The first 100 years………

This site is intended to help preserve the heritage of Sturmey-Archer and to record the various types of Sturmey-Archer cycle hubs produced during the 20th century.

Gears have been in use for thousands of years with the potters wheel being an early example. Bicycle internal hub gears are based upon the epicyclic gear principle, described by James Watt in a 1781 steam engine. The subsequent development of smaller metal gearing for clocks improved function and late in the 19th century, many improvements in bicycle design were introduced. Frank Bowden had purchased a bicycle company initially located in Raleigh Street, Nottingham, England and his engineers worked with ideas from Henry Sturmey and James Archer resulting in the first Sturmey-Archer 3-speed bicycle gear hub patent in 1902. This is all described in much more detail in “The Sturmey-Archer Story”, a book by Tony Hadland, from 1987. This website is intended to be a more pictorial history.

The hub products have been listed in order of year of introduction (or patent application) and clicking on the image will produce a magnified version. There is also an exploded view hub drawing or full technical manual for more recent products. Some views of the factory production areas are included although the dates of these are not always accurately known. Sales and advertising aids are also shown, around their approximate date of use.

The site deliberately does not refer to individuals but it is dedicated to all the employees who have helped make Sturmey-Archer a world renowned supplier of high quality bicycle components.