Another rare Catalan bike is the Reddis, and it is another bike with a complex past and with scant reference material.
Josep Sentís Armengol was born into a family that owned a garage, Garage Armengol at Carrer del Roser, 14 in Reus near Barcelona. Here he grew up surrounded by vehicles, but his ambition and intention were to build a motorbike.
Josep acquired a German DKW RT 125cc engine that had been used in a nearby small factory as a generator and worked on the engine. With the help of a coachbuilder from the family garage, they created a body, based on a photograph of an Italian scooter. This first endeavour was doomed to failure as the panels of the bodywork restricted the airflow to the engine and it overheated and seized.
This 125cc M-62 pictured here is on display at the Museu Nacional de la Ciència i la Tècnica de Catalunya (National Museum of Science and Technology of Catalonia or nMANTEC), located in Terrassa.
Undaunted by this and encouraged by other family members and friends, Josep decided to set up a small motorcycle workshop. Over the next few years, with his uncle, Juli Armengol, they developed an engine, based on the DKW but with improvements. They bought in other specialist parts, the flywheel from Barcelona and the carburettor from Bilbao. By 1952 they had completed their first motorbike and wanted to mass-produce them but did not have the necessary funding in place. They contacted Ramon Grifoll i Payarol, the owner of an iron foundry and manufacturer of stoves and kitchens, for help. Armengol and Ramón Grifoll joined forces to form the company GAMOTO SA (where GA stands for Grifoll and Armengol) and the factory was established in Reus at Carrer Verdaguer 4.
The first sales took place in 1955 with the launch of the first series of the RA 125cc, a single seater that proved to have some reliability problems and this issue was to tarnish the Reddis reputation.
Later that decade, the local police ordered some of the improved model for their motorised unit and they bought several Reddis motorbikes to increase their efficiency. Production continued with the second series of motorbikes launched in 1957 and in 1960 the third series appeared. By 1965, sales had declined, and the factory switched from mass production to building only to fill confirmed orders. However, sales continued to decline and in 1966 Josep retired, leaving his brother Jordi as director. In 1969 the company was renamed Industrias Grifoll and the manufacturing of motorcycles continued but only to fill confirmed orders, but the last Reddis motorbike (the brand’s 499th) was completed in February 1973 and the company closed down motorbike production completely.
Reddis had diversified their range of products and as was not uncommon at the time, in 1956 Reddis flirted with a microcar and a small van, building 2 examples of each. They also produced motoculters (rotavators) and lawnmowers.
This 1965 125cc is part of the Sala Santy Collection and was displayed in Riola in 2024
The premises at Carrer Verdaguer, 4 in Reus are still standing and are to be commemorated by a plaque.
Spanish Motorcycles 