The Rarest of Racers: 1915 Indian 8-Valve

Say the phrases ‘8-Valve’ to a bike collector and watch their ears perk up.  That’s how potent the historical past of those unique machines, constructed by each Indian and (later) Harley-Davidson, are within the story of American board monitor racing.  It’s probably the most romantic period of motorbike competitors, largely due to the extraordinary hazard of the game, it excessive toll on riders, and the bare-knuckles competitors between manufacturers that understood racing was the most affordable type of promoting.  It was ‘Race on Sunday, promote on Monday’, and even when your star rider slipped on the 2 miles of oily pine 2x4s laid at a 50degree angle, and misplaced his life… nicely, that was a headline too. For a time within the 1910s, each main and lots of minor cities within the USA featured banked-track ovals with wood surfaces, referred to as both motordromes, autodromes, or board tracks.  By the late Twenties they have been all gone, destroyed by fires or bulldozers, and few missed the ‘murderdromes’, as they have been dubbed within the press.  Different types of racing shortly supplanted the boards within the public’s creativeness, with hillclimbing turning into the preferred motorsport within the USA by the late Twenties, and dust monitor racing the preferred on the planet.

The racers in all these competitions have been specialised and honed to freakish extremes, usually bearing no relation to the road-going merchandise of their producers, and Indian was the primary to introduce such exotica on the monitor.  The Indian 8-Valve was designed by Oscar Hedstrom in 1910 solely to return Indian to the highest of the racing sport, the place it had established itself in 1902.  Hedstrom’s 4-valve cylinder heads solved main issues with valve cooling on the overhead-valve idea, earlier than direct lubrication was added to valve trains within the late Twenties.  It was nicely understood that overhead valve cylinder heads had higher fuel movement than inlet-over-exhaust valves, however valve breakages from overheating on 2-valve motors have been frequent.  Hedstrom’s use of 4 smaller valves meant the valve prepare parts have been lighter and smaller, giving higher longevity and simpler revving, whereas possessing improved fuel movement traits and thus producing extra energy.  The 8-Valve was instantly profitable in racing, and earned its legendary standing as a bike of extraordinary technical innovation, and a devastating racer that absolutely dominated Board Monitor competitors for years.

The extraordinary machine in these photographs is one among solely 4 real Indian 8-Valve racers identified to exist at present. We all know it’s real because the bike has vital documentation and a identified historical past from new, with photographs of homeowners relationship again many years, and far analysis executed by former proprietor Daniel Statnekov.  It’s the solely identified surviving instance of a factory-built Indian 8-Valve racer in a ‘keystone’ or ‘Marion’ body, which this machine pioneered, and was utilized by Indian subsequently with its sidevalve racers of the Twenties as a really gentle and really short-wheelbase racing body.  The keystone body was a intelligent use of the engine circumstances as a confused member of the body, by the straightforward expedient of chopping out the body’s backside tubes.  This lowered the middle of gravity, which vastly improved the dealing with, and likewise gave a shorter wheelbase, which made the bike extra nimble.  To enhance the brief and low body, Indian constructed a shorter model of their racing entrance fork, which this machine possesses, and an enlarged gasoline tank for long-distance racing – typical Board Monitor races of the period have been held over distances from 100 to 200 miles, and stopping to refuel may imply the distinction between successful and shedding.

This distinctive ‘Marion’ 8-Valve was presumably first utilized by the manufacturing unit with its personal racing group, and interval photographs present simply such machines being raced by the manufacturing unit in 1915.  Whereas the 8-Valve was dominant on the monitor, Indian was growing its first side-valve roadster V-twin motor – the Powerplus – that very same 12 months.  Its designer was Charles Gustafson, who had beforehand designed the primary sidevalve motorbike engine within the USA for Studying-Commonplace.  Gustafson knew he may develop his Powerplus engine to supply extra energy with extra reliability than the 8-Valve, and shortly the Marion body was raced with particular Powerplus motors, which have been certainly higher for long-distance racing…however not quicker.  This 1915 racer is a second-generation ‘small-base’ model of the 8-Valve, and was fairly merely the quickest motorbike on the planet for many years. An inventory of velocity data with this second-generation Indian 8-Valve included: 1 mile at 115.75mph by Gene Walker at Daytona Seaside in April 1920, and 1 mile at 132.52mph by Jim Davis in April 1922.  Such speeds wouldn’t be equaled by FIM-certified land velocity file racing till the Thirties.

 

This 1915 Marion 8-Valve was initially bought from the manufacturing unit within the early Twenties by Waldo Korn, knowledgeable rider for each Indian and Excelsior.  After a interval of racing, Kern bought the Marion within the Forties to Dewey Simms, a legendary tuner and racer, who used the machine for demonstration laps at occasions within the Fifties and 60s, together with the Springfield Mile monitor.  Photographic documentation of Simms with this machine in that period are included with the sale: additionally included are the distinctive aluminum valve covers seen within the photographs.  Be aware additionally the tunnel fabricated into the oil tank to permit clearance for the rear cylinder’s exhaust pipe.  Simms bought this machine on April 7^th 1966 to Renton WA collector Gary Porter, and in flip Porter bought it within the Nineties to historian/collector Dan Statnekov, who described it as ‘working however drained, with horrible paint.’  He leaned on surviving racing machines, racers, and historians to carry the Marion 8-Valve to good and working situation.

It is a distinctive and vastly vital 1915 Indian Marion 8-Vavle racer, and its meticulous restoration was judged at an astonishing 100 factors on the 1998 Perkiomen AMCA Nationwide meet, and took the Pink Wolverton Award for the very best restored racing machine.  It was additionally featured within the Guggenheim Museum’s 1998 ‘Artwork of the Bike’ exhibit, and is included within the exhibit catalog on web page 124.  This 1915 Indian racer is an important American motorbike on the market on this decade, with out query: whereas different machines is likely to be the flavour du jour, there isn’t a motorbike as uncommon, and none as legendary, as an actual Indian 8-Valve.  It’s developing at Mecum’s Monterey public sale Aug 17-19 2023.  [Note: Mecum is a sponsor of The Vintagent]