from the racing circuit until 1919. Any evidence he raced this same bike after WWI? Or is the bike Chris posted the Jones's special reconfigured by some other guy?

[HarleyCreation]

http://books.google.com/books?id=lCT...=0CEcQ6AEwBjgK

This one is very cool. 1908 no less!

[HarleyCreation]

Now to the heart of the matter!

I just had another look at the motor number on the Maldwyn Jones low-slung dirt-tracker. The print is from a high quality 4x5 copy negative, which was about as good as one could do in the pre-digital age. Using a 16x lupe, I again see "M402J". The "M402J" is very clear -- no interpretation is needed for these characters. The breather tube may obscure one or more characters at the right end of the motor number.

Jerry,

Thanks for the serial number. Since you looked at it again it must be "M402J" and no mistake. I believe that is the full VIN and nothing is obscured as that is a complete number for that time.

The trouble is Harley didn't list any 4-V or 8-V models for 1916 so we don't know how the factory marked them. Right now the Jones's bike VIN is all we have, but that's a LOT and here's why.

Ordinary "Single Track Racers" (pocket-valve) were marked "M-100L" which does not fit with how the Jones's 4-V motor is stamped so what do we have?

We know the "M" prefix means racing motor. That's certain. I'm going to speculate that the "J" suffix "possibly" means multi-valve (4 & 8) (and/or also model year?) and that Harley started 4-V numbers at "400" and 8-V numbers at "800." If true, that would make the Jones's 4-V the 3rd such motor assembled in 1916, which, considering how few were made, makes sense.

In addition, the regular run of pocket-valve racers in 1916 started with motor number "100" (single) and "500" (double). It doesn't seem likely they made so many racing singles to get numbers up into the "400s" if they ran the multis and pocket-valve models together, which would be another possibility.

Comments are welcome from any of you guys as what I just said is speculative (ahem: "educated guess"), although the Jones's bike VIN appears to be original factory and that's why we needed to verify the number.

What we need now is a VIN from a c1916 8-V twin. Or any pre-1924 8-V VIN. After that year we know the score.

PS: Any idea how long Jones used that H-D/Merkel hybrid in that form? It's first appearance is documented to June 18, 1916, at Toledo, Ohio. Now we have this photo that Chris posted of a bike somewhat similar to it. Did Jones ditch the bike when he joined the military? Did he possibly mention that?