Bike news

A Triumph to make Italy tremble – but not Japan

18 February 2001

TRIUMPH publicly unveiled to the world this morning the long-awaited successor to its 955i triple – and immediately told riders looking for something to humble a GSX-R1000 to look elsewhere. The...

Can we take the politicians seriously this time?

18 February 2001

REMEMBER the promises the Labour Party made before it was elected? All that stuff along the ” Bike to Basics ” line. Well, unfortunately, the party itself doesn’t. After a landslide victory,...

ZX-9R to power new musclebike

18 February 2001

KAWASAKI is planning to launch a naked musclebike using a retuned version of the ZX-9R’s 144bhp engine. The 899cc four-cylinder engine could be tweaked to make more torque than the ZX-9R’s formidable...

Triumph’s Daytona gets 147bhp

18 February 2001 by MCN News

A BRITISH-built superbike with the potential to take on the best Japanese and Italian machines is enough to get any rider’s mouth watering. And Triumph reckons its new 955i Daytona is exactly...

More Gatso cameras looming

18 February 2001

EVERY police force in the country could soon be allowed to use money from speeding fines to pay for thousands more speed cameras. Following similar pilot schemes involving eight police forces around the country, the Association of Chief Police Officers has announced plans to spread the scheme nation-wide. Richard Brunstrom, chief constable of North Wales and ACPO co-ordinator of the scheme, said: ...

There can be only one

18 February 2001

AUSTRALIAN firm Hunwick Harrop has released full details of the Phantom 1500 cruiser. The bike, which is to go on sale over the Internet towards the end of the year, is the first in a range due for...

Have your cake. And eat it

11 February 2001

THREE-and-a-half hours ago, this bike was sat in the palm-shaded car park of a Sicilian hotel. Its futuristic, angular lines and silver colourscheme couldn’t have been in starker contrast to the...

Gilera plans September unveiling for 600

11 February 2001

GILERA is expected to unveil a new 600cc sports bike at the Milan Show in September. Italian scooter giant Piaggio, Gilera’s parent company, has confirmed plans to reveal its first big bike since the...

Kawasaki’s big-bore response

04 February 2001

KAWASAKI is working on a tourer which is destined to rival Yamaha’s all-new FJR1300. A new bike, thought to be called the ZZ-R1200, will be 2002’s answer to Yamaha’s 145bhp tourer, which has...

Defy convention

04 February 2001

IT’S not every day you get the chance to ride two new British motorcycles for the first time. And when they’re bikes like this, it’s an even more novel experience. The latest models from...

Don’t call me boring

04 February 2001

THE sound of a race bike at full chat is pretty exciting when you’re stood behind one as it flies past in a race. It’s even better if you manage to wangle your way into the paddock and get behind one...

A standard R1 just wasn't enough

28 January 2001

MODIFIED R1s can be found at every pub meet in the country, but few are as desirable as QB Carbon’s Yamaha. More than £12,000 has been lavished on the bike to turn it into the ultimate R1 – and it’s...

Learn to wheelie in a day… or your money back

28 January 2001

OVERRIDING your natural survival instincts is one of the toughest things a human can ever do. As a species, we’ve spent thousands of years relying on our innate self-preservation instincts to get us...

Powervalves: the open and shut case

28 January 2001

IT’S more than a decade since the term EXUP (Exhaust Ultimate Powervalve) entered the bikers’ vocabulary. Back then, most riders knew it was something to do with the exhaust and that it helped...

And you thought you’d never want to buy an MZ

21 January 2001

By Steve Farrell DESPITE its best efforts, MZ is still best known to most people as a manufacturer of stinking, low-tech commuter bikes. But now it has its sights set firmly on superbike riders – and...

Special GSX-R1000 set to steal Ally Pally show

21 January 2001

SUZUKI’S GSX-R1000 is hardly lacking when it comes to performance, but that hasn’t stopped tuning firm Harris working its magic on one of the first bikes in the country. This GSX-R, which will be...

A year’s mileage…in a week

21 January 2001

HINDSIGHT is a marvellous thing. How many times have you bought a bike – or any product for that matter – only to find a glaring fault become noticeable after a few months? Wouldn’t it be great if you...

01 January 2001

Brands Babes

Move over Colin, it’s my turn now

24 November 2000

THE rider in front disappears from view. I lean the bike into the chicane before the start-finish straight, feeling the racing wets digging in. The bike boots it out of the first-gear corner, lifting...

This man could steal your bike in 20 seconds

17 November 2000

DAVE is a thief, and he can nick your bike in less than 20 seconds. He’ll steal it to order and then flog it to someone who can either change its identity and re-sell it, or dismantle it and sell the...

Spot the family resemblance

10 November 2000

PRETEND for a moment you’re a race bike – no, don’t run away, I haven’t gone mad. I just want to try and explain to you how tough a season’s racing is. The chances are you own or have ridden a bike in...

Semi-automatic for the people

03 November 2000

THEY’RE used in World Superbikes and Formula One racing cars, and your road bike could have one in a few years. What are they? Semi-automatic gearboxes, that’s what. We know that Ducati will be using...

Tuck in, hold on and go flat-out

03 November 2000

YOU’RE stood at the side of the track. It’s quiet other than the rustle of the wind in the grass. The people around you have all fallen silent in anticipation. Away to your right you hear the...

A bike is only as fast as its rider

01 November 2000

THERE’S an orange bike, a red bike, a purple bike, a green bike and, of course, a blue and white bike. They’re all parked up on paddock stands with mechanics milling around them, fitting tyre warmers...

Time for a change of scenery

13 October 2000

MOST of us go touring in summer. But if there’s one time when you should really try something different on your bike, it’s autumn. This is the time of year when heavy-duty gloves come out of the...

Give us a go, Mr Walker

01 October 2000

I’VE ridden plenty of Suzuki GSX-R750s in my time. But the number two on the front of this one marks it out as being Very Special Indeed. And I’ve never been so scared in my entire life. You see, the...

All that glitters... is almost gold

15 September 2000

FEW people in the world will ever get to look at, let alone hear, ride or even own an MV Agusta Series Oro. Only 50 of the magnesium-laced ” gold ” series bikes have ever been built. All of them are...

Britain’s answer to the R1

15 September 2000

THERE have been some great British motorcycles over the years. Triumph’s Bonneville, Norton’s Commando, BSA’s Dandy (well, maybe not). But, even in light of the very latest machines like Triumph’s...

A little bit of what you fancy

08 September 2000

IT was all a bit ironic. Here I was in the middle of Germany, howling along on an exotic FireBlade-engined bike I had travelled halfway across Europe to ride. But along with its Japanese-made engine,...

Beyond reason

08 September 2000

I’M sitting in a jammed-up one-way system, snicking the gearbox into neutral. The idling engine’s heat is starting to make its way through my jeans. Traffic jams are an annoyance on most bikes,...

Tale of the unexpected

01 September 2000

TRACKDAY bikes – R1s, Blades, GSX-Rs, 916s, BMWs. Er, excuse me? Let’s try that one again. Track day bikes – R1s, Blades, GSX-Rs, 916s… BMWs? Surely Munich’s big Boxers are designed to clock up the...

The sum is greater than its parts

01 September 2000

IT was just like gazing at the stars. The more I looked, the more I saw. Except this wasn’t the sky. This was a very special Honda SP-1. And instead of seeing planets, I was gawping at a machine which...

Casting light on the secrets of the black box

01 September 2000

YOU know what the problem with that is… that’s your cerebral oscillator confounding your collectivisor, that is… Modern bikes can be such conundrums of electronic complexity that you won’t be alone if your eyes start glazing over when your mechanic begins explaining why yours won’t start. It’s easy to give up, hand over the key and wander off in the hope that there’s a taxi rank nearby, without...

You can’t have too much of a good thing

25 August 2000

FOR some people, enough is never enough. Mountaineers always want to climb higher mountains, athletes always want a quicker time and those strange people who try to set world records by eating...

Why exhausts are left to the experts

25 August 2000

FITTING an aftermarket silencer or complete exhaust system is the most common modification we make to our bikes. We do it to add a bit more power and personality, and to shed a bit of weight. But, as...

What have you done wrong today?

18 August 2000

MISTAKE: ASSUMING DRIVERS CAN’T/WON’T ATTEMPT THE SAME OVERTAKE AS YOU HOW many times have you gone to overtake a slow-moving vehicle only to have a car pull out from the queue behind it to attempt...