Dr Alex Moulton

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Alex Moulton was born in 1920, and grew up primarily in Bradford on Avon.

After school at Marlborough, he studied Engineering at King's College, Cambridge.

His studies were interrupted by World War 2, during which he worked at Bristol Engines.

After the war, Alex Moulton joined the family rubber firm Spencer Moulton, before returning to Cambridge to finish his Engineering Degree.

He subsequently worked with Alex Issigonis at BMC (British Motor Company) where they collaborated on the production of the Mini and other cars.

In the late 1950s he regained an interest in bicycles, and began research and development work into how it's design could be improved.

This work resulted in the production of the Moulton Bicycle in 1962. The Moulton Bicycle was a radical new design, and it was critically acclaimed, and commercially succesful.

The success of the Moulton Bicycle resulted in some aggressive competition from Raleigh. Under financial pressure due to the competition, Alex Moulton sold the Moulton Bicycle business to Raleigh.

Dr Moulton continued to work as a consultant with Raleigh until Raleigh abandoned development of the Moulton Bicycle in 1974.

In 1983, Dr Moulton launched a new business producing high end, hand made bicycles in relatively low volumes.

In the early 1990s Dr Moulton licensed the production of the APB range of bicycles of lower cost spaceframe Moulton Bicycles to the Pashley bicycle company. This relationship continued until 2009 when the Moulton Bicycle Company was formed, by merging the Alex Moulton Bicycles business with the Moulton part of the Pashley business.

Dr Moulton continued to work on automotive suspensions from the 1950s until the early 21st century. His suspension designs, including Hydrolastic and Hydragas were fitted to over 7 million cars.

Throughout the years, Dr Moulton continually refined his bicycle designs. In 1998 he introduced a radical new suspension design called the New Series. On his 90th birthday in 2010, Dr Moulton briefly revealed another radical new design concept, called MDev 90, which is still in active development.

Related Pages

  • Early Life and Education
  • BMC and the Mini
  • Moulton Bicycle
  • Raleigh and Moulton
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