Hagon

Alf Hagon born in 1932 became well known in Speedway, Drag Racing, Grasstrack and engineering. It was when he was grasstraking that he began to think of developing his own machine which with the help of Tom Kirby he did. A lightweight machine fully sprung, powered by a JAP and called a Kirby Special. Alf raced this grasstrack machine with tremendous success.

In 1958 Alf set up his business to build speedway and grasstrack frames utilising his Mothers 6 x 10 foot garden shed, this production was halted for a while as he was called up to ride for England on an Australian tour in 1960.

On his return he moved his business to premises (Alf Hagon Products) in Leyton, East London, living above the shop his frames were having success world wide, by 1964 the demands on his time being made by his successful business were so great that he retired from riding speedway, but being a sportsman at heart it was not long before he became interested in Drag Racing.

In 1970 the Hagon company produced the Hagon Speedway Springer fitter with swinging arm and Girling shocks, later Hagon was to take on the tooling and manufacture of Girling shock absorbers but not until 1985 when Girling stopped the production of these shockers.

Still continuing as a going concern now called Hagon Products Ltd. and moved to Hainault with, I believe, Alf’s son Martin (also a speedway rider) as managing director of the company , Alf is a director.

Halmac Ace

Made by H I McKechnie of Halmac Motors, West London but the only thing known for certain is that it was advertised in the Speedway World in 1951 - unless you know better.

Harley Davidson

Think of the early days of Speedway and the Harley Peashooter will spring to mind, looking back it was a rather strange looking machine with handle bars reminiscent of a drooping moustache and an exhaust system that seemed to be designed to cause tinnitus to anyone who was not out of ear shot and from what I am told that was a fair way away. Although we remember this equipment its use seems to have been limited and short lived even though a different model the CAC was introduced in 1933 it did not gain much ground against other frames that became far more popular.

Harris 1951

This is another speedway frame that we only seem to know of because it was advertised in the Speedway world, I can find not other reference or report of it. Anyone help.

Hayden Frames

Charlie and Herb Hayden, Speedway and Grasstrack riders from Bournemouth riding at Exeter, Poole and St Austell between 1948-1953. These brothers produced a frame that was apparently used by some of the riders at St Austell. I do not know of any examples of these frames nor have I heard of anyone who used one - do you know better?

Hedlund

Nisse Hedlund produced a engine that in 1967 was accepted as suitable for use in a speedway frame, it was tested by Bengt Jansson and used off and on during the next couple of years, when a disagreement between Hedlund and others more or less brought the project to an end, the engine was one of the very few produced for the speedway track that had double overhead cam shafts and a clutch integral with the crankcase.

Hejisun

Colin, Hector, Jim and Bob Sutherland developed a 4v engine called the Hejisun in 1984 the engine had needle roller bearings, do not know which brother was skilled in which speciality or if it was a joint effort. Understand that it was well though of and expected to be successful but in spite of that there seem to be few examples still around - any information would be of help as I have little information except the knowledge that it did exist.

Keith Ridden has been kind enough to supply the following information  Keith writes “Jim Sunderland lived near me at Toongabbie and had an engineering business at Smithfield where in their spare time made replacement parts for JAP engines but the main income was derived from making parts for NSW Railways with their CNC machinery.

A decision was made to design and build a 4 valve engine as the very accurate machinery was very suitable for the job. Figures of 90hp vre spoken off but I don't know about torque produced which is more important in a speedway engine.

I believe David Mills trialled the engine and should be able to give you more information.
Unfortunately for the Sunderland ,the railways were very slow in paying their suppliers and the business folded.”

Keith also explained the name it is apparently (he) from Hector, (ji) from Jim and the rest from the surname giving you Hejisun.

Holmes JAP

Johnny Holmes, an engineer who produced a number of grasstrack and speedway machines in the 1960’s from his workshop in Essex

Homer Sigma

A small range of frames developed by speedway rider Rob Homer for use in speedway and later grasstrack

Humber 1951

There seems no information about this except that it was said to be produced by Snowy Rogers from the Humberstone garage in East London. But, do you know, if so please contact me.

Huck Fynn

Wimbledon and Norwich rider Huck Fynn arrived in England from Australia in 1949 and began building frames in the early 1950’s, the frame had the type of forks known as “trombone” and was available in 1955. One of the first riders to give it a go was Ken McKinlay but most of the Leicester and Coventry riders followed suit. The forks were the easiest way to identify the frame but other features included a handle bar clamp of the tubular type which meant that the handle bars were in two halves and could be fitted from each side, meaning that they could be adjusted to suit the rider. Huck did not return home when he retired from riding  settling in the UK and  said to be producing metal stable tools   - from trombone forks to manure forks.

Hynes Aussie Frame

Dave Hynes from Victoria, Australia was, in the opinion of Tony Webb, who states in his A to Z Speedway Bikes “the most talented and influential frame maker in speedway history” praise indeed, he continues to say that in his opinion “He had an open attitude to the fact that his ideas and frames were copied and capitalised on by well known frame makers in the UK in 1948” he explains his statement by saying that David Hynes told a friend in 1949 that if he had been wiser he would have patented the designs.

We are not in a position to comment on the above we can only say for sure that Dave Hynes produced a frame that was popular with a group of riders including Graham Warran who declared in an interview with Speedway Echo in 1949 that he would never ride anything else. It had a number of features that were exclusive (as far as we know) to Dave’s frame including the design of the engine plates, fixing brackets, the fixing of the handle bar clamp and the fork socket connection amongst other items which without seeing are difficult to describe.

Running short of funds David returned to Australia in 1949 and did not return to the UK.