A 1915 Cyclone motorbike has just changed hands in Las Vegas for an eye-watering sum of $1.32 million, making it the world’s most expensive bike to be ever traded at a public auction.
The Cyclone brand emerged in the United States in 1912 only to go bust five years later, in 1917. The brand name was used by Joerns Motor, a once successful manufacturing firm that ultimately lost the competition to companies offering similar bikes for cheaper. With the downfall of the short-lived Cyclone, Joerns Motor was acquired by Excelcior Motor.
Which is arguably a shame, because the owners remembered their Cyclone motorcycles as very fast and durable. In fact, they raced a lot back in the era – both on well-paved and dirt roads. Their successes could be tracked down to an innovative “V-Twin” engine design that extracted 45 horsepower (33 kilowatts) from a single liter of displacement. It was a truly wild number by the standards of the time. In 1914, a Cyclone bike set a nationwide record in the USA by finishing a one-mile run in 35 seconds.
Various reports suggest that only between 6 to 14 units have survived to this day out of 300 or so made. This particular example was completely restored by the now-late Stephen Wright, a renowned expert in vintage motorcycles.