Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

.....-4 .....-4 .... <1,) ..0 8 <1,) ;:> o Z The Norton RC588 pumps out a claimed 138 bhp at 9500 rpm and has a powerband our test rider says is "practically infinite." The air-cooled twin rotor rotary engine-powered Norton has a dry weiglit of 286 pounds. Norton hopes to get the weight down to 275 pounds. . Y.r lC o , ( B,ttSin's Great White Hope? ) ,~I By Alan Cathcart Photos by Phil Masters { This is a very difficult story Ior me to write, for th e simple reason that I have to take more than usual care to prevent my natural enthusiasm for an avant-garde alternative mo torcycle coloring my reac- ' tions to it af ter havin g ridden it. Why so? Because this time the bike isn't French or Du tch 18 or American and fitted with a j a panese engine: it's 100% British through and through, and though I do my best to be an int ernation alist, it's hard to be entirely objective when after so many years a British bike manufacturer has bu ilt a machi ne that is not only innovative but highly effective too. See that Union jack flag on the side of my hel met? Watch it waving . .. Moreover, the bike in q uestion doesn 't have a n alternative chassis (tho ugh that may als o come in due course), but an alternative engine. Not a conventional four-stroke or two-stroke, nor even one with ova l pistons and/or more than four valves per cylinder. That's just a variation on atheme, whereas this bike doesn't even have a piston, and certainly no valves: in fact, there are effectively only three moving parts. That's because it' s a rotary - ana its name . is Norton. Norton: the magic of a na me. A '. magic perhaps unequalled in motor__ cycling lore, rivalled only by MV Agusta in terms of sporting significance, but far outstripping the rest in terms of history on the road as well as track. Perh a ps on ly HarleyDavidson can boast as prou d a heritage da ting back to the dawn of motorcycling, .b u t of less global importance, though they can boast .one important edge over the British marque whose name became synonymous with our island natio n 's whole motorcycle industry, which dominated world-wide sales for so many years before handing the market to the j apanese o n a p late . H arley has never stopped making bikes in significant quantities since 1903, whereas Norton's recent history has been precarious, to say the least. Dra gged down into the mire of bankruptcy by their fellow companies in the NVT group a decade and ,more ago, Norton has not sold bikes to the public in measurable quantities since then. But what Norton has done is to continue development work on the rotary engine - built under Wankel patents - which they began in the 1970s, an d have latterly marketed in police for m to forces throughout Britain who have effectively helped the factory carry out their road testing on the rotary bikes while professing themselves we ll p leased with them jn operation. However, the long-promised civi lian version seemed as far away as ever un til the company was taken over last -year by South African-born merchant ban ker P hilippe Le Roux, who has not on ly floated Norton successfully on the stock exchange to raise new capital for it (as well as making a substantial pe rsonal investment in the first place), but perhaps more impo rta ntl y has revitalized Norton's operatio ns and in a few short months ach ieved more than the previous management had in 10 years. Nothing epi tom izes the way in which Le Ro ux has injected new life in to Norton better than the bi ke I fou nd awaiting me o ne recent dark but mostly dry day at Mallory Park: the rotary-engined Norto n RC588 factory racer. Yes, for the first time since the ill-fated Cosworth-engined F750 Chal lengeprototype last raced in 1975, there's a works Norton on The rotary engine. built under Wankel patents. has been under development by Norton since the 1970s. the. race tracks of Brita in agai n; thanks principally to the fait h and determina tion of two men: Philippe, , Le Ro ux, who has created a racing department at the Norto n factory and - says that he regards a racing pro~am ' "at the highest level" as an intri nsic part of Norto n 's recovery, bo th in' terms of creating arevitalized image for the firm's products and of technical develo pment, and the man he's p laced in charge of t he racing operation , 37-year-o ld Br G n Crighton. . Crighton joined Norton three years ago after a successfu l .career as a road racer - he was British 50cc Champ ion more th an once on ( a; CR I IO Honda - then bi ke builder:. Britishrace fans still recall with awe and nostalgia th e screaming 14,000 rp m 500cc H ond a four which Crighton developed from a street CB500 in the mid-70s a nd on which ' Dave Hickma n, now chief mecha nic of the EM C -E hrIich G P tea m s, terrorized the japanese two-strokes . in British -Nat ional events. .After that Crighton da bbled in the , co mputer a nd electronics fie lds befo re taking' up a job at Norton look ing after the department servicing police bi kes. Bu t with his developmental ta lents he soon moved to the R&D departm ent where he now has the title of senior en~ine development engi neer, working under Doug Hele, the former BSA, Triumph and Norton technical wizard whose nam e is synonymous with the halcyo n da ys o f Br i ti sh rac ing success. But the rotary racing project is Crighton's bra inch ild, one he's been pressing the Norton management to undertake. ever since he joined the co m pa ny. H e go t now here though, till Le Roux took over, and soon com mitted the necessary budget to build an d develop a rotary racer based very closely on the company's fo rt h co m ing street bikes. After a lightly modified prototype, bu ilt by Cr igh to n and No rton mech an ic Dave Evans in their.spare time and at their own expense, to pped 170 mph in tests o n the banked MIRA _

• Cover