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Lilac motorcycles were manufactured by the Marusho Motorcycle Industrial Co Ltd, which was founded in 1951 in Hamamatsu, Japan by Masashi Ito, owner of an existing car repair and truck body manufacturing business. The first Lilac was a shaft-driven 150cc lightweight and, like many of its Japanese contemporaries, was copied from a European design, in the Lilac's case a pre-war Zündapp. A succession of larger models was introduced, including a 350cc horizontally opposed twin, almost all of which retained Marusho's trademark shaft drive.

Increasingly stiff competition from Honda forced a wholesale revision of the Lilac range in the late 1950s, the new line-up including a brace of transverse v-twins based on the German Victoria Bergmeister. At the same time Marusho concluded a commercial alliance with Mitsubishi, only to be saddled with an insupportable debt when the deal swiftly came unstuck. Despite an agreement to import Lilacs into the USA, the company was forced to file for bankruptcy and the factory ceased making motorcycles in 1961. After a few years acting as a sub-contractor for Honda, the firm returned to the motorcycle market in 1964.

Before then, Marusho had introduced a curious motorcycle/scooter hybrid – a concept also embraced by various European makers – in the form of the JF1 and JF2, the only significant difference between them being the type of front suspension employed, early examples having a telescopic fork and later ones a leading-link arrangement. Overhead-valve engines in both 90cc and 104cc variants were available, while there was also user-friendly two-speed automatic transmission and - most unusually for a motor scooter - shaft final drive.

A Japanese motorcycle rarely seen in Europe, this rare Baby Lilac appears original and unrestored (the engine turns over). There is no odometer fitted.

Following a period of inactivity, this motorcycle will require recommissioning and/or restoration to a greater or lesser extent before returning to the road and thus is sold strictly as viewed. Prospective purchasers should satisfy themselves with regard to this motorcycle's completeness, history, authenticity, originality and mechanical condition prior to bidding.
Offered with key