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My Imme
Refurbishment of my Imme (note: lots of pictures, download can take a while)
2016 meeting of the Imme Freundeskreis in Immenstadt
Imme company pictures
Imme company drawings
Old (company) photo's Imme
I have some original old pictures that have been distributed by the Riedel company to motorcycle magazines to illustrate their articles about the Imme. On the backside they cary a stamp that indicates that they are orignal company pictures, released for publication. On the pictures that I own there is a second stamp of "N.V. Techn. Bureau Mij. Helvetia" in Rijswijk (Netherlands). This seems to be a subsidiary company of the well-known Dutch auto and motorcyle importer Beers. Probably Beers was interested to sell the Imme in the Netherlands, but as far as I know that has never happened.
On some pictures there are also hand written remarks from the magazine makers, like in the example below. The pictures can be found in many magazines from the Imme era.
The company did not only distribute pictures, but also technical drawings by Thusius, to show some technical details of the Imme R100. I also posses some of them, click here to view them.
The first one shows the Imme motorcycle itself. Unfortunately I don't have the matching picture of the left side, as together they would be great to determine the details of the Immes as they were originally built.
One of the pictures shows a proud Norbert Riedel carrying his engine in his hands. This picture clearly illustrates how compact the engine is. This is the original design with the single sided crankshaft bearing, visible by the steel cover right from the chain sprocket.
The next picture shows Riedel with 2 front forks in his hands:
Obviously they wanted to show that designing a motorcycle requests a lot of thinking, looking at the next picture that shows Riedel at work:
Eva Riedel posing on an Imme R100:
Some pictures show the stock of Immes in the factory:
The next pictures shows loading of the Imme motorcycles on a truck. Obviously the Immes were shipped without any protective packaging:
The next picture is a nice one. It shows a swarm of Immes leaving the factory premisses. It is not clear if the riders are factory workers going home, or if this is a test drive of newly built Imme motorcycles.
To demonstrate how solid the Imme motorcycles were, there were factory riders who joined in all kind of races with the R100. They were also heavily used off the road, as this picture shows:
The last 2 factory pictures show parts of the Till roller (scooter). Although the principle of the rear frame construction resembles that of the R100, there are a lot of differences. The swingarm seems to be much shorter, and the pivot point is underneath the engine fixation. The engine itself is clearly identical to the R100.
I also have some pictures that are not official factory pictures, but are still from the early 50-ies. The first has a stamp on the back from the "Motor Foto-Dienst", and the number 39-31-12. Motor is a Dutch motorcycle magazine, so probably this picture has been made for use in the magazine.
Looking at the stand in which the motor is mounted this picture has probably been made on a exhibition. Strange is that the motor has no driver foot rests.
It must be an early Imme, as it does not have the triangular battery, but the tool box between the frame and the rear mudguard. According to the overview on the website of the Imme Freundeskreis, this Imme must therefore have a frame number lower than 3475.
There is no aluminum Riedel logo on the ignition cover, and this logo was introduced with frame number 2963 (together with the modified crank-shaft with double bearing). So probably this Imme is one of the first 2962 that have been built.
The next series of 8 pictures show a late Imme R100 of the Luxus type. This version can be recognised by the chrome plated rims, hub caps and horn cover.
The last picture shows a motorcycle with a conventional frame and frontforks, with the name "Riedel" on the tank and equipped with the Imme R100 engine. On the back of the picture is hand written "Brussel 1951 Imme".
In the book
"A-Z of Belgian Motorcyles" by E. Duchateau, G. Huylebroeck, N. Jonckheere, P. Lembrechts and R. v. Eycken the same picture can be found, with some additional information.
This motorcycle was shown on the Belgian "Salon", the car and motorcycle exhibition in Brussels, in 1952 under the name Alcyon-Riedel.
The company behind this motorcycle was the Belgian "Etablissements Blomme & Lecomte SPRL" in Doornik, and had nothing to do with the French brand Alcyon.
In the Dutch magazine "Motor", no. 5 from Februari 5th 1952, the same motorcycle is mentioned but in a not very positive way. A rough translation:
"A special item was the Riedel with the well-known egg-shaped 100cc Imme engine, but this time in a normal frame, in which, to be honest, this engine does not show to full advantage. We don't know whether this is more or less a left-over sale, because as far as we know the production at Imme has not yet been resumed after the financial collaps. According to our information the factory is only partly working, and this only to product parts to not disappoint the 10.000 Imme riders."
It was not mentioned which company was the producer of this motorcycle.
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