Rotrax

Rotrax Cycles was founded in 1945 at 132 Shirley Road, Southampton. There had long been a cycle shop which specialised in lightweight bikes on the premises which in the 1930s had been run by Bill Harvell. He sold the business to Freddy Prince who was a local businessman and cyclist. He was newly demobbed from the RAF and coined the new name Rotrax from the common name road/track used for bikes ridden on both the road and track with a fixed wheel.

Road/track machines were very popular with many clubman from the late 1930s through to the 1960s and were often used for time trialling as well as track racing and in winter would with mudguards be used to train on. A limited company was formed and Freddy Prince soon recruited many demobbed RAF personnel some of whom had brazing and engineering skills. A frame building shop was set up in Shirley High Street. A range of frames for 1946 was soon offered, it included a Vel D’Hiv path (track) model, a name that was to stay in their range for more than 15 years.

Their market was initially quite local but Freddy Prince was an excellent businessman … quite rare in the cycle trade … and soon marketed the frames through a large number of agents (other cycle shops) right across Britain. Success was also due in great part to the workshop foreman, Mike Compton who was highly skilled and who developed a range of very nicely crafted frames with lots of original detailing that made design sense as well as making their frames stand apart from the competition.

The lugwork was developed to new heights in 1950 to 1952. The Super Course model as in the photos here (left, above and below) featured really elegant hand cut lugs. The front of the head lugs were really quite original in design. The Concours model launched at the November 1951 London Cycle Show featured the most ornate lugs yet and by exhibiting a chrome plated show frame with a retail price of £100 attracted a huge amount of publicity. The early 1950s were a golden age for cyclists and Rotrax capitalised on a large market – Mike Compton told me that over 2500 frames were made at Rotrax in 1951.

After 1953 the market declined rapidly with the end of rationing. Rotrax bought out a new stock model, the Shirley that was available in just five standard sizes. With the decline in the market they also built frames for other names too. Thanet Silverlight frames were built in Rotrax’s workshops from 1954 on. And in 1952 they had started the manufacture of motorcycle Speedway frames which were to prove to be a large success.

But the market in lightweight frames diminshed geatly and in the late 1950s the Rotrax name was either sold or licensed (its not exactly known which) to Witcomb Cycles in Deptford, London. This arrangement continued until the late 1960s when the name came back to Mike Compton who by this time was building frames also under the Kingston name. The Rotrax shop changed hands again in the 1960s and closed only recently.