WSBK most powerful bike racing format?

[EvilSteve]

http://www.speedtv.com/articles/worldsuperbike/moto/35637/

Interesting. The article suggests that with the drop in displacement from 990 to 800 in MGP, the GP bike must be producing in the 200 to 210 range and SBK bikes are putting out ~220. They're still 2sec/lap slower though.

[IrocRob]

MotoGP should have left the bikes at 990, the 800's are already faster
through the corners, so that means everyone wasted alot of money
building new bikes "in the interest of safety."
Rossi dropped a lap record at Jerez by 2 full seconds this week on his new, smaller 800.
Yeah, that's safer.

Even though I've already seen the highlights, I'm really
looking forward to seeing the WSBK races tomorrow.

[EvilSteve]

Same thing happened in F1 too, they made a bunch of changes to make it "safer" and ended up making it less safe. Grooved tires? Meant to slow them down by giving them less grip? How is that safer? I get the concept; that they'll slow down but when does racing ever slow down? If they want GP bikes to go slower, they need to design slower tracks. If they want GP to be safer, they need better safety equipment and safer tracks. IMO the best thing they've done in the recent past that's made GP racing safer is to allow all the electronics into the bikes.

I really looking forward to this season too.

[High_Revs_17]

WSBK bikes need every pony they can muster to push all the extra weight that the one-off MotoGP bikes don't have to, there's still no comparison.

I'm happy for the change to 800, the bike's are much more manageable with their power delivery meaning the competition will be open to others to possibly take podium finishes, I'm just not so happy for Team Czysz, back to the drawing board for them. :(

[EvilSteve]

I believe the 990 -> 800 change has been on the cards for several years, I think Czysz just underestimated the amount of time it would take to get a real GP project off the ground. He can still race in WSBK once he sells enough bikes. :)

[High_Revs_17]

He can still race in WSBK once he sells enough bikes. :)

I'll take that! :drink:

[Retom7]

eh, 990, 800... either way the races are going to be exciting. I know 2 seconds is a lot of time difference, but when you spread it through the length of the whole track, is it any safer or any more dangerous now than before? A couple mph isn't going to make a whole lot of difference in a wreck... the only thing now is that maybe the bikes will be more competitive at the 800 since everyone kind of had to start all over again for it, and you'll get tighter groups and greater chances of accidents.

Anyone know about straight away speed differences though?

[EvilSteve]

Actually, I think that having everyone make new engines still favors the teams with the most money. They have the resources to make something good right off the bat. Look at the *only* privateer team in the field - Illmor - not going so well.

[RCM78]

Same thing happened in F1 too, they made a bunch of changes to make it "safer" and ended up making it less safe. Grooved tires? Meant to slow them down by giving them less grip? How is that safer? I get the concept; that they'll slow down but when does racing ever slow down? If they want GP bikes to go slower, they need to design slower tracks. If they want GP to be safer, they need better safety equipment and safer tracks. IMO the best thing they've done in the recent past that's made GP racing safer is to allow all the electronics into the bikes.

I really looking forward to this season too.


Grooved tires werent required to slow down the cars. The old slicks had so much grip that when they did let go the cars would fly up off the ground and flip in the air. The grooved tires let the car slide more controlably and also let the body of the car maintain it's downforce.

The grooved tires also lessen the g's felt by the drivers during hard cornering. The old slicks were making some drivers disoriented do to excessive g's in the corners...

[EvilSteve]

I don't recall that being the reasoning but I could be wrong. Having said that, that the slicks were making drivers disoriented in corners means it was time for those drivers to quit. Not everyone should be able to drive an F1 car or a GP bike for that matter. IMO it should take an extraordinary person to do it at all, let alone well. How do grooved tires help a car maintain downforce?

[CBRBob]

The article suggests that with the drop in displacement from 990 to 800 in MGP, the GP bike must be producing in the 200 to 210 range and SBK bikes are putting out ~220. They're still 2sec/lap slower though.

In the old AMA FX class, it was basically...if you can build it, you can run it. So we had air cooled gsxr1400s, cbr1150s etc. None of them, even with the same riders that were on superbikes, could beat their superbike lap times.

[High_Revs_17]

Anyone know about straight away speed differences though?

I'm not exaclty sure, but 215mph is about right for the 990's, of course the 500's were under that, the 800's will most likely be under that as well. But the engineers have figured that they can still get nearly the same power as the 990's by simply increasing the RPM's. With endless amounts of technology pouring into these machines who knows, they might get lighter and faster for each new season, then we'll be down to 600's when it's all over. :lol:

[Cakes206]

MotoGP should have left the bikes at 990, the 800's are already faster
through the corners, so that means everyone wasted alot of money
building new bikes "in the interest of safety."
Rossi dropped a lap record at Jerez by 2 full seconds this week on his new, smaller 800.
Yeah, that's safer.

I haven't been following to closely but I think it might be safer. The power transfer is probably not as violent, saving a few high sides here and there. The ol rule of thumb "go slow to go fast" comes to mind. With the smaller cc, seems like they're able to lay the power down nice and make up time everywhere. By being able to be faster in the corners w/o spinning up the rear will allow for a killer drive for the straits.

[CBRBob]

Thats what traction control is for, as mat mladin, he has been cheating for years. Now they made it legal so everyone else can catch up, hence spies won and some closer racing towards the end of the year.

[Cakes206]

They're allowing traction control in MotoGP now? Interesting, so no more spinning up the rear?

[Ant]

They're allowing traction control in MotoGP now? Interesting, so no more spinning up the rear?

They have for awhile now. Also smaller displacement means meaner bikes since the engineers will try to make as much power with less displacement. Take for instance a 140hp 600 or 140hp 1000. The 600 will have a MUCH more violent power delivery. Generally speaking.

If they really wanted to slow the bikes down I would ban carbon brakes and decrease the amount of fuel they can carry. And you could add a little weight.

[Cakes206]

They have for awhile now.
So then how the hell are they spinning up the rear exiting? There also shouldn't be that many high sides(or low sides where the rear steps out) then, no?

[EvilSteve]

Traction control is configurable just like any setting. They have it dialed in to allow a little slip.

[Cakes206]

Traction control is configurable just like any setting. They have it dialed in to allow a little slip.
They're layin down some serious rubber all throughout the turns though. So for argument sake if their actual traveling speed in a turn is 80mph, and they're laying down a stripe, the tire isn't going to be spinning at lets say 83mph, has to be spinning a lot faster than that, no? With traction control, they should never lose the rear...ever.

This is a great discussion btw.

[EvilSteve]

I'm not arguing that traction control is meant to prevent this very thing, all I'm saying (without having any idea at what speed that much rubber is laid down) is that the traction control can be set to allow any amount of spin.

[CBRBob]

Joe, traction control does not mean zero slip. If it did the bike would never leave the grid. It's like having anti lock brakes, they HAVE to lock for them to work.

[SPL170db]

They're allowing traction control in MotoGP now? Interesting, so no more spinning up the rear?


They've had it quite some time now, what's happening in 2007 is that they are allowing T.C. in AMA Superbike (and I think in FX as well, but I could be mistaken).


In regards to the initial post, I've not seen any actual hard numbers on the kind of HP numbers the new 800cc MotoGP bike are capable of. I know the RC211v and the Desmo were putting out in the neighborhood of 250hp.

If you consider that a drop from 990 to 800 is just a little less than a 20% decrease in engine size, does that mean a 20% drop in HP as well (which would put then just above 200hp). Not necessarily I think. As fuel capacity restrictions were imposed in the 990's waining years they had to detune slightly so they wouldn't run out of fuel in a race. Of course the 800's also have a higher rev ceiling than the 990's......many other factors to include into the equation as well.

I think when all is said and done and the 800's are sorted out, they will still be making more HP than their production-based counterparts in WSBK.

[EvilSteve]

There are tighter fuel restrictions for the 800s now too, there was an article mentioning it on crash.net. I'll see if I can find it if anyone's interested?