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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hercules is a brand of bicycle and motorcycle that was manufactured in Germany.
The Hercules Company was founded in 1886[1] to produce bicycles[2] by Carl Marschütz in Nuremberg, Germany[3] and began producing motorcycles in 1904. It was merged with Zweirad Union after being purchased by ZF Sachs in 1963.[4]
In the 1950s and 1960s Sachs was the largest European fabricator of two-stroke engines for motorcycles.[5] Many of these engines were used in the Hercules line of small motorcycles, scooters and mopeds.
In 1974, Hercules became the first company to offer a Wankel engine powered motorcycle for sale to the general public. A prototype was first shown in 1970 at the West Cologne Autumn Motorcycle Show to a mixed reception and the production bike was sold as a Hercules product except in the United Kingdom, where it was marketed as a DKW motorcycle. The W-2000 had a single-rotor air-cooled engine of 294cc displacement that produced 23 hp, later increased to 32 hp. Cooling was by a large fan placed in front of the engine (and the slipstream breeze while riding) and engine lubrication was by manually adding oil to the fuel in the tank.[6]
In 1976 Hercules launched the W-2000 Injection in which engine lubrication was from a separate oil tank via a pump. It had 18-inch wheels, a front disc brake and a rear drum brake. According to a March 1976 review in Cycle World, the handling was good but the bike's low ground clearance limited its cornering ability. That review also declared the W-2000 to be a daily commuting bike, not a sport motorcycle.[6]
In May 1975, Hercules introduced a rotary-powered dirt bike, the KC-30 GS Enduro. The model failed to sell due to a high price of $2,900.[6]
The Fichtel & Sachs single-rotor engine of 300 cc swept-volume as used in the Hercules, the only commercially available engine then, was used as a basis by Birmingham Small Arms Company's (BSA) project engineer David Garside in the early 1970s when designing a twin-rotor motorcycle engine of 588 cc, which reached production as the "Norton Classic".[7]
In 1996, Hercules ended motorcycle production.
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