Aren't Ones

AREN'T ONES

BMW’S R1 wasn’t the only stillborn prototype

DON’T MOURN THE BMW R1. All manufacturers prototype their ideas constantly. Not only are most of these never produced, they are usually destroyed in the bargain. Dick O’Brien, for many years manager of racing at Harley-Davidson, once showed me drawings of a two-stroke 750cc racer that

his team had planned. He then listed a number of other interesting prototypes that were built-a reed-valve, twostroke sportbike that would have predated Yamaha’s RD350, for example.

In my own short racing association with Kawasaki, I heard code names often, and discovered their meanings less often. “New York Steak” was the Z-1, but

when I visited the factory in 1972,1 couldn’t help asking the top manager, Mr. Otsuki, about something called “Lobster.”

His response was explosive. “Lobster?” he spluttered. “How you know Lobster? Lobster very secret!”

Lobster turned out to be a four-stroke 500cc Single, but there was also the tantalizing “Filet Mignon,” a discvalve, square-Four, twin-crank, two-stroke 750 (shown) for which everyone on the race team yearned painfully. It could have made an easy 175 horsepower-as Yamaha’s similar 1983-84 OW-60-based Daytona specials later resoundingly did. Reportedly, Filet Mignon was stopped by crank phasing gear trouble, but you and I know those great guys and gals in Ann Arbor (EPA HQ) never would have let it live anyway. Another hopeful that didn’t make it was the street version of Yamaha’s TZ-750A racebike, shown with lights and full road equipment at the 1972 Tokyo Motor Show.

In 1976, when Kawasaki was racing its KR-750 in Formula 750, we heard constant rumors that a new four-cylinder two-stroke was coming, or that the existing piston-port Triple would get reed valves. Years later, after Kawasaki had abandoned two-stroke pavement racers, unsolicited drawings of this mystery engine appeared in my mailbox-wonderful details of yet another stillborn prototype.

Doesn’t computer modeling make prototypes unnecessary? For lowerperformance equipment, it may, but any time a new design pushes the limits, prototypes have to be built, broken and improved. After all, the model in the computer is just an abstraction from our experience with real things.

Kevin Cameron