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/128183
Inside Team Roberts KENNY ROBERTSJ TEAM IS GOING FOUR-STROKE IN 2003 have eight designers in the office, four of them working on engines." Downstairs among the hard metal, the mood's a little lighter: pop music drizzles from a radio. Fabricator Keith Johnson, 39, who's been creating motorcycle frames since he was 16, is preparing the V-five's aluminum chassis and swingarm. Morris, who has worked on rockets, lasers and spacecraft in the USA, picks up a titanium component made by Johnson and says: "Welding titanium is tricky, but the quality of this is so high that it could fly in space. The weld beads on a Honda are huge, robot-like, not at all like this. It's that kind of detail that Kenny is trying to build into his bikes." By MIKE NICKS PHOTOS BY MOTORCYCLE NEWS ! hhhh, it's quiet in here. In one corner, designer John Magee is creating parts for Kenny Roberts' new V-five Grand Prix engine on a computer screen. Opposite him, ex-Ferrari Formula One technician Paul Bowen is crafting images of the entire bike. To my right, the six-speed gearbox is taking shape on another screen. Nobody looks up; nobody acknowledges the presence of a stranger in the design room. I silently depart, feeling like I'm exiting a Buddhist temple. My gui~e for the day, former aerospace worker Karl Morris, explains: "We'll soon 12 DECEMBER 4,2002' cue • e n.""s Roberts' Proton KR team have finally locked away the 500cc twostroke triples that they have campaigned for six frustrating seasons without gaining a single win. Now the factory at Banbury, Oxfordshire, in the English Midlands, is working f1atout on the design and construction of its first four-stroke, the 990cc V-five. It's a project that could change the way all World Championship motorcycle teams are run from now on. Kenny Roberts is feeling defiant. He wants to topple the establishment, to prove them wrong. His targets are all the manufacturers who will contest the 2003 MotoGP Championship Honda, winners of the inaugural title this year, plus Yamaha, Suzuki and Kawasaki, and Italian makers Ducati and Aprilia. Everyone in Grand Prix racing, in fact, who's better-financed and better-resourced than his modest, 45-strong operation. This is typical behavior for the 50year-old Californian. In the mid- '70s, he beat Harley-Davidson on American dirt tracks with unfashionable Team Roberts engine designer John Magee (right) and fabricator Keith Johnson (left) check the V-five engine Installed in the aluminum chassis. The Proton KR team will try to transfer the renowned handling of the 500cc twostroke to the heavier, more powerful four-stroke.