World SBK | ROUND 01 | Grand Ridge Brewery Australian Round | 23 - 25 FEB

Some serious confidence on that one. Glad to see him up at the front, he’s kept on plugging away.

 

Rea missing Pere Riba I guess. Lowes seems to be gelling with him just fine.

 

https://www.worldsbk.com/en/news/2024/Rea+declared+unfit+after+Race+2+crash+provides+injury+update

 

https://twitter.com/SBSSportau/status/1761591802707238946

 

bautista getting ridden around on the outside like the bitch that he is...love it

 

Kawi apparently benefitting from the new rule change allowing up to +/- 20% change in weight of crankshaft compared to 3% previously. Announcers said they added weight to crank to bridge the massive gap they had in top speed.

 

Wow, I’ve always found it interesting how sometimes seem to be so unaware of their engine going poof. I’ve personally never experienced a rapid unscheduled engine disassembly so I’m not judging at all. But I noticed toprak seemed to recognize immediately there was an issue and get off track. The ASBK clearly had no idea he had a problem and I’ve seen that many times before.

For those that have been there or simply know more than me, what kind of breakages can result in that level of failure without enough sensory input to the rider for them to recognize a catastrophic failure, such as sudden loss of power, change in sound, etc?

 

I heard that too. Curious about the science behind it and how adding weight to crank translates to higher top end

 

That's a thing?

If this were a basketball dunk, they would call it a poster. That was disrespectful and filthy.

 

It's hard to believe that guys at that level have never blown up an engine before. But when it's happening to you for the first time and you have no idea what to expect, you can get pretty stupid real quick.

I once spent a full lap at the track day trying to diagnose a drop in power. Thank black baby Jesus it was an that kind of failure that results in an oil spill (it was bad enough for the engine to need to rebuild). I could have hurt a lot of people.

My one and only experience with oil was even earlier than that, when I used to spend Friday evenings at the drag strip with my street bike. I went through the traps at 120 mph with what I thought was a badly slipping clutch. Turns out it was my tire that had been spinning over second half of the run and the ambulance was already chasing me when I looked back. Oil filter had come lose.

 

I spun two rod bearings on my 675R on the coming up the hill on the front straight at Road America. It started to lose power at the finish line and I didn't realize I blew the motor until the downhill between T1&3.

That was as my first blown motor, luckily I didn't spill any oil. My second blown motor on the bike was a bit more messy. . .

 

Yeah, rod bearing here as well.

 

not an expert but I think the higher rotating mass aids the engine to sort of keep its “momentum”. Same reason why if you go with a lightweight stator you pick up acceleration but lose top speed.

 

Just as a higher compression ratio has a negative effect on high rpm power.

 

Can you explain? I didn't consider that RPM and CR are that interrelated.

 

not to derail this thread but this is allowed in MA this year as well. Will be interesting if any teams pick up.

GG ran a solid race, highest bmw. I wonder if he knew his motor could potentially grenade as well and took it easy in qualy.

Iannone is right up there , Petrucci podiums, lots of great talent and anyone can win. I thought Gardner would have been more of a threat but he seems to have ran into problems.

 

Lets hope all the race weekends will be as good as this one! That pass around the outside was insane!

The walk through the crowd to get to the podium is kinda cool. Is that just at this track? Don’t remember seeing that before.

 

I'll have to search for this information. I believe it was Kevin Cameron who explained it in a TDC article of his.

 

Cool. I have an archive link to some of his stuff. I’ll look it up. Thanks.

 

A high crank mass fights wheelspin.

From KC:
".... in past conversations with former Harley-Davidson racing manager Dick O’Brien and “Mr. Superbike” himself, Rob Muzzy, I was told that neither man had ever had much luck with light cranks and top speed at Daytona. In their (extensive) experience, a certain level of crank mass was essential to achieving high top speeds."

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