Vintage Rules Question - Classes...

Mercer, that was funny.

 

you will never see 17" wheels in V3.

17" Rim & Dot racing rubber with a stiffer (41mm on my old V4 GS)fork was good for 3.5 to 4 seconds

 

With the Shockley triumph and the 73-74 tx 500 yamaha, four valves per cylinder. Thats three examples of multi valve per cyl. bikes from the 70's.

The FT500 appears to be a twin shock from a pic I found. So it is a retro bike built in the 80's. I dont understand the opposition to the FT. Scott, the Bobs, help me out here.

If the front clip from a 85 RZ is deemed period or like design, which is debatable, cause it sure as hell isnt vintage, then why not the FT.

Chumbucket, have your friend write a letter to WERA about the FT, if he really wants to race it. This debate here is unofficial, but now you have a few pro's and con's to work from, good luck. Hope to see the FT out there next year.

Richard Lucas

 

Motorcycle design and technology doesn't always follow a linear progression, with earlier discarded concepts often reappearing when the time is right. Four-cylinder, shaft drive motorcycles were built by the Belgian firm F.N. in 1905, the british Scott motorcycle had a two-stroke, liquid cooled engine in 1908 and Indian made its four-valve race motor in 1912.

 

Very True

The Rudge Four from the 30's had 4 valve heads: That IMO doesn't mean 4 valve per cyl engines should be allowed in F500 and V3. That's not a road you want to go down for the good of the class, I can tell you straight out that Rich & I could put together a fire breathing GS450 8 valve using a Euro/Canadian head from the GS400 twin. It would be a BMF.


Monoshock suspensions have been around in one form or another since the 30's and been available for niche markets & racers from the mid 70's: That IMO doesn't mean V4 should be changed from its twin shock only format.


The line always has had to have been drawn somewhere and Wera & Wera Vintage has done a fine job of doing that for years. Change exclusions, and inclusions by the way of indexing slowly molded the classes into their present format.

As far as V4 goes, lets hold that line keep it twin shock only (But go ahead and brace the fuck out of that swing arm )

V3 and F500, lets hold that line and keep it 18" wheels only and keep the 4 valve's out.

 

I do think that we should remember to remove the gs450 misprint from the 500GP rules.