1939 - Rudge Withworth Modell 95 Aero Path Track for Wembley Six Days - Part One

Rudge-Whitworth were the track frames of choice for many riders around the turn of the 20th century but after 1920 they did not make any again except for for a very brief period just prior to WWII.

Rudge was bought by EMI in 1935 and they soon engaged the services of Jack Lauterwasser, who had won a medal at the 1928 Olympics and had in the early 1930s built some very fine frames under his own name.

Jack Lauterwasser developed a range of top quality road frames for Rudge. And Rudge decided to garner publicity for their new models by sponsoring riders at the Wembley 6-day races in the period 1937–1939.

This track frame Hilary Stone believes was one of the four frames built for the 1939 Wembley Six.

Rudge did offer a track bike in their 1939 catalogue, Model 95, the Aero Path but this frame is clearly not the same.

It has different fork blades and both the forks are fully chromed. There is a picture of Karel Kaers with his Rudge at either the 1938 Wembley Six and this is very similar to the catalogue picture with different forks to this frame.

Further research shows that the frames ridden by the two teams sponsored by Rudge for 1939 (including the winner Karel Kaers had all chrome forks (the fork is fully chromed under the paint) with this shape of fork blade. A picture of Karel Kaers riding an identical frame to this one in the 1939 Wembley 6-day can be seen here.

 

Luckily team Karel Kjaers and Omer de Bruycker won the 1939th session with 1,812.5 miles and 938 points by two laps in front of their competitors.

 

Please stay tuned to see how this frame and this four of a kind will be matched with some period correct parts in order to be ridden on the Ferry Dusika track course again.