Ariel were a British bike manufacturer based in
Bournbrook Birmingham, the company first produced bicycles starting in 1870 later going on to produce cars for a short number of years between 1902 and 1925. Their major success came from their innovative motorcycle designs under designers
Val Page and Edward Turner. The company ceased trading in 1951 when it was sold to BSA "birmingham small arms" but BSA traded the Ariel name along side it's own until 1967 while it built it's reputation as a bike manufacturer.
Today I would like to introduce you to a machine that took part in the war effort. This is the Ariel W/NG 350, at the start of world war 2 Ariel approached the UK government offering this bike as a possible front line workhorse but the competition was tight and the main contract was given to Norton. That said the war department made a order for a couple of thousand of these to be stored and used as a back up in a crisis.
That crisis happened a couple of years later, the mass evacuation of Allied troops from Dunkirk. After losing the battle of France thousands of troops were surrounded in the Dunkirk area and it looked as though they would be taken prisoner or be slaughtered but in a massive effort involving military and civilian boats a rescue plan was hatched. In the space of 8 days some 338,226 troops were saved from the fate of the German army. In the need to retreat at speed the emphasis was on saving human life and much of the machinery of war was abandoned.
This is where the back up plan came into action, the UK war department called upon Ariel to release as many bikes as possible, more than had been originally ordered, the factory work day and night to produce more bikes and also converted civilian models for military use. The first batch were delivered in August 1940 with some being shipped to France, over the next few months they managed to turn out about 10,000 of these battle ready machines.
Ariel W/NG
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These bikes saw service all over Europe and within the British isles, this one was said to have been used as a messenger bike carrying important documents to government department as they made their plans to fight back after the retreat. I haven't been able to find any genuine evidence of this but have no reason to doubt it.
This bike is not totally original, the tank badge has had it's green paint removed, the headlight cover also had to be removed to allow use on road under modern rules. Little details remain like the canvas handgrips which due to rubber shortages were used also you may notice the foot rests are bare steel for the same reason. As a earlier model this has aluminium engine cases, again due to material shortages later models had pressed steel engine covers. By the end of the war some 35,000 bikes had been produced and in post war nations like Denmark placed large orders for their military along with other allied nations, many of the bikes that stayed in the UK were converted and sold to the domestic market second hand through dealerships, for that reason genuine war department bikes like this are pretty rare.
Hope you enjoyed this post, it's was meant as a introduction to the bike rather than a historical record, to have gone into more detail about the war would take way too much time, this is just a attempt to show how small individual companies made great efforts to aid the nation in times of troubles.
I know a couple of people who will like this and also told one I would let him know when I did a post about this bike so for their benefit,
@papilloncharity
@missionx
@galenkp
@themanualbot Hope you like.W
Very precious for the collectors, great restoration.
I like vintage bikes and cars looks and design.
Thanks, it's a very special bike, I love to bring them back to life,pleased you like:)
Ah, so great that you put a solid description here with the bike and it is indeed a great looking one.
Thank you also for the tag and I don't know what I was doing to miss it.
But I can see from the tags that not one has responded???
Wonder what happened and maybe you must post this again with the same tags, as there is a very sordid response here to this quality post?
Too late to vote on it now.
What do you have on the Indian 4square if anything?
Blessings!
Being a Brit, nothing we see very few US bikes and my knowledge of them is very minimal.
Maybe I could re-post with a bit of a rewrite so as to not fall foul of the monitors, I think some people are not keen on re-posts,
Stay safe!
Just asked as my brother in law also had one.
A rewrite sounds fine and you can always justify it by mentioning the poor responses if they ask.
Maybe also just include a different picture of it from another angle?
Take care my friend!
Cool i'll take your advice and give it another blast.
Yeah, I really think that you should give it another try.
I know that there are some guys that like old bikes and if you can find one of their posts, you can see what, or who they tag.
Good idea, I do find my bike posts are a bit hit and miss but hey it's all good as long as someone likes them.
It will be so great if you can find the home of supporters for your bike posts.
Start sniffing around and get those tags brother.