Sales brochure for the Kriedler R 50 scooter made from 1954 to 1957.

Here's the sales flyer for the Kriedler J51 from round about 1955. A fine quality moped in its day from a firm that would go on to make some extremely fast fifties.

Nortons were quality bikes and they always produced quality sales material. In my humble opinion the '59 featherbeds were the best looking of post war Nortons. Let's however not talk about the 250 Jubilee launched to celebrate 60 years of Norton - nicely styled bike and the concept was good (look at the popularity of Honda 250 twins slightly later) but marred by cost cutting and cheapo parts. These last of the widelines possibly don't photograph as well as a slimline but in the flesh the lines are spot on.

Layford Automotive of Hammersmith were the UK importers for a number of different continental mopeds. This brochure promotes both the NSU Quickly and the Peugeot BB ranges. Strange to have two competing brands on one advert but I guess Layfords didn't mind too much which they sold.

The 1936 Vincent HRD range. A surprisingly modest brochure given the product. 

A blast from the past for many. The Sidewinder sidecar from the eighties was a ruse to get around learner motorcycle laws - a learner in the UK was restricted to 125cc until he or she had passed their riding test, that is unless they were in charge of a sidecar outfit. In the case of a combo any capacity was possible; so the learner could ride for example either a CB125 solo or a CX1000 with sidecar.

The Sidewinder was a mail order clip on banking sidecar that was aimed at the learner market. There was no passenger, or even luggage, carrying capacity. The whole thing was just a liberal interpretation of the rules to get around learner capacity restrictions. They sold a whole load of them and at one time they were a regular sight on British roads.

Though the spirit of the law was being twisted there was never a huge spate of road traffic accidents associated with learners and Sidewinders. As learner laws changed and direct access riding tests came on stream so the whole raison d'etre of the Sidewinder vanished and they are now a largely forgotten footnote in British motorcycling history. 

Here's the catalogue for Precision Engines for motorcycles and cyclecars from c1914. Apologies for the slightly dodgy scanning - it's a delicate item and the stapling was wonky from new.