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MotoGP for the 2027 season will feature 850cc engines, down from the current 1000cc. Aerodynamic aids will be dialed back, and ride-height mechanisms will not be not allowed. There are more rules going into effect than this, so take a ride with us to hear what we might expect in 2027.
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MotoGP for the 2027 season will feature 850cc engines, down from the current 1000cc. Aerodynamic aids will be dialed back, and ride-height mechanisms will not be not allowed. There are more rules going into effect than this, so take a ride with us to hear what we might expect in 2027.
Find us on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/cw/CycleWorldPodcast
Become a Channel Partner: https://octanemedia.co/home/become-an-advertiser/
Listen on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6CLI74xvMBFLDOC1tQaCOQ
Read more from Cycle World: https://www.cycleworld.com/
Buy Cycle World Merch: https://teespring.com/stores/cycleworld
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SportsTranscript
00:00:00Hey, it's the Cycle World Podcast. I'm Mark Hoyer, Editor-in-Chief. I'm with Kevin Cameron,
00:00:03our Technical Editor. Our topic today is MotoGP 2027 is coming fast. We are going down in
00:00:11displacement and we are deleting lots of the fancy aero and some ride height business.
00:00:17We'll get into all those details, but it's an exciting time and a big transition for the class.
00:00:25We've done it before. We've gone, well, what have we done before? We've gone down in displacement
00:00:29before and perhaps the outcome wasn't exactly what we expected, but we'll talk about those
00:00:35details as well. Thanks for joining us here on YouTube. If you're on YouTube or on Spotify,
00:00:42et cetera, you can also find us on Patreon. So for a small payment, you can get all this stuff
00:00:49commercial free. So check out the link in the description and, you know, et cetera. Also like,
00:00:55comment and subscribe, hit the bell, et cetera. Okay, Kevin, MotoGP, lots of images and videos
00:01:02have emerged from Ducati's pre-27 test of their new bike. Yes, but we don't know what they are.
00:01:09So it's a little difficult. Look at the thing. There's one of a fairing in black that is no paint,
00:01:18just plain carbon fiber. And it looks just like the GP26. And the closer you look, by golly,
00:01:26it is a GP26. And you look and you say, oh, that's really a big downwash duct. And it turns
00:01:37out
00:01:37it's a GP26 downwash duct. And so is the gently curving faring sides. So are the gently curving
00:01:48faring sides. There are two of them, which when close to the pavement form a venturi. And a venturi
00:01:59is a very efficient way of creating downforce because the air is quickly accelerated at the
00:02:07leading edge of the restriction, just as it was back when the AMA imposed restrictors
00:02:14on the TC750s at Daytona. With the restrictors in place, Kenny Roberts was able to lap the field.
00:02:21And thus, we would say, that is anecdotal proof that a venturi doesn't lose a lot of energy.
00:02:34Well, those features are present on GP26. So we just say, that's what we're looking at.
00:02:44Nobody would be so foolish as to come out in public and say, here's our new bike. Well,
00:02:49you guys still have time to copy it. If there's any good reason to do that,
00:02:56the story isn't going that well for Ducati. But we're getting close. We're getting to a time when
00:03:04all will be revealed. Now, the present motorcycle has a thousand CC engine. So it's something of a
00:03:12locomotive. It's a minimum weight, 157 kilograms, 346 pounds, something like that. 157. Yeah. And
00:03:23that will decrease to 153, which is eight pounds or so lighter. And I'm thinking to myself, the reason
00:03:34they gave them a break was so they wouldn't have to carry Joe Whiter weight plates on the bike to
00:03:43make
00:03:43up for the fact that it doesn't have variable ride height anymore. Because what is still continuing at
00:03:51the present moment is that at the start of the race, the motorcycles are down. So the bottom of the
00:03:57belly pan is nearly touching the pavement, they are low, like a dragster. And at the start, that low
00:04:08position allows them to accelerate towards turn one very vigorously so that then they have to use extra
00:04:16brake to get stopped for it. This then continues throughout the race. If you're braking,
00:04:28and the rear end comes up, that's maximum braking. But by analogy with the dragster case, if you lower
00:04:38the bike, you can brake harder. Not immediately. You have to wait for the tire to warm up some,
00:04:44because it cools off down the straightaway. But these ride height devices are required by rule to be
00:04:53rider actuated. Meaning, I think it now can be a canned cycle. It's automatic, but you have to choose
00:05:01it or not choose it, depending upon the corner. So if you're entering a series of twisties, you're not
00:05:08going to hope that the bike is going to gain some advantage by rising and falling. You're going to leave
00:05:14it high cornering mode throughout. And then you will decide at the next corner that has a decent
00:05:23straightaway extending away from it, whether you need the advantage of the low ride height for
00:05:29acceleration. Now, the reason that's been given for no longer permitting the use of these devices is
00:05:39because everybody has them now. So it's kind of like everyone has titanium fasteners. So where's
00:05:46the advantage? Let's go back to steel. It's lots cheaper. And that makes sense because racing is
00:05:52expensive. Check those hotel prices in Austin. So the thing is that they're going to, with less
00:06:05horsepower, they have less energy with which to push air across a lot of downforce aero. So a bunch of
00:06:16stuff will be missing. They've fiddled around at the front of the fairing. The fairing will be narrower.
00:06:23There'll be more room in front of the fairing for what have you. And this is just details. But
00:06:36I was thinking about the present motorcycle and they claim 300 horsepower for a good strong one.
00:06:42And when you run the numbers, it comes up with a stroke average combustion pressure
00:06:53that is unrealistic. But then I thought, well, yes, but at 225 miles an hour,
00:07:02there is a ram effect that raises the pressure of the air entering the air box.
00:07:07And you'll notice that those intakes are at stagnation. They aren't off center and you used to see them all
00:07:17over the place. Formula One cars, you know, often have had them above the driver's head
00:07:26and slightly back. So I always wanted to draw a swan face on those, those big necks sticking up.
00:07:37So the ram effect was a huge problem for the Italians in running their twin V12 air racer
00:07:49in the late 30s, late 20s and early 30s, because when they got to high speed, their engine began to
00:07:59backfire as if it were lean. It was lean because the ram effect was packing in more air, but nothing
00:08:07was packing in more fuel. This equals a lean condition and powerful explosions blowing the
00:08:13whole induction system off of an engine is not unheard of. What's that bang I hear? So in their case,
00:08:24Rolls-Royce had taken this into account and they were gaining something like 17% extra horsepower.
00:08:33Well, at 220 miles an hour on one of these MotoGP locomotives, you have a theoretical gain of 5.8
00:08:42%
00:08:43available to you. In order to get as much of that as is possible, they do a lot of streamlining
00:08:51to get
00:08:51the air from the inlet at the front around the steering head, no junk sticking out, no tubes in the
00:08:59way
00:09:00to enter the air box. And because it is a resonant air box, which came in around 1990,
00:09:10which is like blowing across the top of a beer bottle, you get a tone. And the air in the
00:09:19intake
00:09:20acts as the mass, the compressibility of the air in the air box is the spring. And the trick is
00:09:27to get
00:09:28the engine to take air from the air box when its pressure is high and not when it's low during
00:09:34refilling. But that thing is sitting down there humming. So then we add ram pressure to that and
00:09:42300 horsepower is definitely a possibility because they're going to pick up
00:09:4812 or 13 horsepower depending on how efficient their diffuser is, the slowing down of the air
00:09:58air entering the air box. So that makes sense. The rumor mill tells us the new bikes, which are 850
00:10:06cc's,
00:10:08will have 35 fewer horsepower. And that probably means that we'll get 250 or 260 out of it
00:10:23without the air box boost. Now, we all know, most of us know, that at the end of 2006,
00:10:34the FIM switched the maximum displacement from 990, which it had been from the beginning of the series
00:10:41in 2002, to 800 cc's. Why did they do it? Well, many riders were saying,
00:10:51our bikes have outgrown the gravel traps. We're going to slide across the gravel with little
00:10:59stones flying in all directions. And then we're going to go, bam, into the barrier. And
00:11:07Valentino Rossi added his voice. He said,
00:11:12tires are improving very rapidly now, back when he was saying this 20 years ago.
00:11:19And it was true. So corner speeds are up. This is a real problem because that's where the crashes occur.
00:11:27And if you lose it in a corner at a higher corner speed, that's double the trouble and
00:11:36an increased risk of thumping the barrier, which nobody wants to do. So the idea was we'll just
00:11:44take away a bunch of displacement, nearly 20 percent in this case, and they'll be slower.
00:11:49So at the end of the 2006 season, the last race, Valencia in Spain, we've all heard of Valencia oranges,
00:12:00Arantia. They had a 800 cc prototype test on the Tuesday after the race. The bikes went out on the
00:12:12track,
00:12:13they warmed up their tires. They were, some of them were as fast as or faster than the 990s already.
00:12:26How were they doing that? Well, Yamaha wanted to know. So I walked down to the end of the
00:12:35straightaway where they had an acoustic analysis business set up. They had machines on the
00:12:45pit wall and they were recording the sound of the Yamaha in top gear as it approached turn one.
00:12:54And of course, nobody discloses their RPM anymore. It used to be that Dorna would put it in a corner
00:13:06of
00:13:07the display so that you could see the tachometer. And there was some muttering and grumbling about
00:13:16that. And so, okay, we'll take that down. So we don't know now. But if the Ducatis were turning 20
00:13:22,000 RPM,
00:13:27in comparison with the 16.4 or something of Hayden's Honda, more than makes up for the decrease in
00:13:39displacement. So they had made a mistake. And they called it, they called the result
00:13:51an RPM race, which means everyone is trying to turn 20,000 or 21,000 or 21,500. And that
00:14:02means a lot of
00:14:03testing where parts break cubic dollars. Yes. You're calling your suppliers and saying,
00:14:09we need another conference. Where can we meet? We'll bring you a basket of fragments. And
00:14:18it's exciting to engineers. But the spectator tachometer information, it has minor interest,
00:14:28what they want to see is racing. So the 800 CC series, the first year was won by Casey Stoner
00:14:37on a Ducati.
00:14:40And he won 10 races. And it was, you know, not much of a contest. So this time, people are
00:14:49saying,
00:14:49well, why would they, why would they make the same mistake twice? 850 CCs? That's not that.
00:14:57Where's the RPM race? Well, what they did this time was they said, we're going to reduce the bore,
00:15:03but we're going to keep the stroke very close to the same. So before, for the 1000 CC bikes that
00:15:12we've
00:15:12raced since 2012, it was 81 millimeter bore by 48.5 millimeter stroke. Now that's not an extreme
00:15:22ratio of bore to stroke. Back in the Formula One's V10 days, in what, 2004 or five or thereabouts,
00:15:31they were running great big three liter engines to 20,000 RPM with a bore of 98 millimeters and a
00:15:42stroke
00:15:43of 39.75 for a bore stroke ratio of 2.4 something. So this crankshaft, five crank pins long,
00:15:55two rods on each crank pin for V10. And the stroke was this 40 millimeters. It's small. And with this
00:16:06great big piston, how would you light up a cylinder like that? Crackle, crackle, said the flame. Lots of
00:16:15way to go yet. Crackle, crackle. That was a problem because those engines had to be ignited like 60
00:16:23something degrees before top center. Dorna didn't want that. That's why they limited the thousands
00:16:32to 81 by 48.5, which is not an extreme ratio. It's highly sporting. But now they've reduced the bore
00:16:43only. They've told the constructors, you cannot use a bigger bore than this. So it will be 75
00:16:53by 48. Same basic stroke as before, half a millimeter difference. What that means is piston acceleration,
00:17:03which is what produces cracks around the wrist pin bosses. If you're not really clever about
00:17:10making beautiful organic shapes and buying your pistons from the people whose aluminum is
00:17:18excellent.
00:17:23That's expensive. So let's keep the same stroke. And we are not going to impose rev limiters. Why?
00:17:33Because there's a big tradition of Honda tearing their hair and rending their garments over rev limiters.
00:17:42We will withdraw from the series. Forget Honda if you ever do this. I don't know if that still
00:17:49puts a scare into the people in the blue blazers. Maybe not. But at any rate, they didn't say rev
00:17:58limiters.
00:18:00So we have 75 by 48. In a 75 millimeter bore, the valves are smaller than in an 81 millimeter
00:18:10bore. So
00:18:12that's another thing that limits performance. But the deal with that is you've got this duct leading
00:18:22up to the valve. And typically the duct is like 0.81 to 0.85 times the valve head diameter.
00:18:29And when the air moving down the duct and shouldering its way past the valve guide
00:18:36and cruising out into the cylinder over the 45 degree seating area,
00:18:44when you get up towards half the speed of sound, there's a lot of
00:18:52resistance to going any faster. There are areas in which there are mock effects. That is,
00:19:00the speed of sound might be approached very closely in certain places. Imagine a P-47
00:19:07Thunderbolt of World War II in a vertical dive, cruising along at 500 miles an hour or so. You
00:19:19get up to the speed of a fuselage. Air is going to get close to the speed of sound
00:19:23somewhere. So this is part of what causes choking of the flow. If you just, you, you, when there's
00:19:32choking beginning, you could suck on the intake side. You could have a piston a mile in diameter
00:19:39moving at a high speed and it wouldn't push any more air, pardon me, suck in quotes, because it's the
00:19:46atmosphere that's pushing. No more air would go through the choked intake port. That is why,
00:19:54when you look at a, at the output of the super flow or any other dyno, you will see that
00:20:02the torque
00:20:03goes along and then it starts to drop. And if you look at the corresponding horsepower curve,
00:20:10it goes up on a nice slope and then it softens and it turns southward. And what this is, is
00:20:20the torque is
00:20:22trailing off because the intake port is getting choked. So at that point you would normally
00:20:32make the valves bigger. Or you might
00:20:37wisely be satisfied with what you have.
00:20:41I don't know. Who's ever done that? I don't think of anyone.
00:20:45Who's ever done that? Yes.
00:20:46Yeah.
00:20:48So, uh, another thing that they talk about, of course, is that there's a limiting piston speed.
00:20:56And this was always written about or spoken of in a sort of, um, this is something that is ruled
00:21:06by the elves and the elves don't give details. And in 1907, 4,000 piston feet per minute was reached
00:21:18by Cisier Nodin, single cylinder race car engine with a 250 millimeter stroke.
00:21:284,000 feet per minute was talked about as the limiting piston speed for years and years,
00:21:33right through the sixties. Then it became 4,500. This is not what limits RPM.
00:21:41What truly limits RPM is piston acceleration. Uh, if you look at, uh, one of those velocity versus
00:21:52crank angle charts, uh, you'll see that maximum
00:21:59piston acceleration is reached in the final instance, approaching top dead center
00:22:06center and not at bottom center. There's high acceleration at bottom dead center, but not
00:22:11as high as a top center. And that's because the connecting route is not infinitely long.
00:22:19So the old banks Norton, um, when it's piston was being dragged to a stop by that mighty connecting
00:22:28route of steel, peak acceleration was like 4,000 times the acceleration of gravity, 4,000 Gs.
00:22:40When, when Yamaha produced their, uh, 600, that was really hotsy-totsy 7,000 Gs.
00:22:51And when, um, Moto GP, mind you, now they've got oil cooling of the piston.
00:22:58So that helps with aluminum fatigue strength because aluminum in Muzzy's words
00:23:06starts to go bad, um, pretty fast when it's hot.
00:23:12Because all those little atoms in the crystal lattice, which are normally vibrating,
00:23:19but not with enough energy to break loose very often. But when you make it hotter,
00:23:25they're vibrating with more energy that is closer to the threshold required for them to
00:23:33leave. So you've got all these little atoms packed in there that are holding themselves together
00:23:40and external strains, such as the rod dragging the fast moving piston to a stop in one inch.
00:23:48Uh, those bonds are stretched. And if you have the vibration of being hot added to that pop,
00:23:57you start to get defects in the metal. That is fatigue failure in progress. So
00:24:06this is what has held back engines from reaching tremendous RPM. Back when Honda were playing with
00:24:13their oval piston NR 500, uh, at the end of the 1970s, their goal was 23,000 RPM.
00:24:23And they wanted to make 150 horsepower. They only got to 19,000 because 23,000 was like 30%
00:24:32greater acceleration than formula one was using at the time. So it's great to have ambition,
00:24:39but sometimes you reach for it and it eludes you stretch goals, as I say, business stress goals. Yeah.
00:24:50You know, so, uh,
00:24:52one afternoon after 5 PM, I was at Laguna, um, and I was walking past the Suzuki pit. This is
00:25:00a story I've
00:25:00told before. So just say Velocet to yourself many times while I recite it.
00:25:06Yeah. But I noticed that the crew were having good time and they were, uh, lifting the flag and
00:25:14frequently, they were having a good old time. And I said, what could you tell me what the occasion
00:25:19is? And they said, sure. They, they just took our pistons off the 100. We went back on the 100
00:25:26K
00:25:27list, meaning that there's a statistical good chance that the pistons will go 62 miles.
00:25:37So they were right up against it.
00:25:41And many teams have experienced this. Every part in a racing engine has a predicted life
00:25:47and it comes, you know, you, you, if you've been to the races, you've seen that new engines come
00:25:52in a sealed caisson. Often it has little casters on it. So nobody has to throw his back out trying
00:25:59to lift
00:26:00it. But, uh, this is, this is a, uh, uh, well, back to the, back to the problem, uh, Suzuki
00:26:18had been
00:26:19improving the performance of their engine by stages. And in doing so, the piston temperature had risen.
00:26:26And so piston temperature, piston life had decreased.
00:26:32So that's why they were delighted. It meant that their riders had a good chance of finishing the
00:26:38race on Sunday.
00:26:39And it's extremely common to have the hour limitation. I mean, aircraft, you know, you.
00:26:44Oh, absolutely. Yes.
00:26:46Major overhauls, pistons, check the, check the turbine blades, you name it.
00:26:50Wing spars, you know, short hours, long hours depends, but all those statistics are.
00:26:55That's why there's a logbook.
00:26:57So the inspector can say, oh, you're due for this and that and the other.
00:27:02Please pay this amount.
00:27:05Landing gear bungees on a 1946 Taylor craft, 500 hours. That's it.
00:27:10And then also a, also a time limit if it's less than 500 hours. So sure.
00:27:16And they literally are, they're just great big bungee cords that go under the
00:27:21lever for the gear and they attach onto the airframe. They're just giant.
00:27:24So the FIM in this case, or Doran or whoever is running the show,
00:27:29technically speaking are relying on having on the same stroke as before imposing the
00:27:35same piston fatigue limit. So if they want to run over 18,000,
00:27:44they'll have to come up with something. They say,
00:27:49I looked for it in the rule, the rules. It's supposed to say somewhere aluminum alloys only,
00:27:55but I didn't find that part. And as you know,
00:27:58Formula One are evaluating steel pistons and steel cylinder heads.
00:28:05It's because steel has a fatigue limit and it is much stronger than aluminum and it is more
00:28:12tolerant of high temperature. The problem would be to make all the parts as thin as they need to be
00:28:19to have an acceptable weight.
00:28:23So the other, the other limiting factor is the breathing because the bore is,
00:28:28is a limited size and the valve so big and you can only accelerate the valves.
00:28:36So we talked about, we talked about bore stroke ratio and, and the NR 500 and what have you.
00:28:43One of the other changes that's coming in 2007 is
00:28:47is Pirelli will replace Michelin as the spec tire for the series.
00:28:54And Pirelli's have a
00:28:59reputation of being softer in the carcass,
00:29:04spreading out more to create a large footprint and generally being
00:29:12well, of giving good warning of imminent disaster.
00:29:17Now, uh, years ago, Michelin, this is back in the two stroke era.
00:29:22Michelin were making great strides toward ultimate grip of rubber compounds,
00:29:30but they had carcasses that were stiff enough that when a lot of stress was passing through the
00:29:38footprint, the edges of it didn't tend to buckle or roll up and by a series of little slips,
00:29:45remind the rider, hey buddy, you're getting there.
00:29:50Stay on this side of that fence, please.
00:29:52And then suddenly comes this, um, modest bombshell.
00:30:01Giorgio, um, um, oh, what is his name?
00:30:09Barbier.
00:30:11Giorgio Barbier says in public that we are going to
00:30:18toward greater stiffness and less flexibility.
00:30:23And the reasons that he gives are one, um,
00:30:28MotoGP bikes are more powerful than the world super bikes where Pirelli has a lot of experience.
00:30:35Uh, another thing is that the, uh,
00:30:41Pirelli's and this is something that, uh,
00:30:45Toprak Razgatlioglu has talked about the Pirelli's after about 10 laps kind of take a step.
00:30:51Oh, I, uh, I'm not really up to all that great stuff anymore.
00:30:59So just watch it.
00:31:02Um, so
00:31:05this means that Pirelli are looking to
00:31:10move toward, uh, some of the qualities
00:31:14of the Michelin when they begin to be the spec tire next year.
00:31:23And
00:31:28this will, this is a big unknown.
00:31:33Supposedly people have had some experience on the prototype Pirelli's and everyone's very optimistic.
00:31:41But what would they say? Oh, we're all downcast.
00:31:43The prototypes are lousy.
00:31:45We've had to start up in a new direction.
00:31:48They're not going to say that.
00:31:51So now is another concern, which
00:31:56may have occurred to you.
00:31:57And that is
00:31:58if the new MotoGP bikes with 35 fewer horsepower
00:32:07are a second or so slower, will,
00:32:10would they be beaten in a race by world super bikes, which remain at a thousand cc's?
00:32:15And how do you cope with that if you're Liberty Media owning both series?
00:32:20And how does world super bike go faster than MotoGP?
00:32:24Just can't happen.
00:32:25Well, I looked at the, uh,
00:32:29lap record
00:32:31for the seven racetracks where both series run.
00:32:37And
00:32:38I had Phillip Island, eight-tenths of a second in favor of MotoGP.
00:32:44Portimao, 1.6 seconds.
00:32:47Austin, one and three-quarter seconds, and so on.
00:32:50Um, finally, we get to Aragon.
00:32:55Point one four zero second.
00:32:58So that one's really close.
00:33:01But here's the thing.
00:33:04If we take away from MotoGP, its variable ride height system,
00:33:12how much slower is that going to make them?
00:33:17Because the front end is going to want to pop up
00:33:20and there's going to be less arrow down force to push it back.
00:33:27Well, um, again, this is all hearsay.
00:33:31You know, you go on the internet, you talk to people on the phone,
00:33:34and they say, well, and then mumble, mumble, mumble.
00:33:38And the name of that game is, of course, how can I
00:33:42avoid looking stupid and not give any information?
00:33:47Because they don't have any.
00:33:49It was said at the time that these variable ride height systems were just beginning,
00:33:55that there was 0.2 to 0.3 second advantage.
00:34:00But then as they got the systems, um, to work better and to poop out less frequently,
00:34:10they never overcame that altogether because you always are hearing about somebody that
00:34:15was doing well in the race and then his system locked in the up or locked in the down position.
00:34:21And that was that.
00:34:24Well, uh, along comes Loris Caporossi, who last raced in 2011,
00:34:31um, who is a safety officer for the series, has talked to engineers, has been shown simulations
00:34:41and so forth. And he says, um, it could be one and a half to two seconds or more
00:34:56slower because they can't accelerate as hard in the up position as they could in the down position.
00:35:08So, um, you can bet that they're all very well aware of this and no doubt they have a solution
00:35:15in mind.
00:35:17I'd, I'd like to know what, what it could be.
00:35:20Well, they're certainly having meetings, right? They've got to be having lots of conference calls
00:35:24and Matt trading math and sending cold coffee.
00:35:28Yeah.
00:35:37So another thing that's been said,
00:35:42uh, and to me, this is, this is just time filling words. Oh, well, if they can't build more power,
00:35:52then they'll concentrate on making smoother power.
00:35:58Does anyone think that they're trying to build in a lot more power?
00:36:04Everyone in that business knows of innumerable, innumerable, innumerable occasions in which
00:36:10people came up with eight more horsepower and went slower.
00:36:16Because what they had to do to get more power caused the power band to develop features.
00:36:24Like when continents collide.
00:36:27When, when the Indian subcontinent pushed its nose into the south, southern parts of Asia,
00:36:35the Himalayas resulted.
00:36:39So, um, we don't want mountainous torque curves.
00:36:47I think some of these people don't know much.
00:36:53Because everyone in MotoGP has been working very hard on developing smooth power since the beginning.
00:37:00As follows.
00:37:02Ever hear of virtual power bands?
00:37:07It comes from Formula One.
00:37:09And we know, we know that anti-spin systems can clip the tops off of torque spikes.
00:37:18But what about the valleys?
00:37:22Virtual power band can fill in the valleys and result in a relatively smooth torque curve that is
00:37:29easier to ride for the rider and is better for the tire because without a lot of thumps or airtime,
00:37:37it's more likely to keep driving forward and accelerating rather than spinning and heading for the outside.
00:37:48Virtual power band operates by putting the computer between the rider's throttle grip
00:37:55and the butterflies in the intake system.
00:37:59And if the engine is accelerating towards a dip, which four into one exhaust pipes used to have in spades,
00:38:09what happens is that as the torque, the torque is almost ready to start dipping, but the butterflies open.
00:38:20And as you go through the dip, more power is added, more torque is added by the butterflies opening,
00:38:27which fills in the valleys.
00:38:29And then when the peak comes next, oh, that's not the shape we want.
00:38:35The butterflies close down so that as the rider accelerates off a turn, for example,
00:38:44the butterflies are describing the same motion as the horizontal stabilizer on a carrier plane.
00:38:51You see those things approaching the carrier and they're just, they're moving constantly.
00:39:00So this system has cost a great deal of money to perfect and it is king.
00:39:10It is the jewel in the crown as far as power band smoothing systems.
00:39:17Another one, which also costs millions.
00:39:20I want to add a little anecdote to the virtual throttle.
00:39:24So Kevin's talking about the virtual power band and, you know, trimming the peaks and just averaging the torque so
00:39:32that the, you know, it's predictable to you.
00:39:34What Aprilia did on the Shiver 750 way back in the day was they lied to you with the virtual
00:39:42throttle or with the electronic throttle.
00:39:44So the Shiver 750 was a moderately tuned 750 twin, pretty nice bike.
00:39:50And the first time you rode it, you're like, man, this is, they really nailed the torque on this thing.
00:39:55This is great.
00:39:56And you'd roll in and you'd roll in like a third throttle, fourth gear, third gear, third, you know, third
00:40:02of a throttle, maybe even half throttle.
00:40:05And that thing would just scoot and you're like, wow, this thing really runs.
00:40:08And then as you explore and as you test, you'd roll it on past that point and there was nothing
00:40:14left.
00:40:15They were throwing everything at you to get that nice surge feeling of torque out of this moderately tuned 750.
00:40:23And that's just, that's a, what do you say?
00:40:26That's the street bikes example of I'm going to give you what we think you want.
00:40:31What we think you want.
00:40:32And it's, it is, it is virtual.
00:40:34It's a virtual torque curve.
00:40:36Another example, which has cost the constructors a great deal of money is seamless transmissions.
00:40:44Now, when the seamless transmission was first announced in 2011, I think Honda had it.
00:40:50Everyone then had to have it just as had happened previously with a big bang firing order.
00:40:57Honda came up with it in 93.
00:41:00Everyone's saying, why are they making that deep tone?
00:41:03Why are they going so fast?
00:41:05Oh, I see.
00:41:11People imagined that the seamless shift would save microseconds at every upshift because there would be no downtime.
00:41:24There would always be a gear solidly driving the rear wheel.
00:41:28Well, in, but that was not what they were seeking.
00:41:35What they were seeking was to smooth the upshifts so that the tire was not as deeply affected by the
00:41:48thump as would otherwise be the case.
00:41:52So, everybody has a seamless gearbox now.
00:41:59And there are other things like you've spoken of, of the, the backlash protector.
00:42:06Everyone has this little app in their ECU that when you've, you're ready to start throttling up from a corner,
00:42:19when the engine takes up the backlash, it doesn't go kathump.
00:42:24Yeah, we had a, we had this conversation with Romano Albeciano, formerly of Aprilia's MotoGP team.
00:42:32Formerly, yes.
00:42:33We had that at CODA.
00:42:35And it was a fascinating conversation because he and Kevin were talking about aircraft engines and I think some locomotives.
00:42:41There was a wide ranging, he's an enthusiast of transportation as all of us usually are, not just a, a
00:42:49guy focused on MotoGP alone because there is, everything that you learn helps everything else that you want to learn.
00:42:56And it was so fascinating for him to talk that, talk about that, picking up of the, the lash that
00:43:02there was a, an ignition map, an ignition map that at that initial roll, it gently brought the gears together.
00:43:08And he did this motion with his hands.
00:43:11He went like, and he brought the gears together to pick up that absolute seamless smoothness.
00:43:17And that's what you see with the riders and their inputs.
00:43:19It's, it's, you know, they're right on that edge.
00:43:23The idea would be to be right on that edge all the time with, without those pesky bumps on the
00:43:29track and.
00:43:30Those disturbances, yes.
00:43:31All those other disturbances that can set you sliding.
00:43:34And once it's, once it's sliding, it seems to accelerate.
00:43:38It's, it's, it's, it's incredible.
00:43:40It's incredible how bad that can feel.
00:43:42So, well, I have a, a, a, a subheading in my, um, outline here that says advantage Toprak question mark.
00:43:54And lots of people are saying that because, uh, Mr. Razgatlyoglu has won three world championship, world super bike championships
00:44:05on Pirelli's.
00:44:08Uh, won't he have, uh, a lot of insight into how they behave?
00:44:12He might, but with what Barbier is saying, uh, that they're, they feel that they're going to have to make
00:44:20a more durable tire for MotoGP.
00:44:25Oh, the other thing of course is, uh, MotoGP race is typically 45 minutes long.
00:44:32Whereas world supers have two races in the weekend.
00:44:37Plus super pole.
00:44:39So it's a little different.
00:44:42Um, I, I wonder if he'll have an advantage.
00:44:47He has this, this incredible braking style, which is so marvelous to watch.
00:44:54Um, and he says that at present that he's come to terms with the Michelin front tire in MotoGP.
00:45:03It's the rear tire that mystifies him.
00:45:06Um, but watching him break, he's going away from the camera and you see the, the distance between the top
00:45:18of the rear tire and the underside of the seat begins to grow.
00:45:23It doesn't, it doesn't, the seat doesn't jump up like he crammed on maximum braking.
00:45:31And then a heartbeat or so later, the rear tire lifts up off the pavement and maybe kisses once or
00:45:40twice.
00:45:40Um, and then he brings it up to seven inches or thereabouts.
00:45:45And he sails serenely into the corner on one wheel.
00:45:52And when he gets to his turn in point, he does what we used to see Mark Marquez do in
00:45:59his strongest years, which is here he is with the rear end up in the air.
00:46:05He lets the rear end swing out because he's turning in with the front and as it swings out, he
00:46:13eases up on the brake line pressure so that the rear tire sinks onto the pavement already at a slip
00:46:21angle appropriate to a two wheel drift through the corner.
00:46:26That's why we're fans of these guys.
00:46:29And when you read his description of what he does, he says, I don't break all that hard initially.
00:46:35And you can see that.
00:46:38And what we suspect naturally is that the tire, uh, the footprint is not huge because there isn't a tremendous
00:46:47amount of weight on the back.
00:46:50Um, so he's, he's going to ease into it with the front and the back.
00:46:56Uh, he does use the rear brake on occasion, but you can see that the process is of the front
00:47:05tires footprint getting bigger and warming up.
00:47:13Dunlop provided information to journalists at one point showing graphs of front tire tread surface temperature rising as the bike
00:47:24goes into a corner.
00:47:25Uh, so here's Razgatlyoglu with his machine in this drifting attitude.
00:47:32That drifting is added to the braking force.
00:47:36So at this point, other riders, if they're close by have gone past him, but they're going to go wide
00:47:43because he's now aimed at the apex.
00:47:47And then he starts to feed power and he says, I move the throttle a little.
00:47:52And if that's okay, I move it more.
00:47:58And of course, the thing is, these people talk about this kind of thing in such a matter of fact
00:48:04way, because to them, it is, it's all happening in slow motion.
00:48:11They're on top of it.
00:48:13It's just delightful to watch.
00:48:18So, uh, we wish him well, we hope that everyone will have, uh, an easy time learning to, uh, cope
00:48:27with, with the new tires.
00:48:29But we don't, we don't really know what, how difficult that will be because of the changes that Mr. Barbier
00:48:37has outlined.
00:48:40Now, uh, I've spoken about the reduction in weight, which is 8.8 pounds.
00:48:48And there's some pipe work and changes in the suspension involved in the variable height, ride height system.
00:48:59And a hundred percent of the fuel must now be of non-fossil origin.
00:49:07This means that it's going to cost three or four times as much, but we knew that what's in the,
00:49:13the ideal that is proposed for the future is that trillions of gallons of fuel will be synthesized by taking
00:49:24carbon dioxide from the air and breaking it down and keeping the carbon.
00:49:29And using electricity to separate, uh, hydrogen and oxygen from H2O.
00:49:38And then they will assemble fuel molecules from carbon and hydrogen hydrocarbons.
00:49:48Now, obviously what this process is, is unburning the products of combustion, because when you burn a hydrocarbon, you get
00:49:57CO2 and H2O.
00:50:00So they're not going to do that at first.
00:50:03Instead, they'll probably, uh, buy ethyl alcohol.
00:50:08That is a result of fermenting corn.
00:50:11I read somewhere that 40% of the U S corn crop is now burned in automobile engines.
00:50:21Good for the farmers.
00:50:27a democratic process does not always guarantee that logic shall rule, but some people will be pleased by it.
00:50:35Hasn't been good for our carburetors.
00:50:39It's leaned, it's leaned out, leaned out a lot of our old carburetors.
00:50:42We have to change needles.
00:50:43And, uh, of course we wonder about the, uh, expense and complication of fixing all the plugged in the eroded
00:50:54jets and all the water that's been captured out of the atmosphere.
00:50:58And certainly there's been a, an impact there, hasn't there?
00:51:02How many chainsaws have we tried to start that don't?
00:51:06Oh, yes.
00:51:08Every year in the spring.
00:51:12With lawnmowers and tillers and string trimmers, little tiny carburetors, all to be cleaned out.
00:51:21It is a nice, it is a nice sign to hang in the window to say, oh, we're synthesized.
00:51:26We're using non-fossil and we're welding our, our molecules back together to make fuel again.
00:51:33And we're pulling that out of the air and, and all of that.
00:51:36But, uh, Kevin's going to say.
00:51:38Including the air.
00:51:39Yes.
00:51:40Kevin's going to say something about 787s and moving everyone around the globe.
00:51:46Oh, yeah.
00:51:47Low these many rounds.
00:51:48It's this, uh, a 787 burns 12 or 13,000 pounds of fuel per hour.
00:51:56And if it's carrying 250 passengers or so, that works out to, uh, each in on the, the pollution account
00:52:07of each passenger are 50 pounds of jet a burned per hour to move that person to the next place.
00:52:17And a regional jet burns, they're much more efficient now, 5,500 pounds.
00:52:24Not so long ago it was 8,000.
00:52:27Um, so, oh, and one of the really frightening ones is manufacturing cement, which now uses unbelievable volumes of natural
00:52:38gas because you have to drive the water of hydration out of the raw material from which cement is made.
00:52:48And that takes temperature.
00:52:50And yes, they do use heat recirculating methods and they try to green it up.
00:52:56So, but fundamentally, it's a lot of, it's a lot of energy.
00:53:02I think just running a semi, just running a semi across the United States, if you want to get your
00:53:08semi from California out to road Atlanta, you're probably going to be in the $20,000 range just to make
00:53:16that drive.
00:53:17I'm guessing, you know, have fueling the truck and moving, just the, the physical act of putting everything together and
00:53:25having all the people go.
00:53:26It's just, uh, it's mighty expensive.
00:53:29Yeah.
00:53:31Uh, beginning with 2027 MotoGP teams must share GPS data session by session.
00:53:41Um, and what that means is that teams that have, um, digital competency, um, will have no advantage from that.
00:53:56It is simply going to be information on, you know, we're going to look at your rider's line through a
00:54:04corner.
00:54:04That's what they mean by GPS data is trajectories.
00:54:09Um, and what that means is that teams that have, um, digital competency, um, will have no advantage from that.
00:54:10Corner lines.
00:54:11Uh, why do this?
00:54:14Is it because of a spoil sport?
00:54:19Everyone at the party must get the same present as the birthday girl.
00:54:24No, what they're doing is continuing the work, which began long ago when they said, everyone must use a spec
00:54:34ECU, the same engine control unit for every bike.
00:54:39Um, and it must run, um, our spec software, which we will issue to you.
00:54:47So that meant no more long tables of men and women hunkered over laptops, trying to find a better way
00:54:58to get through turn seven.
00:55:02Trying to optimize all the settings.
00:55:05Trying to optimize all the settings.
00:55:05So ultimately what they want to do is not to stop technology.
00:55:10They don't want to say rip out all them electronics.
00:55:14They don't want to say, and this was proposed when they were saying that the bikes were getting too fast.
00:55:20They proposed that the tire company should be, should be told to make bad tires.
00:55:28Make tires that skid out real easy so that it's thrilling to watch.
00:55:34And it's slow.
00:55:38So it's, um, difficult fuel capacity, 22 liters.
00:55:45Now, 20 liters next year.
00:55:47Why?
00:55:48Less engine power, slightly lighter bicycle.
00:55:52Um, probably works out.
00:55:55Be okay.
00:55:56They tried the thousand CC engines on 20 liters and it was sort of ridiculous because they were having to,
00:56:04to run extremely lean whenever it was part throttle and it didn't always work out all that well.
00:56:14Hmm.
00:56:15What if they tried EGR?
00:56:17That's marginal.
00:56:18Yeah.
00:56:20So, uh, when you think about all of these things, less power, no more variable ride height, um, aerodynamics toned
00:56:34down.
00:56:36Are world super bikes going to be faster than MotoGP?
00:56:40I think all we can say is stay tuned because that could be the result.
00:56:45Well, one series racing against another, unheard of, but, uh, I have to, I have to sympathize with, uh, Dorna's
00:57:02desire to green, green up their series by saying, look, we, our lubricating oil is made from non-fossil sources.
00:57:12This is easy.
00:57:14I didn't say inexpensive.
00:57:16This is easy for the chemical industry, the oil industry, frankly, because they are the ones who have these enormous
00:57:24reforming systems with fabulous catalysts that will change, that will allow you to add little short molecular pieces to, um,
00:57:39previously, um, very undesirable.
00:57:44To make excellent alkaline.
00:57:50To make excellent alkaline, good anti-knock grating, nice smells to the gasoline.
00:57:56Not too deep.
00:57:58Yeah.
00:58:00So, uh, so, uh, the same thing with oils, the synthetic oil people are starting with something like natural gas
00:58:09or other, uh, fragments, and they are assembling oil molecules of an ideal nature.
00:58:20And these are branched chains, not aromatics, which have those double bonds, those circulating double bonds, which oxygen loves to
00:58:31take a bite out of and causing your oil to gum.
00:58:36Um, it used to be that a lot of things that were bad for your car engine or motorcycle engine
00:58:44were taken out.
00:58:47But now the oil industry is making, uh, oils that are equal in performance to synthetics, which are molecularly indistinguishable
00:59:02from them, from the opposite direction.
00:59:05They're reforming existing molecules to make them more suited to purpose.
00:59:11So this won't be a problem.
00:59:14It's just racing is expensive.
00:59:18Here's another little expense for you.
00:59:21Remember the fuel that they're using now, they can't go out to the airport and get, uh, kind of cheap
00:59:29white grace, race gas.
00:59:31Because the gas is very expensive.
00:59:34What is the major cost?
00:59:36It is the testing required to certify that the fuel meets all of the specifications of the sanctioning body.
00:59:47So it's, um, those people have their meetings.
00:59:52They sit there in their blue blazers and they make these decisions.
00:59:57And so far, so good.
01:00:00Um, the series was attractive enough that, uh, the, uh, big media company bought it.
01:00:10Must have looked like this is, this thing's doing okay.
01:00:14And we think we can improve its value so that someone will want to buy it from us.
01:00:22And cross your fingers on everything in the future, because this is a fast changing world.
01:00:28So I was just hearing the other day about how much the prices of normally used consumption items for race
01:00:39car teams have increased in price because of the, the current push and shove in international trade.
01:00:49And, but that's the game that says it's being played today.
01:00:53So you want to play, you have to pay.
01:00:57Tell you what, just on the, on the base level of going, going to your local, uh, race gas provider
01:01:03and looking at your five gallon pails of various fuels.
01:01:06It's, uh, super easy to, I mean, a hundred bucks is just getting you in the door for five gallons.
01:01:13It's, it's more than that now.
01:01:14That's, uh, it's really something.
01:01:17Yeah.
01:01:18So it makes me wonder, um, they've made this step to a slightly smaller motorcycle engine, but we know that
01:01:27twins are the biggest selling, uh, full-size motorcycles at the moment.
01:01:34Now, some people will say, oh, well, prosperity will come back and four cylinder bikes will look good again.
01:01:40And, um, maybe even that V eight I've been dreaming of since I was 12, but we can't know that
01:01:49because if we could, we'd be all be rich.
01:01:54And, uh, so I keep thinking, oh, look, they're proposing to replace moto three with a twin, a mid-sized
01:02:07twin.
01:02:08Now that makes sense to me because it is saying, yes, this is the kind of thing that the market
01:02:14is interested in.
01:02:16Now I know that the charm of the, the great monstrous locomotives going 225 miles an hour, that's a thrill
01:02:26and the noises are good.
01:02:30I like the noises, even though they are not megaphone music because they are harsh and crisp.
01:02:36You think that things are happening inside those engines that are just right.
01:02:41I love that sound.
01:02:45So, well, what's the compression do we, do we theorize?
01:02:48I mean, I've always, I've always enjoyed the sound of a high compression engine, the blow down, you know, that,
01:02:55that initial opening of the valve that ultimately makes the sound coming out of the tailpipe.
01:03:00Sure.
01:03:01When it's right, it's right.
01:03:02Like the original R seven, the homologation special, special, I rode one of those at Willow Springs.
01:03:08That is the finest inline four sound I have ever heard from the saddle.
01:03:12Well, it was spectacular.
01:03:15And it's just going to be a combination of intake trumpets and cam profiles and compression and.
01:03:21Well, it's a rapidity of exhaust valve lift is what it is.
01:03:24It's just like a two stroke.
01:03:25The piston is at maximum velocity at 76 degrees after top dead center.
01:03:32And my 1965 Yamaha TD-1B opened its exhaust port at 79 degrees after top dead center.
01:03:42Oh, boy.
01:03:43So that means that the release of gas has a really steep front.
01:03:50And that's what really smacks your ears.
01:03:54That's the rotary deal.
01:03:55This is like the 787B, the Mazda that they did at Le Mans and all that is, uh, that same.
01:04:01Very loud.
01:04:02Opens the port with sonic.
01:04:05Uh, yes.
01:04:07Yes.
01:04:07Much ado.
01:04:09Yeah.
01:04:12When I visited Kawasaki in 1972, we went to, to a, uh, the Fuji circuit and there was a Mazda
01:04:21there doing laps.
01:04:22So that was a feast for the ears.
01:04:28Very sharp sound.
01:04:34Well, I'm interested to see what you were saying the other day when we were discussing
01:04:38this, uh, podcast topic, um, what will they do?
01:04:43Well, will they try to slow down world super bike?
01:04:46You said stock 1000 super sport 1000.
01:04:51These are legitimate questions.
01:04:55Bad tires.
01:04:57Yeah.
01:04:57Bad tires.
01:04:59Well, that was another one of the space filling comments that I read on the, on the internet,
01:05:05which was, well, you know, the, the bikes will be slower at first and it will take them
01:05:11people a while to, uh, optimize everything happens every year like that.
01:05:19You get the new, the factory guys get the new this year's bike.
01:05:24And in the first two or three races, there's a good chance that somebody with last year's
01:05:29bike will win because their bike is already optimized.
01:05:34Now this is a fresh start for everyone.
01:05:36So it'll be interesting though, those first three races to see which way the beam of the
01:05:44scale tilts toward world supers, toward MotoGP.
01:05:51It'll be something to look forward to.
01:05:54Yeah.
01:05:54I mean, next gen, next gen super sport, you know, they're, they're just managing ECUs and
01:06:01parity.
01:06:01You know, they're just doing it inside the box because that's how we're getting the variety
01:06:05of bikes.
01:06:06And it's good racing and people are going fast and we have the, uh, diversity of product
01:06:13that, uh, I think we find enticing.
01:06:16I think that the shift to twins would be really interesting, uh, for Moto3.
01:06:22I mean, I, I think the bikes are, are delicate and exquisite, but man, um, outside of dirt bikes,
01:06:30the passion for singles on the road is low since they just don't, they don't sell in a particular
01:06:37volume, even though they're wonderful and simple, dare I say, Velocet, uh, in this context,
01:06:45but, um, you know, twins would be interesting certainly.
01:06:49And I wonder what they would do.
01:06:51You know, Moto3 is running a six, the, um, the Triumph triple race prepped and, you know,
01:06:58a lot of the twins are in the 700 range.
01:06:59Maybe we'd go to 500 twins.
01:07:01There's plenty of those around 450 ish, you know, it's a, it'd be interesting, but a world
01:07:07supers, I wonder how, you know, how do you do that?
01:07:10How do you negotiate that?
01:07:11And if you're trying to grow MotoGP and as they've looked at like moving to city courses
01:07:17and trying to get into city centers and get probably more, maybe more festival, more
01:07:24yeah, more, more eyes, more sort of festival, a more casual fan.
01:07:29I think MotoGP still has a very passionate and knowledgeable fan that likes the technical
01:07:36details.
01:07:37Phillip Island is a really great track to ride on.
01:07:41I know they've had, you know, situations with you need to improve the track.
01:07:45Who's going to pay for the improvements and, and all of that.
01:07:48And, um, you don't get a lot of people out there as you might in a, in a big city.
01:07:55So it's interesting.
01:07:57It's cold and windy a lot of the time.
01:07:59It's definitely windy.
01:08:00I've been, been there for that.
01:08:02Even though the tires are not cold.
01:08:03Yeah.
01:08:05Well, that's it folks.
01:08:07Yeah.
01:08:07I'm curious about it.
01:08:08Yeah.
01:08:09Same here.
01:08:10Well, whatever's going to happen will, and whatever has happened is everything that was
01:08:17going to happen.
01:08:20Think about that.
01:08:21Yeah.
01:08:21Think about that.
01:08:22Um, it's cook Nelson ism everything that could have happened.
01:08:26Did that's when, whenever something spectacular goes on and this guy crashes or these guys
01:08:33come together, uh, that's what cook will say out there in the public forums, everything
01:08:40that could have happened did because we'll, well, if this is dinner with this, no, no, no,
01:08:44no, no, no.
01:08:45It's just how it happened.
01:08:46That's it.
01:08:46It's over.
01:08:47That's exactly what could have happened.
01:08:49Did happen.
01:08:50So, well, thanks for listening folks.
01:08:52That's it, uh, for this episode.
01:08:54Check us out on Patreon and, um, thanks for riding with us.
01:08:57Appreciate your comments.
01:08:59See you in there.
01:09:00We do.
01:09:01Yes, we do.
01:09:02Oh yes.
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