Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1980's

00 00 0") Cal Swanson set a SCTA A-AB-2000 class record at Bo nneville. going 192.490 mph aboard his Suzuki. Bonneville Speed Week Matson fastest of· many record breakers By Dorde Woodruff WENDOVER, UT, AUG. 14-20 Du ring the 1988 Bonneville Speed Week 29 n ew Southeni California Timing Association m o torcycle records and two FIM records were set at a most successful race m eet, after several years of too much rain at the fragile Bonneville Sal t Fla ts. Although riders were hi f th t searc mg or a smoo rou e 12 along the edges at the ~nd of the week, the course was relatively good, and was only shut down because of weather for a .few ~ours one afternoon, due to high wmds. The scrA did ~n exceptionally efficient job of stagmg t~e runs. . . Fast .blke, not surprisingly t~ Bonneville buffs, was D~ve Matson s much reworked 1955 V~nc:ent Black Shadow, WIth one qualifying run at 230 mph and records set at 225 with a fairing and 210 without. Matson had been coming to Bonneville for a long time, since 1959, and works throughout the year on the Vincent. He used to change the frame each year,seeking for something better, but had run the same frame (and ' fairing) since 1986. He draws on his extensive collection of original Vincent parts, bought in the '50s, when they were cheap obtains some from England, and' makes many himself in his home machine shop. This was a peak year for Matson; for several years he went very fast one way but blew up, sometimes spectacularly, on the record return run. (SCTA ru les require an average of two runs in opposite directions.) In '86 the reason for the failure was mysterious until he took the bike apart, which he starts to do the day after he gets home to Bloomfield Hills, Michigan; internal engine parts will already be showing evi- den ce of salt corrosion by then. He found three of the ~our ignition w~res br.oken ofr. :rapmg and covenng WIth heat-shrink was not enough. To prevent any stress, for '87 he bunched the wires carefully, taped them, covered them with heat-shrink and siliconed them. Of such mun'dane details are composed successful Bonneville efforts ' In '87 the salt was slippery; on one run he lost about 50 mph to slippage. Also he broke a welded rocker arm, so for this year he made them out of solid steel. Matson uses Jahn's f d . d hi org~ . c~r pistons, rna e to IS speclftcatl.ons. He cuts the valye pockets himself ~o he can .use different valves. of his own design, a~d m~kes the nngs. He uses a speaal Vincent ~m by Andrews for .the 1653cc engme, and this year Canllo . rod, but ~ake~ many .other parts. Bonnev~lle I~ a Wicked place to run , espeaall),' If you want to go very fast. The salt IS never t.he ~am e from year to year. Weather I S VIOlent and unpredictahle, motorcycle l?arts are 125 miles ~way, and co.rroslOn does strange things to machmes. Despite all this, Matson's campaign this year went exactly according to plan. He wanted no more than six runs. After that the Cylin~ers get scored, whether from the mtro or the salt. He qualified with one run on Sunday in the fairing class , MPS-AF-2oo0, and raised his 1986 record of 205 to 225 in Monday morning record runs. Later Monday he qualified for the unfaired M-AF-2oo0 class, and on T uesday upped his 1985 record of 202 to 210. Six highl y successful runs. Mad sen is abl y assisted by his wife Arlene. Familiar Bonneville com pe titors J im Bickford and Les Ranger, did well, too, with Ranger turnmg in a 217 in a qualifying run , and setting records of 207 with an 1I00cc Honda in th e A-AB-1300 class, and 208 with th e 900cc engine in the A-AB-1000. The bike . is complex ; Bickford's careful crafting makes it work. The 900 is a bored-out '79 750, the bigger engine an '83 "1100" (actually 1030 or so) bored out to 1127; the engine being blown, cubes are mostly neces sary to fit the class. The turbocharger is a big car-sized pump with which they can boost to 35 pounds. The bike has more potential. Family responsibi lities kept original rider Ted Gansberger off the salt the last three years. Bickford and Ra nger would like to take the bike over and obtain a better fai ring, one with no lift. Their fastest faired time so far is 221; Ranger says a more stable fairing is essential. Un fai red the bike is very stab le, and Ranger likes ri di ng it more than his own record-holding 650 because it 's so fast. Also they want a lockout type drag clutch, though clutch problems this year went away when they changed to a less slippery oil. Bikes running over 200 mph tend to have tire problems, and they need . to explore alternatives. On the 217th run the clutch failed and a whole one-inch wide strip flew off the center of their shaved road race tire. Matson is able to run car tires on his Vincent, in the front a 17-inch Goodyear drag race tire. As to the rear, the original Firestone Bonneville tires haven't been made for some years now and are carefully hoarded by the fast guys; Matson uses a 15inch rear Bonneville tire from a more recent batch arranged for by the late, lamented Mickey Thompson. Scott Gu thrie's specialty is multiplerecords, and he outdid himself this year with II , using his collection of variously sized TZ750 engines including one in an efficient small stream liner designed and built by Jim Burkdoll of Utah. The Burkdoll family astonished Salt Flats racers when they appeared with their first tiny, speedy, motorcycle-engined streamliner. Then they built this bigger one to go faster safely. Guthrie liked the car and offered a trade of a prepared TZ750 engine for a ride. The car. got both Burkdoll and Guthrie into th e coveted 200 Milean-Hour Club. It 's rare for someone to get both ca r and motorcycl e records on th e same day , and we can't think of anyone else who set a motorcycle record and got a car into the "Two Club" on the same day. Floridian Guthrie ran the TZZs in I75cc (as a single), 350cc (as a twin), and.500cc (as a four) combinations this year, de-boring and using on ly as many holes as needed. He looks at all ' classes from 175 to 1000cc except 250cc. He's penalized on th e low end by carrying around so much weight in the form of unused me tal, and on the high end by ru nning in the 1000cc class with 751cc. Mos tly he doesn't go for records he already hol ds, and a few records he tries to leave alone for historical reasons, for instance Brian Eriksen's 1977 mark 'of nearly 160 mph with an RD 350. The scrA requires a designated gasoline to be used for record runs, Florida's Scott Guthrie set 10 records aboard his Yamaha TZ750-based land speed machine. Guthrie modifies the bike to run in various classes.

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