Beschreibung:

Societe Anonyme Minerva of Anvers in Belgium were best known in their later years for manufacture of high quality motor cars. Like so many other of their contemporaries the De Jong brothers had moved to internal combustion-engined transport from the manufacture of bicycles – a natural progression as similar manufacturing skills were called for. As well as building cycles and engines for machines to be marketed under their own name, they built engines on a prolific scale – rather as De Dion Bouton in France – for other manufacturers including Triumph, Centaur, BSA and Humber in England and Peugeot in France. Early engines were diminutive and essentially of a clip-on nature for pedal cycles but by 1904 they had progressed from diminutive inlet-over-exhaust valve engines to rather larger side-by-side mechanical valves. This project comes with two such mechanical valve engines, one apparently largely complete and the other missing its cylinder barrel. Both engines have numbers that correspond with a 1904 dating. The cylinder bores suggest an engine size of about 350cc and perhaps a 2 3/4hp rating. This most viable restoration project consists of a frame with girder forks and leaf front spring, rear hub and sprocket and two Minerva engines, one numbered 15474 and the second 15887, the latter missing its cylinder barrel. The project is sold strictly as viewed, however we feel that the essentials are there to enable a viable restoration to be completed when missing components have been located or fabricated. There is no documentation offered with this project.