Australian Motorcycle News Vol 67 Issue 23

IN YEARS TO COME, this special issue of AMCN will be one I look back on proudly. The idea of a feature celebrating 40 years since Hailwood’s famous TT comeback was hatched more than a year ago. Over time that idea expanded to two features, and then into a themed issue. The original feature ideas were then scrapped when Hamish Cooper made contact with Jim Scaysbrook and Neil Cummins, and uncovered a cracking yarn behind the ’78 event. When Alan Cathcart sent through his track test of Hailwood’s TT-winning Ducati, we hatched a new plan and, thanks to the vision of the AMCN team, the result is what you now hold in your hands. Hamish uncovered a cracking yarn behind Hailwood’s famous TT comeback You would be hard-pressed to find a motorcycle…

CURTISS MOTORCYCLES – formerly known as Confederate – has revealed the first of a range of electric bikes that will form the backbone of its future line-up. While the first bike to carry the Curtiss name was the petrol-engined Warhawk, the new Zeus represents the real direction Curtiss intends to follow, and the released bike shows the company has lost none of its desire for avant-garde styling. While the CNC-milled aluminium frame and girder fork are in line with the exotic V-twin cruisers that Confederate made its name with, the Zeus is power by two electric motors. The new-generation motors and electronics have been provided by Zero Motorcycles, and with two motors instead of one, the Zeus is reckoned to make as much as 130kW and a crazy 393Nm of torque. By comparison, the…

IN A LETTER to America’s NHTSA (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration) earlier this year, Curtiss listed four models for 2018. The V-twin-powered Warhawk, which uses an S&S petrol engine like the ones that powered the Confederate bikes, was the first to be revealed, and now the electric T-Block Zeus has been unveiled. Two more electric models are still to come – the Starfire V-Block and the Hercules. Given the T-Block chassis of the Zuess replicates a Boxer twin, it’s a safe bet the V-Block will replicate a big V-Twin. While all four were named as 2018 models, it seems unlikely that the Zeus, Starfire or Hercules will make it to showrooms this year. It’s most likely that the electric range will not reach customers for another year, possibly even as 2020 models.…

SEGWAY – THE FIRM that made its name with self-balancing hoverboard-style personal mobility devices – has registered patents for an electric bike design. The front suspension is a Hossack-style girder arrangement, but it appears the design choice has been driven by an attempt to make sure the bike is made almost entirely of flat material, which we understand to be sheet aluminium. The mechanical side of the bike includes an electric motor mounted concentrically with the swingarm pivot, ensuring constant chain tension. Monoshocks provide the suspension at each end, with a couple of tubular wishbones holding the fork girders to the main frame. With the flat sheets and all the sections of the frame and swingarm bolted together, the bike could easily be supplied in flat-pack form. Two identical battery packs sit between the frame…

SUZUKI ALSO PLANS to launch a naked GSX-S300 model. In issue 67-20 we revealed the Haojue HJ300 that might be related to that machine, but the HJ300 uses an enlarged version of the older parallel twin that has a relatively long-stroke, low-revving design. This GSX-R300 patent shows an entirely new short-stroke engine that’s likely to offer much more performance. Whether the eventual GSX-S300 naked bike turns out to be derived from the Haojue HJ300 or is a naked version of this higher-performance GSX-R300 design remains to be seen.…

WE’VE HEARD RUMOURS that Suzuki will join the ranks of Supersport 300 manufacturers in 2019 with a new GSX-R300 sportsbike, and this patent could be the first sight of its new challenger. Sure, Suzuki already has a small sportsbike, the GSX250R, but it is a low-performance machine that’s little more than a GW250 Inazuma with a fairing. What this patent reveals is a very different proposition. The new bike will be powered by a parallel-twin engine that is surely around the 300cc mark, and possibly higher. It’s clearly a machine in much the same mould as the 321cc Yamaha R3 or Honda’s 249cc twin-cylinder CBR250RR. Given that Suzuki developed new 124cc and 147.3cc single-cylinder engines for the GSXR125/GSX-R150 models, it’s likely the new parallel twin will share similar internal dimensions. Both those new…