Nyteknik skrev:
Detta var uppe för ett tag sedan. Jag hävdade att man hade tävlat med NR:en. Men fick inte så värst stort gehör. Några hastighetsrekord tror jag knappast att Honda har slagit med NR 750.
Läs själv:
The NR750 was Honda's opportunity to show what they can do, but its beautiful engineering was lost on the public. The engine technology, the complex exhaust routing, and touches like carbon fibre composite bodywork and a titanium-tinted screen were not what most observers thought of as the way forward. It was quite heavy, and definitely not intended as a race machine. And of course the ludicrous price (£38,000 in the UK, ¥5,000,000 in Japan) was enough to ensure it remained a curiousity.
Some features, such as the side-mounted radiators and aspects of the styling eventually into Honda's more modest road models, but the enormous expense of developing an oval-pistoned v-four motorcycle means such a design is unlikely to be sold at realistic prices. The conventional v-four engine is already complex and expensive to produce.
The PGM-FI fuel injection was state of the art in 1992, and used 7 sensors and a 16-bit CPU to control the eight injectors as well as controlling ignition timing. In addition it altered the position of an inlect duct in the airbox to regulate airflow. Over 200 were assembled, at a rate of 2 or 3 a day.
Since it couldn't be homologated for World Championship racing Honda decided the NR750 could be used to attempt some records. A lightened, tuned NR, making 150bhp @ 15,500rpm and weighinhg just 180kg was produced (compared to the standard bikes' 222kg). Diminutive GP rider Loris Capirossi set new flying mile, flying kilometre and standing start mile & 10km records, assuring its place in the record books.
Honda had tried the oval-piston concept before. The first motorcycle named NR750 was an endurance racer which appeared at Le Mans in 1987. It failed to finish, but was very fast with a wide powerband. It weighed just 145kg and made over 150bhp - in the days when superbikes were doing well to put out 135 horses. The fascinating development of Honda's v-fours in both race and road guises, including the oval-piston NR bikes, is discussed in detail in Julian Ryder's book "Honda's V-Force". Read the review.
There were only eight NR750s imported into the UK. Performance Bikes managed to scrounge a ride on the only bike that hadn't been crashed and repaired (there were two) or exported (the other five).