# 1953 CWS English Roadster



## JOEL (Jul 21, 2012)

I bought this 1953 CWS Hurricane this week. There's not a lot of information out there about the company. I'm wondering if Raleigh acquired this brand at some point. Elements of the bike look like Raleigh but others don't... Any opinions?


----------



## SirMike1983 (Sep 17, 2012)

I just noticed you didn't get any reply here, so I'll try to help some. That looks to me like a British Cycle Corporation product from the Birmingham factory in the 1950s. It does not look like a Raleigh or Raleigh-related brand. It looks more like a Norman-type roadster. Tube Investments came to own both the Birmingham and Raleigh/Nottingham brands around 1960. That's when the Birmingham brands like Phillips and the others were basically turned into downscale Raleigh Sports clones. Yours is from before that and is a competitor comparable to Raleigh, I think. The rear hub probably has a date code with the month and year listed, and I think 1953 sounds about right for that.


----------

