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History of Betor SL Shock Absorbers

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A walk through the beginnings, growth, golden age and present of Amortiguadores Betor SL

As you already read in our previous post Shock absorbers for Bultaco, we mentioned the Betor union with Bultaco and a part of our history, today we want to tell you about it.

The beginning...

In the 1940s, Betor was founded by the industrial master: Juan Bey Torras (Be-tor). He was dedicated to installing telescopic forks that he himself designed in a small workshop on Virgen de Monserrat street in Barcelona; He was working for Lube and Iso at that time, gradually gaining recognition and began to expand his market until the Lube company made him a contract to equip all the series motorcycles.

The work was gaining position and is expanded by joining other brands with orders for Roa, Iso, and even Ossa and Bultaco since its creation. Montesa joined Betor for the manufacture and installation of the front forks at the beginning of the 70s, then breaking the commercial relationship that they had until then with Telesco, Betor's national competition.

The growth and positioning of the brand

During the 70s, Betor was positioned when practically all the national manufacturers joined: Puch, Dervi, Rieju, Gimsom, Ducati, Sanglas, all of them, except Lambreta. Given the rapid growth of the company, a change of workshop is mandatory and they move to the Free Zone, in which around 250 people worked divided into sections of production, foundry, painting, control, and research.

Image from: http://bultacosherpa199.blogspot.com/

With the expansion and excellent recognition achieved so far, agreements are signed with companies such as KTM, Bombardier, Portal, Motobecane, SWM, Cagiba, Fantic, Vila Italyet, Maico, Hercules, Tomos, Kreider, Husqvarna, Rickman, etc.

The golden age

Betor Shock Absorbers in its time, reached world recognition within a competitive market thanks to quality, excellent manufacturing materials, and design in shock absorbers and forks, becoming the most renowned national auxiliary company in the motorcycling industry in the 70s, being the main supplier of suspension systems for motorcycles to the main European manufacturers of competition motorcycles.

Coming to the end of the 70s, specifically in 1979, around 100,000 forks and 800,000 shock absorbers were produced for a range of more than 600 products. With these figures, Betor reaches its golden age as the largest manufacturer of motorcycle suspensions in Europe of the decade.

Currently in Betor Amortiguadores

Due to the closures due to differences in the decisions of the company and the crisis with suppliers of the fork molds, the decision was made to only manufacture only the rear shock absorbers and as for the forks we only restore them.

Years have passed, but we continue working and making our customers happy with the quality and variety of products that we have at our disposal.

In our next post, we'll talk about the features of the forks and shocks that propelled our brand to success.

Read the second part of our history clicking here

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