Bimota Sb6
BIMOTA SB6
CW RIDING IMPRESSION
FROM ITALY WITH INNOVATION
ALAN CATHCART
ITALY'S BIMOTA HAS LEARNED THE HARD WAY THAT one problem with being a technological pathfinder involves staying ahead of competitors eager to copy your forward thinking. Think about it: Bimota was first with a production aluminum twin-spar chassis, and lots of other great ideas, that quickly became sportbike standard-issue.
The launch of Bimota's Suzuki GSX-R1 100-powered SB6 and GSX-R750-powered SB7 at October's Milan Show debuted Bimota's latest tech-advance, the Straight Line
Connection frame, an idea that really does point frame design in a new direction.
Check it out, see if your attention doesn’t focus on that broad, straight sweep of aircraft aluminum that connects the steering head and swingarm pivot as directly as it’s possible to do.
But v/hile the elegant simplicity of the SLC format is selfevident, the principal design objectives are hidden. They’re only hinted at when you sit on the bike: It’s tiny. The SB6 feels completely unlike any other bike, and it most certainly seems a highly improbable home for anything capable of the 156 horsepower Bimota says it gets from the Suzuki engine. The SB6’s 29.7-inch seat height compares vividly with a Honda CBR900RR’s 31-inch perch, or the 31.3-inch altitude of the Suzuki GSX-R1100’s seat. Couple this with the bike’s 54.7-inch wheelbase (compared to the 57.7-inch axlespan of the GSX-R1100) and you begin to understand how small this bike is.
Because it seems so small, the SB6 invites you to explore the performance potential it offers. Doing so soon demonstrates that you’ll run out of courage and grip before you touch down the bike’s fairing; that it’s incredibly stable around fast, sweeping turns, in spite of the short wheelbase;
and that the steering is unbelievably positive and easy, not only setting a new standard for liter-class bikes, but exceeding the abilities of anything in the 750 class.
How did Bimota designer Pierluigi Marconi accomplish these results? He explains, “My main concern was to alter the center of gravity to bring it closer to the center of mass. This results in a reduced polar moment of inertia. This improves handling because there isn’t such a pendular effect of weight transfer when you change direction.”
Doing so required a completely new chassis concept, and the Suzuki’s near-upright cylinder block helped a lot here, allowing Marconi to locate the motor very close to the front wheel, shorten the wheelbase, accentuate front-end weight bias and lower the seat height.
The stock steering-head angle is a very sporting 24 degrees, but this is owner-adjustable by 1.5 degrees in either direction, in half-degree increments, via eccentric bushings. Trail is 3.7 inches. At the basic rake setting, weight distribution is a front-biased 53/47 percent, a quite extreme figure by four-cylinder road-bike standards.
This has been partly achieved by posi-
tioning the long, hefty battery demanded by the GSX-R motor in the nose of the fairing, behind the twin headlamps, as well as spreading the fully adjustable clip-on handlebars notably wider than is usual on Bimotas, to help load the front end with the rider’s weight.
The SB6 is one of those bikes you feel a part of when you ride it. It falls into turns in a very controlled, responsive way, and changes direction easily and confidently. Any expected twitchiness in long, fast turns that might result from the bike’s quick steering geometry and short wheelbase is countered by its very low center of gravity. This is a very stable motorcycle.
It wouldn’t be without a quality suspension package, though. Before you get sniffy about the SB6 not having an upside-down fork, take a closer look-that’s a layer of carbon-fiber sheathing on the bottom sliders, there to help deliver a very light but strong structure. Because of this design, Marconi says, the Paioli fork’s 46mm stanchions actually offer less deflection under the massive stopping power of the twin 12.6-inch cast-iron Brembo rotors than an upside-down design.
On the road, this translates to a front end that feels extremely progressive in response. You can feel it gently iron out ripples and small bumps, then stiffen up the response when you hit a big dip or an even bigger bump. Ride quality is very high, partly due to the two-rate fork springs, partly due to Paioli’s success in developing the internal damping. At the rear, the Öhlins shock, offset to the right to save space, is operated via a risingrate linkage, and has a huge range of adjustment for preload, compression and rebound. I never found a setting that gave me as supple a ride as I'd have liked, but it was a surprise to find rearwheel traction so good from a chassis with such a forward weight bias.
The liquid-cooled version of Suzuki’s maxi-motor takes no prisoners in terms of
power and performance, but transplanted from a porky GSX-R 1100 into a reedy SB6, it is simply awesome—even more so than usual because Bimota liberated an extra 7 to 12 horsepower between 5000 and 8000 rpm, thanks to a bigger-bore exhaust system. Not a lot goes on below 4000 rpm, but from there onwards things happen very fast, with even more of a midrange punch
than on the stock GSX-R. The SB6 has the most mind-grabbing acceleration I’ve ever experienced on a roadbike.
The SB6’s styling is perhaps a bit less dramatic than the Italians originally intended it to be, but it still is spectacular.
The dark-tinted windscreen gives surprisingly good protection in spite of being so low, and the steering lock is amazingly wide for a sportbike, adding to its user-friendliness in town.
There’s no rear subframe. The seat and rear bodywork—fiberglass, with carbon inserts—is self-supporting to save weight and further increase front-end bias. The tail section is well insulated from the heat of the twin high-rise exhausts exiting through its rear. The result is very svelte and clean appearance at the rear of the bike, which enhances the impression of reduced size.
Truly, the SB6 is beautifully detailed, and about the only aspect I can complain about involves the instruments. These look great until you actually have to read them. Both the tach and speedo needles are white, the same color as most of the background, meaning they merge with it, rendering the instruments illegible. Additionally, the figures on the instrument faces are too small to be easily read. Score 10 for style, zip for practicality.
mere or course was a time when Italian motorcycles scored zip for everyday use, but the SB6 is a very different plate of linguini. Expect this innovative, striking and beautifully engineered motorcycle to open a new chapter in chassis technology, as it can be just a matter of time before other manufacturers again follow Bimota’s lead. Interest in the SB6 is so intense that the factory is swamped
with orders, as you might expect from an exotic like this with a price tag that will allow it to sell in America for right at $20,000. I can only say after riding it that the new Bimota SB6’s apparent commercial success is well and truly deserved. Prospective owners signed up for SB6s without ever riding one, and I doubt very much that any will be disappointed once they have taken delivery.
