Rarest Kawasaki Race Bike ever built.

Gosling1 · Post by **Gosling1** » Fri Jan 06, 2006 6:06 pm

What you are seeing here are photos from my archives, of the rarest Kawasaki racer ever built.

It is Neville Doyle's 'Trapezoid' racer, built specifically to contest the F750 series in the late 70's.

This motorcycle owed a lot to the KR750 racer.

The 4 cylinder design was really ahead of its time, with the 'offsetting' of the barrels to reduce overall width, and allow almost 'unlimited' porting revision as/when required, the 'canted' crankcases - designed to lower the CoG without lowering the engine in the frame etc etc.

The wheels on this bike were designed to Doyle's specs by Campagnolo in Italy, and were the first wheels ever built with the disc-carrier built into the hub.......common everywhere now, but in 1979 ??.....

This bike is still owned by Neville afaik.....

Philthy - looks like another trip ' out the back' mate

gizmo · Post by **gizmo** » Sat Jan 07, 2006 9:56 pm

So did it race?

Jonno · Post by **Jonno** » Sat Jan 07, 2006 10:39 pm

I like an engineering challenge, obvioulsy a lot of thought went into it's design and very interesting, yeah how did it run?

Nothing like the smell of 2smoke in the morning

greenmeanie · Post by **greenmeanie** » Sun Jan 08, 2006 6:03 am

WILD!

Gosling1 · Post by **Gosling1** » Sun Jan 08, 2006 5:30 pm

gizmo wrote:So did it race?

not sure - have been looking through my old REVS for any race reports, will post them if I find them....

Not long after this bike was built, TKA took delivery of a SR1000 Endurance racer, and spent a lot of time on that - it certainly raced, and was a great rig as well............will psot up some photos when I find the colour shots

Colette · Post by **Colette** » Sun Jan 08, 2006 5:41 pm

Interesting post there Dave, thanks for the history lesson

Gosling1 · Post by **Gosling1** » Fri Jan 27, 2006 1:28 pm

gizmo wrote:So did it race?

In a nutshell, no it didn't. Its official 'factory' designation was the 602 S, and it was supposed to be good for 143 bhp at 10,500rpm.

Gregg Hansford tested it at Mugello in April 1979, however the engine suffered from excessive vibration, and he didn't race it. It was not tested in Australia at all *afaik*. After the one-off test at Mugello, the whole machine was shipped back to Japan, and the project was abandoned. It did not come back to Neville Doyle........he was just about to get busy with the SR1000 by that stage.......

midorioni · Post by **midorioni** » Sat Jan 28, 2006 3:19 pm

Awesome early 2 stroke technology!Imagine slottin that engine into current body frames....blissfull blue smoke

gizmo · Post by **gizmo** » Sat Jan 28, 2006 7:39 pm

Be an alright go cart engine!