NationMaster - Encyclopedia: James Starley

James Starley (Born April 21, 1830, died June 17, 1881) was an English inventor and "Father of the Bicycle Industry." He was born in 1831 at Albourne. James Starley ran away from home and later settled in Coventry where he became one of the most innovative and successful builders of bicycles and tricycles. His son, William Starley, and his nephew, John Kemp Starley, also entered this industry and one of the outcomes was the Rover car company. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (1944x2592, 1174 KB) Summary Photo taken by me on 14 August 2006 at about 5. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (1944x2592, 1174 KB) Summary Photo taken by me on 14 August 2006 at about 5. ... The Precinct in Coventry city centre. ... April 21 is the 111th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (112th in leap years). ... Liberty Leading the People by EugÃ¨ne Delacroix commemorates the July Revolution 1830 (MDCCCXXX) was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar). ... June 17 is the 168th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (169th in leap years), with 197 days remaining. ... 1881 (MDCCCLXXXI) was a common year starting on Saturday (see link for calendar). ... Leopold I 1831 (MDCCCXXXI) was a common year starting on Saturday (see link for calendar). ... Albourne is a village and civil parish in the Mid Sussex district of West Sussex, England. ... The Precinct in Coventry city centre. ... This article is becoming very long. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... John Kemp Starley (1854 - 1901) was an English inventor and industrialist. ... Rover was a British automobile manufacturer and later a marque based at the Longbridge plant in Birmingham. ... Car redirects here. ...

As a teenager, James Starley ran away from his parents' Sussex farm to Lewisham. With the industrial revolution in full swing the quiet farm life was not for him and his head seems to have been bursting with mechanical ideas. Initially, he worked as a gardener but soon gained a reputation for mending clocks and devising useful gadgets. He married Jane Todd when in his early 20s. Sussex is a traditional county in South East England corresponding roughly in area to the ancient Kingdom of Sussex. ... Lewisham is an area within the London Borough of Lewisham in south-east London. ... A Watt steam engine in Madrid. ...

James' employer, John Penn, bought a then rare and expensive sewing machine for his wife which shortly broke down. James of course fixed the problem and, what is more, could see various improvements to the mechanism. Penn knew Josiah Turner, one of the partners of the makers of the machine, and in due course Starley was taken on at the London factory. His talent was such that Turner and Starley started their own sewing machine company in Coventry around 1861. A modern machine (Singer Symphonie 300) A sewing machine is a mechanical (or electromechanical) device that joins fabric using thread. ...

Turner's nephew brought one of the new French bone-shakers to the factory in 1868and the company soon started making bicycles. At this time velocipedes (cycles) had wheels of nearly equal size, the front slightly larger, although to grow much larger in the famous penny-farthings such as Starley soon manufactured with William Hillman. Their Ariel was all-metal and had modern-style wire-spoked wheels. Tangent spokes were patented in 1874. Lever-driven and chain-driven tricycles, often in strange configurations, were also devised for ladies and for two riders. It was steering problems, while riding a tricycle tandem, caused by the unequal power input of the ageing James on one side and his more vigorous son on the other that prompted James Starley to invent the (open) differential in 1877. It is still used in some tricycles and was ready and waiting when the car needed the device. Boneshaker is a name used from about 1869 up to the present time, to refer to the first type of true bicycle with pedals, which was called velocipede (from the Latin for fast foot) by its manufacturers. ... 1868 (MDCCCLXVIII) was a leap year starting on Wednesday (see link for calendar) of the Gregorian calendar or a leap year starting on Friday of the 12-day-slower Julian calendar. ... This article is becoming very long. ... The velocipede was the predecessor of the bicycle, introduced in the Victorian age. ... The front wheel from a racing bicycle made using a Mavic rim A bicycle wheel is a wheel designed for a bicycle. ... The penny-farthing is an early model of bicycle, produced in England in 1870. ... The Ariel was an English automobile manufactured in Birmingham from 1900 to 1915, and again from 1922 to 1925. ... To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ... In an automobile and other four-wheeled vehicles, a differential is a device, usually consisting of gears, for allowing each of the driving wheels to rotate at different speeds, while supplying equal torque to each of them. ...

Starley's sons continued manufacturing cycles after his death but his nephew John Kemp Starley made more of a mark in the long run. It was (John Kemp -) Starley and Sutton who devised the recognisably modern Rover safety bicycle with 26" wheels (still a standard size), chain drive, and a diamond shaped frame (no seat-tube as yet) in 1884, showing it in 1885. The penny-farthing or ordinary cycle was not a safe machine, with a "header" accident being an ever-present danger. Others had experimented with chain-driven "safety cycles" but the Rover really made its mark to the extent that "Rover" means "bike" in some countries such as Poland. Roller chain and sprocket Mack AC delivery truck at the Petersen Automotive Museum with chain drive visible Chain drive was a popular power transmission system from the earliest days of the automobile. ... Steel frame and carbon fiber fork of 2000 LeMond Zurich racing bicycle A bicycle frame is the main component of a bicycle, onto which wheels and other components are fitted. ... 1884 (MDCCCLXXXIV) is a leap year starting on Tuesday (click on link to calendar) of the Gregorian calendar (or a leap year starting on Thursday of the 12-day-slower Julian calendar). ... 1885 (MDCCCLXXXV) is a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Saturday of the 12-day slower Julian calendar). ...

In due course, motor-driven bicycles became motor-cycles and were followed by motor cars. James Kemp Starley experimented with an electric tri-car around 1888 but the petrol-driven Rover 8 h.p. car was released in 1904, two years after his death. A motorcycle or motorbike is any two-wheeled vehicle powered by an engine. ...

See also