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This Is the World’s First Completely 3D Printed Motorcycle*

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Additive manufacturing (better known as 3D printing) is going to change the motorcycle industry – and industry in general – in a big way. Rapid prototyping materials are already changing how we develop new products, and as cost, sophistication, and quality increases, we can see this technology turning manufacturing completely on its head. It is exciting to watch.

For the motorcycle industry, this means that there will come a day when all you need to do to get a new part for your motorcycle is to download the design from the OEM, and “print” it out at home or at a local 3D printing facility.

This will fundamentally change the role of dealerships and how we design and build motorcycles. I cannot emphasize this point enough. The day of this industrial revolution just got a little closer today too, as we see what is being dubbed as the world’s first completely 3D printed motorcycle. 

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Products

Third-Generation Dainese D-Air Debuts – 37% Lighter than Before, And Now For Ladies Too

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Airbag technology is making your traditional motorcycle apparel items obsolete, and the technology just keeps getting better and better. Both Alpinestars and Dainese continuously raise the bar against one another, proving that competition improves the breed.

As such For the 2019 model year, Dainese is releasing its third generation D-Air airbag system, which boasts significant improvements over the previous iteration.

For starters, the new Dainese D-Air system is 37% lighter the previously generation, which is a big deal if you have ever picked up an airbag-equipped leather suit or jacket.

Dainese also says that its third-generation system has better ergonomics and efficiency than before. Most importantly though, Dainese is going to start using the D-Air technology in suits and jackets for women.

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News

Alta Motors Ceases Operations

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Bad news from San Francisco today, as we learn that Alta Motors has ceased business operations, effective immediately, sending the company’s staff home as the electric motorcycle manufacturer looks for future funding.

Talking to an anonymous source, Asphalt & Rubber has been told that Alta Motors is in the midst of a strategic wind down, as it looks for an outside acquisition or investment.

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Products

Aftermarket Winglets for Superbikes Are Now a Thing

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The dawn of aerodynamics is upon the motorcycle industry, because aftermarket winglets for superbikes are now a thing.

If we are surprised about anything, it is that it has taken this long for someone to come up with a winglet for modern superbikes.

Ever since the first MotoGP bike rolled out of the pit lane garage sporting aerodynamic aids, the clock has been ticking until someone made them for the general public. That time is today. That someone is the good folks at Puig.

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Bikes

Here Is the BMW R1250GS with “Shiftcam” Engine Technology

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We have known about the 2019 BMW R1250GS for some time now, but today we get our first real look of the machine, thanks to the bike’s promotional video, which has leaked on the internet (hat tip to the folks at Motorcular.com). And, despite everything we knew about the BMW R1250GS, the Germans still managed to surprise us.

This is because instead of the “Shiftcam” technology that BMW Motorrad has developed for its revised boxer engine.

Originally tipped to have variable valve technology, we now see how BMW is going to achieve this goal, and the answer is with a camshaft that has dual lobes and a shift gate that engages the high valve lift set during full throttle applications.

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Harley-Davidson Opening R&D Facility in Silicon Valley

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When we broke the news that Harley-Davidson and Alta Motors were parting ways, we teased the idea that the Bar & Shield brand might go it alone with its electric future.  Since that breakup, there have been murmurings that Harley-Davidson was going to build its own EV design and research center, right in the heart of Silicon Valley, and today those rumors became true.

Announcing the plans during the company’s 115th birthday celebration, Harley-Davidson CEO Matt Levatich described the plan as an extension of Harley-Davidson’s commitment to make electric vehicles, and the move is an obvious grab at some of the top electric vehicle talent that resides in Northern California.

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Bikes

Indian Motorcycles Get Rear-Cylinder Deactivation

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Indian’s heavyweight models aren’t really our cup of tea, though we do get an immature chuckle when we hear them talk about their “Thunder Stroke” engine platform. Childish jokes aside, some interesting news caught our eye about the American brand’s 2019 models.

Included as part of the 2019 Indian Chief, Springfield, and Roadmaster models is a number of new features, the most interesting of which is the inclusion of rear-cylinder deactivation.

We have seen this technology most recently in the World Superbike Championship (and it is no stranger in the land of four wheels), where manufacturers deactivate cylinders mid-corner to improve bike’s response during partial throttle applications.

Indian is using this concept in a different way though – one that will be more applicable to riding on the street.

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Is Air Conditioning Coming to a Helmet Near You?

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I got an interesting email today from a startup company with a “revolutionary” new helmet concept. No, it wasn’t that motorcycle helmet startup, but the aftermath of Skully does make anyone wanting to swim in this space drip with a bit of radioactivity.

Instead in this case, Feher Helmets hopes to bring air conditioning to a helmet near you. To do this, Feher takes a relatively simply concept, and applies it in a way that no one else is doing in the market.

The Feher ACH-1 is pretty simple, though I am sure the technology behind it takes a bit more skill and engineering to execute. As you would expect, the cooling unit is a small and efficient heat pump, which turns hot air into cold, and then pushes it into the helmet shell.

Using air channels and mesh fabric (note the lack of air vents on the shell design), the cool air then moves around the rider’s head, where it obviously lowers the head’s surface temperature.

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MV Agusta Debuts Auto-Clutch Tech for Sport Bikes

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The concept of an auto-clutch is nothing new, and for dirt bike riders, products like those produced by Rekluse are virtually common place. But, on the sport bike side of things, the use and adoption of this technology is still relatively young.

We have seen scooters and other small-displacement machines use continuously variable transmission (CVT) technology before, and Honda is currently proudly touting its dual-clutch transmission (DCT) on several of its models, the latest being the new Honda Gold Wing, but what about the rest of the market?

Today we see that MV Agusta is the first brand to strike back in this space, debuting its “Smart Clutch System” (SCS) – an automatic clutch designed with sport bikes in mind, making it an option on the marque’s MV Agusta Turismo Veloce Lusso sport-tourer.

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What Everyone Missed About Ford’s Lane-Splitting Patent

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If you were reading other moto-news sites this week – first of all, shame on you – then you would have noticed much noise being made about Ford Motor Company applying for a patent on detection technology for when a motorcycle is lane-splitting between cars.

What you didn’t notice, along with those other publications, is that this is nothing new from Ford, as the American automobile manufacturer was already granted a patent for this technology over a year ago.

Much ado about nothing? Not quite, but the story isn’t remotely close to what was being reported elsewhere. In fact, this news of Ford’s lane-splitting patent strategy is much bigger, and much more important, than what has been in the media thus far.

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Bikes

What Does the Yamaha NIKEN Look Like Naked?

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It has to be the weirdest motorcycle yet, if you can even call it that (some don’t), but it is also luridly intriguing. we are of course talking about the Yamaha NIKEN (read the ride review here, by the way).

A mullet of machines, the NIKEN is business in the front, and party in the back, with its dual 15-inch front wheels mated to a grand total of four conventional fork tubes, via an elaborate parallelogram linkage, while the 17-inch rear wheel spins from a more conventional swingarm design.

This is because from behind the headstock, things get a bit more familiar, with a chassis that is built mostly from steel tube, and a swingarm that comes from cast aluminum. The motor is a revised version of the three-cylidner engine that is found in the Yamaha MT-09.

Available in any color you want, so long as it’s blue, Yamaha has wrapped up the NIKEN in some…interesting…fairing designs, but it is what is under the plastic that is the most intriguing.

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