Cycle News - Archive Issues - 1990's

EUROFILE BY ALAN CATHCART M Vstillcoming Cagiva is on schedule to begin the lon gawaited pro du ct ion of the MV Agus ta F4 in November, accord ing to company boss Claud io Castig lioni. "We sho uld build the first 20 bikes or so before Chris tmas out of the 200 'Serie O ro' lim ited- ed ition first-run mod els," he says , "with the ba lance finis hed early in the new year. After th at, we p lan to s ta rt vo lu me p ro d u ct ion o f the 'Serie Argen to ' (s ilv er, as op p osed to gol d) next April, after eval ua ting th e resp onse of our first cus tom ers to the bike in use." Two production lines at th e com pany' s new Cassine tta p la nt a re no w in full o pera tion, s tru ggling to ke ep u p wit h -dema nd for the good-selling Gran Ca nyo n 900 an d H us qvarn a m od el ra nge, as well as manu factu rin g the new 50cc Cucciolo scooter a nd 125cc Pla ne t com muter bike. A 125cc fo ur-s tro'ke version of the Cucciolo is und er development and will be lau nched in March, ano ther product of the 155 people in all tha t Castiglioni says he has working on R&D proje cts at CRC San Marino u nder Massimo Tam burini, and at the home bas e in Varese. " We' ve invest ed $100 millio n in Cagiva in the pasrl S months," he says, " none of it a d irect result of our sale of Du ca ti . O ur income from th at h a s 'served mainly to im pro ve cash flow and allow us to concentra te on rebu ild ing Cagiva to its form er po sit ion as Italian mar ket leader, before suffering the distraction of rescuing Ducati from extinction a deca de ago. For this reason , I've decided that we will not cons ider racing th e MV Ag us ta off icially in su perb ike events u nt il the year 2000, a t the earliest. I wa nt to m ak e sure our engineers are focu sed 100 percent on ge tt ing the F4 into volu me prod uction and raising the leve ls of quality control to the maxi m um deg ree, com m ens ura te w ith the h igh expec tat ions of suc h a glor ious , prestige marq ue. Nothing else rriat ters more raci ng can wait till we have the F4 road bike fully established in production." Okay - so w hich cus tome r will be the first to break ranks and gri d up an MY Agus ta in top -level competition for the first time in ove r two deca des - albeit on a privatee r basis, without factory assistance? Because ma ke no mistak e, it wi ll happe n. Peugeot,m otorcycle With Voxan abou t to s tart production of its ran ge of 1000cc 72-d egree V-twin models , Fra nce w ill soo n o nce aga in have th e m ot o r cycl e in du s try it h as essentially lac ke d si nce W orld War II. Througho ut thi s .ce n tu ry , thou gh, one French company has establishe d a rep utat ion for inn ovat ivedesign of powered ~ .two-w heelers of all kinds , eve n though t3 for the past ha lf-cen tu ry it has focused _ , EJ exclu sively on the scoo ters and m opeds with w hich it tops sales cha rts in m an y - European countries , including Britain. .; ~ T hat co m p a ny is Pe uge o t, a n d thou gh it' s often a su rprise to so me that , the Fr en ch au tom o tive g ia n t s hou ld ~ riv al BMW in owning suc h a successful 0\ two-w hee led division , the company that ,.-< foun der [ ea n-F rancois Peu geot began Lt) back in ISl l to manu factu re machin ery C'J for m a ki ng b races to p u t in to la d ies ' @ corsets was one of th e pionee r firms in .0 th e evolu tion of the 'm otorcycle, whose products we re ren owned befo re World CJ.) War T for the ir eng ineering sophis tica;> tion and daring. The 500cc Peugeot GP o racer o f this era was th e world 's first DO H C eigh t-va lve pa rall e l-tw in, fo llowed in the 1920s by its SOHC cou nterp art . .w hich wa s th e fi rs t G ran d Prix ~ E Z 4 Bimota bought It' s a d on e deal. As reported in th ese colu mns ove r th e p a s t s i x m o n t h s , t h e dra w n-o u t takeover of Bimo ta by a grolJP of investors head ed by former Lav erda bo ss Fra ncesco Togno n has now been conclud ed . As of October 13, Tognon no w cont rols th e fortunes of the prestige Italia n m arque, which he plans to revitalize by concentrat ing on Bimota's tradition al core va lu es o f lead ing-ed ge chassis techn olog y, cl o thed in stunning styli n g, the w ho le develop ed in and promoted by high-profile participation in top-level road race com petition . To this end, in spring of 1999, Tognon intends to intro duce restyled.jiprated version s of two of Bimota's m ost popular models ever: a po we r-up RR vers ion of the top -sellin g Suzuki CSX-Rll 00engined SB6R, and the revived YBS Furano, now to be fitted with a Yamaha YZFI000 Thunde race mo tor instead of the FZR1000 EXUP engi ne pr eviou sly used . . The SB6RR in particu lar is expec ted to fea tu re strongly in the new Stockbike series being run as a su p p o rt class to Wo r ld Superb ike in 1999. Also , Tognon plans to establish a separate race d epartment outside the Rimin i factory, most probably - for fiscal reasons - in the nearby hilltop republic of San Marino, where Bimota alu mni and former chief engine ers Massimo Tamburini (head of Cagiva' s CRC) a n d Pierlu igi Marconi (Ap rilia R&D) hav e already encamped : It' s getting crowded u p there! Cu rrent plans call for Bimota's race operation to be b ro u ght in-house, under th e con trol of lon gtime m arketing execu tive Davide Ge ng hi ni. w it h team . says a leading execu- Fran ces co To gnon , f or mer b oss at tive in ano ther Italian Lav erda, has finalized his de al t o buy mana ger Stefano Ca racchi in charge of day-to-day ope ra tion. Bimo ta will contest the 1999 World Su persport se ries with m anu fact urer. "T hi s B im ota. He hopes t o ge t the Ital ian wo rks YB9 racers while at the sa me tim e deve loping the Super- is good for all of us in c h as s i s specialist b ack int o ra c i n g bike versio n of the TLlOOOR Suzuki- powered SBSR d ue to enter t h e It a li a n b ik e heavily. full production in February, rea dy for a full-on two-rider wo rks in d us try , b eca u s e a lt h o ug h th eir proteam to contest the 2000 World Superbike Cha mpions hip. As part of that d evelopmen t, Bimota wi ll com pe te in the 1999 d uct ion volu me will always be extremely small and not ma ny ) Wor ld Enduran ce series via its current German and new British peop le can afford to buy their bikes, the cha rismatic ap pea ran ce im porter s, using an uprated vers ion of the prep roduction SB8R and techn ical allure of th eir products rubs off o n us all, a nd w hich already won the prototype class in the Spa 24 Hours and helps create a positive image for La Moto ltalian a. This is good Bol d' Or this ye ar. A lig ht wei gh t version o f the sa me bike is new s...." The main" reaso n for the d elay in the To gn on tak eover of being raced by Brit ish public road s specialist Sim on Beck in the Macau GP in No vember, while the new British im po rters, Pre- Bim ota - apart fro m negot ia tin g suitable terms with former mier Motors, are planning a th ree-bike works team for the 1999 owner SCM (unders tood to have retained a m inor ity interest in Isle of Man TI in an effor t to em ulate Bimota's last World-titl e th e compa ny) - was his need to ext rica te himself ho norably from success, w hen Virginio Ferrar i wo n the 1987 TI Formula One his co m m it men ts to Lav erda, now 90-perce n t owned by the Spezzapria and Brazzali families, w ho have recently mad e a sigWo rld Ch am pionsh ip wi th the fue l-injected YB4EIR. Finall y, th e new Ducati 900SS-powered DB4, launched at nificant new capital inves tment in th e company . This w ill enab le m o re m an u facturing o p er a tio ns to b e lnt ermot and d ue to begin prod uction in January, wi ll also compet e in the 1999 Sound of Thu nder World Series, w hich Bimo ta bro ught in- house, as w ell as jump -sta rt d evelopment o f the 900cc Jo ta triple, w hich has been sideline d in th e wake of the won with theVee-Two Aust ralia-powered DB2R back in 1996. Suc h a heavy commitmen t to competition has two purposes recent upheaval in ownership. According to new sales director in commercial terms, as it a ffec ts road-bike production, says Aurelio Lolli, the very com pa ct, pro totype fuel-injected th reecylinder 12-va lve eng ine is now expec ted to ru n on the d yn o for Togn on. . ' ':We must m ak e Bimot a a respected nam e once ag ain, on e th e first tim e before the end of the yea r, en route to a pro jected that people talk ab out and ad mire, for the quality of our race- launch at the Mila n Show next September. TIS riva l to the Ya m ah a TOM , Before th at , La verd a' s SOO d eriv ed product s and th e su ccess th ey ac h ie ve on the race track," he says, "Bu t as well, we must re-establish the techn ical la unched a t Inter m o t with a lon g- stroke ve rs io n o f th e 1S0link between racing and th e models we sell to our cus tomers. degr ee parallel-tw in engine from the 750S (chosen for its combiWithin the limits imposed by homologa tion, a Bimota street bike nat io n of improved to rq ue coupled w it h high-s peed performust be a ra cer with ligh ts, conveying the excitem ent of the race m a nce ov er th e 360-degree versi on Laverda has ha d under d evelopm en t), is schedu led to ente r producti on in Ju ne, says track to our customers wh en th ey rid e it on the stree t." Suz u ki's apparen t disinterest in pursu ing development of the Lolli, to coincide with the op en ing of Lave rda's own U.S .d istri TIl000R in Superbike form (it won't be raced officially by the buti on op erat ion in Ho uston, Te xas, in May. . Recently recruited , fresh from a l a-year career wi th nearby Yoshimura AMA team in 1999, as it was this ye ar, nor at World Superbike level) leaves Bimota to assu me the role of m akin g the Aprilia, is new chief design er Alberto Cappella, who's responsi'Japanese V-tw in a winner via the SBSR, albeit in a chassis very ble 'for the TIS and who is already wo rking o n th e new generadiffe re nt from the donor bike's. "The next-best thing to havin g tion of 900-1200cc tr iple s.. Laverd a is set to increase production sligh tly to 2500 bikes in 1999, says Lolli, prep ar ato ry to stepping our ow n four-stroke eng ine !" says Tog non. Of course , Bim ota a lrea d y has its own two-st ro ke V-twin up numbers big-time in the new millen nium. "We recog nize tha t th e three- cy linder p ro ject o nly mak es engine in a ra cer-w ith -lig hts, in the fo rm of th e 500cc Vdue w hose troub led care er helped bring the com pany to its kne es . sense if we go for volu me," he says . "The economy of scale will Tognonrefuses to be d raw n o ut regardi ng his future plans !i'r allow us to price the mod els at a n' afford ab le cost, if we make a th is mo del, other than to re affi rm tha t Bimota will take fu ll reasonable number of u ni ts each ye ar, witho ut compromisin g respo nsibility for those bikes alrea d y d elivered to cu stomers . q ua lity or the exclus ivity of the marqu e. All our efforts in the past few mont hs have been aimed at raisi ng quality and preparthat have not yet been recalle d. Alongside his cho ice as chief eng ineer, Fra nce sco Med ici, ing the ground for production of lar ge-capacity bikes in se rious w ho has been working ins ide Bimota in a prep ar atory role for numbers , w hen the tri ple comes on line. 750cc machines have a the past fou r mo nths, Tog non has now appointed as comme rcial healthy but ultimately lim ited market. For Lave rda to grow sigdi r ect or in cha rge of day-to-d a y o p era t ions the fo rm e r nifican tly, we need to focu s on bigger bikes - so tha t' s w ha t Ducati/Cagiva general manager and former Fiat executive Mas- we're doing." Plans still call for the [ota to enter Superbike racin g, though a . simo Marmo tti. "Birnota looks to have to u ched bo tto m , been saved fro m se rious facto ry-backed effort now isn't expected before 2001 at d ro wning, and is now rea d y to start sw imming har d again," the ea rliest.

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