Freakz

I have an old Royce Union 3-speed bike that I’m looking to restore a bit. I’m currently trying to recreate the stickers that are on the bike but some of them are badly damaged and I cannot make out the original design. My hope is that by identifying the year and model of the bike, I’ll be able to find some images of the original designs online and use those to recreate the stickers. All this being said - here is what I know about the bike:

SN (?): 770273
364 - visible on the frame but appears to be a sticker/painted on
It has a sturmey archer 3-speed but not sure if it is stock or after market

SN

Looks like a metal badge used to be here

Badly damaged design

It’s hard to see but it says ‘364’

Sturmey-Archer 3 speed

juvela

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since the trigger is SA one would expect the rear hub to be as well

if it is there should be a readable date on the shell

do front and rear rims match?

if so wheels are likely to be original

more pictures of frame and complete cycle would assist readers to determine actual manufacturer of the machine


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Velo Mule

This looks likely to be a Dutch made Royce Union. Graphics could be hard to find but perhaps you or someone could make them based on what you have. The alternative is what I did. I ended up just going to an Lettering.com and getting graphics make that were not original to the bike but do have a period correct look.

Here is my built in Japan Royce Union with Graphics from Lettering.com:




This is likely what your head badge looked like.

The graphics on the down tube. Block lettering, gold with a black outline. Also notice that this frame had gold box lining.

Royce Unions were department store bikes. As a result there is not as much out there as there is for old bikes like Peugeot and Raleigh for instance.

They were private label bikes made for Times Square Stores and may have been sold to other department stores around the country as well. Generally, my opinion is the bikes were not bad, but not great either. There is a thread on BikeForums about them. History of Royce Union Bicycles

For me the diy graphics were more fun, quicker to get to the finish line and less expensive. I do like the graphics on your Royce Union. Whether that will be feasible to replicate, I don't know.

Keep the pictures coming as this project progresses.

juvela

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IIRC the Nederlands sourced ones were done by Batavus


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Freakz

Never even thought to check the rear hub - looks like it was made Aug ‘63



I was surprised it cleaned up so well

Rims appear to be the same but front rim is cracked and both are pretty rusted

The bike has been disassembled already but here’s a couple pictures I took before

Freakz

Thanks Juvela and Velo! It looks like the stickers will have to be best effort for now. For the designs I draw them out myself and then have them printed via red bubble.com but I think for the lettering graphics I’ll check out lettering.com to see if they can match that gold box lining. The stickers are what caught my eye about this bike in the first place so I’m just trying to do them justice,

non-fixie 

On a previous version of the Dutch Union brand's website there was a picture of a Royce Union on their history page. Whether they actually made (or sold?) bikes for Royce Union or this was an error of the communications department I don't know. No explanation was offered on that site.