Mission Motors tweeted out something interesting just a moment ago, a link to a new website for Mission Motorcycles. Teasing there a photo of the Mission R, it would seem that the electric superbike that does competitive AMA Supersport lap times at Laguna Seca, is finally set to come to production. It seems we won’t know everything about the new Mission Motorcycles project until June 3rd, though we can speculate pretty accurately on what the A&R Bothan spy network has been telling us. Expect to see the Mission R electric superbike in street legal trim, honed even further than when we rode the machine back in August last year.
Stefan Pierer’s acquisition of Husqvarna continues to baffle me. You will note I say Pierer, and not KTM, bought Husqvarna, since the Austrian CEO used Pierer Industrie AG in the transaction as a means to help side-step European antitrust issues. After all, we can’t have Europe’s largest dirt bike manufacturer, nay largest total motorcycle manufacturer, gobbling up even more brands in the two-wheeled world. But, I digress. Developing three road bikes (Husqvarna Nuda 900, Husqvarna Strada 650, & Husqvarna Terra 650), with three more concepts waiting in the wings (Husqvarna Moab, Husqvarna Baja, & Husqvarna E-G0), it is with even more confusion that we learn that Pierer & Co. intend to kill the Husqvarna Nuda project and its other street siblings.
In case you missed the story last week, Kevin Schwantz is preparing to race in this year’s Suzuka 8-Hour endurance race. For the race, Schwantz will be riding on a team formed by Yukio Kagayama, who in addition to having raced in the MotoGP, World Superbike, and British Superbike Championships, is also a previous Suzuka 8-Hour winner with the Suzuki Endurance Race Team (also joining the three-rider team Noriyuki “Nitro” Haga). Releasing a Q&A about his team’s Suzuka 8-Hour entry, Kagayama-san walks us through how the team came together, what equipment the riders will use, and his outlook on the team’s competitiveness.
A single-cylinder hooligan-maker, the KTM 690 Duke is 330 lbs (curbside without fuel) and 67hp of two-wheeled fun, and we hope that the Austrians bring the KTM 690 Duke R our way as well. While we are on the topic of things missing from KTM’s American line-up, a decent supersport is painfully obvious, yet we can’t see the folks at KTM following the paths of other brands. That’s where our friend Luca Bar comes to mind with his latest concept: the KTM RC4. Using the KTM 690 Duke platform and its LC4 engine, Bar has designed a super-single full-fairing sport bike that takes the Austrian company’s “Ready to Race” DNA and applies it to an idea that is not all that disimilar to the Ducati Supermono.
When I sat down with Claudio Domenicali at the Ducati 1199 Panigale R launch, the now-CEO of Ducati Motor Holding was still just the General Manager of the Italian motorcycle company. Four weeks after our interview though, Gabriele del Torchio would leave Ducati for Alitalia; and Domenicali, a 21-year veteran of both the racing and production departments of Ducati, would take his place at the top of Italy’s most prestigious motorcycle brand. After reading our interview from Austin, Texas after the jump, I think you will agree too.
That Yamaha is working on a seamless gearbox is no secret, with Yamaha’s test riders currently racking up the kilometers around tracks in Japan. Recently, however, Spanish magazine SoloMoto published an article suggesting that Yamaha has already been using its new seamless gearbox since the beginning of the season. My own enquiries to check whether Yamaha was using a seamless gearbox or not always received the same answer: no, Yamaha is not using the seamless gearbox. To test this denial, I went out to the side of the track on Friday morning at Jerez to record the bikes as they went by.
After a very public father/son break-up between Paul Teutul Sr. and Paul Teutul Jr., a steroid-ring scandal involving Paul Sr., and finally a bankruptcy proceeding, it appears that Orange County Choppers is the impossible to kill multi-headed hydra of doom that we all knew it was, as the custom chopper shop is once again headed to the small screen and recruiting some talent, on and off the show. Looking for “someone who will work alongside Paul Senior, running the shop and helping build some of the best custom motorcycles in the world,” OCC says it will be back on television with a new show later this month. Please for the love of god, will someone give this man the attention he craves so dearly??! Or, just shoot us in the face.
We love us some concept bikes here at Asphalt & Rubber, and we have featured more than a few pieces of stunning design and imagination on our pages. Though, we can’t remember the last time one of these works of art were brought to us by a legitimate racing team, but that is what we have here with the Team Alstare Superbike Concept. A nod to the former Suzuki team’s return to the World Superbike Championship as the Ducati factory squad with Carlos Checa and Ayrton Badovini, Alstare has enlisted the help of designer Serge Rusak of Rusak Kreaktive Designworks to ink the shape of its futuristic Superbike concept, while Tryptik Studios handled the 3D modeling prowess.
If you didn’t watch Thursday’s pre-event press conference for MotoGP at Jerez, it is worth a viewing right to the end (assuming you have a MotoGP.com account). Building off the news about the NBA’s Jason Collins coming out as gay in a self-written feature in Sport Illustrated, my good colleague David Emmett had the courage to inquire about the culture and acceptance of the MotoGP paddock for homosexual riders. For the sake of accuracy, after the jump is a full transcript of David’s question, as put to riders Cal Crutchlow, Jorge Lorenzo, Marc Marquez, Andrea Dovizioso, Stefan Bradl, and Scott Redding, as well as those riders’ responses to David’s inquiry.
News that Suzuki plans on returning to the MotoGP Championship in 2014 should be old information for dedicated Asphalt & Rubber readers, and the Japanese company’s inline-four race bike was already spotted doing test laps last year by the eager eyes at Cycle World. Well the American print-mag has another set of eyebrow-raising high-quality photos of the 2014 Suzuki GSV-R to mull over from the Motegi race track, along with some technical insights provided by the venerable Kevin Cameron.
Cool. We were just discussing this over on the elmoto forum. I had heard that he had three bikes, but two sounds good. Best of luck to Mark Miller and Michael Rutter.
My guess is that its a dustbin bike:
http://www.asphaltandrubber.com/news/motoczysz-e1pc-dustbin-ready-iomtt/
I can remember Czysz saying if they had built something that looks like a cigar, they could go well over 100 mph average. They just didn’t want to do that last year.
Maybe they want to try that now.
Haha, you said “idle speculation,” which is funny because electric bikes don’t idle.
Cheeky baastid.
I can’t wait until it gets unveiled next month. I hope it’s not a dustbin machine. The winds on the Island will blow that bike around like a paper aeroplane.
Top marks to MotoCzysz for what will be a huge effort to field two machines in the TTZero 2011 event.
I would be amazed at a dustbin effort, no way, they are dangerous in cross winds and I was sure they had been outlawed by the FIM decades ago. However the TTXGP 2010 winning ‘Team Agni’ did enter one in TTZero 2010 here: http://www.deejay51.com/tt2010_tt_zero.htm
"@Asphalt_Rubber: MotoCzysz Fielding Two Bikes at the Isle of Man TT – http://bit.ly/lnajgc #motorcycle"
Confirmed RT @Asphalt_Rubber: MotoCzysz Fielding Two Bikes at the Isle of Man TT – http://aspha.lt/jl #motorcycle
It would be very exciting to see Motocysz, Mission Motors, Brammo, and Lightning Motors at Laguna Seca this July.
Motocysz was there last year. Will they be there again?
How can Motoczysz even compete at all? They’ve been around for years and never sold a single bike nor competed in a single season? Where is their cash flow?
One does not have to sell bikes to make money.
yep
evertime they pass gas, the international motorcycle media swoops
they get as much coverage as the big time stars
there lies your income…. sponsorship
they may also make income in the form of electric drive-train research grants
Remind me: Would a dustbin fairing be legal under TT Zero rules?
I’ve long been in support of freeing ‘prototype’ (ie: MotoGP) classes from fairing rules that are dated and arbitrary. Allowing unlimited aero freedom in those classes would help to differentiate them from production-based classes (ie: SBK).
In the case of e-moto racing, it would probably serve to give the electric bikes a ‘futuristic’ look that might really capture fans’ attention.
While we’re at it, though, it’s worth noting that the ridiculous drag coefficients that modern motorcycles are saddled with are not the only holdover from days when 100mph was fast. The overall shape of modern sport bikes in general – and telescopic front forks in particular – are probably what an engineer would choose for a single-track racing vehicle if he was starting from a clean sheet. Or, a screen without a single pixel on it…
So far, electric motorcycle designers have almost without exception focused on the ‘electric’ part and taken the motorcycle for granted. We don’t just need freer rules. We need freer thinking.
Hi Mark. Yes, the TT Zero rules allow dustbins. “The rider must be completely visible from either side, except for the riders hands and forearms which may be obscured by bodywork.” Within that basic rule, a dustbin is possible.
@Mark Gardiner. I don’t really agree with your assertion that motorcycle development has been stagnated by the rules.
Motorcycles are highly developed and refined animals. There are no rules limiting where the engine can be placed or where the rider is positioned, yet all of them place the rider and engine in almost exactly the same place. This didn’t happen by accident or convenience. Just look at how a small difference in weight balance or aerodynamics effects the overall performance of a bike.
Rossi is having a heck of a time getting Ducati’s GP11 to perform properly, mainly because of a slightly more rearward weight bias due to the architecture of their L-Twin engine.
Casey Stoner also had issues with the Ducati GP10 bike earlier last year when Ducati extended the fairing sides 2 inches further forward which made it much too sensitive and unstable in cross winds, they modified the fairing accordingly and the issue was solved. Imagine the effect of dramatically increasing the side area by using a dustbin fairing would have on the stability of a bike if only a couple of inches on the GP10 was enough to cause a problem.
It also makes no difference if the bike is powered by an electric motor or a gas engine, a motorcycle is still a motorcycle, the dynamic forces are the same regardless.
Good points from both Marks.
Innovation would be opened up more if electrics for the track would be developed with a clean sheet. A good example, as Mark G mentioned, is the front suspension. Proper suspension should not be developed in a silo “next” to the motorcycle. It needs to be part of the whole development with the chassis and motor. For close to a century, almost all chassis design has been done from the steering neck to accommodate a tele. then the motor and rest of the chassis is included. (Example: http://moto2-usa.blogspot.com/ This motor will be integrated with the front-end and the rest of the chassis from the beginning.)
Look at the weight savings James Parker has achieved with his latest GSX-RADD. Electrics are porky, so why has no one been working on an alternative front-end to help cut weight? Czysz has one, but it still involves a stout neck that is light due to cf.
Mark G. -
Did you mean to include a “” in this comment:
“he overall shape of modern sport bikes in general – and telescopic front forks in particular – are probably “” what an engineer would choose for a single-track racing vehicle if he was starting from a clean sheet.
oops…looks like I inadvertently used some html in my last sentence above. “Not”
Rutter will win the race
hoyt, I agree, front suspension technology is an area with lot’s of room for improvement, electric drive or not. I was looking forward to Moto2 as a platform to develop some alternatives, instead they are using the same old racing mentality of making whats known to work a little better rather than using better, yet unproven technology.
That’s a pretty big play by MotoCzysz to sign Michael Rutter to ride their 2011 E1pc. Even more so that last year, they are not messing around. My guess is that that 100mph average lap around the Isle of Man for the TT Zero event is going to be achieved this year. Even if the MotoCzysz team isn’t the one that gets it (first)…someone is going to.
I’m with Jim Bob….I’m really hoping we get MotoCzysz, Lightning, Brammo and Mission (and hopefully some other surprises as well) to compete against each other at the Laguna Seca FIM e-Power/TTXGP race in July. To see all four teams on the same track together will be a lot of fun! Especially if some teams, like MotoCzysz and Lightning, enter two machines each. Be nice to get about 10-12 bikes on the track for the race, if that is possible.