McGuinness at the TT

Snotzo said:

Peter Hickman went through the Sulby speed trap at 156 mph, a very creditable top speed, but he finished 49 seconds adrift of the winner's time. Hickman is a top rider around the IOM circuit, so it's hardly likely he was directly responsible for the deficit, so where is the Norton Superlight still short on performance ?
McGuiness and Todd failed to finish, seems like Norton still have work to do.

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Agreed but I think it's quite creditable as it's only its second showing on a brand new untried machine with their own engine and frame. Not even the Patons run their own engine. Besides it looks and sounds mint.

That’s all true Cab, but is an ‘excuse’ like that enough to ensure the top boys ride Norton’s next year?

Those boys don’t turn up to come 8th... they turn up to win!

They have no brand loyalty (can’t afford to have), they’ll ride whatever they think gives them the best chance of winning...

Depressing isn't it, the saying "the BS stops when the flag drops" springs to mind and when a company that runs on BS puts its bikes on the world stage with the best riders available on them and fails, it must be very damaging.

Hickman won the supersport race earlier in the week so proving he can ride the smaller bikes, and yet he would probably have gone faster on a road bike than on the Norton. It smacks of a lack of development and is the IOM the place to be developing a race bike with the worlds best riders?

It looks like the big bike still has problems, on Thursday McGuinness did 2 practice laps, one in the morning at 105mph and one in the evening at 109mph, why? McPint went round at over 120mph on the Durocell bike so when things are right he still has it.

We know the Spondon Aprilia is good because of what Josh Brooks was able to do with it but it looks like the bike needs a service, has it not been refreshed because they expected to be using their own engine?

And that raises another question, if the V4 is a 1200cc engine and the Superlight is half a V4, why is the superlight a 650cc engine? is the V4 really a 1300?

Mind you, as Dommie Nator says, it does look and sound good.

Personally I find it hard to believe that Norton genuinely expected to be running the 1200 motor.

The rules are clear, it’s a 1000cc class. We’re not talking about a motor that’s 1 or 2 cc over, we’re talking about a motor that’s 20% bigger!

Skinner et al were quoted in various interviews explaining why they can’t use their motor in the IOM because to turn a 1200 into a 1000 and still have it run at an optimal level is, to quote Norton “practically another new engine”.

So... they’ve known for a long time that A) they can’t run the 1200 in a 1000 class and B) running in a 1000 class means sticking with the Aprilia motor (for the time being at least).

It's worth bearing in mind that the Norton Superlight engine is two cylinders from their V4, which if we are to believe the BS has been designed without compromise, and developed to a high degree of excellence.
By contrast, the Kawasaki ER-6 engines are mass produced units with no pretensions to racing excellence, and only perform as they do because of the efforts of individuals to get them to run a bit better than stock.

Craig said:

Really too bad the weather is being such a negative this year .... can always hope for blue sky !!!

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I wonder why the TT this year is suffering from all this bad weather and I think I have found the answer, it’s the Manx Fairy’s which are upset because a Fairy House at Bradda Glen had to be removed after being vandalised

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-isle-of-man-48463349

You don’t upset the Manx Fairy’s!!!!!

My Son is married into an IOM family will check and see what the oldest soothsayer sees .....

For its first outing at the TT I dont think 8th place in the Lightweight is a bad result. I wonder what the other 2 mechanical failures were? I heard one was a suspension issue but dont know what happened McPints machine?

Fast Eddie said:

Personally I find it hard to believe that Norton genuinely expected to be running the 1200 motor.

The rules are clear, it’s a 1000cc class. We’re not talking about a motor that’s 1 or 2 cc over, we’re talking about a motor that’s 20% bigger!

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Which does beg the question, why build a 1200 in the first place? If the maxim, win on Sunday sell bikes on Monday what good is a 1200?.

McGuinness out of the Senior at the bungalow. He deserves better.

speirmoor said:

For its first outing at the TT I dont think 8th place in the Lightweight is a bad result. I wonder what the other 2 mechanical failures were? I heard one was a suspension issue but dont know what happened McPints machine?

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I think the brake downs could be written off as new bike development but didn't McGuinness say the bike was too slow at the North West? if so, not its first outing.

But take the mechanicals out of the equation, and 8th, 50 seconds behind the winner with the fastest rider at the TT on it doesn't seem like a good result to me.

Oh well next year!!!

storm42 said:

8th, 50 seconds behind the winner with the fastest rider at the TT on it doesn't seem like a good result to me.

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I'm sure hes more upset with BMW than Norton

Fast Eddie said:

Personally I find it hard to believe that Norton genuinely expected to be running the 1200 motor.

The rules are clear, it’s a 1000cc class. We’re not talking about a motor that’s 1 or 2 cc over, we’re talking about a motor that’s 20% bigger!

Skinner et al were quoted in various interviews explaining why they can’t use their motor in the IOM because to turn a 1200 into a 1000 and still have it run at an optimal level is, to quote Norton “practically another new engine”.

So... they’ve known for a long time that A) they can’t run the 1200 in a 1000 class and B) running in a 1000 class means sticking with the Aprilia motor (for the time being at least).

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Ducati has a new V-4. The street version is 1200cc. The race version is sub-1000cc (998, I think). So there is precedent.

https://www.cycleworld.com/2019-ducati-panigale-v4-r-riding-impression

I would imagine that is Norton’s (eventual) plan Dave. But as they said, building a motor that much smaller AND still expecting it to perform at that level means a revisit to the drawing board.

Things like bore and stroke, valve and port sizes, throttle body sizes, cam lift and profiles, exhaust pipes, ECU and injectors, ALL have to be at least refined, possibly redesigned.

It all takes time, resources and money!

swooshdave said:

Ducati has a new V-4. The street version is 1200cc. The race version is sub-1000cc (998, I think). So there is precedent.

https://www.cycleworld.com/2019-ducati-panigale-v4-r-riding-impression

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There is a precedent, but why?

For a cash strapped company to design and build a bike that is obviously a race bike first and a road bike second, and as such, needs to perform on track to justify its existence, why build one that isn't allowed to race?

I would like to know, who dresses the person of a morning that looked at the regs for racing and decided to design a bike that wasn't eligible, isn't a 1000cc bike fast enough for the road? madness!

It is like the ground up building of a race bike that cannot compete with a shed tuned commuter bike.

Aprilia do a V4 1200 road and a 1000 version for racing and have planned this from the start. Looks like SG was trying to get the NW200 and the IOM to give him the ok based on the publicity of Norton and the extra spectators, but they preferred to stay within the rules they had signed up to. Falling back to the Aprilia 1000 was always an option and should have been first option if money was tight. Goodwill only lasts so long.

I think that loose engine bolt tells us a lot about what must have been going on behind the scenes.

Pandemonium, last minute dashing around and a general mad scramble to get the bikes to the start line on time is my guess!

Hopefully, some time to calmly go through proper problem solving and fine tuning will yield MUCH more from these machines...