LEO KUZMICKI REVEALED

Finally!  Reader John Hall discovered a photo of Polish engineer Leo Kuzmicki (pronounced, if I remember my Polish, Kootsmitsky), an unsung hero in the history of the Norton Manx, Vanwall F1 car, and Hillman Imp.  The photograph was found on an Imp fan site, and discusses a bit Kuzmicki's development of the Coventry Climax engine, which was originally an iron four-cylinder pushrod motor used to power fire pumps, then re-purposed in the late 1950s for the first Lotus cars such as the Elite (one of the prettiest cars ever made, methinks).

The Imp engine became an overhead-camshaft, all-alloy unit of 875cc, which had to be shoehorned at a 45º angle to fit into the pre-existing Imp body.  The radiator was slotted beside the engine, at the rear of the car.  Kuzmicki's Imp engine was beloved by speed tuners of cars and racing sidecars, as it was very well engineered and strong, and light at 170lbs including carbs, alternator, etc.  It was considered the smoothest production four-cylinder engine of it's day and for many years after production ceased.

Below is a photo of the man himself beside the Imp unit:

LEO KUZMICKI REVEALED

Finally!  Reader John Hall discovered a photo of Polish engineer Leo Kuzmicki (pronounced, if I remember my Polish, Kootsmitsky), an unsung hero in the history of the Norton Manx, Vanwall F1 car, and Hillman Imp.  The photograph was found on an Imp fan site, and discusses a bit Kuzmicki's development of the Coventry Climax engine, which was originally an iron four-cylinder pushrod motor used to power fire pumps, then re-purposed in the late 1950s for the first Lotus cars such as the Elite (one of the prettiest cars ever made, methinks).

The Imp engine became an overhead-camshaft, all-alloy unit of 875cc, which had to be shoehorned at a 45º angle to fit into the pre-existing Imp body.  The radiator was slotted beside the engine, at the rear of the car.  Kuzmicki's Imp engine was beloved by speed tuners of cars and racing sidecars, as it was very well engineered and strong, and light at 170lbs including carbs, alternator, etc.  It was considered the smoothest production four-cylinder engine of it's day and for many years after production ceased.

Below is a photo of the man himself beside the Imp unit:

HARRY WESLAKE AND SWIRL

While Leo Kusmicki utilized the 'Squish' combustion chamber to great effect on the Norton Manx in 1950, the theories behind his work were certainly well-known in theoretical engineering circles. He was in fact breaking no new ground technically, but had a knack as an engineer of putting the theory he taught at the University of Warsaw into effective practice - a rare quality in an academic.

Tugging at this thread of engine development, we bump into two Giants of combustion theory who also had the capability of translating research into devastatingly fast motorcycles and cars. Kusmicki's 'uncle' in this regard must be Harry Weslake (above and below, behind riders), who began his career tuning motorcycle engines for Brooklands racers, using the theories of Sir Harry Ricardo, who we'll meet later.

Harry Weslake was a child (b.1897) of relative privilege whose father was the director of Willey&Co., manufacturers of gas meters. As a young man, he became obsessed with motorcycles and adept at riding and modifying them. His first mount at 16 was a Rudge which he set about improving for competition in his local Exeter hillclimbs, by fitting an NSU two-speed gear hub to the crankshaft (below). Thus, his appearances at competitions often resulted in embarrassment to older and more experienced riders. Weslake became notorious for his fast riding style, and should be considered certainly a Veteran Café Racer!

The Rudge used a unique carburetor, the 'Senspray', which had several good ideas, but required the constant manipulation of two levers to give good performance. Harry's first patent in 1914 was an improvement on the Senspray principles, and led to his production of the 'Wex' (Weslake EXeter - see below) carburetor after WW1.

The Wex was certainly one of the best performing carbs available in the late 'Teens, requiring only a single lever to operate, and gave significantly better fuel economy with a cleaner gas flow, which also happened to boost power. Soon the Wex could be seen on all sorts of competition machinery, including Sunbeams, Brough Superiors, and Zeniths. George Brough (below, with 'Spit and Polish', which used a Wex carb - note Harry behind GB), in his usual effort to have that something 'extra special' from his parts suppliers, insisted at one point that Weslake personally road test SS100s fitted with the Wex carb, to see for himself how the machines performed.

Gordon Cobbold, a die-hard Sunbeam racer in the early 1920s, pulled Weslake into the world of track racing at Brooklands, asking Harry to tune his engines and sponsor his machines to retain Cobbold's amateur status. Weslake quickly became an indispensable figure for serious racers, and plenty of Vintage-era photographs from that hallowed track show him standing behind a victorious motorcycle which used a Wex carb. In short order, John Marston, owner of the Sunbeam factory, contracted with Weslake to tune their competition engines. In 1923 he was given three 500cc OHV Sunbeam engines to tune, and while externally identical, he found their power output varied by almost 20%. After giving some thought to the matter, he decided to investigate what must be a logical reason for these differences. Previously (and for many years to come actually) factories tested their supposedly identical production engines, sending the best ones to the competition shop, the worst to their 'cooking' road models, without ever investigating systematically the reasons why such variation should occur.

And this is where the family business comes in; remembering the testing facilities at Willey&Co which measured the volume of gas metered by coin-slot pay devices, Weslake reckoned that it would be very useful to measure the volume of fuel-air mix which passed through his motorcycle cylinder heads, to see if there was any correlation between the volume of gas passed and their power output. [And for my US readers; in England it is common to pay for your cooking/heating gas via a coin meter on your gas line... no meter readers or mailed-in bills; if you don't pay, you have no gas!]

Weslake quickly found a positive correlation between the 'good' and 'bad' Sunbeam cylinder heads, and how efficiently they moved a given volume of gas. His hastily set-up test rig (see above) soon saw considerable action testing other cylinder heads, and remained in continuous usage right into WW2. The Sunbeams he tuned using gas-flow tests were shortly gaining plenty of Brooklands 'Gold Stars' (for laps at over 100mph during a race), and winning TTs and GPs across Europe. Weslake experimented endlessly with shaping inlet and exhaust ports, and within a short time was the foremost expert on cylinder head tuning in the world.

Such talents do not go unnoticed, and Weslake was soon approached by W.O. Bentley himself to 'see what he could do' with some troublesome engines. His results were so spectacular, regularly gaining 20%-40% power increases, that Bentley too used his services to tune their racing 4.5liter and 6.5 liter engines. Thus, in 1929, four Bentley engines which were Weslake-tuned gained the first four places at the LeMans race, and won again in 1930. His services were soon in demand for designing cylinder heads for various automotive manufacturers, including A.J.S., Austin, Wolseley, and S.S. (later Jaguar).

Weslake kept his hand in motorcycle development as well, and in the late 1930s encountered Joe Craig of Norton at an Earl's Court Motorcycle Show. These two no-nonsense gents took an immediate and intense dislike for one another when Craig, notorious for his biting sarcasm, made a 'remark' to Weslake about his prowess with automotive tuning. Whereupon Weslake proceeded to relate all the relevant tuning details - cam timing, inlet bore, valve size, compression ration - of a new Works racing Norton sitting beside them on a plinth, after only a quick exterior observation. Craig was visibly shaken that the tuning 'secrets' of his unbeatable racer were so easily summarized, and despite their personal animosity, Craig hired Weslake in the late 1940s to help improve gas flow characteristics in the Manx engine, which included reshaping the inlet and exhaust ports, and improving the turbulence of the fuel/air mix into the combustion chamber. At this point, Weslake must have worked with Leo Kusmicki on the development of the new 'Squish' engine for the 1950 Manx. Their methods differed, and Kusmicki, the former academic, knew that Weslake's 'testing rig' should theoretically be unnecessary, since gas flow characteristics could be calculated mathematically. Of course he was correct, but a computer had yet to be invented which could provide results as quickly as Weslake's experienced hand at port-shaping. That 'John Henry' moment would not come until the late 1980s!

Kusmicki and Weslake worked in parallel again on the Vanwall racing project (with Sterling Moss, above). Tony Vandervell knew Weslake since the 1930s, as Vandervell had been one of the Brooklands 'boys', racing (of course) a Norton at the track with good results. Thus, when the Vanwall F1 team was formed, Weslake was hired to modify their Ferrari cylinder heads. When Tony Vandervell hired Kusmicki to design a British engine for the Vanwall, Weslake was on hand to help shape ports and look after cylinder head design. In a curious side note, while Vandervell was a Board member at Nortons, he 'took' Kusmicki's design for the four-cylinder, watercooled DOHC racing 500cc Norton engine with him when he left the Board, during the A.M.C. takeover of Norton in 1955. This design was expanded and used in one of Vanwall F1 cars.... so in effect, the legendary 4-cyl Norton engine WAS built, only in a 2.5 liter form.

Weslake's accomplishments in the motorcycle and automotive industries are simply too numerous to mention, and range from LeMans-winning D-type Jaguars to Gurney-Weslake GP cars, and special engines for the Weslake-Metisse racer (below), with four-valve cylinder heads (above), which became popular tuning accessories for Triumph twins (and was the basis of the Triumph 8-valve TSS model). Not to mention the Weslake speedway motorcycle which took several World Speedway Championships in the 1970s.

I cannot recommend highly enough the Jeff Clew biography of Harry Weslake, 'Lucky All My Life' (Foulis, 1979), from which much of this information is taken. In my opinion, this work is Clew's masterpiece; completely readable and compelling from start to finish, sufficiently technical to satisfy the connoisseur, with a personal narrative fascinating enough to read in one sitting. Which I've done four times.

HARRY WESLAKE AND SWIRL

While Leo Kusmicki utilized the 'Squish' combustion chamber to great effect on the Norton Manx in 1950, the theories behind his work were certainly well-known in theoretical engineering circles. He was in fact breaking no new ground technically, but had a knack as an engineer of putting the theory he taught at the University of Warsaw into effective practice - a rare quality in an academic.

Tugging at this thread of engine development, we bump into two Giants of combustion theory who also had the capability of translating research into devastatingly fast motorcycles and cars. Kusmicki's 'uncle' in this regard must be Harry Weslake (above and below, behind riders), who began his career tuning motorcycle engines for Brooklands racers, using the theories of Sir Harry Ricardo, who we'll meet later.

Harry Weslake was a child (b.1897) of relative privilege whose father was the director of Willey&Co., manufacturers of gas meters. As a young man, he became obsessed with motorcycles and adept at riding and modifying them. His first mount at 16 was a Rudge which he set about improving for competition in his local Exeter hillclimbs, by fitting an NSU two-speed gear hub to the crankshaft (below). Thus, his appearances at competitions often resulted in embarrassment to older and more experienced riders. Weslake became notorious for his fast riding style, and should be considered certainly a Veteran Café Racer!

The Rudge used a unique carburetor, the 'Senspray', which had several good ideas, but required the constant manipulation of two levers to give good performance. Harry's first patent in 1914 was an improvement on the Senspray principles, and led to his production of the 'Wex' (Weslake EXeter - see below) carburetor after WW1.

The Wex was certainly one of the best performing carbs available in the late 'Teens, requiring only a single lever to operate, and gave significantly better fuel economy with a cleaner gas flow, which also happened to boost power. Soon the Wex could be seen on all sorts of competition machinery, including Sunbeams, Brough Superiors, and Zeniths. George Brough (below, with 'Spit and Polish', which used a Wex carb - note Harry behind GB), in his usual effort to have that something 'extra special' from his parts suppliers, insisted at one point that Weslake personally road test SS100s fitted with the Wex carb, to see for himself how the machines performed.

Gordon Cobbold, a die-hard Sunbeam racer in the early 1920s, pulled Weslake into the world of track racing at Brooklands, asking Harry to tune his engines and sponsor his machines to retain Cobbold's amateur status. Weslake quickly became an indispensable figure for serious racers, and plenty of Vintage-era photographs from that hallowed track show him standing behind a victorious motorcycle which used a Wex carb. In short order, John Marston, owner of the Sunbeam factory, contracted with Weslake to tune their competition engines. In 1923 he was given three 500cc OHV Sunbeam engines to tune, and while externally identical, he found their power output varied by almost 20%. After giving some thought to the matter, he decided to investigate what must be a logical reason for these differences. Previously (and for many years to come actually) factories tested their supposedly identical production engines, sending the best ones to the competition shop, the worst to their 'cooking' road models, without ever investigating systematically the reasons why such variation should occur.

And this is where the family business comes in; remembering the testing facilities at Willey&Co which measured the volume of gas metered by coin-slot pay devices, Weslake reckoned that it would be very useful to measure the volume of fuel-air mix which passed through his motorcycle cylinder heads, to see if there was any correlation between the volume of gas passed and their power output. [And for my US readers; in England it is common to pay for your cooking/heating gas via a coin meter on your gas line... no meter readers or mailed-in bills; if you don't pay, you have no gas!]

Weslake quickly found a positive correlation between the 'good' and 'bad' Sunbeam cylinder heads, and how efficiently they moved a given volume of gas. His hastily set-up test rig (see above) soon saw considerable action testing other cylinder heads, and remained in continuous usage right into WW2. The Sunbeams he tuned using gas-flow tests were shortly gaining plenty of Brooklands 'Gold Stars' (for laps at over 100mph during a race), and winning TTs and GPs across Europe. Weslake experimented endlessly with shaping inlet and exhaust ports, and within a short time was the foremost expert on cylinder head tuning in the world.

Such talents do not go unnoticed, and Weslake was soon approached by W.O. Bentley himself to 'see what he could do' with some troublesome engines. His results were so spectacular, regularly gaining 20%-40% power increases, that Bentley too used his services to tune their racing 4.5liter and 6.5 liter engines. Thus, in 1929, four Bentley engines which were Weslake-tuned gained the first four places at the LeMans race, and won again in 1930. His services were soon in demand for designing cylinder heads for various automotive manufacturers, including A.J.S., Austin, Wolseley, and S.S. (later Jaguar).

Weslake kept his hand in motorcycle development as well, and in the late 1930s encountered Joe Craig of Norton at an Earl's Court Motorcycle Show. These two no-nonsense gents took an immediate and intense dislike for one another when Craig, notorious for his biting sarcasm, made a 'remark' to Weslake about his prowess with automotive tuning. Whereupon Weslake proceeded to relate all the relevant tuning details - cam timing, inlet bore, valve size, compression ration - of a new Works racing Norton sitting beside them on a plinth, after only a quick exterior observation. Craig was visibly shaken that the tuning 'secrets' of his unbeatable racer were so easily summarized, and despite their personal animosity, Craig hired Weslake in the late 1940s to help improve gas flow characteristics in the Manx engine, which included reshaping the inlet and exhaust ports, and improving the turbulence of the fuel/air mix into the combustion chamber. At this point, Weslake must have worked with Leo Kusmicki on the development of the new 'Squish' engine for the 1950 Manx. Their methods differed, and Kusmicki, the former academic, knew that Weslake's 'testing rig' should theoretically be unnecessary, since gas flow characteristics could be calculated mathematically. Of course he was correct, but a computer had yet to be invented which could provide results as quickly as Weslake's experienced hand at port-shaping. That 'John Henry' moment would not come until the late 1980s!

Kusmicki and Weslake worked in parallel again on the Vanwall racing project (with Sterling Moss, above). Tony Vandervell knew Weslake since the 1930s, as Vandervell had been one of the Brooklands 'boys', racing (of course) a Norton at the track with good results. Thus, when the Vanwall F1 team was formed, Weslake was hired to modify their Ferrari cylinder heads. When Tony Vandervell hired Kusmicki to design a British engine for the Vanwall, Weslake was on hand to help shape ports and look after cylinder head design. In a curious side note, while Vandervell was a Board member at Nortons, he 'took' Kusmicki's design for the four-cylinder, watercooled DOHC racing 500cc Norton engine with him when he left the Board, during the A.M.C. takeover of Norton in 1955. This design was expanded and used in one of Vanwall F1 cars.... so in effect, the legendary 4-cyl Norton engine WAS built, only in a 2.5 liter form.

Weslake's accomplishments in the motorcycle and automotive industries are simply too numerous to mention, and range from LeMans-winning D-type Jaguars to Gurney-Weslake GP cars, and special engines for the Weslake-Metisse racer (below), with four-valve cylinder heads (above), which became popular tuning accessories for Triumph twins (and was the basis of the Triumph 8-valve TSS model). Not to mention the Weslake speedway motorcycle which took several World Speedway Championships in the 1970s.

I cannot recommend highly enough the Jeff Clew biography of Harry Weslake, 'Lucky All My Life' (Foulis, 1979), from which much of this information is taken. In my opinion, this work is Clew's masterpiece; completely readable and compelling from start to finish, sufficiently technical to satisfy the connoisseur, with a personal narrative fascinating enough to read in one sitting. Which I've done four times.

LEO KUSMICKI AND THE NORTON SQUISH

Research into the history of VMT816RC inevitably brought up the question - where did Norton get the idea for a 'Squish' combustion chamber, from which Veloce gained their own Production TT victory in 1967?

The answer, in Norton's case, was a Polish engineer by the name of Leo Kusmicki (1911-82), who, the story goes, began to make suggestions to Joe Craig, legendary race boss at Norton, about how he might improve the performance of the aging 'Manx' OHC engine. In the 1940s Kusmicki was employed by the Norton factory as a 'sanitary' engineer, i.e., a janitor! Who was this broom-pusher to tell the indomitable Mr. Craig how to make his engines faster?

The story of Leo Kusmicki, like so many invisible heroes, has never been fully told; a web search reveals no photographs, only a few parroted mentions of the high points of his life. Undoubtedly his lack of renown suited his character, for he made no pains to publicize the contributions he made to the English motorcycle and Automotive industry from the 1940s through the 70s. From what little is published, we know that Kusmicki was a lecturer at Warsaw University in the late 1930s, specializing in internal combustion theory. He must have also been a pilot, if not yet in the Polish Air Force, then as a private citizen, for he managed to escape the two-sided attack on Poland in September 1939 from Germany and the Soviet Union, and make his way to England.

A sidebar here on some WW2 history; it's often repeated that Poland fell 'in a day' to the oncoming German Blitzkreig, with images of Polish horse-mounted cavalry facing Panzer tanks to their doom. The truth is more fierce - the Poles fought like demons against an invader with vastly superior forces and armaments, and managed to wipe out fully 30% of German heavy artillery, 285 of their planes, and 16,000 troops. About 66,000 Poles were killed, with almost 700,000 captured; lopsided yes, but Hitler was shocked at his losses. Josef Goebbels, Nazi Minister of Propaganda, spun stories about a 'walk through' victory in the East which resonate to this day, as do many other of his highly effective fabrications - the man was good at his job. Other forgotten tidbits; three Polish mathematicians, just weeks before the invasion, cracked the German 'Enigma' encryption code, and managed to smuggle the information to England via France which greatly eased intelligence during the War.

The Polish Air Force, in common with much of its military, managed to escape through Hungary to France, just in time for Germany's invasion of that country. Kusmicki would have had been a hardened veteran pilot by the time the Polish military-in-exile escaped to Britain after the fall of France, officially establishing themselves in June 1940 on English soil. The Polish Air Force became legendary during the Battle of Britain for their effectiveness (using English planes - Spitfires and Hurricanes), and Squadron 303, named after Polish-American hero Gen. Tadeusz Kosciuszko, had twice the 'kill' rate of the R.A.F., as they had already been fighting the Luftwaffe for a year and were successful tacticians.

By the time the War was over in 1945, Kusmicki had been fighting for 6 years on foreign soil, in the branch of the military with the highest casualty rate, with his homeland occupied first by Germany, then post-War by the Soviet Union; there was no going home. After such an experience, is it any wonder he took refuge sweeping floors at Norton Motors?

Which is where Joe Craig discovered a secret asset already within his building, who extended the useful racing life of the beloved Manx for another ten years. The revelation of Kusmicki's deep proficiency in combustion chamber theory came inauspiciously, with an upbraiding! Charlie Edwards, a Norton race shop employee, remembers (vide Mick Woolett's 'Norton' - sadly out of print):

"When I came in one morning he [Kusmicki] was sweeping the experimental department and we got talking. It was soon obvious this man was no ordinary sweeper-up and we were chatting away when Joe Craig came in. He was like a bear with a sore head most mornings and he gave Leo a right dressing-down for standing talking and not getting on with it - and then I got one! But I told Joe that this guy might be able to help, and that he should have a talk with him. Well, it wasn't long before Leo was in the drawing office and in my opinion it was he who vastly improved first the 500 then the 350, He was brilliant on cam profiles, combustion chamber shapes, valve timing, porting - the lot."

The 'Model 30' racing engine had changed little from its Arthur Carroll revamp in 1929; Joe Craig (above), while a very determined and canny race team manager for Norton, was certainly no engineer, and developed his engines on a 'suck it and see' basis, rather than from first principles or theoretical research. Thus, to have an expert in engine theory land literally inside his office was something of a miracle... one for which he showed no gratitude publicly, but such was his manner. He was a hard man, had been a successful motorcycle racer in the 1920s, and followed this with nearly 25 years at the helm of the Norton race team, which had possibly the greatest run of success in International level racing, with the least financial support! Under his helm Norton won 9 World Championships, 27 TTs, and countless GPs.

The principal change Kusmicki made to the Manx engine for 1950 was to create a 'Squish' combustion chamber, although a host of modifications were made to the engine and chassis that year, including the introduction of the Featherbed frame. His efforts on the engine raised power by 20%, from 30hp to 36hp on the 350cc engine. The totally redesigned Manx made its début in the hands of young star Geoff Duke that April, where he smashed race and lap records, a situation repeated at the Senior TT that year, where Duke's race average bettered the previous lap record at over 92mph. Much praise was given to the McCandless brothers' new frame design, and Joe Craig was publicly praised as 'the Maestro of Poke'... although of course, no mention was made of the quiet Pole who had completely revised the Norton racer. But, Geoff Duke (above) certainly knew the score, saying in the 1980s, "After the way he [Kusmicki] transformed the singles, particularly the 350cc, I had great respect for him." (vide Woollett).

Kusmicki continued to develop the Manx for a few years, and was heavily involved in the design of a four-cyliner DOHC Norton racer, but funds for racing grew short worldwide by the mid-1950s, and the Norton race shop was shut down Such talent, even if unsung, does not go unnoticed, and Tony Vandervell, a major stockholder in Norton Motors Ltd, had a passion for Formula 1 car racing. His father, Cornelius Vandervell had purchased a large quantity of Norton stock back in the 1920s (the C.E.V. magnetos which graced Norton motorcycles in the mid-20s were C.E.Vandervell's product, and while technically inferior to an M.L. or Lucas magneto of the day, it took a few years before C.E.V.s disappeared from Norton 'original equipment'). The Vandervell family made a fortune with 'Thinwall' bearings (ie, bearing shells with special soft metal linings for high-pressure oiling systems), and around 1950, coincident with Kusmicki's contribution to Norton, the 'Vanwall' (VANdervell thinWALL) Formula 1 team was created, using modified Ferrari engines in Cooper chassis.

A new all-British F1 car was required, and Kusmicki laid out a 2.3liter engine in 1954 which was effectively four Manx engines on a common crankcase; similar to the extent of using four Amal GP motorcycle carburetors! The engine produced 235hp, which was certainly good enough to win races in 1955 when the car débuted, but the chassis was simply not up to snuff. In a move reminiscent of the McCandless brothers' new Featherbed chassis being mated to Kusmicki's revamped Norton engine in 1950, the services of a rising star in racing chassis design was hired to start from scratch on the Vanwall racer. Colin Chapman, later to gain fame for his Lotus cars, created a typically unorthodox and very rigid tube frame chassis, which allowed for much softer suspension and exceptional handling, the hallmark of Lotus racers to come. The Kusmicki/Chapman Vanwall became the first British car to win a GP series since the 1920s.

The Vanwall team began to wind down in the late 1950s due to Vandervell's health issues, and Kusmicki found work with the Rootes group, designing the OHC engine for the Hillman 'Imp', a late competitor to the Austin Mini. Of course, the Imp engine became a favorite with quite a few sidecar racers, and the wheel turned full circle again. In his later years, Kusmicki worked for Chrysler, and his star faded into obscurity. By the time of his death in 1982, few people realized the contribution he had made to Grand Prix World Championships on both two and four wheels - an engineer's version of John Surtees!

Next up: who invented the Squish?

LEO KUSMICKI AND THE NORTON SQUISH

Research into the history of VMT816RC inevitably brought up the question - where did Norton get the idea for a 'Squish' combustion chamber, from which Veloce gained their own Production TT victory in 1967?

The answer, in Norton's case, was a Polish engineer by the name of Leo Kusmicki (1911-82), who, the story goes, began to make suggestions to Joe Craig, legendary race boss at Norton, about how he might improve the performance of the aging 'Manx' OHC engine. In the 1940s Kusmicki was employed by the Norton factory as a 'sanitary' engineer, i.e., a janitor! Who was this broom-pusher to tell the indomitable Mr. Craig how to make his engines faster?

The story of Leo Kusmicki, like so many invisible heroes, has never been fully told; a web search reveals no photographs, only a few parroted mentions of the high points of his life. Undoubtedly his lack of renown suited his character, for he made no pains to publicize the contributions he made to the English motorcycle and Automotive industry from the 1940s through the 70s. From what little is published, we know that Kusmicki was a lecturer at Warsaw University in the late 1930s, specializing in internal combustion theory. He must have also been a pilot, if not yet in the Polish Air Force, then as a private citizen, for he managed to escape the two-sided attack on Poland in September 1939 from Germany and the Soviet Union, and make his way to England.

A sidebar here on some WW2 history; it's often repeated that Poland fell 'in a day' to the oncoming German Blitzkreig, with images of Polish horse-mounted cavalry facing Panzer tanks to their doom. The truth is more fierce - the Poles fought like demons against an invader with vastly superior forces and armaments, and managed to wipe out fully 30% of German heavy artillery, 285 of their planes, and 16,000 troops. About 66,000 Poles were killed, with almost 700,000 captured; lopsided yes, but Hitler was shocked at his losses. Josef Goebbels, Nazi Minister of Propaganda, spun stories about a 'walk through' victory in the East which resonate to this day, as do many other of his highly effective fabrications - the man was good at his job. Other forgotten tidbits; three Polish mathematicians, just weeks before the invasion, cracked the German 'Enigma' encryption code, and managed to smuggle the information to England via France which greatly eased intelligence during the War.

The Polish Air Force, in common with much of its military, managed to escape through Hungary to France, just in time for Germany's invasion of that country. Kusmicki would have had been a hardened veteran pilot by the time the Polish military-in-exile escaped to Britain after the fall of France, officially establishing themselves in June 1940 on English soil. The Polish Air Force became legendary during the Battle of Britain for their effectiveness (using English planes - Spitfires and Hurricanes), and Squadron 303, named after Polish-American hero Gen. Tadeusz Kosciuszko, had twice the 'kill' rate of the R.A.F., as they had already been fighting the Luftwaffe for a year and were successful tacticians.

By the time the War was over in 1945, Kusmicki had been fighting for 6 years on foreign soil, in the branch of the military with the highest casualty rate, with his homeland occupied first by Germany, then post-War by the Soviet Union; there was no going home. After such an experience, is it any wonder he took refuge sweeping floors at Norton Motors?

Which is where Joe Craig discovered a secret asset already within his building, who extended the useful racing life of the beloved Manx for another ten years. The revelation of Kusmicki's deep proficiency in combustion chamber theory came inauspiciously, with an upbraiding! Charlie Edwards, a Norton race shop employee, remembers (vide Mick Woolett's 'Norton' - sadly out of print):

"When I came in one morning he [Kusmicki] was sweeping the experimental department and we got talking. It was soon obvious this man was no ordinary sweeper-up and we were chatting away when Joe Craig came in. He was like a bear with a sore head most mornings and he gave Leo a right dressing-down for standing talking and not getting on with it - and then I got one! But I told Joe that this guy might be able to help, and that he should have a talk with him. Well, it wasn't long before Leo was in the drawing office and in my opinion it was he who vastly improved first the 500 then the 350, He was brilliant on cam profiles, combustion chamber shapes, valve timing, porting - the lot."

The 'Model 30' racing engine had changed little from its Arthur Carroll revamp in 1929; Joe Craig (above), while a very determined and canny race team manager for Norton, was certainly no engineer, and developed his engines on a 'suck it and see' basis, rather than from first principles or theoretical research. Thus, to have an expert in engine theory land literally inside his office was something of a miracle... one for which he showed no gratitude publicly, but such was his manner. He was a hard man, had been a successful motorcycle racer in the 1920s, and followed this with nearly 25 years at the helm of the Norton race team, which had possibly the greatest run of success in International level racing, with the least financial support! Under his helm Norton won 9 World Championships, 27 TTs, and countless GPs.

The principal change Kusmicki made to the Manx engine for 1950 was to create a 'Squish' combustion chamber, although a host of modifications were made to the engine and chassis that year, including the introduction of the Featherbed frame. His efforts on the engine raised power by 20%, from 30hp to 36hp on the 350cc engine. The totally redesigned Manx made its début in the hands of young star Geoff Duke that April, where he smashed race and lap records, a situation repeated at the Senior TT that year, where Duke's race average bettered the previous lap record at over 92mph. Much praise was given to the McCandless brothers' new frame design, and Joe Craig was publicly praised as 'the Maestro of Poke'... although of course, no mention was made of the quiet Pole who had completely revised the Norton racer. But, Geoff Duke (above) certainly knew the score, saying in the 1980s, "After the way he [Kusmicki] transformed the singles, particularly the 350cc, I had great respect for him." (vide Woollett).

Kusmicki continued to develop the Manx for a few years, and was heavily involved in the design of a four-cyliner DOHC Norton racer, but funds for racing grew short worldwide by the mid-1950s, and the Norton race shop was shut down Such talent, even if unsung, does not go unnoticed, and Tony Vandervell, a major stockholder in Norton Motors Ltd, had a passion for Formula 1 car racing. His father, Cornelius Vandervell had purchased a large quantity of Norton stock back in the 1920s (the C.E.V. magnetos which graced Norton motorcycles in the mid-20s were C.E.Vandervell's product, and while technically inferior to an M.L. or Lucas magneto of the day, it took a few years before C.E.V.s disappeared from Norton 'original equipment'). The Vandervell family made a fortune with 'Thinwall' bearings (ie, bearing shells with special soft metal linings for high-pressure oiling systems), and around 1950, coincident with Kusmicki's contribution to Norton, the 'Vanwall' (VANdervell thinWALL) Formula 1 team was created, using modified Ferrari engines in Cooper chassis.

A new all-British F1 car was required, and Kusmicki laid out a 2.3liter engine in 1954 which was effectively four Manx engines on a common crankcase; similar to the extent of using four Amal GP motorcycle carburetors! The engine produced 235hp, which was certainly good enough to win races in 1955 when the car débuted, but the chassis was simply not up to snuff. In a move reminiscent of the McCandless brothers' new Featherbed chassis being mated to Kusmicki's revamped Norton engine in 1950, the services of a rising star in racing chassis design was hired to start from scratch on the Vanwall racer. Colin Chapman, later to gain fame for his Lotus cars, created a typically unorthodox and very rigid tube frame chassis, which allowed for much softer suspension and exceptional handling, the hallmark of Lotus racers to come. The Kusmicki/Chapman Vanwall became the first British car to win a GP series since the 1920s.

The Vanwall team began to wind down in the late 1950s due to Vandervell's health issues, and Kusmicki found work with the Rootes group, designing the OHC engine for the Hillman 'Imp', a late competitor to the Austin Mini. Of course, the Imp engine became a favorite with quite a few sidecar racers, and the wheel turned full circle again. In his later years, Kusmicki worked for Chrysler, and his star faded into obscurity. By the time of his death in 1982, few people realized the contribution he had made to Grand Prix World Championships on both two and four wheels - an engineer's version of John Surtees!

Next up: who invented the Squish?

LOUIS LUCIEN LEPOIX

Occasionally a great talent slips completely off the radar of design afficianados, due to a lack of available historic material in multiple languages, or a simple lack of press. The work of Louis Lucien Lepoix is such, one of many unsung visionary designers whose ideas and efforts were so far in advance of the motorcycling world, they weren't fully addressed by the industry for decades. His son Bertrand recently contacted Chris Hunter, editor of BikeExif, with photographs scanned from a 550-page tome on Lepoix's ouevre, published after his death in 1998.

Lepoix was born Feb.4, 1918 in Giromagny, France, to a very poor family. He studied industrial design and architecture in Lyon and Paris, continuing his studies with a degree in engineering. After WW2, he worked in Germany at Dornier Flugzeugwerke (makers of interesting aircraft, etc) and ZF Friedrichshafen - whose director Dr. Albert Meier designed a small car which Lepoix clad in a shapely body, to much acclaim.

During the war, Lepoix, passionate about streamlined vehicles, sketched quite a few cars, motorcycles, and planes with futuristic curvy body styles and flowing lines. His son claims that Lepoix, who spoke no English, had no knowledge of the work of Raymond Loewy or Bel Geddes, icons of the school of streamlining whose work for automotive, aircraft, and rail companies defined the ideals of an era, their work embodying the hope that the age of war, disease, and conflict would end with a coming age of Modernity.

An example of Lepoix's thinking is this 'Air Concept Car', drawn up in 1942-3, with seating for 7, and a clear emphasis on a low coefficient of drag. The general shape of the vehicle recalls Buckminster Fuller's 'Dymaxion Car', patented in 1937 (and revised in 1943), and the concept is identical - low drag equals high speed and efficiency, an aircraft for tarmac. The benefit of lower fuel consumption would have been very much on the mind of any automotive designer during WW2, given the fuel rationing imposed on all combatant nations, with eventual shortages as the war intensified. Fuller's Dymaxion was reputed to achieve 120mph and give 30mph - terrific for '37 - but the project was ultimately scuttled due to a fatal accident while the car was being tested...while a brilliant engineer, perhaps Fuller's ideas were ahead of their time as regards safety and stability. It wouldn't be sacrilege to suggest the same fate would befall the 'Air Concept Car'.

In 1947, Lepoix founded his own design atelier, initially focussing on two-wheeled projects, beginning with this amazingly futuristic bodywork for his 1934ish BMW R12, a 750cc sidevalve flat-twin with pressed-steel 'Star' frame, which when new was considered quite stylish, with a bit of Art Deco flair.

Lepoix purchased the BMW at an auction organized by the French military in Baden Baden, Germany (French HQ in occupied Germany at the time) and set about to completely revamp the bodywork, but not the structure of the BMW.

Lepoix was a keen motorcycle enthusiast, and began work on his motorcycle with a brief to address the issue of a rider's exposure to the elements (cold hands, knees, and feet!), while making a statement about the Future. He had been working on drawings and models of his concepts during the war, and his sketches plus a hand-carved model motorcycle survive today.

The finished result is spectacular, modernistic, and very stylish, if a bit heavy-looking. Very few motorcycles before 1947 had explored the concept of full streamlining of the motorcycle, and even more rare was consideration for the rider; in fact, it would be another 7 years before the Vincent factory introduced their Black Prince model, which was the first fully enclosed and faired (ie, the bodywork protected the rider with an aerodynamic, wind-cheating design) production motorcycle.

To be sure, quite a few motorcycles built for speed records were designed with a full enclosure (Gilera, BMW, Brough-Superior, DKW, etc), but these were never meant for the road. Lepoix was in tune with the streamlining ideas of his time, and just that bit ahead of the curve in actually Building a motorcycle with weather protection for the rider, so early after the War.

Remarkably, his sketches from the War years also include a totally aerodynamic Feet-First design, which predates the rage for this type of motorcycle (and bicycle) by fully 30 years! Very few FF designs like this were produced prior to 1943, although hub-center steered machines with 'tankless' seating positions were built as early as the Veteran period by Wilkinson ('09), Ner-A-Car ('19). The Ro-Monocar ('26) came closest to realizing an enclosed 'car on wheels' - the stated aspiration of so many designers. The Monocar has the clunky bodywork of a cheap saloon vehicle, but the seeds of the idea were sown. It's a shame Lepoix didn't have a Majestic or Ner-A-Car at hand to modify, and realize his vision of a curvaceous and appealing body style.

The BMW R12 was used as a mobile calling card for Lepoix's budding design firm, and he soon gained commissions with many European factories, becoming especially known for his work on scooters (for Puch, Maico, Bastert, Walba, etc). He also worked with Horex on a design very similar to his BMW, around a Regina twin-cylinder 400cc parallel twin model. I'm not sure if this was done as a design exercise with the factory, or another one-off to display his skills. In either case, both motorcycles were extensively photographed, and made his reputation as an industrial designer of note.

His later career was occupied with agricultural machinery, heavy truck cabs, aircraft, and a host of modernistic smaller designs (telephones, household appliances, etc). Clearly he was busy with motorcycles into the 1970s; in a way, it's too bad he didn't continue his working career into the 'plastic era' of motorcycling - the bodywork of modern motorcycles went through a long period without much sex appeal, and a man with Lepoix's flair might have produced bodywork with curvaceous sensuality over those mass-produced four-cylinder appliances.