1964 Trojan Magnum Super Sport

Consider this the mystery machine of the day. A two-page B&W ad paid for by Ken Kay Distributing Company of North Hollywood CA appeared in the August 1964 issue of Cycle World. Ken Kay had been the western distributor of Suzukis since 1962, but this particular ad seemed to have been unique unto itself. This unusual machine, seemingly named after a legendary condom, shared the spread with the earliest Kawasaki imported into the USA, the Omega. The 125cc Omega did not carry the Kawasaki badge, and it was the predecessor to the 1966 Kawasaki F1 model. (The Omega will be covered in a later post.)

I scanned in the whole advertisement at full size, dividing it into two pages, and then cropped out the photo of the machine, allowing the most detailed viewing here. The following statements are quoted directly from the ad, as I have never found another speck of information on the Trojan. The brand name is not even listed at Sheldon's EMU site, which offers quite extensive coverage of European machines. The ad states that the Trojan was the lowest priced 175cc sold in the U. S. in '64 at $465; it produced 15 horsepower with a four-speed foot shift; and it weighed 175 pounds featuring its sport tank and fenders and magneto ignition. However, that looks to me like a small battery strapped to the frame just behind the air cleaner. Maybe it used the battery only to power the lights. The claimed top speed was 70 mph.

Here is what I can ascertain outside the ad copy. I assume this is an Italian machine just because of all the obvious styling and design cues, but I do not have a clue what company actually built it. Was there a short-lived Trojan company? This little bike has an awfully long name. Did they tack on the Super Sport to distract the snickering little boys to whom all the Sixties tiddlers were marketed? Was there a regular Magnum with a larger tank and fenders? The main reason I don't have a clue who built it are the presence of the straightforward, vertical, two-stroke cylinder and the large single downtube frame. The cylinder and air filter container look very Spanish, like those of a Metralla, but the frame design looks Italian. Could it be Austrian? Notice that the gearshift is on the right and the kickstarter on the left, in typical European fashion. The tank and seat look very typically Italian to me. The strangest component seems to be that black bar in front of the downtube. Is that a tire pump, or maybe some sort of steering damper? I think that is a screw-down knob for a conventional steering damper just behind the handlebar mount. There were many more Italian builders of tiddlers back in those days than we saw commonly imported into the U. S. Maybe this is one of those. Anybody have any comments or ideas?