Days of Future Past: the Mercury

There wasn’t an announcement when the Future died, but die it did, sometime around the 1980s I reckon, as the Age of Optimism was superseded by the Age of Irony. For over 100 years the Future was a popular pastime, the subject of countless magazine articles, fantastic illustrations, and sometimes wacky/sometimes dead accurate conjecture on what our material surroundings would look like, and how they would function, in the Future. As we’ve passed the Millenium, and are still driving piston-engine cars and telefork motorcycles, it seems our imminent whiz-bang Future hasn’t arrived yet, and isn’t likely to arrive soon; hell, we don’t even have a space program anymore. Our enthusiasm for the Future seems to have died when the bills – financial, societal, environmental- came due.

Dedicated Future-hunters in the motorcycle world smile ruefully at regular columns and drawings published in magazines from the 1920s through the 50s, in which visionary readers and schoolchildren sent sketches of their ‘ideal’ motorcycle (Four cylinders! Suspension!), while a few hardier and more determined souls actually set about building their dreams. It is to them we must truly tip our hat, and, without irony, give thanks, for they are the actual creators of the technologies we take for granted today. Yes, four cylinder, and yes, suspension, and disc brakes, and center-hub steering, and all-aluminum everything. Which brings us to the Mercury.

The product of four backyard visionaries, the Mercury project was especially the vision of one man, Laurie Jenks, who had toured extensively on the typical girder-forked, rigid-framed motorcycles of the late 1920s, and decided the time was ripe for a more sophisticated touring motorcycle. His first prototype, built in 1933, featured a tubular frame, with articulated rear suspension and a version of ‘duplex’ steering up front, similar to the OEC system, a cousin of hub-center steering, which we know had been around since the earliest days of motorcycling (Ner-A-Car of the 20s, and before that, the Zenith Bi-Car of the ‘Noughts), the principal advantages being lack of deflection under side loads, and greater stability over rough surfaces/hard use, and zero tendency for ‘speed wobbles’.

When the tube frame prototype of 1933 proved satisfactory, Jenks’ ‘Ideal’ motorcycle went a step further, with an all-riveted aluminum chassis and alloy bodywork covering his advanced steering and suspension ideas. It took another four years to begin ‘production’ of the Mercury, after ordering aluminum castings for the steering head and other lugs, plus extruded I-section aluminum for the main frame spars; enough frame parts were ordered for an initial batch of of 4 machines. The shape and material of the Mercury chassis is top-shelf 1930s practice, echoed by the most advanced GP machine of the era, with which it shares many features; the Gilera ‘Rondine’ also had an ultra-strong twin-spar chassis, and extensive use of aluminum, and water cooling…but the similarities end there, as the Rondine’s DOHC supercharged inline 4 was truly the Future, whereas the Mercury’s tuned Scott 600cc two-stroke twin-cylinder engine was merely the Present.

In truth, with limited funds available to buy a new engine (let alone develop a motor of their own), Jenks and his partner Mr. Swabey, who ran a garage tuning Scott engines, relied on the Past for their Mercury motors, and used reconditioned and tuned Scott engines from as far back as 1933 in their futuristic machine.

While Scott was the only ‘sporting’ and TT-winning motorcycle to never win a Brooklands ‘Gold Star’ (for a 100mph lap during a race), the Scott engine had its appeal, being very smooth, simple, reliable, and easy to maintain, while possessing devilishly quick acceleration, if not the 100mph top speed required of a truly Hot bike. When press-tested in 1937 for Motor Cycle, the completed Mercury was ridden hands-off around the incredibly bumpy Brooklands track at an average of 70mph, while 90mph was the estimated top whack. When introduced to the world in 1937 as the product of ‘Mercury Motors’, the price was listed at £115 – the same as a Brough Superior ’11-50′ model with 1100cc JAP engine (see the full Brough price list here, on the excellent B-S company archives). Those first four aluminum chassis were the only Mercuries built; we love the Future, until we must pay for it.

The Mercury was stable enough for Brooklands, and fast enough at 90mph, even if not a racer; what else was it? Meant for touring, clearly, with a lot of elegant details with the rider’s comfort in mind, like the large tool/glovebox in the tank top, which also housed an oil reservoir for a chain oiler. The instrument panel included a fuel gauge, and various pull-knobs for electrical controls. Both front and rear suspension consisted of undamped compression and rebound springs, which Jenks felt kept the wheels in more contact with tarmac over undulations. Large section tires (4″x19″ – huge for the day) gave comfortable if slow steering, and all that aluminum protected the rider from oil and mud. While the chassis and bodywork were aluminum, the deep mudguards were nickel-plated steel, giving an overall super-silver look, akin to the sleekest aircraft of the day, all rivets and shiny panels, the very picture of the Future, Buck Rogers on two wheels.

Laurie Jenks wasn’t the first, nor the last to build an ‘ideal’ motorcycle, and his Mercury was better than most in looks and real-world performance. While not to everyone’s taste, I find the Mercury visually exciting, and 1930s-futuristic like almost no other vehicle on two or four wheels – closer to advanced aircraft practice. Jenks’ fundamental ideas – a comfortable and civilized sporting motorcycle which protected the rider from the elements- were completely sound, and an accurate vision for the Future. A funny thing about the Future, though; when it actually arrives, it immediately becomes the Ordinary. Motorcycle manufacturers have been burned many times by introducing radical new ideas (full enclosure, Wankel engines, hub-center steering) to a non-buying public, but the idea of a sophisticated, smooth, fully enclosed sport-touring motorcycle finally came to fruition in the 1990s, embodied by machines like the Honda Pacific Coast, and later, the fully-enclosed Gold Wing and its cousins. All very efficient and rider-friendly, yet somehow, incorporating good ideas from design Futures seems to leave the ‘Wow’ factor in the Past…

Many thanks to Norman Gunderson of Canada for the beautiful b/w detail photos of the Mercury; Norman found reference to the Mercury in my coverage of the Concorso di Villa d’Este earlier this year, and was a personal friend of Laurie Jenks, from whom the photos originated. Also thanks to the Hockenheim Museum in Germany, for sending the rest of the photos; four Mercuries survive, plus the tube frame prototype (a chassis only at this point – 2012), and all are at Hockenheim; if you haven’t seen this collection, you owe it to yourself to make a trip.