Two months ago we revealed what the 2010 Yamaha FZ8 looked like from the headlight up. Yamaha is again teasing us with only a headshot, but this time it is the 2010 Yamaha FZ8R or “Fazer 8” as Yamaha seems to want to call it, the fully-faired FZ8, that is getting unwrapped. While the photo above is an official photo from Yamaha, Motociclisimo.it has what they believe are leaked photos of both the naked an faired bikes in their final form. Check those photos after the jump.
Bikes in the Fast Lane is running a piece on a impressive collection of 35 BMW motorcycle ads from around the world, which shows how the German has branded itself across the globe. BMW’s marketing efforts run the gammet from very good to utterly bizzar. We grabbed a few of the good, bad, and ugly to share with you after the jump, but you’ll have to head to Bikes in the Fast Lane to see the rest.
Motus Motorcycles has trickled out a bit more information about its Made in America MST-01 sport-tourer, giving CycleWorld their obligatory first look. What do they have to report? A 1650cc V4 motor with two valves per cylinder that features direct injection, which sums up to equal 140hp. More on that and photos after the jump.
The Boston Globe is running a series of photos from the Dakar Rally, which we think are some of the best shots we’ve seen of the race to date. A mixture of octane and gorgeous landscape, we think you’ll enjoy these shots as much as we did. You can find the rest of them here at boston.com.
Rally racers are currently on their 12th stage of the race, heading from in San Juan, Argentina to San Rafael. After today, the riders will have to complete two more stages before the rally concludes where it began in Buenos Aires.
Photo: GABRIEL BOUYS/AFP/Getty Images
Lord Drayson, UK Minister of Science and Technology, took the wraps off the TTXGP exclusive CRP Racing eCRP 1.0 today at the 4th Annual Cleaner Racing Conferance. CRP’s goal is to innovate in the world of motorcycle roadracing and the all electric race bike seems to be a good fit for the company. The eCRP 1.0 dual motor electric drive is based on 2009 TTXGP winning Team Agni X01, while the rest of the bike was designed and built in house by CRP and incorporates 30 years of race proven technological know-how.
CRP Racing does not have plans to field an electric race team but will make the bike available to teams who want to race in the TTXGP. The bike will not be available to teams wishing to run races in the competing FIM ePower Series who has yet to announce a race team entry.
Harley-Davidson is probably the last company we’d expect to start showing concept motorcycles, but that didn’t stop designer Miguel Cotto from imagining what the Milwaukee brand would look like in 10 years. We don’t know what the next decade will have in store for the American brand, but we’re willing to bet this isn’t it.
We apologize for that headline…scooters were never cool in the past, but they are cool now. Slidescooters has taken your basic unsuspecting Piaggio/Vespa/Honda, and slaped onto the front a steerable ski, and onto the back a rugged treaded tire. The result? Budget hooliganism in the powdery white stuff. Video, photos, and more after the jump.
Keeping the theme going, motorcycling in 2009 was sometimes expressed better in a single frame, rather than in full-motion. With so many great photos coming in from a plethora of talented photographers, it’s hard to pick just a few that stand-out from the rest. But still, we gave it our best shot. Click past the jump for our picks.
After Yamaha released only a limited view of the FZ8, there has been much speculation about what the new fazzer will have in store for would-be riders. As such in the past week, there have been a couple attempts to decipher what the Yamaha FZ8 could look like by using the all-glorious tool that is Adobe Photoshop.
Unveiled at the COP15 United Nations Climate Conference in Denamrk, the Copenhagen Wheel system was developed by Ducati Energia, MIT’s SENSEable City Lab, and Progical Solutions for the Kobenhavns Kommune (City of Copenhagen), and is an electrical drive system that can be added to any bicycle to help assist the rider with a boost of extra power. Along with its motor assist, the Copenhagen Wheel has a variety of sensors that relay information back to the rider via a Bluetooth connection that syncs with the rider’s smart phone (iPhone used in the demonstration). It’s a pretty cool concept, check after the jump a video and more.
After taking the wraps off the Mavizen TTX02 at SEMA this year (we of course spoiled the fun a little bit earlier than that), there was a bit of chatter in the EV community as to why the TTX02 was consistently pictured without its Agni motors hooked up to the battery packs and controllers, and why in the bike’s various public showings it was never fired up for the audience (jump to 4:18).
To us and many others, this meant that the TTX02 had yet to be fully developed before it’s unveiling to the public at SEMA. With claims of a 130mph top speed, and specifications that matched or exceeded the TTXGP winning Team Agni motorcycle, we began to wonder how exactly those figures came to be on a motorcycle that wasn’t actually tested drawing table spec-sheets.
Clearly since that time, Mavizen has been busy in the lab making the TTX02 work. At their UK launch in the Bloomberg building this week, the TTX02 for the first time showed up with its motors connected to leads going underneath the bodywork, along with scrub marks on the tires. Now a couple days after that event the company brings us this video of the bike testing at low-speeds. Video and photos after the jump.