Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

RIDING IMPRESSION i1fee Two Squalo (Above) Twin carbon-fibcr silencers hide In the crisp tall section with gil~ike vents. (Left) The artful oval-tube aluminum chassis and swingann were designed in . Japan by Over. The Irame and swlngsrm weigh lust 265 pounds.' (Below) The two-valve desmo 900SS-sourced powerplant's heads, valves, cams, combustion chamber. and pistons all get fiddled with In an effort to increase output. Stili, th is prototype Squalo 1 the base model, and only produces 76 bhp at 5 the rear wheel. The top-line version will produce over 100 bhp and feature ext ensive mods. wa lls, whose extra g ive increases com p liance. G ri p from th a t sticky rear tire w a s fau ltless, at least wi th th e sub- llJO..bh p ou tp ut from the lightl y breathed-on tw ovalve desm o m o tor, s till fitted with the sto ck CV Mikun is ra ther tha n th e Flatslide carbs m ost customers will p robab ly retro-fit. Still, thanks to the ligh t weight of the complete bike, this d elivers pretty b ri sk ac celera tio n, especi all y when at least the first six red lights are lit u p on th e distincti v e It ali a n -m ad e crescen tshaped Dis co aftermarket ta ch u which will be fitted as standard to the carbonfiber dash, denoting six gran d -p lus on th e dial. I found I co u ld jus t see the in struments b e n eath the sw ee p of th e tinted screen. but even taller rid ers might haw a problem doing so. It's no exaggeration to s.1y that, in creatin g th e Squ alo, Vee Tw o h as done a Bimota - d eliv e red a new sta n d a rd o f handling and vastly im proved aesthetics to a m ains tre am manufacturer' s engine package, in series- production street-legal form. But unlike o ther chassis specialists' uprated designs, the Vee Tw o Squal o will en a b le th e Down Un der Ducati tuner's expertise to deliver increased performance, as w ell, with the ran ge of kit p art s for th e two-valve d csmo engine already found in the Vee Two catalogu e. H owev e r, t hat' s o nly t he s ta rti n g point - for the question I fou nd mysel f asking as I su rfed the Squalo along the good -s u rf a ce d , wind ing, e u ca ly p tu s Iined road s o f th e West ern Australian bush wa s answered. when I go t back to base that evening. For sure, the Over chassis has the abi lity to harness much more power than the present single-cam two-valve mot or can d eliver - so Broo k Henry and Kensei Sato h a ve already started work on th e ne xt m odel in the Squalo school, due to be la unched in st reet form a t the Phillip Island World Superbike round in March '98. This will see the Over frame adapted to fit an eigh t-valve mot or and sin g lesided swingarm wi th 916 rising-rat e rea r susp e nsio n, re ta in in g th e sa me tra d emark body sty ling bu t w ith a red -an d black moti f. "We realize we can't stan d still a n d sell the bike the wa y it is now for the next five years," says Henry . " But at the same tim e, the strength of a small manufacture r lik e Vee Two is th at w e ca n m o v e more quickly than a big factory to in trodu ce new models mo re frequen tly. So we 'll star! selling the 8V SuperSqualo in May '98 on the same basis as the existing two-valver, in kit or fully built-up form . Bu t the com plete bike will only be av ail- able as a 995, usin g the Vee Two big-bore conversion kit an d performance package we've developed over the past year. The bike will 'co m e wit h t h e s tock W ~b~r /Ma r~ 1Ii EF I re p rogram med to suit, b ut customers will be able to op t for the Australian EFI we've developed w ith M o'T e c, wh ich is considerab ly m o r e sophisticated tha n the stock en gine-m an agemen t sys te m , and has a b ui lt -i n telemetry function, which up ens u p a h uge range of pos sibilities." But th at' s n ot all : A t Day tona next March, the works Vee Two Squalo 944 race bike will make its de bu t, and as a m eans of bringin g the much-needed benefits o f m od em te chnology to the tw ovalve desmo m otor, it w ill be fitted wi th ra m -ai r in take ducts th at r eplac e the headlamps of the street bike, and use Vee Tw o's prototype DOHC cylinder head s th at H enry ha s bee n w o r k in g o n for some tim e and that are now ready to go into p roduction. . Very nice - but why bo the r? Wh y not go straight to a four-va lve hea d ? "Two reasons: weight an d com plication," answers H enry. "People say th e two-val ve Du cati engine has been developed as far as it will go, but I d isagree wit h that. It' s just that nobody, not even Ducati themselves, ha s yet applied any of th e technology developed on the eigh tvalve mot or to the olde r engine d esign. All t h e w o r k ' s b een d one, ju st n e v er applied to the older V-twin. J believe that by u si n g th e S01m c rocke rs and v al v e an gles as on the 916, we can get ove r 120 bhp at the rear whee l in race form out of the 944cc two-val ve m otor and ov er 100 bhp in ro ad g u ise wi th the t w in-cam head s, which are oil-cooled, and SO retain th e essen t ial simplicit y of th e e ngine design. w ater-cooling' s a great thin g. but it's cumbe rsome, he av y, an d ultimately only nec~s sary if yo u' re d eli vering an awesome am ount of speci fic po we r · ask Porsche why th ey ' ve stayed faithful to air-cooling fo r so long on th ei r road engines. " The p robl em wit h t he tw o -v al ve D u ca ti e n g i ne is twofo l d - o n e, t h e cran kcases crack if you start to m ake seri ous p ower; an d tw o, th e cylinder h ead w as design ed in th e ea rly '80s, an d th e valves are just about parallel to the roa d! I reckon I can ge t almost as much po wer fro m th e tw in-cam tw o-v al ve hea d s in road form as from an otto tlQlvole street bike, but at reduced cost and wi th a lot less weight an d com plication." And of course; th is means that in the not-too-distant futu re Henry will resol ve th e final w eak link in the engine's annor by casting .h is own improved. crankcase d es ign in stronger m aterial, th us a t last turning Vee Two into an engine manufacturer in its own righ t. Th e Vee Tw o twin-cam heads will be ava ilable in m id-'98 as a d rop-on retro-fit to existing two-valve engines; using the same cam be lts as the 916, but with a single 50mm inlet and 44mm exh au st va lve per cylinder, each operated by its o wn camshaft an d set at a total included va lve an gle of 37 degrees (versus 60 on the cur rent 900SS motor). This of cou rse means the combustion cha m be r w ill be totally red esigned, and fitted with sp ray bars to d eliver o il coola n t, O1 S o n the pre -' 96 Suzuki GSXRs . Either carburetors or fuel injection can be fitted, with the 916 Weber /Marelli EA a bolt-on. syste m since th e angle o f th e inlet po rts on the Vee Two bi. '"",, head is identi ca l to th at of th e otto valuolt', though of course for racin g purposes the MoT ec system will certa inly be favored. Th e maximum bore size which the twincam heads ca n acco m m o d a te will be 98mm, w hich, coupled w ith the 68mm stro ke of the tw o-va lve motor, will allow a m aximum engi ne capacity of l 026cc the biggest desmo Big Twin roadster yet built. The Great White Shark is comi ng: Lock up you r d au ghters, Ducatisti • and d on 't set foot in the w ater! f;\: Vee Two Squalo Specifications AH--eooled SOHC 9O-degree V-,w; n fo ur-strol

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