AGV Backmarker: The Selfish Mechanical Gene

Recently, I wrote one of those Facebook “Mark is…” instant updates to the effect of, “Mark is wondering what to write in Backmarker.”

One of my friends on the Isle of Man suggested, “About how Ben Spies is going to dominate World Superbikes this year?”

As they say in France, “The only things that are new are those that have been forgotten.” Cadillac made its first crossplane engines in 1923. They’re far easier to balance in a V8 format, and Yamaha’s trick was figuring out a way to balance one bank. That explains people saying it sounds like a V4: It should, since it’s half a V8. Matteo Cavadini/Alexphoto.

I have to say, I expected Spies to be right in the hunt, right off the bat. But he’s exceeded my expectations. That prompted me to wonder how much of an advantage the new R1 is, with its vaunted “crossplane” crank. When I mentioned that in an email to CJ, he shot back, writing he’d heard the same insinuation from Euro-snobs, looking for excuses why their favored riders were suddenly getting their asses handed to them. Actually Biaggi and Haga are among my favorites, but what really made me wonder was less that Spies was winning with it, than that Tom Sykes was a top-five guy with it.

Spies certainly answered a question I’ve had since 2006, when he emerged as the one guy in the AMA who could handle Mat Mladin. As soon as that happened, he was tipped for some higher purpose, usually a MotoGP ride (lucky for World SBK that didn’t happen, eh?). Anyway, the longer his series of AMA Pro wins dragged on, the more I wondered if having only one other guy to race could possibly be enough. Or did he need to get into a deeper field to reach his full potential?

I guess I needn’t have worried. It turns out racing Mladin—and pretty much only Mladin—was a good enough apprenticeship for Spies.

The R1 must be good enough, too. It’s not good enough to give Ben Bostrom or Josh Hayes a huge advantage here (or at least, it wasn’t at Daytona). I think that it may be a better tool in World Superbike than in AMA, because in SBK (on 16.5” rubber, and I think some teams are even using 16-inch rears), it can better exploit the crossplane motor’s rider-throttle-rear-contact-patch “feel” advantage.

All these thoughts were turning over in my head, going nowhere except to make me wish I’d been invited to the R1 launch, so I’d have at least some direct knowledge of what the crossplane’s like to ride. Not that such experience would give me any sense of what it’s like when Spies rides the R1, since I tap far less of a modern sport bike’s potential.

Changing the subject, but not really…

A few weeks ago, a cool foreign magazine asked me to write a story on the state of two-wheel drive, as it applies to street bikes. I’m a little bit sworn to secrecy for now, but I can at least tease you with some of what I learned.

(I should point out that, throughout this AGV Backmarker, when I write “2WD,” I mean systems that direct power to the rear wheel until rear wheel spin exceeds a certain ratio, at which point some power is transferred to the front wheel—similar to the way the Mercedes 4Matic system works in cars.)

Not surprisingly, the early 2WD R&D focused on off-road applications. The first 4WD vehicles were mostly “Jeep”-type utility vehicles, until the Audi Quattro came along in 1980. For now, I’ll skip over the early history of 2WD trail bikes, of which the Rokon is only the most famous and eccentric.

Beginning in the late ’90s, Yamaha and its Öhlins subsidiary spent a lot of time and money devising the 2-Trac hydraulic drive system. They initially tested it on a two-stroke motocrosser, but most of the development was done on the WR450 off-road bike. Yamaha France eventually sold 400 2-Trac bikes, and Öhlins signed a deal to provide the system to KTM, but it never came to anything. According to Öhlins, that project is now dead.

Although there were strengths and weaknesses to the 2-Trac system in off-road settings, one thing definitely held it back from commercial success. That was that 2-Trac was a huge benefit for novice riders, and less of an advantage as rider skill improved. Commercially speaking, looking at the size of market segments, “not very skilled riders” is a big one. But it’s not that easy to address. That’s why few motorcycle magazine ads carry the headline, “Hey, loser.” Also, a feature that costs several thousand dollars is easier to add to an experts’ expensive bike than it is to a novice’s cheap one.

Even Spies’ R1 doesn’t have this hydraulic hub motor. A rare photo of the Öhlins 2-Trac R1 test mule. It transferred from 0-15 percent of the countershaft power to the front wheel, depending on grip and throttle position. Courtesy Öhlins.

Öhlins also fit a 2-Trac-style hydraulic drive to an R1. I had a long and very interesting conversation with Lars Jansson, who headed that research project. It was one of those chats that left me thinking I really don’t know how motorcycles work, but he was willing to answer a lot of stupid questions. I ended up learning quite a bit more than Öhlins had previously made public about the R1 experiment.

Until Jansson talked to me, almost all that Öhlins released about the 2-Trac R1 was, “It was five seconds faster around the Karlskroga test circuit in the wet.”

Obviously, it wasn’t five seconds faster in the dry, or we would already be testing production versions. Jansson confirmed that to me. There were some issues with the system’s weight, with power losses in the hydraulics, and with handling (notably in high-speed transitions, which makes sense since adding positive torque to the front wheel makes it want to lean more; it will always be harder to go from max lean on one side to max lean on the other if both wheels are powered).

Another problem was that—as Jansson explained it—on a conventional motorcycle, as you approach the limit and the rear wheel starts to slide, the front wheel more or less automatically follows the correct line. (Unlike car drivers, we never have to learn to steer into the skid—our bikes just do that for us.) But if you’re adding torque the front wheel, it now has a drift angle too. That’s totally against the instincts of skilled riders. Most of the Öhlins testers were national-level Superbike guys from Europe—a pretty skilled group. Jansson told me that they all came in shaking their heads and saying, “I know if I could get used to it, I could go a lot faster.”

Jansson was disappointed that 2-Trac was not pursued for road applications, where he’s convinced (and convincing) that it would be a big safety feature for real riders on real roads.

Although the R1 was the only bike Öhlins let its man talk about, he did admit that in total, Öhlins adapted 2-Trac to five street bikes, including two at the specific request of other (non-Yamaha) manufacturers. About the time that Öhlins gave up on 2WD, Steve Christini picked up the baton, developing his elegant mechanical system. I’ve spoken to him at length too, and while he won’t give me specifics (at least, not until I can get him drunk), he’s admitted that OEMs (note plural) based on more than one continent have talked with him about road bike projects.

Anyway, right now, I’m kind of constrained on how much more I can write about it; I’ll spill my guts (and a few other people’s!) some time in the next few months. But where this leaves me is ruminating on the evolution of motorcycles.

That crossplane crank provides an advantage (however much of an advantage it is) only on a big motor, spinning at high rpm, and making a hell of a lot of power—Spies is comfortable aboard such a bike, but most buyers are not. That said, it’s probably at least a racing evolution that is going to be felt as an improvement by average riders. The same can’t be said for much of the racing-driven change in sport bikes over the last twenty years.

Lars Jansson ran the R1 R&D project. He’s disappointed it never led to a 2WD production bike, but he’s philosophical about it. “If you’re a sport-oriented company, you tend to think that new products should first be proven in racing. In that setting, two-wheel drive will not be so attractive; the better a rider you are, the less you need two-wheel drive.” Courtesy Öhlins.

One reason there’s been an upsurge in interest in post-classic bikes from the late ’70s and early ’80s is that they’re affordable, and that’s important in this economy. But another part of it is that people are starting to realize the Supersports market is driven by changes that are sometimes appreciated or even wanted by only 1 percent of riders.

Meanwhile, developments that would make riding safer and more fun for all of us are slow to reach the market because they won’t make racers faster, or aren’t race-legal at all. Only a minority of models even offer ABS as an option, and only Ducati has offered us true traction control. If you could combine 2WD with state-of-the-art ABS and TC, you’d give real riders on real roads real confidence.

Don’t get me wrong: I love racing and race bikes. I love going to racetracks and riding as fast as I want. I love that I can just go buy a crossplane-crank R1. It’s amazing that such things are sold to anybody (with $12,500, which—now that I think about it—makes it as financially accessible to me as a Lear Jet, but anyway…). And if the crossplane crank’s good for half a second per lap, that’ll sell it to a handful of very experienced riders and many more wannabees.

Is our focus in the right place? As an industry, we need to attract new riders. The way to do that is with some great new rider-friendly features that make today’s powerful bikes easier and safer to use. Is 2WD one of those things? Watch this space for details; I just might convince you.