Sambiase Yamaha RD500

Here we have a very fine and rare example of a Sambiase RD500! The French Sambiase brothers made a total of 8 frames and 15 swing arms. 

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Sambiase RD500

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The Sambiase brothers

Nico Bakker Yamaha RD350

In 1983 Suzuki introduced the box-section aluminium frame to the world on the Suzuki RG250. In Japan this type of frame was an instant hit. In 1984 The Dutch frame builder Nico Bakker received a rather suprising phone call from a Japanese motorcycle dealer if he could make such a frame for the Yamaha RZ250. They made a deal for 50 frames, Nico used a brand new RD350YPVS as a reference point. The alloy frame became 6.5 kilo lighter than the original steel frame, it had all the mounting points for the original bodywork. Two of the frames stayed in the Netherlands, one of these is the yellow bike in the photo set. It was equipped with a lot of special parts like an alloy tank, PVM wheels, WiWo brakes and a White Power shock. How many of these bikes still exist in Japan? The 2 Dutch bikes survived. 

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Nico Bakker Yamaha RD350

Bakker HRD Suzuki TR750 (2)

Nico Bakker made a beautiful alloy fueltank for the Bakker HRD TR750. 

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Bakker HRD Suzuki TR750

KTM 700 twin

This KTM 700 twin two stroke was made by Jerry van der Heiden for Dutch sidecar cross ace Ton van Heugten. Jerry many thanks for the pictures of this very trick engine! The twin consisted of two KTM 350 cross engines grafted together. Just one gearbox and final drive are used. The engine sits normally in the frame and the second cylinder is pointing directly forward. It's mounted to the front half of a KTM 350 lower end that is attached to the right side of the complete 350 engine. The cranks are timed so that both pistons move identically, and it fires as a single. Ton van Heugten won his last sidecar cross with it. Jerry made a total of 7 engines, most of them still exist today. It all started when Rudi Kurth made Yamaha 500 triples in the seventies for sidecar racing, he also grafted an extra cylinder to a twin. Jerry repeated this idea when he made a 350 triple for Takazumi Katayama, Katayama became world champion on a bike with such an engine in 1977. More about Jerry and this bike in a later post.

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KTM 700 twin

Sidecar racing engines

Through the years I collected a lot of pictures of two stroke racing sidecar engines. It all started with König and their 4 cylinder boxer engine, at the same time Rudi Kurth created a triple Yamaha 500. After that four cylinder Yamaha TZ500's were used. They were replaced by TZ500 clones made by JPX, Krauser and ADM, these engines had reed-valve crankcases and could use more modern barrels with power-valves. They still used a lot of TZ500 parts, such as the cranks and clutch. The unreliable gearbox was often replaced by aftermarket ones like ARCO from Italy. Egbert Streuer kept using TZ500 engines and modified the uppercases for reed-valve use and modern barrels. 

In the early ‘90s Swissauto developed its own version of the Krauser 500cc inline-four crankcase reed-valve two-stroke motor by then ubiquitous in the Sidecar GP class, and Switzerland’s four-time World champion Rolf Biland raced the result, winning a further hattrick of World Championships in 1992/3/4. “We made everything new inside, including the gearbox,” said Wenger, “and though we used the original Krauser crankcases, we modified the upper half quite heavily, because we were the first people to use the 54 x 54.5 mm configuration in the Sidecar class. We developed it to give more than 180 bhp by the end of the ’94 season. 

When the two stroke engines were replaced by four strokes it all ended with the great Swissauto V4 raced by Rolf Biland. Wenger claimed the V4 engine was originally only intended for solo use. “The inline four-cylinder engine is absolutely the best format for Sidecar racing,” he asserted, “but only for that. However, the V4 engine is much lighter, so even though we designed it for solo racing, the Sidecar guys wanted to use it, too. We took pole position with it in every Sidecar GP in 1995, won five out of the seven races, but lost the title because our drivers Biland and Guedel took points away from each other, and let Darren Dixon win on the ADM!” However, fast as the five Swissauto V4-powered rigs were in every race, they also suffered a series of mechanical failures that were an inevitable part of the new engine’s R&D.

Egbert Streuer and Rinus Dorgelo made the Stredor, unfortunately Egbert never raced it. It is a two stroke boxer engine with 200 hp. First they used Honda and Yamaha cilinders, at the final version Aprilia ones.

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Sidecar racing engines

Rolf Biland warming up the Swissauto

Swissauto V4 1

Swissauto V4 2

Egbert Streuer testing the Stredor

Stredor 500

The Aprilia 250 GP bike

The year is 1985 and the debut of an extraordinary GP bike the Aprilia in the GP 250cc class is a fact. The first bike has an alloy aluminium dual beam frame with a Marzocchi fork and a rear monoshock mounted on a pro lever type suspension. The engine is a two stroke Rotax tandem twin. In the debut on 23 March 1985 in Kyalami South Africa Loris Reggiani finishes 12th. For the rest of the championship the bike performs so well that Reggiani takes a third place at Rijeka and repeats this in Imola. In 1987 the Aprilia 250 rises quickly to the top. A new chassis and V-twin engine take it to second place (Salzburg and Rijeka). Victory is within reach and comes at Misano. The date is 30 August 1987 and Reggiani rides his AF1 250 to its first success in a Grand Prix race. In 1991 the bike configuration changes from AF1 to RSV (production bikes) and RSW (factory bikes). After three consecutive 250cc world titles for Aprilia with Biaggi from 1994 to 1996, the title is in 1998 for Loris Capirossi, as he beats fellow Aprilia rider Tetsuya Harada on the last corner of the last race in Argentina. The late 1990s also saw Valentino Rossi thrilling race fans on Aprilia machines as he won the first two of his total of nine World Championships, in the smaller classes. Rossi spent his first four years in Grand Prix racing on Aprilia bikes, winning the 125cc title in 1997 and the 250cc crown in 1999, before he moved up to the premier class. In 2007 the configuration changes to RSA. The last 250 World Championship on an Aprilia was for Marco Simoncelli with a bike under the Gilera brand, he succeeded in 2008. 

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Tandem twins

V-twins

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Ex Preining AF1 250 V-twin

Kim Newcombe

Born in Nelson, Newcombe grew up in Auckland, then moved to Australia (first Brisbane, then Melbourne) in 1963, and subsequently moved to Europe in 1968. He competed in the 500cc Grand Prix World Championship finishing second to Phil Read in the 1973 season on a König 500 developed completely by himself.

Read the amazing story about Kim and the König here

Kim Newcombe not forgotten

For pics of this awesome bike see

König 500

Suzuki GSXRG500

When you think you have seen all the Suzuki RG500 frame combinations, this bike pops up at Facebook. It is a combination of a Suzuki GSXR400 rolling chassis and an RG500 engine, made by Mark Walker. 

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Suzuki GSXRG500

Mark Walker also makes some very trick stuff for the Suzuki RG500, like frames and dry clutches.

For pics of his parts see

Mark Walker RG500 parts

The golden era of sidecar cross

The eighties were the golden era of sidecar cross racing, this was the time of the big two stroke twins, Startwin even produced a four cylinder boxer engine. The leading companies were EML with their Jumbo and the Swedish Folan. Dutchman Jerry van der Heiden produced a Vtwin KTM engine for Ton van Heugten. Husqvarna made a prototype, the Proof 2000 with a Folan engine. 

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Sidecar cross engines

Want to know how they sound?

Folan sidecar

Hi-Tac Suzuki 500

Barry Sheene on the very special Hi-Tac Suzuki 500 two stroke twin. The Hi-Tac was Peter Inchley's (ex-Norvil chief) project, started in 1972. He saw that water cooling was desirable for two strokes and designed a thermo-siphon kit for the T500 (before Suzuki's own watercooled TR III). 

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Hi-Tac Suzuki 500

Lotus Rotorvic V12

This amazing assemblage is the V12 Rotorvic two stroke which appeared in British club racing in 1965, powering a specially modified Lotus 23 sports car. It consists of six Ariel Arrow two stroke motorcycle engines disposed at an included angle of 90-degrees and driving the central shaft. Transmission was via a Hewland five-speed gearbox and the engine was cooled via huge air-scoops in the body panelling. This 1482cc V12 made a ferocious noise and it was almost impossible to tell it was misfiring on one or two cylinders. It produced 220bhp at 10000RPM. The creator was R.V. Marchant and the driver was Bill Hill.

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Lotus Rotorvic

Want to know how it sounds?

Lotus Rotorvic Youtube

Monotrack by Dan Hanebrink

Here we have a very special bike made by Dan Hanebrink! The description on the Hanebrink site (no longer there) pretty much sums it up: 

"In 1971 “Cycle News” publisher Chuck Clayton asked Costa Mesa, California engineer Dan Hanebrink to sketch a futuristic machine of the eighties for a front page Christmas issue of the newspaper. From this sketch Hanebrink developed his ideas and the result, two years later, was the Monotrack Experimental. This design accounted for a large number of firsts in motorcycle engineering. The monocoque chassis was made from magnesium plate and a three-cylinder, rubber-mounted, two-stroke Kohler snowmobile engine provided power to the belt-driven torque converter. Drive to the rear wheel was also by belt. Hanebrink produced the 16-inch cast magnesium wheels on which Goodyear racing tires were mounted. The suspension had no springs, but relied on air and oil damping. The circular component on the fork bottom and rear strut contains a central neoprene diaphragm, which separates the oil and air. In use, the oil in the suspension struts compresses the air under load, allowing 41/2 inches of travel in the front forks and 4 inches in the rear."

Dan Hanebrink has been building quite a few interesting vehicles over the years including the “Ice Bike” used in a bicycle trip to the south pole, which is now his Extreme Terrain Bike which can be used on sand, snow or wherever else a regular bike can’t go. Dan has done a little downhill bicycle racing, too, and of course there is the motorcycle business. 

Dan Hanebrink died at the age of 80 on 29 December 2018.

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Hanebrink Monotrack