Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/125838
.., . II III • I II ..:I t CI"l r--O"l """" """" """" '"' ~ ..0 E .... ~ u ~ Q By Jim Gianatsis Photos by Charles Morey us varna 360 Grand Prix . - 26 Every motocross rider has the same dream. I used to lie awake nights thinking how fantastic it would be to own an exotic motocross bike like Joel Robert's World Championship Suzuki or Bengt Aberg's Grand PriX winning Husqvama. Showing up the guys at Sunday's Podunk motoeross would be a cinch with such a super trick, mucho horsepower monster machine and afterwards, everyone would be crowding around at the trophy presentation to get a better look at you and drool over the bike. Visions of being a super hero soon cloud the mind and before you know it you're in Europe and sliding through a downhill off camber beside Alr.e. Shift up a gear, dial on the throttle, start shuffliDa your weight as you fight for traction.. .slowly you inch ahead, taking the checkered flag by a wheel length. After watching Heiklr.i Mikkola banzai the start of the Mid Ohio Trans-AMA and leave the two reigning World Champions in his dust, his 360 Grand Prix Husqvarna slr.imming across the ground faster than what seemed possible, I knew what I wanted. Heiklr.i subsequently retired with a seized engine. His carburettor had picked up some dirt and leaned out. Well, Heiklr.i went back to Finland to rest up after a long season of European racing and an overall victory in the American Inter-AMA series, but his bike stayed, the 360 GP machine slored away inside the big yellow Husky transporter bus that is operations headquarters for Team Husqvama. Not really expecting team manager Gunnar Lindstrom to say yes, I asked him if I could do an article on the bike and perhaps ride it. I almost peed in my Hallman GP's when he said, "Sure." I guess everyone envisions a factory GP bike as a lightweight firebreathing rocket. I sure did, and in the last few years it was true, but it isn't quite so true any longer. For 1-973 the F1M ruled that all Open class motocross bikes of 251 or larger displacement meet a minimum required weight of at least 209 Ibs. For 250 and 125cc class bikes the weights are also fixed at a reasonable limit. What this does is allow the manufacturers to build competitive bikes at a reasonable expense without having to resort to exotic metals and fragile lightweight designs. Nowa manufacturer can offer nearly the same basic motocross bike as being raced by the factory, for sale,to the public at a reasonable price. When Suzulr.i took the World Championship from Husqvarna back in 1970 with their lightweight hiP reving horsepower machines, Husky tried tO,foUow suit and hence, factory riders like Bengt Aberg, who had two World Championships under his belt with the old torquey 4-speed models, found it difficult to ride the new highly powered and pipey-5-spced GP bikes. Racing is the best developer for new desips though, and these past two years Husky has been reverting back to bikes which have wide, useable power bands. The latest 360 GP engine is a good compromise between a responsive engine and one with broad useable power. The 250 engine follows the same trend. On a dyno the Husky eosines may not seem to pump out much peak horsepower, but put them in the dirt beside any other Grand Prix machine and they're more than competitive. Husqvarna's Jack Lehto explained to us when we arrived to ride Heiklr.i MikkoJa's bike that most of the features on the Husky GP bikes will be available on the new 250 Production motocrosoer that is due for release the first of this coming year. The GP frame with its rear shocks moved closer to the front, smaller engine cases and a radial head will all be new on the 250. The 360 engine will also find its way into produciton in about 12 months after a little more development has taken place on it. Both bikes will weigh almost right on the FIM limit. Jack pointed the way to Heiklr.i's bike we checked to see if it had enough gas, then he turned Charlie (ace photog) and I loose with the multi-thousand dollar prototype. Gulp! His only warning was not to use the kick starter. It had been discovered with the 360 that the new smaller engine cases weren't stron~ enough around the kick starter stop if the kick lever decided to punch back. Already the '74 model production molds were being changed at the factory to strengthen up this area and another weak section near the cylinder base. I'll be the first to profess that I'm not the best judge of a Husky prototype GP bike, especially a big bore one that had me scared to death before it was even started up. At the risk of having you think this is a biased article, which I hope it isn't, I'll teU you that I own and race a '73 model Husky 250 CR and will try and compare it with the GP bike. The biggest problem all day was keeping the 360 running, which apparently for Heikki Mikkola isn't a problem at all. The 38mm Bing carb is set up so it won't idle, which is perfect for Heikki because the bike is either resting in the pits between motos or out on the track running WFO. Once bump started the engine takes a little while to warm up and run clean. Tbe radial engine really does it's job of keeping things cool. Engine response is smooth once warmed up, and underway the power is fantastically easy to control. The special Husky throttle is almost a balf turn like the standard Magura on the Production bikes, but it weighs less and isn't as bulky.