Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

EUROFILE BYALAN CATHCART ST4· definne There's no firm word on when the uova 900sS will be launched, but it's confirmed that later this year Ducati wi /I debut a performance version of the twovalve ST2 Sports Tourer designed by Miguel Angel Galluzi (creator of the Monster) that was launched at Cologne last October and will enter production in April. Known as the ST4, this will appear at the Milan Show in September, powered by a revamped version of the fuel-injected otto valvole 916 motor in single-injector form. However, Ducati also is developing an uprated performance version to be known as the ST4S, using a 955cc twininjector version of the "desmoquattro" motor, producing 120 bhp and likely to be more than a match for the new BMw R1200RS when it comes to high-performance, long-distance mile-eating. Except, the Ducati will still come fitted with chain final drive - for now. Let the shark bite t--. 0\ ~ "§ CO '0::::' ,£:i 4 A revised version of the 6-year-old 90055 (and 75055/60055 derivatives) heads the list of new models planned by Ducati management after the takeover by American investment house TI'G. Though you won't get anyone in Bologna to ay so on the record - presumably because they're afraid of denting sales of the existing model, another batch of which i set for production in the 1997 model year now that TPG money has paid all outstanding bill , and deliveries from suppliers have started to flow again - the Nuova 90055 must surely be set to debut at the Milan Show in September. After all, it's badly needed and a year overdue. But before that, Ducati enthusiasts around the world will already have been able to buy a radical new alloyframed 900SS-powered street bike that will be considerably more advanced technically and stylistically than anything likely to come out of Bologna any time soon - the Vee Two Squalo. Due to be launched on March 22-23 at the opening round of the 1997 World Superbike Championship at Phillip Island in Australia, the Squalo (Italian for "shark," very appropriate, given the bike' Down Under heritage) is the product of a collaboration between two of the top specialist companies in their respective fields, Brook Henry's Vee Two Au tralia and Kensei Sato's Over Racing in Japan. The genesis for the collaboration was the keenly contested rivalry between Vee Two and Over in the 1996 European Supermono series, run as a support event to the World Superbike Championship, during which Henry and Sato were able to strike up an acquaintance and to appreciate each other's work. From this, they decided to team up on a V-twin Ducati project, developing first a race version of the OV-1 OA Over chassis for the 900sS Ducati, fitted with the engine from the Vee Two Bimota DB2R on which yours truly had clinched the 1996 BEARS World Series title. The all-new street version is currently being completed in the Vee Two factory in Perth, Western Australia. The new Vee Two Squalo uses Over's trademark oval-section alloy tubular spaceframe, fitted with WP rising-rate rear suspension and upside-down fork, and Vee Two's 944cc version of the twovalve Ducati 90055 motor, clothed in dramatic bodywork styled by British designer John Keogh. Keogh's working drawing (shown right) gives an impression of the finished product, and contrasts with the more clas ical look of the stock Over OV-1 OA, of which Over has built and sold more than a dozen examples in the past six months, exclusively for the Japanese market. "The tie-up betweenus and Over makes all the sense in the world," says Vee Two's Brook Henry. "We're engine specialists, not chassis designers, though the success of our Alchemy frame kit for the' bevel-drive Ducati motor shows our customers are waiting for us to offer them a more-modern chassis package compared to the stock Ducati frame. "Now, thanks to linking up with Over, we can do the same thing with the Squalo for the belt-drive two-valve desmos as we did for the older engines with the Alchemy. Over's worldwide reputation for chassis expertise is second .to none, and together with John Keogh's design flair and our proven engineering ability, I'm certain there'll be a strong market for the Squalo when we put it into production in April this yea r. We'll be selling it all around the world (including, through Over itself, in Japan) both as a complete bike where homologation allows, and as a chassis kit for road or race." The extensive range of Vee Two tuning options for the 90055 motor will also be available, up to and including the new fully sequential fuel-injection package, developed in conjunction with Australian EFI specialists Motec. Reliable sources have confirmed that an Over OV-10A chassis has been acquired by the Ducati factory's R&D department via the company's Japanese importers, while a leading Ducati engineer has openly expressed keen interest in the Over frame's steering geometry and handling. It may be too much to expect the Nuova 90055 to have a tubular alloy chassis - too close to the obviously Ov.er-inspired TLlOOO Suzuki frame, perhaps? - but expect something with similar geometry and a steel chassis to come out of Bologna before too long, fitted with an uprated version of the "Classical" two-valve desmo engine. Harris Suzuki TL1000 on the way Ducati may have decided to opt for a steel rather than an alloy spaceframe because it don't want to risk being accused of following in Suzuki's footsteps with its V-twin, but later this year you will conversely be able to buy a TLlOOO-powered bike fitted with a European-built tubular steel spaceframe for the fuel-injected Suzuki motor. No, not Bimota's SB8, due to debut at the Milan Show in September, which will surely have an alloy spaceframe not so dissimilar from the Vdue 500 twostroke's. Instead, the TL WOO cafe racer will come courtesy of British chassis gurus Harris Performance Products who of course, let's not forget, run the works Suzuki tearn in the World Superbike Championship. "We're not in any way suggesting we can improve on the stock Suzuki frame," says Harris partner Steve Bayford. "Only that the TLlOOO· is such a fabulous engine, it deserves to be the basis of a whole range of different interpretations of what a V-twin ports bike should be - of which ours will be the first of many, I'm sure. "We see a mMket for a more classical, European-style cafe racer which makes more of a feature of the motor than the stock TLlOOO does. rt'll still be a modern design, not a sort of Jap'lllese Vincent, but the flavor of the styling and chassis design will be more European." Harris is working flat out to have the new V-twin ready to launch at the Birmingham (England) Show in November, even though designers Steve and Lester Harris haven't yet put pen to paper to start drawing up the chassis geometry. This is beca us.e, unlike all previous designs to flow from the prolific British frame specialists over the past 25 years, they've commissioned a professional styling house to first finalize how the completed bike should look before designing the chassis - rather than building the frame first, and clothing it after, as usual. We're not allowed to reveal the name of the stylists, but it is an internationally known design house with two-wheeler clients all over the world. However, this move marks an important step in the evolution of the Harris company - one that, as they withdraw from Grand Prix racing (there's no Harris-Yamaha team in the 500cc GP class in '97) will see the bespoke chassis specialists develop more and more into a small-volume, high-tech street bike manufacturer. Not unlike - well, Bimota. "The success of our Magnum 5 frame kit for the Honda FireBlade and Suzuki GSXR has also taught us something," Bayford says. "Lots of people want the bike delivered to them fully built up there are still customers who want to order a frame kit and emerge six months later from their garage with something they built themselves, but they're getting to be a minority. We'll still go on catering for them - but we have to recognize that we're becoming a full-scale manufacturer, and the TL1000 project is the one that'll take us over the brink. That's why we're having the bike designed first, before we develop the prototype - we're not going to compromise performance for styling, bu t instead will have the entire bike designed as an integrated whole." Because of this, a final decision in favor of a tubular-steel spaceframe has yet to be made, but Bayford says it's 95percent certain this is what the Harris TL1000 will end up using. "Steel is a more classical material than aluminum,H he says, "and it's also more versatile - you can nickel-plate it to make a feature of the welding, or paint it as an integral design feature or as part of the overall paint scheme. Weight is hardly a factor - Ducati has shown there's no effective penalty for using a steel spaceframe, if you do it right." One thing's for sure, though - the Harris TL will be fitted with a risingrate rear suspen ion using a conventional Ohlins shock, rather than Suzuki's avant-garde rotary damper. Next Up • the OV·20 One company that has of course already made the step from being a chassis specialist to selling complete bikes is Over, whose TDM-engined OV-15A EuroTwin was sold in small-volume production as a complete bike. Designer Kensei Sato is currently developing several exciting projects, including the new OV-20 chassis with which Over will defend its European Supermono title this season, but with the 105 x 88mm mega-mono 762cc Yamaha five-valve engine of the OV-16 title winner to be fitted during the course of the season with fuel injection developed in Australia by Motec. Sato has just completed the first Honda-powered version of the OV-16 for Japan's Thruxton team, whose 674cc Honda Dominator-based engine has input from HRC, and delivers over 70 bhp at the rear wheel. But away from the booming (pardon the pun) world of singles, Sato also is hard at work on th·e OV-19, which involves designing one of Over's distinctive oval-section alloy-tube frames around the Yamaha YZF1000 Thunderace engine. The bike will make its debut later this

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