OMMAG... Noticed this quote in the news:
"It's very important for us to sequence these big initiatives in a way where they don't all just crash at the same time" ......
Friday, August 24, 2012
I Had This On My Wish List ...
But ... sadly even the dream of having and riding a revived and updated Norton motorcycle seems to have been crushed. Although for those few who did manage to get their hands on one ... the future is $$$ Rare and Collectable$$$ ..... The Norton Revival ... Is a Scandal ...
H/T to Hellforleathermagazine.com
So regrettable .... but ... If I had been able to pony up ... I might have succumbed to the scam myself.
105 race wins and 9 world championships .... rider Valentino Rossi says ..... I can't ride this ....
Pretty amazing. I figure that Ducati is going down the tubes in the near future as a race powerhouse.
This failure to evolve their world class race bikes in the direction that they need looks like the engineers have followed the design and development of the machines down a dead end path ... if not having finally reached the performance envelope boundary for the desmo engine as a stressed member of the rolling chassis. It makes me wonder why .... after all the historical failures of this layout that the Ducati designers chose to go down this route.
Past efforts to use the stressed member engine layout in a motorcycle were aimed at reducing weight rather than obtaining the best chassis dynamics. This is a strategy indicates the power plants are at the end of their potential for more output and that the weight reduction tradeoff against best handling is a "last chance" sort of effort to extend the life of the current technology.
Apparently ... the street versions of the bike are fantastic .... but they deliver something like 100 hp LESS than the GP Bike.
Although it is sure that Ducati has produced the finest handling and most powerful combination ever and most likely possible in the Desmosdici and Panigale machines.... At this point I would think that a clean sheet of paper and some fresh ideas would be in order.
Perhaps this will be, since it looks like Audi is taking over the Ducati brand. Or ... perhaps not.
In the mean time .....
"It is unrideable and it doesn’t matter what track you are on. I cannot enter the corners hard and we can’t hope the situation will change with the new Bridgestone tyres. These aren’t problems that can be solved with set-up alone."
There's some rumors running around that Ford is planning to re-introduce a four cylinder engine to the Mustang lineup.
To me this seems like "Deja Vu ... all over again.." (borrowing an old Yogi-ism ). Basically ... remembering these horrendous failures :
Mustang II - possibly the worst car ever made
EXP - The evolutionary joke
Early Fox Bodied Mustangs with four bangers
The Merkur - a quirky misfit with some redeeming qualities in the performance and handling departments
The SVO Turbo - which was not all bad either ... but still a failure as a true performance/enthusiast car
However, the thing that gets me about this train of thought in motoring design/marketing is that it follows the behaviour that leads to the most common trap that North American car companies are prone to find themselves in. The error they make is in thinking that the opinions of motor journalists, who are grasping for something to write about and thus justify their existence, are a sound source of ideas that need to be developed. This is essentially a failure of vision in the design/engineering and product development groups, but the willingness of the marketing people to embrace the perceived wisdom of the chattering cretins in the press combined with the executive office willingness to be guided by false assumptions about what public demand is really based on ... sadly ... seems to wind up on the showroom floors.
Why this bothers me is that it is instead of being offered vehicles that actually are better we ... the automobile buying public ... get crap shoved at us with the attitude that we ... as in you and I ... are too stupid to know what we want or what is good for us. In the process of getting to this point the manufacturers waste hundreds of millions of dollars that could be otherwise used to actually make their products better. The fact that they continue to do this time after time is one of the reasons I have never invested in auto manufacturers and is also one of the reasons the so called Big Three are in the financial state that they are today.
As in the 70s and the 80s the cycle of car development is once again being impacted by the government meddling and arbitrary regulations being imposed by people who simply have no idea what they are doing but are bent on doing it anyway... hang the cost and screw the consequences. The auto company brass are cravenly eager to placate the meddlesome pols and bureaucrats .... foolishly pandering to demands they imagine the public to making.
Hence .... once again ... the Four Cylinder Mustang idea.
Now ... realistically ... the current mustang is a bloated little lump of steel and plastic. It's not bad looking but it has NO SOUL. It is overweight for it's dimensions. It has terrible driver feedback and most of the power plants it comes with are weak feeling if not just sedated and unsuitable for a performance car. The reality of the Mustang is that it is a vehicle with bland characteristics and sporting pretensions. Of course ... if you lay out the cash for one of the high performance packages you do actually get some kickass horsepower. But what is the point of a car that is being sold as raucous driver satisfying beast when it fails to actually inspire? Looking at recent motor-press efforts ... they seem to be mightily confused about just what a Boss 302 or Cobra or GT is supposed to be ... how many of these dummies actually did comparisons between the Mustangs and BMWs?
Frankly ... I don't care how a car that is supposed to be a muscle car/ pony car/ hooligan ride compares to some Euro sedan that is sold primarily to wankers and their girlfriends. I don't really care what they use for a motor and I don't care what knob polishers in the motor-press think.
But ... let's assume for just one moment that the Ford guys were actually serious about producing a four cylinder Mustang. Let's also assume that the reasons for this would be to make the car better.
Then the underlying goals would seem to be less weight and better handling. Part of the rumor mill take on the supposed new mustang is also supposed to be Independent Rear Suspension... which is something that Ford should have made standard in the Mustang decades ago... and the overall benefits to the car and the driver experience would be a lighter and more responsive and more FUN car.
I would heartily approve a a lighter and more responsive car that is more fun to drive... wouldn't you? The speculation on the four banger and the tone from Ford seems to indicate that the four will be an especially potent little mill. All right ... let's say we have a quick revving four that kicks out some impressive numbers and actually has some character.
What is stopping Ford from putting the same character into the V6 or the V8s? The 6s and 8s are NOT currently free revving motors ... they are tuned for low and mid-range torque and have far too much flywheel plus they are severely rev limited ... all in the supposed name of "drivability" which is really marketing wonk code for safe and easy to drive. Same for the handling ... these cars all push the front end when driven hard and are overly soft. Again a lighter and more fun car could be built even with a four banger .... or the 6s or the 8s.
But sadly the guys at ford could have done this years ago by keeping the mustang lean and mean. There never was the need for this car to weigh in at the 3500 lb plus range ... even with the V8 engines. And most of all there never was a need to make the Mustang anything BUT a sports car. And that is the root of the problem.
Please ... DO ... give us a lighter and better handing Mustang ... but don't try to do it while shoving another four cylinder powerplant down our throats.
Related...
While I'm on the topic of motor sports and the motoring press ... I watched a few minutes of Motoring 2012 today. I've never really enjoyed the Motoring TV production because the show is much more of an effort to display and market the cars as products than to actually evaluate and inform in any meaningful way. But today ... one of the talking heads ... Jim Kenzie ... found the need to offer his opinion on the merits of building prisons versus the merits of the federal government regulating traffic safety programs. For the record ... Jim Kenzie clearly does not know what the hell is talking about and should stick to talking about cars .... keeping his political opinions to himself.
Also related ...
The word "bespoke" .... this seems to have cropped up in the last couple of years ... originating as far as I can tell in the British motoring press. The term itself refers to tailor made clothing ... specifically made to order men's clothing and suits. Somehow ... some person in the Automobile Journalism field though it would be clever to describe some car as "Bespoke" ... it seems to have caught on as well in marketing circles and is not limited to the auto industry. However, the frequency of the word "bespoke" appearing in articles related to the automobile and the enthusiast automobile is on the rise.
I think the guy or gal who first applied this esoteric little adjective was being somewhat original and witty. The trend seems to be leading to mindless copy cat repetition and misuse of the word as a pronoun which I find annoying and unnecessary.
In short ... most people you will see using this term are in fact nothing but pretentious knobs who have glommed onto something they think makes them sound more clever and intelligent than they will ever be.
I'd definitely want to put some REAL tires on it before I'd try to ride it.
The RD 350 is a real sport bike .... in spite of it's age. Even a stock 350 can smoke the rear tire and break traction in corners at speed. Light weight and quick handling make you want to ride the little bike hard.
And even GOOD tires can be pushed to their limits by an RD 350.......
Nice build and finish by the Analog Motorcycle Shop (Tony Prust) ...
Paul Crowe at The Kneeslider ... has found another work of mechanical art.... worth asking the question "Is This A Motorcycle?" As a study in mechanical form.... the Falcon Motorcycles tribute to the Vincent Black Shadow and early British performance bikes in general is pretty impressive.
A work of art in a way .... the creation of a passionate artisan for sure.
I particularly like the use of brass finishing as an accent .... a bit of the Steampunk influence I think. I doubt if I'll have time to produce anything like this before the EOW .... probably never come close to this level of skill .... but I do have a project that needs finishing.
Finally! I got to watch an F1 race again ... not on Speed Channel aka the NASCAR network.... but TSN came through with a 7 to 9 am timeslot for the Grand Prix of China (Shanghai).... an exciting race with some gutsy moves .... and finally a Lewis Hamilton win over Vettel.
Later today .... the Nascar network found some time for World Superbike racing ... Assen Holland.... race #1 went to Johnny Rea on the Castrol/Honda ... SBK Official Site ....Second race is still on ....
On the topic of motorcycles I've come accross a very interesting site ... Motorcycle Specs ... shows some history and reports on all sorts of bikes ... plus some cutting edge new developments and off the hook customs like that Desmodoctor at the top of the page.
Following a spectacular crash at this past weekend's NASCAR race at Atlanta Our Canadian broadcasters all seem to have been infected with a sudden infatuation for the four wheeled racing business.
Not that they have any love for it or knowledge of it... merely that it provides an opportunity to sermonize about the sports deficiencies as seen from the towers and broadcast studios in the GTA.
That and the fevered imaginings of the their chicken little pin heads.
And so CTV today offered a "special report" on the matter..... having of course profound knowledge of speedway racing from watching Hollywood's ever so educational productions like : Days of Thunder .
Sure! I can sum up what these pinheads know about NASCAR in three letters S F A ..
Since Speed Channel became the NASCAR network .... and whatever became of all the really interesting motoring hobby and bike shows ... I've been feeling a little blue on Saturdays and Sundays. Not that I'll miss the Teutils meathead antics or Jesse James self promoting BS ... but there used to be some interesting episodes on American Thunder when it was produced by Michelle Smith.
Even that bunch of pricks (Russell Mitchell ... being the owner of the business ... could have used some decent help!) at the Exile motorcylce's "Biker Buildoff" .... was pretty good a couple of times
But all that being over and done with .... I'm kind of excited to find out about ..... THIS!!
New Ultra Sport Wheels, new Cooper all terrain tires and a 2" lift for my Jeep.
It all started back in the spring when I was cleaning the old wagon after that particularly messy winter of 08/09.
Among the things that I was concerned about was the condition of the shocks ... some steering and suspension bushings ... the wheels and the tires.
The old Rancho shocks were losing their bushings. The front suspension was getting loose.
The original 15" aluminum wheels which were part powder coated and part milled with clear coat were getting corroded from salt finding it's way into chips and scratches and were leaking air around the rim beads. The white powdery crust that formed on the aluminum is truly hideous. And finally, the tires were getting near the end of life, hardening and losing their once excellent grip in the wet and snow.
Since I had always thought the Grand Cherokee would look better with a bigger set of boots on... it seemed like the right time to look into the upgrades and began looking around for parts and such.
What I settled on after doing some web searching and talking to a few local wheel and tire guys along with one pretty decent Jeep expert :
Ultra Rogue 16x8 aluminum wheels
Cooper ATR 255/70R 16 tires ... a tire I have some experience with and find to be just the ticket for our Manitoba Winters.
Also needed were a modest suspension lift ... I settled on a 2" combination from Skyjacker with spacers over the stock rear springs and new front springs, a new set of shocks to accomodate the altered movement and miscellaneous bits and pieces like new track bar mounts.
The process was a bit frustrating at first with a few hiccups along the way as I learned what to do and what not to do when undertaking a process like this.
Maybe I'll make the process of making the mods a blog subject for another day....
Very much ahead of it's time with a double overhead cam in line four cylinder engine and twin front disc brakes combined with shaft drive. This should have been the motorcycle of choice for the long distance tour and sport touring enthusiast. However, poor (virtually non-existent) distribution and sales operations in the US and Canada along with a steep price tag $3000 helped to keep this from happening.
An interesting side note is that CW Magazine had this test/demo bike for sale after the article appeared ... as I recall they were asking $600 bucks or some ridiculous low price for it.
To think I could have owned this classic! Oh well..................
Honda has a new sport touring machine coming to the showrooms across North America for the 2010 season.
Some interesting features ...
Based on the long time proven reliable V-4 engines of the Interceptor line the new bike has a unique crank and cylinder layout placing both the rear cylinders on the inner journals and thus making the bike narrower where the rider's legs go.
Exceptional ergonomic (comfort+control) design..... 1200cc of smooth and torquey pulling power...... The bike uses up to date electronic control for the throttle ( fly by wire).... There are plenty of touring options and accessories. There is traction control and antilock brakes as well as an optional twin clutch auto/manual shift system that makes a lot of sense for this type of bike. Think about clutcless push button shifting for sport mode riding and smooth automatic control when loaded up and on a long trip.
Or get the "standard" manual clutch version if you like!
If this doesn't play well for you use the LINK to YouTube .
Awesome ride for the armchair race fan ! 6 1/2 minutes around the Nurburgring !
This car is a prototype using an engine developed by cloning and grafting parts from the Suzuki Hyabusa 1300cc motorcycle engine into a V8 configuration. The motor is built into a prototype race car and you may be able to buy a street legal version sometime!!!!!
You can buy an engine NOW and use it in a conversion or kit car. See ... Radical Extreme Sports Cars ... h/t to Paul Crowe at The Kneeslider! OMMAG
