Although the speed record at Bonneville for recumbent, fully enclosed streamliner motorcycles is higher, last weekend, at the old Loring Air Force Base in Limestone, Maine, Bill Warner, of Winauma, Florida, aimed his turbo Hayabusa down the 1 1/2 mile runway and ran 311.945 mph, beating his old record of 273.356 mph set last year. He’s done a lot of streamlining on this bike, too, but he’s sitting on it in the conventional racer crouch, not locked inside a tube. The event, now in its 3rd year, was put on by the Loring Timing Association.
A wide, 1 1/2 mile long straight piece of smooth concrete just begs for this sort of “How fast can you go?” meeting and everyone brings their cars, truck, motorcycles and what have you to come up with an answer. Running on concrete has the advantage of traction that Bonneville can’t match which helps a lot when you’re slowing down, too, making high speeds in this relatively short distance possible. This looks like a very popular and growing annual event. Pretty cool.
Congratulations, Bill!
Link: Loring Timing Association
Video below:
B50 Jim says
Shows you what a turbo and some streamlining can do; and I’ll bet his ‘Busa is mostly stock otherwise. The world of LSR racers is a rarefied place; I wonder what they could do with 10 miles of smooth, level concrete? I’ve been to Bonneville (even tasted the salt), and I wondered then how anything got sufficient traction on the stuff to go anywhere, much less speeds in the stratosphere. I still wonder — in light of that, my hat’s off to anyone who aims for the horizon and cranks it on in a quest to go faster than anyone ever has gone.
WillyP says
Well put Jim, though I would wager there is not much stock ‘Busa left in that bike.
B50 Jim says
Maybe we’ll get more details later. I’d love to know what went into it. Love the video; he just flat disappears into the distance.The spirit of Burt Munro lives on!
chris says
Jaw dropping, Congratulations!!!!!!!!
sfan says
This is a remarkable achievement, congrats to Bill Warner. One thing I like really about this is its demonstration of the effectiveness of good streamlining. While no doubt a great many variables are needed for this kind of performance, good aerodynamics is a necessary condition. Yet, it doesn’t take a lot of imagination to see a slightly less radical application of bodywork that could be perfectly comfortable but very effective as a regular ride.
I really do not understand why there isn’t more innovation and envelope-pushing in reducing the drag coefficient of motorcycles, highway-capable scooters and even bicycles for that matter.
rohorn says
I agree completely – some of the reaction to this on explains a lot, sadly:
http://thekneeslider.com/archives/2010/01/21/do-it-yourself-214-mpg-motorcycle-project/
ATinkerer says
The record for Bonneville is about 40mph faster, BUT Bonneville is a flying start. Bill set his record from a standing start.
Congratulations on an outstanding effort.
todd says
I’m not discrediting this achievement one bit but people tend to forget the fact that Bonneville is over 4200 feet above sea level; Loring AFB is 70.
It must be quite a thrill to run that fast though, that’s some serious power.
-todd
Larry Forstall says
Todd: The Bonneville altitude makes a turbo bike go faster because the air is thinner. What you say is correct for a N/A bike but a turbo creates it’s own atmosphere. BTW that is my name on the tail section. LSL
Larry Forstall says
A Tinkerer-The record at Bonneville is 58 mph SLOWER (We are talking about conventional motorcycles. LSL
davd says
An astounding achievement which ever way you view it!!!!
The question i have is this: How standard IS that bike? Is it:
a) standard busa with turbo and dress
b) highly modified busa, with entire internals suped up (bearings etc)
There was an accusation that the this busa made the veyron look silly, and as per numbers i’d agree. But there’s a difference between stock and modified vehicles, the veyron being “stock”. That the veyron can be driven all over, where as this is a 25 second wonder.
Comments?
Tapsa says
No first hand informations but searching a bit in the web it sounds like (b.). A Spanish website even claims that the bike as no (serious?) cooling system and that it can run for just a minute or so but I was unable to find more about this in any authoritative site. Still, if you search for pictures it is clear that this is far from being a standard busa.
p.j. o furey says
there,s always some computer based turd who wants to pull bones out of whatever real people do with motorcycles-let me tell you just building a bike to do one single thing, is a major work,to streamline a bike,sucessfully, is also a major work,riding these things is a major rush-thankfully were usually too busy building/riding/planning modifying to pay much heed.
we dont ride bonneville for the traction-