Peter Lea's Speedsix

Article from Ken Butterfield.

I first heard of Peter Lea’s remarkable mileage on a Moulton S Safari from Tony Hadland’s book, the Moulton Bicycle, many years ago.

This was a first edition library copy which I photocopied (sorry Tony!) and read to bits. There was a photograph of the S in the Hall museum and mention of his 30,000 miles in one year on the bike, as most people only do a third of that distance in their cars. This piece of information stuck in my mind.

The next time I read of the man was in issue 48 of the Moultoneer in 1997. Peter wrote a short account of his exploits with the Special unit Moulton, which he had ordered at the Blackpool show in February 1965 when they were not yet fully in production. This seems to prove my pet theory that: if you talked to the right people at the works then your S could be tweaked to your personal requirements?

He had to wait twelve months for the bike to be built and fitted with gears to suit his needs, which comprised of a 68T chainring and close ratio block both of which were special. This Moulton was then used for club competitions including reliability trials, long and short distance racing, twelve and twenty four hour time trials and hill climbs.

When Alex Moulton heard of the mileage achieved over the next three years he contacted Peter and acquired the red safari for his newly displayed "museum of development" collection at the hall. A lot of the bikes here have very interesting stories behind them and perhaps a guide book detailing them would be interesting reading for visitors?

I knew that in exchange for their new high mileage exhibit, Moulton bicycles had built Peter Lea a replacement and that this was a tangerine orange speedsix which was assembled at Bradford on Avon in 1970. This is remarkably late for a series two, as the Mk3 was in full production over in Nottingham and development work at the Hall was taken up with this latest frameset. Other speedsix specials are known to have been built in this period though, including ones built by Jack Lauterwasser himself.

Peter Lea’s experience must have been considered valuable, as Alex Moulton wrote to him asking if he had any advice for a young rider who was going to ride to Australia on a cycle that he was making for him. This was of course the Marathon, and the young man was Colin Martin!

Soon the delivery driver was on his doorstep in Wigan with the new hand-built machine, the bike was specced for time trials and racing use and sported a Unica saddle, expensive Williams AB77 splined cranks and a large track ring and also used a close ratio six speed block. In many ways the new bike was a carbon copy of his previous S safari.

Peter used the tangerine speedsix for a couple of years but changed over to long distance running, having considerable success in this sport also.

Many milremo rimmed Moultons were converted to 16” wheels in this period and a lot lost their drop bars and brake levers as they were pressed into more mundane use but this bike remained original, for racing use the bike was fitted with a set of Scheeren record sprint rims and tubs ! One of the rims had survived and came with the bike, but the tubs had been thrown away years ago as unusable.

The bike sat unused and all but forgotten for many years until I contacted Peter, now living in Wales and told him that I would love to own the bike if ever the opportunity arose as I was fascinated with the history of his high competition mileage and choice of the Moulton system - Truly this was what AM had envisaged for his sporting Moultons in the sixties?

Peter phoned me within days and kindly agreed for me to purchase and make use of the speedsix as he did not think that he would use it again and much of his time was now taken up with writing. Within a few weeks my son Paul and I were heading down the North Wales coast armed with voice recorder and camera to meet this remarkable man and talk to him about his cycling achievements on Moultons.

I will put these experiences in order and hope to write an article for a future Moultoneer. These will include how Peter used to go to work on the S at Leyland and after his shift would ride as far as Kendal before heading home to Wigan for tea! This would probably be close to 120 miles, quite a ride home!

The bike was waiting to be inspected and the first thing that struck me was the outrageous Tangerine enamel on the frameset which apart from some chipping and period scrapes was in remarkable condition. The front forks were finned as befits this age of new series frame and the entire construction featured good brazing and several unusual details in construction. The transfers were original and stated simply Moulton Speed, but not in the usual colours!

Peter said that he had not done many miles on it; I had to question him on this point given the record breaking mileage achieved on his previous mount!

The Unica Nitor saddle was highly polished with use and I believe that this was retained by him from the S and had probably covered tens of thousands of miles!

Ten years ago the bike was refurbished and cleaned up and at this time it lost a couple of original bits, namely the stem and bars and the derailleur which were replaced by more modern components. Study of an old fuzzy photo of the bike revealed a GB hiduminium spearpoint stem with maes bars so these could be easily sourced. The rear mech was missing, but the control fitted was the original cyclo lever so I decided to fit a NOS Gian Robert mech which looks period and was offered by Ron Kitching as an alternative fitment for speedsixes.

The sprint rims had been replaced by AM rims laced onto the original BH airlite hubs a decade previously and the brakes were GB Coureur Plus at the rear and a sport mk2 at the front.

The frame was a BoA modified "Nottingham" style unit fitted with speedsix rear forks, and was fitted with a Track ring which was a whopping 72T and would have been special order from TA.

The Williams AB77 axle was etched with the code for 1967 which ties in nicely as a stock late sixties part at the works.

In effect the frameset had been modified to obsolete speedsix spec but had been customised at the works to include high quality running gear so that Peter could compete on it. Among the special bits was a grease nipple under the BB shell for reliable lubrication!

I have since been working on the bike to bring it back up to scratch, following good advice to "grease it and use it" I have replaced all the bearings and done some polishing to remove light surface corrosion of the alloy parts and that is it.

I have resisted all temptation to make the bike into a replica of itself and it will remain in it’s Bradford on Avon Tangerine enamel with as many original parts as possible while I clock up a few miles on the unique machine, but obviously not as many as Peter Lea.