Excelsior model numbers/years

[chrisjichidan]

I edit the AMCA European Chapter newsletter 'One Voice' and I'd appreciate some help please with a short item I'm writing. A member in Sweden has sent me photo's of his beautifully restored 'Series 17' Excelsior twin, but I'm not sure how the series 17 fits in. His accompanying letter was very brief, and his English is limited, so I'm coming to you to complete the picture if possible. I can e-mail a copy of one of the photo's for ID if somebody will mail me on amca@norfab.co.uk To my untutored eye, the bike could be a 1917 model and that's what confuses me. Could the owner mean year '17 not Series 17? It certainly is a teens model. No front brake, acetylene lighting, IOE valve layout, nickel plated cylinder barrels, ignition control lever on the l/h gas tank pivoting in the center of the big X, Indian style leaf springs on the front fork. Can somebody help me to flesh out the piece?

[Perry Ruiter]

I'm no expert on this but I believe a Series 17 is a 1917 model. I know that Series 18, 19 and 20 are 1918, 1919 and 1920 models respectively (as a counter example the 1921 models were also Series 20) ... Perry

[RWasson]

Chris: Check out the Excelsior pictured and described at http://www.benncomm.com/ancient/alle...17/excel17.htm The site quotes from a description of the engine as a "Big Valve Series 17 Ultra Power Twin." It does confirm the year of that bike as 1917 and contains some details you may be able to compare with the one you are asking about.

Roy D. Wasson, the Nightrider

[RWasson]

Chris:

The forum does not want to accept the full-blow site address for the Excelsior 17, so go instead to the home page at www.benncomm.com and then click onto the Blazing Thunder Cycles link to see the list of bikes, which includes the Excelsior.

Roy

[chrisjichidan]

Thanks Perry and Roy. The info you've given me is just what I needed. Roy, the Big Valve Series 17 Ultra Power Twin referred to in Blazing Thunder is indeed the same model as the one in Sweden I'm writing about. You've both helped to broaden my knowledge of American motorcycles. Thanks again.

Chris

[knossos99]

I had always thought that the Series number was the same as the Year number, but they may have been exceptions.

The Series 16 Excelsior catalog on ebay, just completed, showed only 1915 models. There are several changes from 1915 to 1916, and the bikes in the catalog had all the 1915 features.

So maybe the series numbers came early, and stayed late for certain years....


cheers
Pete in San Francisco

[Tommo]

I bought to the top of the "American other" section a discussion that was started by Knut from Norway back in 2001 about Excelsior dating hoping it may help and also to avoid the trouble of having to type in again all the production run numbers listed.
I've a question here, mainly for Admin Guy, what happens ultimately to the likes of these earlier posts that contain excellent data and information, is it stored for ever and is it able to be cross referenced or does it slowly decend to the bottom of the list to fall off and be lost forever? Can a new forum member search the forum in any way by make and or model/year to find if any discussion on his/her particular interest is buried somewhere in the system?

Merry Xmas to all

Tommo

[AdminGuy]

The database is searchable. It will pull up everything via key word.

Nothing is lost/dumped.

Sometimes you may want to select the option of show all the posts from the beginning. Under a given sub-section(click menu at bottom). So yes, the most receint stuff is shown -but old convo is still in database.