Your favourite motorbike ever? The RBT perpetual motorcycle thread.

On Monday, July 7, 2014 8:56:00 AM UTC-4, wrote:
On Monday, July 7, 2014 8:22:18 AM UTC-4, Andre Jute wrote:

On Monday, July 7, 2014 1:01:26 AM UTC+1, wrote:



this IS dangerous...stop the last zack in a chicane...bike falls on rider















http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2c998TT71oA







Road racing is a dangerous sport. That's why the 24 Hours of Le Mans is the most dangerous automobile race in the world, and the Tourist Trophy in the Isle of Man the most dangerous motorcycle race in the world. On average two people per year have died at the TT as long as it has been going. The road races feeding into it, of which the most important is the North West 200, are equally dangerous. There's no way the organizers can resurface the road to racetrack smoothness, nor remove those lethal kerbs on the sidewalks, and even the height of the kerbs on the chicanes, to slow the racers down to semi-sane speeds, are still lethally high, as several of the incidents in your linked video shows, and also the related videos on the same page.







Still, in Northern Ireland, road racing is the second most popular sport after soccer. It's a way for poor kids with daring to raise themselves out of the ghetto, as the cycling Tour de XYZ once was.







Andre Jute



DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD





word is the right side rider had a forceful personality...



http://www.youtube.com/results?searc...ly+car+crashes

nnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

the braking area crashing ? was wet....last lap...and off course the last corner.for the right rider...see the announcers paws..

Canadish was on the first last corner...

the renoo video here is similar to the chicane crash...MORE DIRT TRACK HERNI !

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdzFI_uS2YU

If you could choose any motorcycle today, anything new or even a fully restored classic bike, what would it be? I know what I'd choose, the Norton Rotary. It was the last important bike development, and it stalled there for spurious environmental concerns and conservative stiction in the bike market*.

Andre Jute

All those Harley-Davidsons sell for a reason, as I said the other day: people want a conservative bike and don't care if it is more image than reality -- they know a Hayabusa is a better bike, but they also know the Hayabusa will kill them as soon as look at them. The Hayabusa since it appeared has killed more Marines than enemy action; even if you count in the American military's tendency to kill its own ("friendly fire", a superior oxymoron), the Hayabusa is a clear winner.

On Thursday, June 26, 2014 12:31:21 AM UTC+1, Andre Jute wrote:
My Laverda three-cylinder 750 and then the one litre were sturdy, fast, reliable bikes of the highest quality, every detail carefully considered and attended to by obsessives, overflowing in tactile and kinesthetic pleasures at standstill and on the move (very quickly indeed).

On Wednesday, June 25, 2014 11:12:13 PM UTC-7, Dan O wrote:
On Wednesday, June 25, 2014 4:31:21 PM UTC-7, Andre Jute wrote:

My Laverda three-cylinder 750 and then the one litre were sturdy, fast, reliable bikes of the highest quality, every detail carefully considered and attended to by obsessives,


I like that in a machine.

... overflowing in tactile and kinesthetic pleasures at standstill and on the move (very quickly indeed). They made British crap look like what it was,


Hey!

Okay, different attributes weigh differently in different
applications. My application was dirt flat track racing -
in particular TT courses (of which there were many in the
US Pacific NW when I was racing), and there the Triumph /
Norton / BSA _kicked ass_, with the best powerband
characteristics for TT courses, which are typically ~short
(i.e. not more than ~half-mile) ~ovals with at least one
right-hand turn for some twisty action - making a broader
powerband very desirable. In particular, the Triumph
Bonneville dominated (probably in part because its popularity
meant availability and experience). There were a number of
*master* engine builders in the region that could make the
Bonneville really shine (my babysitter's husband being one
of them).

Though not built by one of the Pac NW guys (AFAIK), but surely
influenced by them, here's the representative paradigm:

http://www.motorcyclemuseum.org/asp/...ike.asp?id=107

even in the electrics, where the British bikes were a joke, and the Laverda was, surprisingly, faultless; even the starter worked every time, regardless of how cold and stiff the engine was. Pricey, of course, but not all that much more than a fragile Ducati when you just needed to eyeball them side by side to see the Laverda would outlast the Ducati by several factors.. And once you got into the BMW options list, the Laverda was not only much faster, it was cheaper if you closed your eyes and squinted a bit.


Boy, the Laverda looks similar to the British twins. I'll take
your word for its superiority for your application.

The thing about a Harley-Davidson is that it might be a piece of **** when it comes to roadholding and handling and ergonomics and just about everything else that defines a quality bike, a sort of a sick joke against Japanese or German bikes (and some Italian bikes, like my Laverda), but it least it runs when you want it to run which you can't say for British or most Italian motorbikes. The Harley sells because the people who want it do want it, not because they don't know any better, but because they're more interested in the image than in the engineering.


Hogs are what they are, and it's mostly image by now. They suck
performance-wise, IMO - except for the XR750, popularized by e.g.
Evel Kneivel, their true fame is total domination of the mile and
half-mile dirt ovals of the AMA Grand National racing series -
producing copious power skimming and sliding across the dirt
while leaned way over - bike (and rider) going close to 100 mph.

A note about those big oval dirt tracks which were the mainstay
of the Grand National series: The British bikes could not be
made to produce the raw horsepower to compete with the XR750's,
and the Yamaha's powerband was too narrow and the engine too
fragile when pumped up to produce competitive peak horsepower.
So in an effort to compete, Yamaha put a freaking 4-cylinder
2-stroke 750cc _road racing_ engine in a dirt track frame,
set their rider on it and sent him out on the dirt oval, where
he conquered the Hogs and purportedly said something to the
effect that "they don't pay me enough to ride that thing".

... Oh, yeah - there it is:

http://www.superbikeplanet.com/dontpaymeenuff.htm

The AMA banned the bike almost immediately anyway, and the
Hogs resumed their domination.

http://www.motorcyclemuseum.org/asp/...assjan_600.jpg

http://cyrilhuzeblog.com/wp-content/.../TomFritz1.jpg

Rob Muzzy was there at the Indy Mile when Roberts debuted
the TZ750 flattracker, and told us about it back at the
shop when he got home. Just hearing the story was one of
the more memorably awesome experiences of the period for
me.

So anyway, my personal favorite is the Triumph Bonneville
in Trackmaster frame (no lights, brakes optional, wheelies
allowed :-)

http://www.riderfiles.com/2011/02/21/

On Tuesday, August 12, 2014 5:46:33 PM UTC+1, Dan O wrote:

http://www.riderfiles.com/2011/02/21/

What a fabulous story. The guy's only National win, from the back, in front of his home crowd. Yeeeow!

In 2004 I saw Frankie Chili, in his sunset years, take his last victory at Misano, coming from deep, deep, deep in the field, riding like a man inspired, at time so on the edge that he had to rise out of the saddle to add wind resistance to the brakes, an absolutely amazing performance. He was 40 years old in 2004...

Andre Jute

On Tuesday, August 12, 2014 4:15:44 PM UTC-4, Andre Jute wrote:
On Tuesday, August 12, 2014 5:46:33 PM UTC+1, Dan O wrote:



http://www.riderfiles.com/2011/02/21/



What a fabulous story. The guy's only National win, from the back, in front of his home crowd. Yeeeow!



In 2004 I saw Frankie Chili, in his sunset years, take his last victory at Misano, coming from deep, deep, deep in the field, riding like a man inspired, at time so on the edge that he had to rise out of the saddle to add wind resistance to the brakes, an absolutely amazing performance. He was 40 years old in 2004...



Andre Jute

yeah yeah I watched a local sprint car hero...old style sprint cars....run rings around the old style USAC Pro's...

the local had an extra 50 CI

http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/hub...e-2014-a-77121