Brough Superior SS100 – Modern with Spirit of the Marque

Brough Superior SS100  from Relaunched Classic Brand

Mark Upham, the proprietor of British Only, an Austrian classic spare British motorcycle parts company, has owned the Brough Superior marque since 2008, and has been building brand new examples of the iconic 1920s-1930s SS100 model.

Now, Upham has decided to relaunch Brough Superior with a modern range of high-performance, high-quality, and inevitably high-priced models costing €50,000, and employing advanced technology, high-class materials, and radical design.

“It happened almost accidentally,” Upham says of the decision. “I’d been invited to America in 2007 to be a judge at the Legend of the Motorcycle [International] Concours d’Elegance at Half Moon Bay in California. Bonhams were going to auction the rights to the Brough Superior marque in their sale there, but in the end it was withdrawn due to trademark issues in the USA. But, that gave me the green light to go after it, and after 11 months of negotiation we bought the company from the Card family in England to save it from whatever fate it might have had in the hands of other people.

“In 2009, I went around England to find out the possibilities of being able to produce a new Brough Superior motorcycle in the UK, but I went up so many blind alleys it was very disappointing. I managed to find every single way not to be able to design and make it in England!

“But, in July 2013, you [the author] introduced me to iconic French designer Thierry Henriette [owner of Boxer Design in Toulouse], which was very fortunate, because I am a bit of a Francophile. At the time I met Thierry, I had a house in France, as well as in Austria. There was an immediate spark when we met each other, and of course it helped that he already knew Brough Superior and admired the brand, which not everyone outside Britain might do without being keen on vintage bikes. So, we forged an agreement whereby he would design and create a modern-day motorcycle which in my opinion completely embodies the spirit of the marque.”

The SS100 is powered by a specially developed liquid- cooled 88-degree V-twin engine produced to Boxer’s design by Akira Technologies in Bayonne, France—builders of the Kawasaki Ninja ZX-10R motors which powered Tom Sykes to the 2013 World Superbike Championship crown, as well as his teammate Jonathan Rea’s blistering domination of the WSBK series in 2015.

Upham had intended to use an air-cooled motor for the new SS100, but was persuaded otherwise. “I had my own vision of how I thought it should be done,” Upham admits, “but I now understand why it can’t be done like that. One of the things I was hoping for was air-cooling, but I realize now that’s not possible for homologation today.”

“I think George Brough would be very pleased to see the diligence and air that’s been invested in creating something that speaks to his design ethos. Many people aren’t aware that one of his last prototypes was a 90-degree V-twin with his own engine–30 years before Ducati! The first design that Thierry showed to me just clicked—one of George Brough’s last bikes was a 90-degree V-twin, and this is 88 degrees.

“George Brough tried to get Brough Superior going again after the war, and one of the things he did was to go to Bonneville in 1948, though sadly without success. Six decades later, we went there and set some records, so we’ve just taken up where George Brough left off in continuing the history of Brough Superior.