Dr Alex Moulton
Dan Farrell BSc(Hons) MTech CEng FIED looks back over the life of Dr Alex Moulton CBE, documenting his many innovations and his lasting legacy to engineering.
If asked to name Alex Moulton’s greatest innovation, one could describe the answer as ‘too close to call’. On one side we have his eponymous small-wheeled, full-suspension bicycle – still in manufacture and a great export success 50 years after its launch – attracting tributes from the likes of Lord Foster and Sir James Dyson, as well as discerning cyclists worldwide. On the other, one could cite the Moulton rubber and gas-sprung suspension units, cone, and the interconnected Hydrolastic and Hydragas systems, which were to be found under all four corners of more than 12 million British cars from the 1959 Mini to the 2003 MGF. One could also argue for the Moulton double-bogie coach that offered unparalleled ride comfort and safety but, despite several joint ventures, never saw series production.
There is less doubt over the period of his life when his work was most prolific. During the closing months of 1962, with the rubber cone spring firmly established and well-proven on the Mini, Moulton’s fluid-interconnected ‘Hydrolastic’ suspension was introduced on the new Austin 1100 to universal acclaim. Scarcely six weeks later, the Moulton bicycle received an overwhelming response when launched at the Earl’s Court Cycle Show. Moulton’s marketing manager, David Duffield, later commented that “we had to beat them off with sticks – at the show we were desperately short of manpower and we had to enlist friends, relations and anybody else to help us”. Alex Moulton became a public figure overnight as journalists from
all fields penned articles about the ground- breaking Moulton products and interviews with the man himself appeared in newspapers, magazines and on the television. On 9 December, racing cyclist John Woodburn broke the Cardiff-London speed record, at a stroke establishing the reputation of the new bicycle. At the time, Moulton Developments was a small organisation based in the stable block and carriage works in the grounds of Alex Moulton’s Jacobean mansion, The Hall. Thanks to the success of the Moulton bicycle and Hydrolastic suspension, the scale of business was to change dramatically by the end of the year.
Moulton was born in Stratford-upon-Avon in 1920, youngest child of John and Beryl Moulton; great-grandson of Stephen Moulton. Stephen was a friend of Charles Goodyear, and following Goodyear’s discovery of the rubber vulcanisation process, he returned to England with this knowledge and established a rubber works – Stephen Moulton & Co – in Bradford on Avon, Wiltshire. Having formed a strategic alliance with George Spencer & Co (eventually merging into George Spencer, Moulton & Co – ‘Spencer Moulton’ in 1892), Moulton became famous for the supply of rubber springs for railway buffers and draw-bars as well as carriage interconnects, hoses, etc to rail companies worldwide.
Alex Moulton’s education was interrupted by World War Two. A mechanical sciences undergraduate at King’s College Cambridge
Moulton, with characteristic conviction, built a bicycle factory in the grounds of The Hall and launched the Moulton bicycle in November 1962.
when war broke out, he started work as an assistant tester at Bristol Aeroplane in Patchway whilst waiting to be called up. His talents in engineering were soon noticed, and he was promoted to junior technical assistant in June 1940. Following a devastating air raid in the September, Alex was thrust into the position of Roy Fedden’s assistant on the Centaurus engine – Adrian Squires having been killed by enemy action. In a reserved occupation, he felt some guilt at not fighting the war in the skies over Britain, but he knew that those brave pilots looked to the engineers at Bristol for continuous improvement in their aeroplanes.
In 1945, Alex returned to Bradford on Avon, 1981. Alex Moulton in his study at The Hall.
1947 in a Stanley steam car. 23
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