| Author | Message | ||
     Hughlysses |
http://www.bikeexif.com/pikes-peak-motorcycle | ||
| Ducbsa |
Great bike! A production run of 5 bikes? They must have been working hard on getting XBRR motors. | ||
| Ltbuell |
...man,would LOVE to have that for a street tracker bike.....grin factor plus.Throw on some lights and mirrors an go.LT  | ||
| Oddball |
Shame those motors never made it to regular production. I've hoped for years that S&S would get the rights to them from HD. | ||
| Natexlh1000 |
Besides being huge, there really isn't anything special about those engines as compared to an XB12, right? Not trolling, just waving the ignorance flag. | ||
| Hootowl |
If I recall, different cases, different cylinders, different heads, different crank. Other than being a 45 degree air cooled 4 cam engine with similar mount points, it doesn't have a lot on common with the xb. | ||
| Torquehd |
Shame those motors never made it to regular production. I rode the XBRR twice. When someone says "torque monster", that bike was the archetype. I was justifiably afraid of WOT in first and second gear. If I could have the simplicity of an air-cooled engine with no valve adjustments with THAT kind of power (and if it was reliable)... I'd trade my 1125r in a heartbeat. (Shh.... daddy didn't say that, go back to sleep my dear). | ||
| Blake |
The achievement of the BOTT Power crew is nothing short of amazing. The XBRR is what the air-cooled Buell engine could have been. With a little more test and development, it would have been a world beater, no doubt. I couldn't agree more with the sentiment expressed by Torquehd. For a street bike, that engine, even detuned for EPA noise and emissions regulations would be absolutely amazing. I've ridden Buell hot rods with 120+ RWHP, Pammy Brown's X1 and Brian & Richard Nallin's tube frame based diet tracker. Each were major adrenalin kicks, but at least Pammy's X1 had a front brake! | ||
| Hughlysses |
Does anyone know if Buell was planning to continue with air cooled engine development when the closure happened, or was all effort shifted to the 1125 once it got underway? Back to Bottpower, I thought seriously about building one of those bikes. It would be a very fun project, but the price of the parts alone (NOT including an XB donor bike for the engine, suspension, ECM, and wheels) was nearly equal to cost of the 1190SX I bought a couple of weeks ago. | ||
| Lynrd |
Tooling is expensive and so is short run manufacturing....but yeah...that stuff is really pricy for what it is. Love the idea, though. | ||
| Hootowl |
"Does anyone know if Buell was planning to continue with air cooled engine development when the closure happened" Buell, as far as I am aware, wanted to go water cooled early on. HD didn't have time, and wouldn't let them go outside, so they set about fixing the 1203's issues, and came up with the XB engine, the first of which, the 9, was to be turbo charged. Again, HD wouldn't let them go outside for the turbo, and HD tried, but failed, to come up with a reliable one in house, so the turbo XB never saw production. When HD did finally let them seek outside engineering partners, they chose Rotax, and a water cooled design. So no, I do not believe Buell was designing more air cooled platforms. | ||
| Blake |
Not new platforms, just a new engine. It seems improbable that HDMC and Buell would create the XBRR engine with no plans to eventually transform it into a commercial product. | ||
| Rsh |
While the XBRR engine was/is an amazing engineering piece. It was built to give the privateer something to compete with in the AMA formula extreme class against 600cc factory hot rods. German rider Rico Penzkofer was the first XBRR race winner in the CCS Supertwins race held during the Daytona 200 in 2006. In the Daytona 200 that year, the Warrs, Jeremy McWilliams ridden XBRR was running in the top 10 until retiring with mechanical problems. Could have been an interesting upgrade to the XB line of bikes. | ||
| Snacktoast |
Just about the only things that made their way from the XBRR engine to street engines were the oiling system and carburized connecting rods. You can only develop an air cooled engine so much, as evidenced by reliability issues with the XBRR. It was pushed within an inch of its life. | ||
| Oddball |
I'd still take it over a helicon. Update it to 4 valve heads. Something that could and should have been done across the line by HD 30 years ago. I forget who had 4 valve heads out for a couple years back then. Ok, XBRR + 4 valve heads + H2R supercharger! The XXXBRR Rated triple X for blowing adult minds only. | ||
| Hootowl |
Rivera/Fueling. | ||
| Skinstains |
"I'd still take it over a helicon." Move over as I would like a seat in that boat too. | ||
| Torquehd |
How would you do 4 valves? 4 pushrods or still two (per jug), with 1-into-2 rockers? Would additional reciprocating mass lower the redline? | ||
| Torquehd |
ou can only develop an air cooled engine so much, as evidenced by reliability issues with the XBRR. It was pushed within an inch of its life. I remember our XBRR constantly being broke. But i don't remember specifically what the problems were. Anyone know what its pitfalls were? | ||
| Hootowl |
Smaller valves are lighter. So even though there are more of them, they are individually lighter. Lighter valves means they can move faster without floating. Increases RPM potential, doesn't lower it. 'Course, you're still limited by piston speed. I don't know much about those 4 valve heads, but I hear they don't do much for a street twin. If they were a boon to power and efficiency, you can bet Buell would have done it. | ||
| Skinstains |
tons of clutch trouble with the RR from what I've heard and some cam problems as they spun in the case without being bushed. there were a bunch of revisions done to the bikes as they were being tested (raced) so some have them and some don't. This is what I've been told by others as I don't know but it certainly makes sense to me. As for 4 valve heads...I don't know but would certainly think Mr. Buell was well aware of the performance advantages of a 4 vs 2 valve combustion chamber. My own conclusion...HD wanted to keep their beloved 45 degree 2 valve pushrod mill. Damn the performance gains as we're a cruiser company and we'll hold onto tradition until it almost kills us, then we'll change, maybe. All this when HD had 4 valve heads in the teens and twenties. | ||
| Hootowl |
It's likely that the bee hive spring lightened the valve assembly enough to work reliably in the XB9 at the intended RPM, and that, at those RPMs, 4 valve heads didn't have an advantage over a 2 valve head and so wasn't worth the effort/expense when they were putting the XB platform together. But yes, I can totally buy HD not wanting something in the sportster that would make people want to actually keep their sportsters, since it's just a girl's bike/starter bike they want you to trade in for a big twin (in their minds). | ||
| Oddball |
In my thinking, the extra valves would be for flow at reduced lift. Combine that with some forced induction and it could be the crazed giggle machine I've seen happen to riders of the H2/H2R. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNbf2BWAXpQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k24Et_Oa3qM (Message edited by oddball on September 20, 2017) |
