CAFE RACER
A Cafe Racer is a light-weight, lightly-powered motorcycle optimized for speed and handling rather than comfort and optimized for quick rides over short distances. With bodywork and control layout recalling early 1960’s Grand Prix Road Racing Motorcycles, cafe racers are noted for their low slung racing handlebars, prominent seat cowling and elongated fuel tanks, often with indentations to allow the rider’s knees to grip the tank.
The term itself developed among British motorcycle enthusiasts of the early 1960s, specifically the Rocker or “Ton-Up Boys” subculture where the bikes were used for short, quick rides between cafés in other words, drinking establishments.
In 1973, US freelance writer Wallace Wyss, contributing to Popular Mechanics magazine, wrote that the term cafe racer was originally used derogatorily in Europe to describe a “motorcyclist who played at being an Isle of Man road racer “and was in fact” someone who owned a racy machine but merely parked it near his table at the local outdoor cafe.”
In 2014, journalist Ben Stewart described the café racer as a “look made popular when European kids stripped down their small-displacement bikes to zip from one café hangout to another.”
Typical Configuration
In addition to its characteristic light-weight and lightly-powered engine and distinctive bodywork, the café racer typically featured distinctive ergonomics.
Low, narrow handlebars known as clip-ons (two separate bars that bolt directly to each fork tube), clubman or ace bars (one piece bars that attach to the standard mounting location but drop down and forward) enabled the rider to “tuck in”, reducing wind resistance and improving control. Along with rearward located seat, the posture often required rearsets, or rear-set footrests and foot controls, again typical of racing motorcycles of the era. Distinctive half or full race-style fairings were sometimes mounted to the forks or frame.
The bikes featured minimalist styling, engines tuned for maximum speed and light road handling. A well-known example was “The Triton“, a homemade combination of Norton Featherbed Frame and Triumph Bonneville engine. It used a common and fast racing engine combined with a well-handling frame, the Featherbed frame by Norton Motorcycles. Those with less money could opt for a “Tribsa” the Triumph engine in a BSA frame. Other combinations such as the “Norvin” (a Vincent V-Twin engine in a Featherbed frame) and racing frames by Rickman or Seeley were also adopted for road use.
Evolution
Café racer styling evolved throughout the time of their popularity. By the mid-1970s, Japanese bikes had overtaken British bikes in the marketplace, and the look of real Grand Prix racing bikes had changed. The hand-made, frequently unpainted aluminium racing fuel tanks of the 1960s had evolved into square, narrow, fibre glass tanks. Increasingly, three-cylinder Kawasaki two-strokes, four-cylinder four-stroke Kawasaki Z1, and four-cylinder Hondas were the basis for café racer conversions. By 1977, a number of manufacturers had taken notice of the café racer boom and were producing factory café racers, such as the well-received Moto Guzzi Le Mans and the unpopular but unforgettable Harley Davidson XLCR. A Japanese thumper introduced in the late 1980s (to disappointing sales) the Honda GB500 ‘Tourist Trophy’ emulated British café racers of the 1960s.
In the mid 1970s, riders continued to modify standard production motorcycles into so called “café racers” by simply equipping them with clubman bars and a small fairing around the headlight. A number of European manufacturers, including Benelli, BMW, Bultaco and Derbi produced factory “café” variants of their standard motorcycles in this manner, without any modifications made to make them faster or more powerful, a trend that continues today.
Subculture
Rockers were a young and rebellious rock and roll counter culture who wanted a fast, personalised and distinctive bike to travel between transport cafes along the newly built arterial motorways in and around British towns and cities. Biker lore has it that the goal of many was to be able to reach 100 miles per hour (160 km/h) called simply “the ton” along such a route where the rider would leave from a café, race to a predetermined point and back to the café before a single song could play on the jukebox, called record-racing. But author Mike Seate contends that record-racing is a myth, the story having originated in an episode of the BBC Dixon of Dock Green television show. Café racers are remembered as being especially fond of rockabilly music and their image is now embedded in today’s rockabilly culture.
The sub-culture continues to evolve with modern cafe racers taking style elements of the American Greaser, the British Rocker and modern motorcycle rider to create an global style all their own. Google Trends shows that, since 2010, the number of searches for the term ‘cafe racer’ has increased by approximately a factor of three relative to the total number of Google searches.
(source: wikipedia)
BOBBER
A Bobber is a custom motorcycle that usually has had the front fender removed, the rear fender “bobbed” (made smaller), and all superfluous parts removed to reduce weight.
History
The bobber was the earliest simple and stripped down variety of custom motorcycle. They are hand-built by individuals with mechanical skills, and were often part of the early biker clubs before there were any such thing as choppers. This style of custom motorcycle, which took shape in the 1940s and 50s, is generally thought to have been started by returning WWII American servicemen working on ex-military motorcycles. They were inspired by lighter European motorcycles they had seen and ridden. When bobbers were first created, the intent was not to create a new genus of motorcycle, it was to keep motorcycles performing as cheaply as possible.
The bikes reflected their owners and were often homemade. The style has also influenced motorcycle manufacturers, such as Harley Davidson and Honda.
The bobber continues to be favored by some to this day. Hybrid styles have emerged, such as the “bobber chopper”, and “retro-bobber”. These newer bobbers are more about individuality than simply being constructed cheaply.
Bobbers vs Choppers
Bobbers are related to choppers in that they represent a minimalistic approach where the motorcycle is stripped of parts or accessories not needed. The principal difference between a bobber and chopper is that bobbers are typically built around unmodified frames. Chopper frames are often cut and welded into shape. Bobbers also often lack most of the chopper’s aesthetic characteristics such as chromed parts and elongated forks. Thus, bobbers are fairly easy to create from stock motorcycles and are generally hand built.
While customized motorcycles can be expensive, bobber builders tend to adopt an economical approach involving old, second-hand, recycled parts and hand-machined items reminiscent of the period before the mass-market motorcycle accessory industry had developed.
(source: wikipedia)
CHOPPER
A Chopper is a type of motorcycle that is either modified from an original motorcycle design (“chopped”) or built from scratch to have a unique hand-crafted appearance. Some of the characteristic features of choppers are long front ends with extended forks often coupled with an increased rake angle, hardtail frames (frames without rear suspension), very tall “ape hanger” or very short “drag” handlebars, lengthened or stretched frames, and larger than stock front wheels. The “sissy bar”, a set of tubes that connect the rear fender with the frame, and which are often extended several feet high, is a signature feature on many choppers.
Choppers typically are stripped down and have had many parts found on stock bikes “chopped” – that is cut down or modified to be smaller, or removed altogether. Parts often removed include the front fender, turn signals, one or more mirrors, speedometers and gauges, electric starters, batteries, chain guards, and various covers. Two anachronistic front suspension systems, the girder fork and the springer fork, are often used on choppers, to further differentiate them from the telescopics forks found on almost all modern production bikes.
Perhaps the best known choppers ever are the two customized Harley Davidson, the “Captain America” and “Billy Bike”, seen in the 1969 film “Easy Rider”.
History
The Bobber Era, 1946-1959
Before there were choppers, there was the bobber, meaning a motorcycle that had been “bobbed,” or relieved of excess weight by removing parts, particularly the fenders, with the intent of making it lighter and thus faster, or at least making it look better in the eyes of a rider seeking a more minimalist ride.
An early example of a bobber is the 1940 Indian Sport Scout “Bob-Job” which toured in the 1998 The Art of The Motorcycle exhibition. Indian Scouts and Chiefs of the time came with extravagantly large, heavily valanced fenders, nearly reaching the center of the wheel on the luxurious 1941 Indian Series 441 while racing bikes had tiny fenders or none at all. The large and well-appointed bikes exemplified the “dresser” motorcycle aesthetic and providing a counterpoint to the minimalist bobber, and cafe racers.
In the post-World War II United States, servicemen returning home from the war started removing all parts deemed too big, heavy, ugly, or not essential to the basic function of the motorcycle, such as fenders, turn indicators, and even front brakes. The large, spring-suspended saddles were also removed in order to sit as low as possible on the motorcycle’s frame. These machines were lightened to improve performance for dirt-track racing and mud racing. In California dry lake beds were used for long top speed runs. Motorcycles and automobiles ran at the same meets, and bobbers were an important part of the hotrod culture that developed in this era.
The first choppers were built in America, and were an outgrowth of the milder customization trend that had originated after WW2 when returning soldiers and others began modifying cars and motorcycles, frequently to improve performance in top-speed races on dry lake beds in Southern California and similar desolate spaces such as unused airstrips in other parts of the country, or on the street for street racing. These early modified motorcycles were known as “bobbers”, and there are many common features between bobbers and choppers, with choppers differentiated being more radically modified, and especially by having the frame tubes and geometry modified (“chopped” by welding) to make the bike longer.
The earliest choppers tended to be based on Harley-Davidson motorcycles, at first making use of the Flathead, Knucklehead and Panhead engines – many of which could be found in surplus military and police motorcycles bought cheaply at auction. As new engines became available they were soon utilized in choppers. British bikes, particularly Triumphs, were also a popular motor for choppers early on. As the Japanese manufacturers began offering larger engines in the late 1960s these motors were also quickly put to use by chopper builders. The Honda 750-4 was the most widely used Japanese motor for chopper builders early on. Choppers have been created using almost every available engine, but builders have always shown a preference for older air cooled designs. It is rare to see a chopper with a radiator.
Over time choppers became more and more about achieving a certain look, rather than being primarily performance oriented modifications. The modifications that had had their origin in hotrodding evolved into an artistic and aesthetic direction. By the mid 1970s stock Japanese and European performance motorcycles would outperform most bobbers and choppers. The one exception to this was the drag racing arena, which placed a premium on pure engine power, rather than handling over curvy courses. Chopper styling continued to be influenced by drag-bike modifications throughout the 1960s and 1970s.
While all choppers are highly customized bikes, sometimes even being built from scratch using all custom parts, not all customized bikes are choppers. In Europe at roughly the same era that choppers were invented and popularized in the USA, bikers modified their bikes (primarily English brands like Triumph, BSA, Norton and Matchless) in a different way, to achieve different looks, performance goals and riding position. The resulting bikes are known as café racers, and look very different from a chopper.
As the popularity of choppers grew, in part through exposure in movies such as the 1969 classic Easy Rider, several motorcycle brands took note and began to include chopper influenced styling in their factory offerings. None of the factories were willing to go all out and do things like abandon rear-suspension to achieve the classic chopper look, however. As a result these bikes were given the name “factory customs” and are not considered choppers.
Over the decades since the first choppers were created many different trends and fads have taken hold and held sway, so that that it is often possible for someone to look at a chopper and say that it’s a “1970s” style or fits into a specific era or sub-type. Currently some builders specialize in building choppers that very exactly fit into these styles, they are frequently referred to as “old school” style choppers.
1960s – Early Choppers
By the early 1960s there was a big enough contingent of people modifying motorcycles, still mostly big Harley Davidsons, that a certain style had begun to take hold. A set of modifications became common: the fat tires and 16″ wheels of the stock motorcycles were replaced with narrower tires often on a larger 19″ or 21″ wheel. Forward-mounted foot pegs replaced the standard large ‘floorboard’ foot rests. Frequently the standard headlight and fuel tank were replaced with much smaller ones. Often upgraded chromed parts (either one-off fabricated replacements or manually chromed stock parts) were added. It is in this era that what we would today consider a chopper came into existence and began to be called the chopper.
During the 1960s, candy colored paint, often multicolored and metal-flaked with different patterns, became a trend that allowed builders to further express their individuality and artistry. Soon many parts were being offered by small companies expressly for use in building choppers, not necessarily as performance parts as was common in the Bobber Era.
The first famous chopper builders came to prominence in this era, including Arlen Ness who was a leader in the “Frisco” or “Bay Area Chopper” style. Ness’s bikes were characterized by having long low frames and highly raked front ends, typically 45 degrees or more, and frequently made use of springer front ends. Many made use of the newer Harley Davidson Sportster motor, a simpler and more compact “unit motor” that included the transmission in the same housing as the motor itself, which lent itself nicely to Ness’s stripped down style. Many of Ness’s bikes in this era retained the rear shocks of the donor Sportster to provide a more forgiving ride than the typical hardtail chopper.
In 1967 Denver Mullins and Mondo Porras opened Denver’s Choppers in San Bernardino, California, and soon became famous for building “long bikes”, often referred to as “Denver choppers”. These featured even longer front ends than the Bay Area style, and had a much higher frame (stretched “up and out”). Denver’s was particularly well known for the springer forks that they fabricated, as well as the overall style of their bikes.
With choppers still not yet a mass market concept regional variations and formulations flourished in this period. Many innovations were tried in this period, found not to work that well, and then abandoned. A great deal of knowledge about how to build long bikes that handled well adjusting rake and trail was developed, yet less sophisticated builders also created a lot of bikes that had handling issues in this period as expertise was still scarce and closely held.
The 1970s: Iconic Choppers, Diggers and Japanese Motors
The huge success of the film Easy Rider instantly popularized the chopper, and drastically increased the demand for them. What had been a subculture known to a relatively small group of enthusiasts in a few regions of the USA was now a worldwide wave. The 1970s saw the first wave of European chopper builders, and the “Swedish Chopper” style has its roots in this period.
Custom shops multiplied, and with them the number and diversity of bikes. According to the taste and purse of the owner, chop shops would build high handle bars, or later Ed Roth’s Wild Child designed stretched, narrowed, and raked front forks. Shops also custom built exhaust pipes and many of the aftermarket kits followed in the late 1960s into the 1970s. Laws required (and in many locales still do) a retention fixture for the passenger, so vertical backrests called sissy bars became a popular installation, often sticking up higher than the rider’s head.
While the decreased weight and lower seat position improved handling and performance, the main reason to build a chopper was to show off and provoke others by riding a machine that was stripped and almost nude compared to the stock Harley Davidson and automobiles of the period. Style trumped practicality, particularly as forks became longer and longer handling suffered. As one biker said, “You couldn’t turn very good but you sure looked good doing it.”
The Digger became another popular style. Similar to the Frisco choppers Diggers were frequently even longer than earlier bikes, but still low. The coffin and prism shaped tanks on these bikes were frequently mated with very long front ends (12″ over stock and more), with the archaic girder fork often being used to accomplish this instead of the more common springer or telescopic types. Body work was also moulded to flow seamlessly, using copious amounts of bondo. New paint colors and patterns included paisleys, day-glo and fluorescent, along with continuing use of metal-flakes and pearls.
Honda’s groundbreaking 750 cc four cylinder engine, first introduced to America in the 1969 CB-750, became widely available from salvage and wrecking operations and became a popular alternative to Harley-Davidson’s motors. Harley’s then-current big-twin motor, the Shovelhead was extremely popular with chopper builders in this era, and use of the older motors, particularly the Knucklehead and Flathead declined as parts became harder to get and the performance of the new motors proved superior.
The 1980s and 1990s: Improved Engineering and Aftermarket Suppliers
In 1984 Harley-Davidson, who had been using chopper inspired styling for a number of years, released the ‘Softail’, a design that hid the rear shocks under the engine creating a profile that looked a lot like a hard-tail. This frame was initially offered in the Softail Custom, a bike that took many styling cues from choppers, including the narrow 21″ front wheel. Buyers looking for the chopper look had a plausible factory alternative, and interest in choppers declined.
With some time out of the limelight chopper builders seemed to work on craft more than wild innovation in this period. While individual builders still built long bikes, the trend was towards more moderate geometries, and the basics of how to build a good handling but still great looking chopper became more common knowledge. In this period it became possible to assemble a complete chopper using all aftermarket parts, companies like S&S built complete Shovelhead style replacement engines, frame makers such as Paughco offered a variety of hardtail frames and many bikes were built using these new repo parts. Super long girder and springer forked bikes were less popular in this era, while the use of telescopic forks grew, and builders upgraded to larger diameter tubes in both forks and frames to gain more rigidity.
Japanese bike builders offered a dizzying array of new bikes, including full-faired racing styled machines as well as many ‘customs’ that picked at chopper styling in a random way and rarely achieved the powerful integrated style that more and more custom chopper builders in this era seemed able to consistently achieve. As materials, fabrication and knowledge improved the performance of the better choppers improved. More powerful engines drove the need for stronger frames, brakes and bigger tires with more grip. These trends worked together so that as the 1990s closed the modern chopper was larger looking, more powerful machine. The widespread use of CNC made it possible for even small shops to fabricate out of block aluminum, and billet components became a signature item often replacing stamped and chromed steel components of the earlier eras.
The 21st Century: Choppers on TV, Fat Tires and Big Power
The millennium began with the cable TV network “The Discovery Channel” creating a number of television shows around several custom bike builders who built choppers. Jessie James, of Long Beach, California was the first builder to be so featured, and that first special Motorcycle Mania provided both a vehicle for his stardom and a trigger to the second great chopper hype wave, much as the movie “Easy Rider” had kicked off the first wave 30 years previously.
The celebrity builders featured on the cable shows enjoyed a large following. Companies like Jesse James’ West Coast Choppers have been successful in producing expensive choppers, and a wide range of chopper-themed brands of merchandise such as clothing, automobile accessories and stickers.
The American Chopper reality television series featuring Paul Teutul Sr, and his sons Paul Jr. and Mike, enjoyed a six year run of building bikes at Orange County Choppers (OCC).
While Jessie James and OCC built different sorts of bikes, both were firmly in the modern school most of the time: aftermarket motors, frequently with huge displacements of up to 120 cubic inches and well over 100 horsepower, modern low profile tires in extreme widths sometimes on wheels as wide as six-inches, lots of fancy computer-cut billet parts. The OCC team went a step further and built many bikes with themes such as supporting a particular company or product. The prices for their bikes, and similar bikes built out of all-new, high end and custom parts rose quickly placing such bikes out of the range of many enthusiasts.
2010: Backlash, Bobbers and The Old School Revival
This led to a backlash, and a renewed interest in home garage fabricated bikes built on a budget with available materials. Many builders eschewed Harley “pattern” motors and frames and started building choppers out of neglected bikes like Yamaha XS-650 twins, old Harley Sportsters, and various 1980’s so called UJM bikes (four cylinder air-cooled Japanese bikes).
Another aspect of the backlash was a return to more traditional styling. Bobbers were again in style. Stock rake machines with a stripped down look, often with flat or primer paints in charcoal grey, flat black, olive drab or brown.
Indian Larry and Paul Cox along with other New York City builders from Psycho Cycles are often credited with leading the movement back towards old school choppers in this period. Indian Larry was a featured builder early on the series “Biker Build-Off” on Discovery network, and won all three build off competitions, highlighting the popularity of his old-school style.
Three inch wide belt drives and 120 cubic inch motors were still appreciated by many, but an increasing counter-movement of people building bikes with Shovelhead motors and chain drive primaries has occurred. Springers and even girder forks have made yet another come back. Magazines such as Iron Horse, Street Chopper and Show Class cater to the retro, old-school and backyard builders, and feature more DIY technology than the TV builders with their million-dollar garages of the previous decade.
(source: wikipedia)
SCRAMBLER
The Scrambler’s roots lie across the ocean in England back in the late 1920’s, in the form of point to point races that favoured speed over rules. Competitors were tasked with racing from point A to B in the shortest time possible to win, conquering whatever terrain laid in their way to shave off those precious seconds.
In a world before mass-produced dirt bikes, riders would have to convert their every day road bikes into grass churning, hill climbing beasts that could handle themselves on any surface – the rougher the better.
Before long these ‘scramble’ races developed into closed circuit trials riding, motocross, and the Californian desert scramble, and by the mid 1960’s bikes more closely resembling the dirtbikes we see today began to go into production.
It doesn’t matter what you have, any road bike has the potential to be a Scrambler.
What generally characterizes a Scrambler is the adaptation of a road bike into an all-terrain ride. As these bikes historically would go from crossing a stream to climbing a muddy hill whilst trying to get from point A to B as quickly as possible, it was important that they be lightweight, powerful, and reliable. With that in mind, some key characteristics of a Scrambler are:
A higher mounted exhaust for ground clearance
A shorter, padded seat
Torque over top end power
Visual simplicity
Lightweight components
Smaller tanks
Mini guages, and a tucked in light.
Chunky off-road tires with spoked wheels.
It’s important to remember that visually, the goal is to make the bike appear as though all unnecessary features have been removed, as the aesthetic of the Scrambler was born out of a necessity for lighter, faster bikes that could handle themselves in rough conditions. And that’s what makes a Scrambler such an interesting bike. It intermingles a stripped down, chunky, and powerful aesthetic into something beautiful and raw. But remember that rules are meant to be bent and broken. A Scrambler with a cafe seat like the striking BMW below may just be the right touch for you.
There are some absolutely gorgeous examples out there, and we’ve compiled a shortlist of our favourite links to get you inspired on your own build. Remember that if you’re interested in using the bike purely off-road, your needs and eventual look are going to be far different from an occasional all-terrain adventurer. Sometimes it’s just good enough to feel like you can keep going when the road ends, even if you never will.
(source: wikipedia)
SPEEDWAY
Motorcycle Speedway, usually referred to as Speedway, is a motorcycle sport involving four and sometimes up to six riders competing over four anti-clockwise laps of an oval circuit. Speedway motorcycle use only one gear and have no brakes racing takes place on a flat oval track usually consisting of dirt, loosely packed shale, or dolomite (mostly used in Australia and New Zealand). Competitors use this surface to slide their machines sideways, powersliding or broadsiding into the bends. On the straight sections of the track the motorcycles reach speeds of up 70 miles per hour (110 km/h).
The exact origins of the sport are unknown but there is evidence of a type of speedway racing being practised in the USA before the First World War and in Australia in the late 1910s and early 1920s. There are now both domestic and international competitions in a number of countries including the Speedway World Cup whilst the highest overall scoring individual in the Speedway Grand Prix events is pronounced the world champion. Speedway is popular in central and northern Europe and to a lesser extent in Australia and North America. A variant of track racing, speedway is administered internationally by the Federation Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM). Domestic speedway events are regulated by FIM affiliated national motor sport federations.
History
The early history of speedway race meetings is a subject of much debate and controversy. There is evidence to show that meetings were held on small dirt tracks in Australia and the United States before World War I. An American rider named Don Johns was known to have used broadsiding before 1914. It was said that he would ride the entire race course wide open, throwing great showers of dirt into the air at each turn. By the early 1920s, Johns’ style of cornering was followed in the US where the sport was initially called “Short Track Racing” by riders such as Albert “Shrimp” Burns, Maldwyn Jones and Eddie Brinck. Consequently, two long-hold and common beliefs are incorrect: first, that New Zealand born rider Johnnie Hoskins invented the sport, and second, that the first meeting was held on 15 December 1923 at West Maitland Showground, in the Hunter Region of New South Wales, Australia. For instance, a contemporary newspaper report of this meeting, in the Maitland Mercury, mentions previous meetings.
The first meeting in the United Kingdom took place at High Beech on 19 February 1928. There are, however, claims that meetings were held in 1927 at Camberley, Surrey and Droylsden, Lancashire. Despite being described as “the first British Dirt Track meeting” at the time, the meeting at Camberley on 7 May 1927 differed in that the races were held in a clockwise direction. Races at Droylsden were held in an anti-clockwise direction but it is generally accepted that the sport arrived in the United Kingdom when Australians Billy Galloway and Keith McKay arrived with the intention of introducing speedway to the Northern Hemisphere. Both featured in the 1928 High Beech meeting. The first speedway meeting in the UK to feature bikes with no brakes and broadsiding round corners on loose dirt was the third meeting held at High Beech on 9 April 1928, where Colin Watson, Alf Medcalf and “Digger” Pugh demonstrated the art for the first time in the UK. Proto speedway was staged in Glasgow at the Olympic Stadium (Glasgow Nelson) on April 9, 1928 and the first fully professional meeting was staged at Celtic Park on April 28, 1928. The first meeting in Wales was staged at Cardiff White City on Boxing Day 1928.
In the 1928/29 season, Australian Colin Stewart, at Exhibition Speedway Melbourne, won the prestigious Silver Gauntlet, which required the rider to win the feature race 10 times in one season. He won it 12 times. He also achieved success at an international level, racing for Southampton Saints in 1929 and captained Glasgow in the Northern League in 1930 before moving to Wembley Lions in 1931, for whom he rode in just four matches, averaging 4.00 points per match. He also raced in the 1930 Scottish Championship which was won by Wembley Lions’ Harry Whitfield.
The forerunner of the World Championship, the Star Riders Championship, was inaugurated in Great Britain in 1929 but was split into two sections as it was felt that the British riders were not yet the equal of the Australians and Americans. Frank Arthur won the Overseas Section and Roger Frogley the British. The following year the two sections were amalgamated and Vic Huxley proved to be the winner. Huxley was also runner-up three times and won the first British Match Race championship in 1931.
Speedway racing typically took place on purpose built tracks, although in Australia bikes shared larger Speedways with cars such as Sprintcars, Speedcars (Midgets) and Saloons, with tracks traditionally ranging from ⅓ Mile Showground tracks, such as the now closed 520 metres (570 yd) Claremont Speedway in Perth and the 509 metres (557 yd) Sydney Showground, to smaller, purpose built 300 metres (330 yd) long motorcycle tracks, such as Gillman Speedway in Adelaide and Mildura’s Olympic Park.
Speed
Each track is between 260 to 425 metres long and it takes approximately one minute to complete four laps. For example, Leigh Adams set a record time of 59 seconds on a 342 metres (1,122 ft) track and produced an average speed of 83 km/h (49 mph). The speed on straight sections of the track reaches 110 km/h (70 mph) or more on longer tracks, but the limited speed on curves lowers the average.
At the start of a race it takes between one and two seconds for the motorcycle to reach the “curve speed” (somewhat lower than the average), which is roughly estimated to be the equivalent of 2.5 to 3 seconds to reach 100 kilometres per hour (62 mph) (or 0 to 60 mph). The start of the race is an important aspect of the race overall. “Gating” correctly can help a rider gain an initial advantage over other riders but speed advantages can be made as a race progresses. Those riders willing to take a risk and opt for finding the grippy parts of the track rather than the race line, are sometimes rewarded with extra speed allowing them to pass other riders either on the outside or the inside.
Tracks
Tracks used for professional speedway racing are regulated by the Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM) who provide rules concerning construction, size and safety requirements. Speedway racing takes place on a level oval track consisting of two straights joined by two semicircles. Tracks must be between 260 to 425 metres (850 and 1500 ft) in length, this is measured at a distance of 1 metre (3.3 ft) from the inner boundary. Tracks may be banked, but the gradient must under no circumstances exceed 5% in the straight, 10% in the bends, and must remain constant and grow from the inner edge to the safety fence. A white start line is marked across the track approximately mid-way along one of the straights. The starting area is also divided into four equal parts (known as gates) by white lines marked at right angles to the start line and extending back at least 1 metre (3.3 ft). Additional rules govern the placement of warning systems such as lights and also the construction of the starting mechanism. The minimum track width is 10 metres (33 ft) on the straights and the bends must be at least 14 metres (46 ft) wide. The minimum widths give each rider adequate space to safely navigate the track. The start line and starting gate assembly is halfway along one of the two straight sections of the track. Starting gates are simple spring loaded mechanisms that raise two or three strands of tape to start the race.
The FIM regulations require licensed tracks to provide a garage or pit area for motorcycles as well as medical and press facilities. Track boundaries are marked by white lines or barriers on the inside and outside of the track, any rider who crosses this boundary with both wheels will be disqualified unless they only did so in the interest of safety or were forced to by another competitor.
The track surface consists of four layers of grading. The topmost of which must be of shale, granite, brick granules or other loose material of which no individual piece can be over 7 millimetres (0.28 in) in size. Competitors use this surface to slide their machines sideways (powersliding or broadsiding) into the bends using the rear wheel to scrub-off speed while still providing the drive to power the bike forward and around the bend. The skill of speedway lies in the overall ability of the rider to control his motorcycle when cornering and thus avoid losing places through deceleration. The use of asphalt, concrete and tarmac for any layer is prohibited. The top layer must be levelled or “graded” at intervals during an event by tractors towing specially adapted rakes to evenly re-distribute the surface. Tracks are watered before and, if needed, during meetings to prevent the surface becoming too dry and to protect the public and the riders from dust.
Safety requirements include the use of suspended wire fences, air fences and wooden fences. Air fences are made up of inflated panels installed on the bends. The fence is designed to dissipate energy by allowing an impacted area to compress and transfer air into the rest of the fence through blow-off valves or restriction ports connected to the other sections. They are mandatory for tracks in the British Elite League, Polish Ekstraliga, Speedway Grand Prix and Speedway World Cup. Neutral zones outside the track provide safe run-off areas for riders and their machinery to minimise the potential risk of injury to spectators. The majority of tracks are dedicated to speedway or other sports such as sidecar speedway and banger racing. For larger events, the FIM occasionally sanctions the use of stadiums that install temporary tracks such as the British Grand Prix held at the Millenium Stadium in Cardiff.
Motorcycles
Speedway uses a unique type of motorcycle, governed by the FIM’s “Track Racing Technical Rules”. In the past, bikes with upright engines were used (the name taken from the way the engine sits in the frame), but today most professional riders use laydown bikes as it is argued that they are easier to handle. As speedway bikes do not use brakes, the clutch is used as a release mechanism at the start of races. FIM regulations state that the motorcycles must have no brakes, are powered by pure methanol, use only one gear and weigh a minimum of 77 kilograms (170 lb). By using engine and rear wheel sprockets the gear ratio can be adjusted as required for track conditions. The use of methanol allows for an increased compression ratio to the engine producing more power than other fuels and resulting in higher speeds (approximately 130 kilometres per hour (81 mph) when cornering).
Machines used must:
- Weigh no less than 77 kg (unfuelled)
- Use a four-stroke, single cylinder engine with one carburettor and one spark plug and a maximum capacity of 500cc
- Have guards fitted over moving engine parts where reasonable
- Use an additional chain guard to prevent a hand or fingers being cut at the nip point where the chain meets the sprocket by a chain
- Have a peg (Dutch Peg) fitted to prevent a broken primary chain flailing and injuring a rider or a fellow competitor
- Use shatter resistant plastics where reasonable
- Be fitted with a dirt deflector
- Be fuelled by methanol with no additives
- Be fitted with an approved silencer
- Have a handlebar width greater than 650 mm and less than 850 mm.
Machines used cannot:
- Be constructed in any part from Titanium
- Use uncoated ceramic parts
- Use telemetry during a race except for timing purposes
- Use any electronic components to control the engine
- Use brakes of any form
- Use supercharger or a turbocharger of any kind.
In addition all motorcycles must have a safety cut out device fitted, this is defined as a switch that “must cut off the circuit of the electrical supply by the simple action of pulling a lanyard or a non-elastic string (with a maximum length of 30 centimetres (12 in)) attached to the rider’s right wrist.” The high compression ratio of the engine can also assist in slowing down a machine; if the throttle is closed the engine may stop. Riders can stop the bike by deliberately laying down the bike on the track and this technique is used to avoid riders who fall in front of a pursuing colleague. Before cut outs were fitted an engine was stopped in an emergency situation by removing the plug lead from the spark plug or shutting off the fuel supply.
Racing
Races (known as heats) consist of four riders racing over four laps from a standing start. Riders wear different coloured helmets, traditionally in team events red and blue denote home team riders, and white and yellow/black quartered colours (latterly plain yellow) denote visiting riders. The starting area is divided into a grid of four equal parts and the riders from each team must take their place in alternate grids or “gates”. The colours also denote starting positions in individual events; Red is the inside gate (gate 1), blue starts from gate 2, white starts from gate 3 and yellow/black starts on the outside (gate 4). Riders must be able to get their bikes to the start line under their own power, without any external assistance and not by pushing the machine, then line up in parallel.
A rider who is not at the start line within a reasonable period of time is also liable to be disqualified, although league matches in the UK allow teams to elect to start the disqualified rider fifteen metres back from the tapes or replace the disqualified rider with a team reserve. This period of time is standardised to two minutes from a time determined by the match referee and usually indicated by a bell, a rotating orange lamp or a digital clock readout. All riders must be at the tapes under their own power before the two minutes have elapsed. Additional time between races will be allowed by, and at the discretion of, the referee if a rider has two consecutive rides, to allow the rider time to prepare.
A starting gate consisting of two or more tapes is erected across the start line. The riders must situate themselves not more than 10 centimetres (3.9 in) from this and not touch it once the green light comes on, they must also remain stationary until the tapes are raised. Failure to do so is known as a tape infringement and can result in a false start being recorded and the rider penalised (disqualified, or in league matches in Great Britain, a 15-metre penalty or replace the disqualified rider with a team reserve). The race is started with the raising of the start tape mechanism operated by the match referee and the riders must proceed around the track in an anti-clockwise direction without both wheels illegally leaving the track boundaries.
Once a race is underway, no rider can receive outside assistance, including push-starts, from others. Historically, pushers were allowed at the start of the race. A white line at the 30 metre mark used to designate the extent to which a push was allowed but due to safety concerns, assistance is now illegal.
Occasionally races consist of six riders but this is rare as most tracks are too narrow to accommodate the extra riders safely.
(source: wikipedia)
BRATSTYLE
JAPSTYLE
ROUNDTANK
CHOPPY CUB
FLAT TRACKER
The Kawasaki KZ 200 was a street cruiser produced between 1978 to 1984 by Kawasaki Motorcycles.
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GUMZ CUSTOM MOTORCYCLE 