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1965 Velocette Venom ‘Special’

We are pleased to be able to offer this excellent Velocette Venom ‘special’ for sale, an interesting bike being a factory ordered Venom in touring guise the bike comes complete with the original receipt showing the specifications as you see them on the bike. We have serviced and road tested her for the new owner.

The name ‘Velocette’ will always be associated with high quality motorcycles of a sporting nature. Founded by German émigré Johannes Gütgemann in 1905 to manufacture bicycles and related components, Veloce Ltd first applied the ‘Velocette’ name to one of its two-stroke lightweight motorcycles, thereby distinguishing it from the larger four-stroke Veloce models. During The Great War the family name was changed from the Germanic ‘Gütgemann’ to ‘Goodman’, and the Goodmans would remain in charge at Velocette (‘Veloce’ was not used after WWI) until the firm’s demise some 50-plus years later.

Velocette was one of the first British companies to adopt overhead-camshaft valve gear and its KTT racers were certainly the first to achieve competition success using that technology. However, in the post-war period the expensive-to-produce OHC roadsters were discontinued in favor of a range of sporting overhead-valve models culminating in the legendary Thruxton production racer. The first of these sports roadsters was the Venom, which was derived from the touring MSS. The latter had disappeared from the range in 1948, reappearing in 1954 with a new swinging-arm frame and telescopic fork. The engine too was up-dated, changing to ‘square’ bore and stroke dimensions of 86x86mm and gaining an alloy cylinder barrel and ‘head.

In this heavily revised form the motor underwent further development as part of the scrambles program, which bore fruit in 1956 in the shape of the high-performance Venom and its 350cc sibling, the Viper. The MSS frame and forks were retained for the newcomers but full-width alloy hubs were adopted to boost braking power and smart chromed mudguards fitted to enhance the models’ sporting image. In 1960 ‘Clubman’ versions of both were introduced, minus the enclosure panels of the standard models, which featured a raised compression ratio, Amal TT carburetor, ‘racing’ magneto, rear-set footrests and a close-ratio gearbox among many other improvements. When supplied with the optional dolphin fairing, the model was known as the Clubman Veeline. Produced until the end of Velocette production in 1971, the Venom in its various guises represents the final glorious flowering of the traditional British sports single, and today these supremely well-engineered thoroughbreds are highly sought after.

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