Austral bikes

fletch62
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Austral bikes

Postby fletch62 » Wed Apr 23, 2008 1:38 pm

Just spotted an Austral bike at the looking recycle joint.
Very old looking steel lugged frame, blue with white pinstriping with horizontal r/hanger. Austral stickers with headtube one has map of Australia and several rainbow stickers.
Anybody know of these bikes? Worth picking up?

feelthewheel
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Postby feelthewheel » Thu Apr 24, 2008 9:59 am

I've got one of these bikes. The Austral you have described sounds like one dating from the 50's/60's. By this time the Austral brand had long been taken over by Malvern Star (for over 20+ years) and ceased to be anything special. To be honest it's not really all that valuable but if you think it looks cool why not grab it for a retro-resto project?

Austral also manufactured a range of other (farm/industrial) machinery I believe.

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WyvernRH
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Autral paintwork?

Postby WyvernRH » Thu Apr 24, 2008 2:15 pm

I have a mens Austral I was given (hand painted bright red and yellow....). It is fully brazed up and looks and feels weightwise about the same build quality as my Malvern Star 2-star racer/light roadster, square lugs and all. Would that be a good comparison?
More important does anyone have any photos to show what the original headbadge/downtube/paintwork looked like on these bikes? I had a quick look around the Internet and scored zero.

Cheers

Richard

fletch62
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Postby fletch62 » Thu Apr 24, 2008 2:54 pm

I went to pick it up today, and of course it was already gone! Bugger

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munga
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Postby munga » Thu Apr 24, 2008 6:02 pm

so the lesson here is: if you think it might be a bargain, go!

goulash
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Austral

Postby goulash » Wed Jul 09, 2008 1:19 pm

I've got an old Austral that we think is from about 1920 or before. The serial number on it is H905, which doesn't follow the usual MS format of 9S99999 or 9M99999 so it possibly pre-dates the take-over from Melvern Star.

I would be very interested in finding a photo of one with the original paint work. My father says he thinks it was originally black with gold pin-strips and chrome front forks.

If anyone has a photo of one of these bikes, I would appreciate it if you could send it to:
walkabout (dot) wombat (at) gmail (dot) com

Happy biking.
Stu

feelthewheel
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Postby feelthewheel » Thu Jul 10, 2008 7:41 am

Hello goulash
If you do indeed have a pre-Malvern Star takeover Austral it should have the following defining characteristic - both front head-tube lugs should have a cut-out of a map of Australia (no Tasmania), as well as the fork crowns.

If it does, then you've indeed hit the jackpot!
Regards
Feelthewheel

goulash
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Postby goulash » Thu Jul 10, 2008 9:24 am

Hi Feelthewheel,

That it does... both front forks have the map of Australia carved in, as well as as well as the head tube lugs.

Would you happen to know where I'd be able to find more information about this bike?

Unfortunately I do know it's had a couple of modifications done to it (inner-cog gears added, re-painted & new seat...) so it's not in original condition. If I were able to find out the original spec's and paint work, I'd love to restore it back to new.

feelthewheel
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Postby feelthewheel » Thu Jul 10, 2008 3:14 pm

Hello goulash
Try this for a little bit of information:

http://canberrabicyclemuseum.com.au/Aus ... ticles.htm

There's not much else out there that I could find - other members may have more information that I do. Congratulations on finding a pretty rare frame.

Don't worry about the new paint and modifications - that can always be fixed with authentic period parts and a correct paint-scheme. Mine was painted black with the all lugs highlighted in scarlet red (its very faded but original, unrestored colours).

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WyvernRH
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Postby WyvernRH » Fri Jul 11, 2008 10:47 am

feelthewheel wrote:Hello goulash
If you do indeed have a pre-Malvern Star takeover Austral it should have the following defining characteristic - both front head-tube lugs should have a cut-out of a map of Australia (no Tasmania), as well as the fork crowns.

If it does, then you've indeed hit the jackpot!
Regards
Feelthewheel
Hmm, When did the takeover happen? As I said I have a fully brazed up men's Austral (repainted in vivid colours :) )
which has the maps in both head lugs and both sides of the fork crown but it looks very 50's (or later) to me - I thought this was long after the Malvern Star takeover.

Richard

feelthewheel
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Postby feelthewheel » Wed Jul 16, 2008 8:52 am

G'day WyvernRH
Sorry about the delayed reply. Research indicates that Austral was absorbed into Malvern Star in 1933 (plenty of other firms went the same way, Bruce Small was voracious in gobbling up competitors). After that it was merely an in-house name for them. Hope this information is useful.
Regards, feelthewheel

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WyvernRH
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Postby WyvernRH » Thu Jul 17, 2008 8:06 pm

feelthewheel wrote:G'day WyvernRH
Sorry about the delayed reply. Research indicates that Austral was absorbed into Malvern Star in 1933 (plenty of other firms went the same way, Bruce Small was voracious in gobbling up competitors). After that it was merely an in-house name for them. Hope this information is useful.
Regards, feelthewheel
Thank you, that's very useful info. Since the last mail I remembered I had two more Austral frames that live in the other garage, one mans frame and one ladies both with the crappy Dulux paintjob :? Both have all the maps but these two are definately roadsters or possibly early sports bikes as they have bolted up rear ends. The ladies frame has BSA cranks and chainring.
I know I'm probably asking for the moon here :) but does anybody know a frame number sequence that might date any of my three. Do the Malvern Star Australs follow the (assumed) Malvern Star number sequence?

Also for my own personal edification, does anybody have a list of the other makes that Bruce Small aquired and sold?

Cheers
Richard

elk
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby elk » Fri Jan 06, 2012 3:04 pm

A recent pick up is this Austral . It was given a makeover by Cecil Walker around the early 50's judging by the parts it now has .

Universal brakes , prior pedals , Maxim Luxe hubs and alloy rims stamped ''Made in Italy '' . Unfortunately the rims have deep fatigue cracks in several places . All the parts are scruffy as is the paint but I plan to just clean it up and replace the bearings and rims . Eventually I may repaint it as an Austral but it has an interesting feature that I'd regret sanding off .
It's covered in ladies names . I've counted more than twenty and there are more that are illegible . Eyvonne must have been extra cute as she's mentioned twice . Was this a trend back in the day or was this rider in a world of his own ? Any ideas ?

I'll have to settle for some new alloys but will retain all the other parts .

Image
Image
Image
Image

elk
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby elk » Wed Jan 23, 2013 4:09 pm

G'day . I've developed an itch to repaint the bike in the previous post . The trouble is that I need some decals . Not much use doing a respray if I don't know what the original looked like . Any help with images of early decals would be appreciated . The serial number is 8309 .

tedsbikes
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby tedsbikes » Thu Jan 24, 2013 9:02 am

elk wrote:G'day . I've developed an itch to repaint the bike in the previous post . The trouble is that I need some decals . Not much use doing a respray if I don't know what the original looked like . Any help with images of early decals would be appreciated . The serial number is 8309 .
Maybe this will help http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/RARE-VINTAGE ... 460bf88720" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Cheers Ted

elk
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby elk » Thu Jan 24, 2013 5:35 pm

Thanks Ted
I've contacted the seller . Hopefully we can work something out .

Tinker
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby Tinker » Wed Jan 22, 2014 10:19 pm

I thought i'd bump this rather than start a new thread.

My two friends and myself all have an Austral bike each that we are looking to restore in the near future. The trouble is there's not much out there in regards to this Australian bike company of yester year.

What i'm trying to do is gather all I can in regards to the old Australs and put together some kind of online resource page for other people to reference when in comes to their bikes.

If anyone else has any pictures, serial numbers, ephemera etc of their Australs I'd love to try and start to pool all of that together to create the above resource page.

So if you have anything you'd like to contribute please post it in this thread or feel free to PM if you'd prefer to email it through privately.

If you have an Austral bike I'd love to see pics of it!

Hopefully enough can be compiled to allow others in the future to have something to work off on their Austral rebuilds.

SPARKYDAVE
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby SPARKYDAVE » Fri Jun 20, 2014 6:58 am

HERE HI ALL I JUST FOUND A GENTS AUSTRAL BIKE AND A LADIES BULLOCK BIKE .ANY KNOW HOW TO CLEAN PAINT AND CHROME. ALSO HOW TO TELL HOW OLD THEY ARE AND ARE THEY MUCH RESTORED . I WILL TRY TO PUT PHOTOS UP THANKS DAVE.

Tinker
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby Tinker » Fri Jun 20, 2014 2:05 pm

Hi Dave, PM sent in regards to the Austral.

SPARKYDAVE
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby SPARKYDAVE » Fri Jun 20, 2014 2:16 pm

HI TINKER WHAT IS BEST WAY OF UPLOADING PICTURES ON HERE THANKS DAVE

Tinker
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby Tinker » Fri Jun 20, 2014 3:06 pm

You can put them up by using something like tinypic to host them for you. http://tinypic.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; or any other image hosting site.

Or check you private messages and I might be able to help you date the Austral.

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Miguel_au
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby Miguel_au » Fri Jun 20, 2014 8:49 pm

i have a old ladies Austral with the maps and BSA cranks, Perry rear hub. The number on the seat post is 4M 26358, it has the British Made bottom bracket, there is also a number there as well, but not hit in as hard as the other one o or 6R2 or z3 V 13.

This bike was in a garden as a decoration, I have almost finished painting it, it is looking better.

Tinker
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby Tinker » Fri Jun 20, 2014 10:08 pm

Miguel_au wrote:i have a old ladies Austral with the maps and BSA cranks, Perry rear hub. The number on the seat post is 4M 26358, it has the British Made bottom bracket, there is also a number there as well, but not hit in as hard as the other one o or 6R2 or z3 V 13.

This bike was in a garden as a decoration, I have almost finished painting it, it is looking better.
Sounds like you have a Malvern Star made Austral bike built in Melbourne. Going by the seat post serial # its from around 1944.

Did it have any of the original decals left on it?

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Miguel_au
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby Miguel_au » Sat Jun 21, 2014 8:12 am

Thanks Tinker, no decals. It had been Duluxed at some stage, that probably stopped it saved it from rusting away when being used as a pot plant holder.

SPARKYDAVE
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Re: Austral bikes

Postby SPARKYDAVE » Sat Jun 21, 2014 9:41 pm

hi back again with austral pics and bullock pics .hope this helps anyone thanks dave. http://feed3.tinypic.com/rss.php?u=uZQT ... Wjmw%3D%3D" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

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