Table of contents for May 2017 in Performance Bikes

HONDA TO BUILD CUT-PRICE INDIAN MIDDLEWEIGHT Honda are putting together plans to build an Indian-manufactured middleweight bike, which they are looking to export to the rest of the world, and which we suspect will be a parallel twin. They won’t be the first to do so – BMW’s and KTM’s 300cc-ish A2 bikes are built on the sub-continent, too. DUCATI ROLLING IN IT Ducati are swimming in Euros after announcing a record turnover of €731 million and a profit of €54 million. Hopefully they’ll be putting a chunk of that money into their new V4. And selling it for £6000... STUDENTS CREATE ELECTRIC BIMOTA A group of French students have created a concept for an electric Bimota. Named the EB1, the hub-centre-steered bike is just a rendering so far, but…

The up, down soap opera of MV Agusta continues, with boss Giovanni Castiglioni saying the firm is set for a period of stability. In a recent interview, he admitted there had been supply problems, but that a money injection from Russian investors Black Ocean had allowed production to satisfy orders. It’s predicted that we’ll see some new MVs soon – the F4 and the F3 aren’t Euro 4-compliant but they’ve said they’re concentrating on a new four-pot Brutale instead of a superbike. In other MV news, a number of UK owners are still waiting for a reg doc or a refund after they were left with a bike they don’t legally own when some former UK dealers are alleged to have sold them bikes before closing down.…

Surprisingly, Honda’s first 2017 aero effort was the most basic of the lot; surprising because this is a company that’s been involved in Formula One for decades and now manufactures jet planes! “This looks like a bit of an afterthought,” says Rowland-Rouse. “It’s a standard fairing, with a skin wrapped around last year’s wing. The skin is a carbon-based rapid prototype [from a 3D printer]. We use this system all the time in F1; if we need a last-minute part, we churn it out and put it on the car.” Honda’s first solution didn’t work well: Marquez crashed and blamed the accident on the aero. But now that Honda know where the aero race is going, it will be interesting to see what they come up with next.…

IF YOU’RE BORED of us telling you how brilliant the MT-10 is... we make no apology. What do you want us to do – be miserable and give it a kicking for the sake of it? The only area where you might wish to give it a kicking is the looks – it’s a weird looking thing with some messy details and cheap finishes, not to mention the underwhelming colour choices. But that’s about it – and given that they were money-can’t-buy objects for a while last year, obviously it’s not enough to put most people off. Even now, Yamaha are selling all they can get into the UK, and there’s hardly a glut of bikes being sold second-hand by disappointed owners. The trick Yamaha pulled off is sharing the…

‘Point-to-point on a country road, an ER-6 won’t see which way the new 650 went’ ENGINE The updated ER-6f parallel twin sheds 2.5kg in weigt,and gets tuned for more midrange at the expense of a bit of top end. Supertwin racers will get it back, and more, with ease. CHASSIS All new steel tube frame saves 10kg over the ER-6 item (no, not a misprint). New swingarm saves 2.5kg. Thai Dunlops,twin-pot sliding brakes and bouncy springs are all budget additions. STYLING Lower seat and clip-ons are sportstourer-tastic, but race rep fairing has Ninja written all over it – literally. Sculpted tank is nice, pillion seat is higher than ER’s. THE RECENT DEMISE of the ZX-6R potentially leaves a hole in Kawasaki’s midrange. Unfilled, it would be the first time in…

Don’t get overwhelmed Rebuilding a bike can be overwhelming, and that’s why so many people give up. I did the same; my 916 was in boxes for 10 years. Treat it as several small projects that combine into one large one and it becomes manageable. Walk away If you get stuck, don’t be afraid to walk away for a while. Mow the lawn, go for a walk, just do anything to take your mind off the job. I found that when I was shaving the answers to tough problems often popped into my mind! Start them young I started rebuilding bikes before I even knew how to ride them – my first job was an AP50 given to me by a friend. If you have kids, get them a project…

‘Mismatched rubber needs replacing with something much sportier’ STUBBY-ON Arrow half-system is a proper neighbour-waker. Whether it goes or stays depends on how many complaints Chris gets. STYLE ICON The Brutale 750 brings Tamburini design to the masses – especially if you take a punt on a high-miler. PREVENTATIVE MEDICINE Getting involved in sorting anything major that could go awry is Chris’s best course of action. 2003 MV AGUSTA BRUTALE 750 CHRIS NEWBIGGING THIS WAS supposed to be a KTM 990 Super Duke. I’d researched them, viewed one, but got cocked around by a useless dealer. I wanted some decent pics or a bit of extra info before I set off on a 300-mile round trip. A week of hassling got me no further; in which time, they’d dropped the…

CHRIS NEWBIGGING EDITOR chris@pbmag.co.uk Taylor Mackenzie. It’d be great to see some fresh new talent at the top. AUSTIN SMITH ART EDITOR austin@pbmag.co.uk Sylvain Guintoli. Caz reckons I look like him. I’m taking that. It could be worse... JOHN McAVOY ROAD TESTER editorial@pbmag.co.uk Glen Irwin. Like me, he also grows a ginger beard due to Irish blood. MICHAEL RUTTER TRACK TESTER editorial@pbmag.co.uk Shakey. He’s only 10 younger than me, so the furthest from being a youngster. MARK WHITE TECHNICIAN editorial@pbmag.co.uk Luke Mossey. I’m having a tenner on him this year, once he’s got his eye in. JOHN McGUINNESS COLUMNIST editorial@pbmag.co.uk Dan Linfoot – he’s my team-mate, and that Blade is going to fly this year... KAR LEE FORUM EDITOR editorial@pbmag.co.uk Josh Brookes, for the way he clears Cadwell’s Mountain. It…

Here’s a thing we spent a day dicking around on this month. Yamaha launched a new T-Max alongside the MT-10 SP (mostly for the benefit of the Euro lot, who love them more than stinky cheese and three-hour lunches). It seems expensive but they out-sell R1s and are surprisingly good for arsing around on at high speed as well as getting to work with a three-course lunch stowed under the seat. And if it all gets too much, you can always set the cruise control and have a snooze on the pillion seat...…

‘The GP17’s aero is light years ahead of the opposition and could take bike aerodynamics down a new road’ Ducati Desmosedici GP17 Ducati Corse boss Gigi Dall’Igna was angry when winglets were banned, so you can imagine his delight when his aerodynamicists showed him their latest work. The GP17’s so-called ‘hammerhead shark’ bodywork does what engineers are supposed to do: push the rules to the very limit. And it does more than that. The radical design has had jaws dropping up and down pit lane because none of the other factories had expected anything like this. The GP17’s upper fairing looks like an on-board stereo system, with the speakers missing. Ducati have cleverly worked their way around the rules to create four ‘wing’ surfaces in front of the handlebars. “The…

Aprilia’s first go is an odd one: the downforce aero in the RS-GP’s new upper fairing looks more like a NACA duct, as used in race fairings since the 1980s. “It’s a restrained solution – a duct with a small vane inside – and I can’t see it being a particularly strong solution,” says Rowland-Rouse. “But it’s got to be doing something because this stuff costs a lot of money. I suspect they farmed out the work to an Italian aero specialist with a wind tunnel and CFD [Computational Fluid Dynamics] facility; someone like Dallara or Aerolab, who have designed F1 cars.”…

AT THE MOMENT my head is spinning from all the travelling I’ve done this month. I started flying from London to Dublin, Dublin to Gibraltar then Gibraltar to Monte Blanco for the three-day Fireblade test. From there I flew home for a day before flying from Manchester to Inverness to do a gig with Vauxhall. I’m now driving from Inverness to Edinburgh to fly to Belfast for the North West 200 press conference; then it’s off to Brooklands, my mechanic Julian Boland’s wedding, and finally home to Morecambe for a few days to see the family. I’m a bit worried the council may take my key to Morecambe back as I’ve been away so much... The one day I did have at home between all this flying wasn’ t exactly…

Suzuki has become the first to field a VVT superbike, using a clever inlet cam phaser that uses centripetal force rather than hydraulics UNLESS YOU’VE been living in a cave for the last couple of years you’ll be familiar with the term ‘Euro 4’. The current European emissions limits for bikes came into force in two stages – newly type-approved models had to comply from the start of 2016 and carry-over bikes had to be updated to meet the limits from January 1, 2017. For manufacturers, it’s old news; all bike engineers’ eyes are now firmly on the next-stage ‘Euro 5’ limits which represent a much bigger step. But could stricter regulations spell the end for sportsbikes – or force manufacturers to try new ideas? PB takes a close look…

SUSPENSION Adjustable for preload at the rear... and that’s your lot. It’s softly set up but rewards smoothness of input. ENGINE BMW’s 109bhp flat twin ensures there’s ample grunt and heaps of engine braking on tap. BODYWORK 50-year-old stylingis form over function – the screen is next to useless. But that’s missing the point... COMPLEXITY, TECHNICAL features and advanced electronics are the hallmarks of BMWs –from sportsbikes to tourers, they’re often first with trick details. The R nineT Racer is not clever in any way, shape or form: it’s air-cooled, the unadjustable forks lack any sort of Telelever nonsense, and traction control is basic, if you specify it at all. Visually, it harks back to the 1960s-70s (there’s a hint of R90, but it owes as much to British metal…

‘Even my impossible-to-impress teenage son was surprised to learn that it’s 20 years old’ NEW FLAME What RGV? La,a,la... can’t hear you... J Mac turns his attention to the TRX850. FORGOTTEN TREASURE If Jonny’s RGV250 ever turns a wheel in anger, we’ll buy every PB subscriber a pint...* 1997 YAMAHA TRX850 JOHN McAVOY WITH MY RGV250 restoration project nearing glacial pace, and entering a phase of its restoration that is really time-consuming, I had a rare moment of clarity. I realised that it’s going to be a very long time before it turns a wheel under its own power. And even when that happens, realistically it’s not going to be a regular ride. After a chance meeting with ex-PB photographer Simon Lee, and a negotiation that took less time than…

WEIGHT ON YOUR SHOULDERS It weighs more than 1.6kg. You feel the extra 200-300g over other helmets over a day’s riding. WHAT DID YOU SAY? The protruding vents and sidepods create lots of wind noise that even earplugs can’t combat. SEE HERE New visor shape offers great visibility, but the fixingsystem is absurdly complex. Arai RX-7V HOW LONG FOUR MONTHS/ONE HIGHSIDE COST £699.99 CONTACT WWW.WHYARAI.CO.UK ARAI’S STUNNING RETRO paint options are somewhat appropriate – their helmets are living in the past technically as well as visually. It has been a good few years since I’ve worn an Arai. I’ve tested a number of other brands’ offerings at different price levels, and I prefer just about all of them to the RX-7V. Going back to the Japanese firm’s top lid revealed…

‘It’s like we’re going faster, but feeling slower. The new GSX-R1000 is perfect for the TT’ The prospect of May’s North West 200 and June’s TT looks tantalising now that we’ve seen every contender for 2017 in action. First out of the box was 13-times TT winner Michael Dunlop, who has made the switch to Suzuki’s new GSX-R1000. Piggybacking on a recent BSB test, the Northern Irishman was faster than some BSB regulars at Cartagena, clocking a time 1.7 seconds quicker than he managed last year on an S1000RR. This was despite using a standard engine and superbike-spec running gear. “It’s got big potential,” said team boss Steve Hicken. “The smooth power delivery isn’t upsetting the chassis so it’s like we’re going faster, but feeling slower. It’s just perfect for…

A Cambridgeshire S1000RR rider has been jailed after a series of high-speed police chases. Paul Whyatt, 57, used a false numberplate and made off from cops on a number of occasions. After sentencing, police released a video of him pulling away from a pursuit car showing 148mph. He was finally recognised by his rucksack and tracked down after one chase on his genuine plates. Whyatt was sentenced to 30 months for dangerous driving and conspiracy to pervert the course of justice.…

Yamaha’s design is the most elegant solution: two aero vanes inside each side of a widened fairing. “It’s a neat little solution, but the effect will be much less than what they had last year,” says Rowland-Rouse. “They’ve presumably looked at the maximum width allowed, then positioned a couple of vanes in there, because they’re more like vanes than wings. Then they’ve run the fairing skin around the outside of the vanes. I’d say the gap between the two vanes is too small because the two surfaces are really close to each other, so the low pressure underneath the upper vane may interfere with the high pressure [for downforce] of the lower vane. On the other hand, it’s probably more efficient in terms of drag than last year’s wings. Also,…

‘It’s still an incredibly competent, laugh-a-second machine, but the problem is it doesn’t change enough’ THE BEAUTY and the problem of building any further bikes based on the MT-10 platform is the brilliance of the standard bike. Last year, the stunning/fugly (delete according to personal preference) supernaked shocked us with its sheer fun factor and value for money – for £10k there’s nothing to touch it, and it takes a good few grand more before anything else competes. Even on a track, it’s good. Yes, the £14,500 Tuono 1100 V4 betters it on a circuit, but it’ll relieve you of 40% more cash. Beating the stopwatch isn’t the MT-10’s strength anyway – it’s how accessible the speed and the fun is. No other 150bhp bike is this easy to thrash,…

‘From the moment you feel the front wheel sliding away until you hit the road seems like 30 seconds, but in reality it’s only a split second’ ‘I’m struggling a bit with the leg at the minute because the cage has been on for a year and seven months’ In 2012 Ryan Farquhar, one of Ireland’s most successful motorcycle road racers, retired from the sport following the death of his uncle at the Manx Grand Prix. The 41-year-old may have quit racing but he had been mentoring promising youngster Jamie Hamilton, who continued to ride in his KMR Kawasaki team’s bright orange livery. Hamilton, a former British short circuit champion, won races and set lap records in road events under Farquhar’s tutelage. The successful partnership continued until the Dungannon…

1 Ducati head bolt tool ‘I made this myself and it is the only way of doing up Ducati cylinder head nuts as they are so tucked away. It is simply a ½-inch socket welded to the end of a 15mm spanner and as long as you keep them at 90 degrees there is no torque-multiplication so you can do them up accurately. It’s actually a copy of a genuine Ducati tool.’ 2 Dremel ‘I tend to buy plug-in 240-volt Dremels rather than the battery-powered ones because they are cheaper. I use it for everything and it is great for cutting a slot into a nut or bolt if the head has seized into place or has rounded off. The cut-off wheels are amazing. If you get a mains Dremel…

CHASSIS Richard Adams Maxton Suspension Richard is a familiar face in the BSB and TT paddock and is the go-to man when it comes to suspension. What he doesn’t know about damping and springs isn’t worth knowing... www.maxtonsuspension.co.uk ENGINE Mark Brewin BSD Performance Mark Brewin has prepared 1098s that have raced in Europe as well as the UK and has lost count of the number of road and race bikes he has had on his dyno. He still builds 1098 and 1198 race bikes. BOLT-ONS John Burrows Service Manager at Ducati Coventry John has been with Ducati Coventry, which also houses JHP Performance, for over 13 years. In his time he has seen just about every kind of Ducati in existence and a lot of 1098/1198s. www.ducaticoventry.com…

‘Short of a V8, that crossplane motor is the best sounding fuel-to-noise converter’ WHEELS Rumour has it these fluoro hoops won’t stay that colour for long. At this rate, the front tyre will remain pristine, though. BIG HANDFUL The MT-10’s sticky gobs of torque make this possible off the throttle. Lazy lob-on not pictured. 2017 YAMAHA MT-10 MARK WHITE WHILE THINKING about how to write an introduction to my year on the MT-10, I was parked up in a van in a service station on the M40 (to be honest with you, I’d buckled from extreme hunger and was slap-bang in the middle of an Alan Partridge Toblerone-style binge, but fighting my gag reflex while punctuating gulps from a carton of rice milk with wolfed-down moutfuls of falafel). I was…