Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/128177
Intermot 2002, Part /I it was due to commence marketing next year - and maybe not the money to do so, either, according to show scuttlebut. That means no sign of the promised production version of the GSX-R600 Suzuki-powered Gilera SS600 launched in prototype form a year ago at Milan, and none either of the projected Raptor-based Naked bikes, fitted with Gilera's own singlecam 850cc V-twin engine which also debuted at Milan 2001. The group's only motorcycle novelty was a 1000cc, dohc, fuel-injected, 'otto valvole' 90-degree V-twin engine, employing the same crankcases as the single-cam version first displayed a year ago, but evidently with a great deal more performance potential, including powering a Gilera Superbike. One day, maybe ... Piaggio's own scooter range was enhanced by just a single new model, the Beverly 500 big-wheel single powered by the same 460cc Hexagon motor as its Aprilia Scarabeo rival - though the Deutsche bank-owned firm's newlyappointed Two-Wheeled Business Manager (Le. fall guy?) Giancarlo Binetti spoke bravely of a total of five new Piaggio scooter models appearing between now and the start of the European spring selling season six months from now. Piaggio is looking very shaky, though, with layoffs 26 OCTOBER 23. 2002' cue affecting 40 percent of its workforce and a right-wing government in power in Italy that would have to really change its tune to fund a statefunded bailout package. At the other end of the Italian industry scale in almost every sense is one-man show BOrile, which once again appeared at Intermot with a final production version of its B500 • e n&vvs single, powered by an air-cooled 87 x 82mm, 487cc, four-stroke engine derived from the GM motor with which Sweden's Tony Rickardsson has dominated World Speedway for the past decade'. Umberto Borile insists that manufacture of the first batch of 50 examples he plans to make of the retro,looking B500CR model shown in Munich - which has now been homologated Europe-wide, and appears for all the world like a modern street-scrambler version of the legendary Lito '60s Swedish motocrosser - will begin in November, after which he'll tum his attention to the good-looking Supermoto model he unveiled a year ago, powered by the same engine. Benelli, however, seems finally set to fulfil its evident potential, with the launch at Intermot of the much less costly volume-production version of the three-cylinder Tornado sportbike, known as the Novecento and due to start production in November for sale around the world - Benelli is ceasing scooter production to concentrate on meeting pent-up demand for the triple. Retailing at around Euro 17,000 in Europe - so up to 10 percent less than the Ducati 999 or MV Agusta F4 1+ 1 - the mass-production Tornado uses aluminium castings wherever the 150 examples of the Euro 32,000 Limited Edition bum so far employed magnesium, plastic bodywork instead of carbon fiber, and Marzocchi upside-down forks and an Extreme Tech rear shock, rather than Ohlins race suspension. Together with heavier Brembo wheels, this results in an increase in weight to 435 pounds from the LE's 407, but the 900cc engine produces the same 141 bhp at 11,500 rpm as the earlier bike, though it now employs a conventional oil-bath clutch instead of the LE's race-derived dry unit. However, the