| Author | Message | ||
     Buelliedan |
I highly doubt you will ever see a Motus in the 20K range with the parts they come with now. Just like the 1190 RS these bikes use premium parts like Ohlins, Brembo, forged or carbon fiber wheels, Akropovich exhausts, etc. | ||
| Ourdee |
The guys who bought the $10,000 RX's probably made a very good decision. Will they be upset when the rest of us are buying six to eight thousand dollar kit bikes that we put together ourselves? | ||
| Buelliedan |
This article states my feelings exactly: http://lanesplitter.jalopnik.com/erik-buell-racing s-death-is-all-your-fault-1712321918 | ||
| Snacktoast |
Great article buelliedan. Thanks for posting the link. | ||
| Oddball |
Motus could have a windfall if they could talk GM into using the engine in small vehicles instead of equivalent inline 4's. Motus in a slingshot would be cool. | ||
| Greg_e |
Well, based on that article's qualifier, most of us here are not at fault. Most of us realized that convention sucks, so we bought something different, we bought a Buell. I almost bought some conventional 2 wheeled non-descript transporter, but then I saw a Buell and started researching. Decided that little and practical was out, might as well go all in and get a great "full out" race machine. Can't say my choice was wrong, but I'm kind of wanting a full out light touring machine right now. The XB-R doesn't make a great commuter unless you have twisty roads both ways. Two up is just not right. Luggage is just not right. Probably should buy a Uly or an older BMW. | ||
| Henshao |
I really wish we had an answer on whether or not Hero stiffed Erik Buell out of their hard earned money. Shit like that is only but so much Erik's fault but his reputation takes a more and more devastating hit the longer the truth is submerged. | ||
| Steveford |
That article had something I haven't seen before: Amidst the bickering and disappointment following EBR’s closure, rumours are circulating of EBR failing to hold up an important part of their agreement with Hero: starting a distributorship for Hero products in the U.S. and Canada. | ||
| Glitch |
Sounds like what HERO was saying, only they left out that HERO never paid for services rendered. Hard to "hold up an important part of their agreement" when your "partner" owes you 20million | ||
| Ourdee |
Missing 20 bones makes it hard for a body to function. | ||
| Stevel |
Much of what was stated in that article was true, but much also was pure speculation. We all do that, myself included. However, we all must wait for the story to emerge. I'm certain there is fault with Erik and Hero, otherwise failure would not have occurred. It is true the EBR bikes were not selling fast enough. It is true that entering WSB before the bike was competitive was a foolish thing to do that bled money and proved to many perspective buyers that the 1190 was not ready for prime time. Erik's stubbornness to scrap the ZTL brakes and sort out the intractable engine problems also did not help. I sincerely hope that this isn't the end of the Rotax Helicon engine. It is a great design that needs a little help and it has received none. | ||
| Henshao |
Yeah, there is probably a fault with Erik. Believing in something that's too good to be true. I just can't get behind your arguments Steve. How the hell do you build a world superbike without entering world superbike; the world superbike Helicons got squeezed for every drop of spare juice they could muster and they were just on the verge of almost barely being close to doing something worthwhile when the axe fell; they ran conventional brake setups alongside ZTL. Now I ain't saying I wouldn't go fishing with ya, Steve, but I must disagree with your points. | ||
| Tpoppa |
The WSBK effort advertised to the world that the 1190 was a last place bike (when it could finish a race). Fielding a bike on the WSBK grid was probably a dream Erik had for years, and he did it. But it was a rotten decision for a fledgling company. | ||
| Tpoppa |
...and before someone posts something about the value of development during racing. Erik was expecting to surprise the world with a strong WSBK effort. He didn't. | ||
| Crusty |
Such happy, positive and supportive comments... | ||
| Hootowl |
"Erik was expecting to surprise the world with a strong WSBK effort" And you know this how? Everything that was ever printed about his aspiration for WSB was to learn and improve the motorcycle. He stated multiple times that they were not expecting to podium. Besides...what's a strong effort? Showing up with a stock bike with race plastics a pipe and a tune and not getting lapped by $200000 machines? I'd call that a strong effort. | ||
| Tpoppa |
These were the goals going into the 2014 season. I would have called that a strong effort. “I'm delighted to remain with Team Hero EBR for 2014 and join them in moving to the World Superbike championship,” said Yates. “There will be a lot of new tracks to learn and a lot of data to collect, but we have a strong team with competent personnel so I am confident and excited to head to Australia where Geoff and I should both have a strong chance of scoring points in both races.” “This coming season is a new chapter for us and I can't wait to get started,” added May. “We know that we have a big challenge ahead of us but we are all ready for it. I am not expecting to be at the sharp end immediately but am confident of featuring inside the points consistently and springing a surprise or two throughout the year.” http://www.crash.net/wsbk/news/198913/1/erik-buell -racing-confirms-wsbk-entry.html | ||
| Tpoppa |
Showing up with a stock bike with race plastics a pipe and a tune Oh, so those we stock motors blowing up left and right?!?!? And that is supposed to make me want to own one, why? Care to try again? | ||
| Mackja |
And Suzuki is having a banner year! GSXR is a really great machine, but there WSBK effort has been wrought with mechanical failure too. Would that stop me from buying one, no. | ||
| Hootowl |
Sure. Lots of race bikes blow engines. Over revving on a downshift will blow any motor. Also...neither of those quotes by the riders were quotes by Erik, the goals of whom are the topic of this discussion. | ||
| Froggy |
Not sure why Hoot thinks the WSB bikes were just a pipe and tune, because they were not. To quote Erik on a Facebook post, "Our WSBK engines made around 205 RWHP on the same dyno where stock bikes made about 160-163 RWHP. Of course they had cams and a little tweaking beyond exhaust..." The rules did restrict a lot of what they could do to the bike, and it likely was closer to stock than the competition, but it was not a few minutes of work away from the streetbike. Regarding your quotes of a strong effort, it sounds like they achieved it. Yea things didn't go as great as planned, but they kept learning and improving, and were doing better this year than last till the axe fell. | ||
| Ace117 |
Regardless of the engine failure factors, its really disheartening as an RX owner (speaking just about me here and not the rest of the RX owners) to have the thought of engine failure at the back of my mind. The highest Iv spun my RX to is 8k and out of engine failure paranoia I probably will never take it past that, especially since my warranty has gone the way of the dinosaurs. Now don't get me wrong I love my RX it its a great bike and I strongly believe in it (I bought it when I could have bought and S1k or R1) but lets be real engine going boom is a possibility with this bike regardless of how I feel about it. I suspect potential buyers that were deterred from purchasing an EBR had some sort of concern about engine failures. This is just my 2cents I certainly don't regret my purchase and if I could I'd buy a second. | ||
| Hootowl |
I had no idea they used different cams. I thought those couldn't be replaced. Interesting. Thanks Froggy! | ||
| Froggy |
Ace, the race bikes are running at a higher RPM and are putting down about 40 more horsepower than our bikes, I have no doubt that even running a stock bike at 11k RPM all day would be perfectly fine. | ||
| Snacktoast |
Ace, The WSBK engines were heavily leaned on to make the power they were. As mentioned, they were also turning more RPM to achieve that power. Comparing a purpose built race engine that is sharing really only the bore and stroke dimensions and basic architecture I think is a bit of a stretch to cause worry on a street ridden stock engine. Best current analogy I can think if. A couple Porsche engines blew up at Le Mans this year during the 24 Hour race. I wouldnt hesitate to buy a Porsche because of that. | ||
| Bads1 |
Are they Froggy?? Factory bikes are in the hood of 215 rwhp. So reality not far off. I dont believe cams and a tune will net you 40HP. If it does my CBR is going in the shop down the road from EBR for a rather cheap upgrade (Message edited by bads1 on June 19, 2015) | ||
| Snacktoast |
"Factory" meaning what? Factory entires like Kawi, Aprilia, Ducati? I bet theyre making more than 215 at the wheel in WSBK. | ||
| Froggy |
Dana, all I have is what Erik said, which is good enough for me. I haven't seen any dyno plots for the WSBK bikes. There is more than cams and a tune, but I don't know exactly what. (Message edited by Froggy on June 19, 2015) | ||
| Classax |
A lot of things can cause engine failure and a lot of things can be CALLED engine failure. Its funny how peoples memories fade and forget facts. EBR in WSBK Year 1- First 5 races they are running what is sitting on show room floors with the addition of a aux fuel tank, race plastics and race ECU and exhaust with the intention of developing race parts. Chronic problems reveal engines are not being prepped properly and performance is below that of even unprepared street bikes. The engine builder is finally replaced- bingo engines start to last full races at pace with the soft limiter RAISED to 12.5, 1K rpm above the street bikes. Every time they want to make a change to the engine for test, they get charged an engine- New Rules are no longer development friendly as in previous years- Just after mid year they squeeze 205RWHP out of engines with stock cams,pistons, rings, rods, springs, stator, water pump, oil pump and radiators. ( Mind you both EVO and Superbike replace nearly ALL those items to go racing as part of the factory Super STOCK catalog. Rules change to allow fewer homologation sales and BIMOTA still can't sell enough and drop out. EBR has already built and sold the number required. May misses super pole by less than .25 of a second in 4 rounds. New Heads and Cams arrive ahead of US round. In the US round they find the Italians basically ignore the riders on set up. The alternate set up scores them a Pegram point and Mays almost picks up one as well. Mays makes it into super pole for the last three rounds and misses scoring points by less than half a second in his last five finishes... Year two- New rules make Superbike closer to Superstock- Half MFG release new UBER stock bikes for sale, others (Kawi) suddenly aren't making nearly as much power in SBK trim... hmmm EBR bikes are putting down somewhere near 210RWHP with new cams and heads and exhaust. Starting to finish races and score points, with a shoe in for super pole every round and then the principle sponsor who had agreed to and signed a CONTRACT stating they would compete in ALL rounds with two riders, pulls out after assuring the team all was well and things would continue. Not to mention obliterating the track record on the bike's home test track(which is more indicative of the tracks found in the US) Ace the race bikes are built(higher compression and advanced timing) for the engines to last maybe two or three race weekends before needing major tear down. They were run at higher RPM longer, abused with high RPM downshifts close to or beyond the physical limits. I am currently about to replace a front header after it cracked after 4 straight track days, of 8 20 minute sessions each at TWS a high speed oval similar to Daytona and a member day at MSRH. (My RX has just over 12K miles with more than 1/3 of that collected on track) Of the bikes in the group with us who also did all 5 days a S1krr blew a head gasket, a GSXR locked up an engine after a downshift at 140mph, a 1199 blew a water pump and a couple of other bikes also had issues. A number of bikes didn't complete all 5 days. Run hard enough long enough and even the good ones will break. The point is even with the abuse of redline in the first 4 gears followed by engine braking down from 150mph+ every lap for four days straight the engine is fine. The heat cycling from track sessions followed by 40 minute cool down to back to track sessions fatigued the weld at the base of the header and the vibration finally cause it to crack. That's more abuse than most racers put on a bike in a weekend unless they are running multiple classes. I'm not saying go run it all day on the soft limiter but the engines are certainly up to the task of being ridden very hard by non aliens like ourselves. The fact that most of the components were tested in WSBk in even more a abusive environments than our skill levels can generate is a plus not a minus. | ||
| Hootowl |
"Year 1- First 5 races they are running what is sitting on show room floors with the addition of a aux fuel tank, race plastics and race ECU and exhaust" This must have been what I was thinking of Froggy. But still, I didn't know they got new cams later on, so thanks for that. |
