About us

Ed Gilkison has owned Velos for over 30 years, and has run his Velocette Spares and Service business for more than 15 years. The business is in the direct line of descent from that owned by Lou Branch in Los Angeles, and he carries one of the widest ranges of Velocette parts in the world.

He is the main Authorized Velocette dealer in North America, and also an Authorized Velocette dealer for Australasia. He offers a worldwide mail order service. Feel free to contact him for all your Velocette needs wherever you may live. And even if you do not have a Velo, he can supply Amal carbs and parts, Renold chains, Avon tyres, control levers, and other fiddly bits for most British Classics.

Here’s a little history for those who may not be familiar with the marque:

The Velocette motorcycle was made in Birmingham, England by the same family firm from 1905 until its demise in 1971. They were a relatively small firm, but produced many superb motor-cycles, and were very successful in the Isle of Man TT Races, especially in the Junior (350cc) class, for which they made the first genuine competitive production racer, the KTT.

The factory had a well deserved reputation for fine engineering, in both the design and manufacture of their motor-cycles. They were highly innovative, being the first to use pivoted fork rear suspension with two spring/damper units (on the KTT in 1936 — near 10 years before others, and nearly 20 years before BSA, Triumph and Norton) and the first to design and use the now universal positive-stop gear change. They also pioneered the ATD (automatic timing device) to advance ignition timing automatically as engine speed increased. They introduced truly adjustable rear suspension (not just pre-loading the springs) before WW2, and used it on all but a few rear sprung road bikes thereafter. It was also just pre-WW2 that they used shaft drive on prototypes where the shaft was incorporated in the pivoted fork, thereby eliminating the need for a sliding joint in the shaft. BMW did not follow suit for several decades!

In 1928, a Velocette became the first 350cc motor-cycle to average over 100mph for 1 hour. The World Record for unlimited motor-cycles over a continuous 24 hours was attained in 1961 at over 100mph (for the first time). This record still stands for the 500cc Class, but survived for just 1 week for larger capacities, thanks to BMW!.

The photos above are of a couple of bikes Ed has recently finished full rebuilds on. Larger versions of these, and other photos, are in the Gallery pages.