Klaus Enders Busch Chassis

[Eddy Wright]

Interesting discussion in a civilised manner. I have been itching to join in but decided to leave it to the youngsters until now. Two points I would like to make. Terry windle built a few TZ750cc outfits in the late 70s early 80s from sheet steel. They were much heavier than his tubed version.

JocK Taylor ran one of these chassis and thought the same, he was instrumental in getting Terry to go back to tubed construction because the sheet steel "Tin Windle" as they were known weighed a ton. (figure of speech)

The other point Keith is that Chrysler made an Imp Engine with a five bearing crankshaft way back in the period. This engine had a capacity of 1200cc both Brian Rust and Richard Nelson raced them, there was also another but the name escapes me.

I can not think why anybody racing a classic sidecar today would want a chassis made from sheet steel especially with the quality of the tubed chassis currently available, Unless ! They just wanted to be different and create a thing of beauty.
Personally I don't see a problem Sheet steel chassis were built in the period, if a team wants one then they should be allowed to build and race one now.

[RARING TO GO]

"As regards the Konig engine, it was the first of the 2 strokes that eventually sounded the death knell of reasonable cost racing, they should not be allowed into classic racing under any circumstances, they have a place in post classic."

So £12000.00 BMW engine prep equals reasonable cost racing? Holy crap its amazing what passes for reasonable isn't it?
Hi Mr Wright, I go along with your take on things, but I am disappointed you didn't mention the Konigs that raced along side the trick Imp engines inter alia. Why anyone would be "afraid" of a Konig spoiling their BMW track day, beats me, as they do have the reputation of being about as reliable as a 5/- watch and only produce 90 BHP MAX.

[kew]

Eddy, so you left it to the youngsters until now, what are you trying to say?????
From what I remember there were only about 5 engines built with a 5 bearing crank by the Chrysler competition department. I think they were all used by car competitors.
I think the bike that Richard Nelson had was Brian Rust's bike and it was 998cc.
Also Richard Nelson and Mark Camp didn't start racing until I think 1986.

As regards the Konig, please note Michel, I also said that I believe the £12000 BMW and the 1200cc imps were also not classic.

Signed
A very young Keith Walters

[666]

BMW's yes they are expensive to build initially possibly around the figure suggested but for that you have a gearbox, clutch, custom made exhaust,carbs ignition + dyno time. A full house Maney Norton is similar money but without exhaust and dyno time. The other consideration is reliability,the only time our BMW has broken in 2.5 seasons was due to eating a stone at lydden and the same at Brands caused by playing in the gravel trap. If you take this into account it makes the initial cost worth it, they are mechanically stronger than all of the Brit engines available. You can still buy all factory parts new at sensible prices. Most of the Brit parts used now are a little long in the tooth making them a little fragile. The next thing is chassis, we prefer to build our own as we cannot afford to buy ready made, Also unless you know the complete history of a s/hand chassis, has it been crashed and how many yrs has it been stored in in a leaking shed (you all must have seen some of the rusty crap thats been sold on ebay??) and as i was around in the classic period i can tell you that all of the dimensions used on new build classic chassis conform to those used in period. As well as building my own in the 60's and 70's I helped 2 chassis builders Mick Harris and Jack Rook, both of whom built bikes with 40" tracks and wheelbase in excess of 61" and s/car wheel lead of between 12" and 16". So can say definitely that all of the chassis currently running in CRMC Conform to the rules of the period. And please no more whingeing about money. There are three of us in our team,2 of us are OAP one having been on disability pension for 35yrs and the driver is in an average sort of job, we manage to go racing with reasonable kit!

[petercaughlin]

I think Kew`s point about "some" people spending large amounts of money on their machinery is very apt,he also says the Konig sounded the death knell of cheap racing,perhaps the parallel to this would be a "classic BMW", so were I a newcomer to classic racing considering a competitive mount I would require one of MRE`s excellent chassis`s at £13;250 plus Tyres and a £12;000 BMW engine, probably plus a bit more for other necessities, so looking at around £25;500 plus to go classic racing,perhaps I could be forgiven for thinking that CRMC meant "Chequebook Racing Motorcycle Club. Cynical Moi !!!! never.

[sidecarracing]

back again, especially after the last few posts where the Beemers are mentioned...

Who will give the proof that there were pre-1973, 1000cc BMW's(or even more, because I hear the rumours that the fastest Beemers around are 1200/1300cc) being raced...?!

I will give you the answer: no one, because they didn't exist...

Or is it that because of the classic class limit being 1300cc that any engine can be raced at a larger displacement as that they were raced in the period?

From my eyes only Imp's and Vincent should be allowed to race with 1000cc, because that were the two (widely used) engines in the period with such displacement.

Just my two cents.

[666]

back again, especially after the last few posts where the Beemers are mentioned...

Who will give the proof that there were pre-1973, 1000cc BMW's(or even more, because I hear the rumours that the fastest Beemers around are 1200/1300cc) being raced...?!

I will give you the answer: no one, because they didn't exist...

Or is it that because of the classic class limit being 1300cc that any engine can be raced at a larger displacement as that they were raced in the period?

From my eyes only Imp's and Vincent should be allowed to race with 1000cc, because that were the two (widely used) engines in the period with such displacement.

Just my two cents.

John,I think the biggest BMW using a standard crankcase is 1070, to get anything bigger you would have to move the barrel studs out for a bigger bore, that would mean either modifying the crankcase (welding the area around the c/case to be able to have enough material to move the studs and bore out the c/case mouth to accept the liner of a new barrel) There is another way, this would special barrels (a lot Longer) to sit on the top of the crankcase mouth without the need for a liner fitting into the c/case,you would need some very long rods, this would obviously make a very wide engine. I don't think anybody would do this. Or the other way would be a longer stroke and i am not sure there is enough in the c/case to achieve this.

[jkr46]

Hello Michel, i don't know answer to that, Howard Langham will tell you because he had that problem.
Hello Jason, Tony didn't ask the question what engine one in the CRMC his question was did a .... win last year. An sorry my understanding of Kevin's bike must have been incorrect. Ed bought our old IMP a long time ago, Ed spoke to Windle about it and Windle identified it. Ed took it to Rod Bellas and he Cleaned it up and replaced a few tubes that had a lot of rust build up on them. After Rod did all the work on it, for his thanks we entered it as a Windle Bellas IMP. The bike still has the original Rubber donut and Mini car dampers on it.

I spoke to Rod Bellas today and he would be interested in building a sheet steel chassis. He also said that a circumference of a 28mm tube is roughly 88m and a 32mm tube is 100.5mm. The bottom rails on a sheet steel chassis wold be about 70mm x 30mm giving 200mm. The sheet steel chassis would have 1.2mm wall. Tubes would be 1.6mm. There is more sheet steel than there is tube from the head so how would the sheet steel weigh less?

A sheet steel construction would make the bike very rigid. A tubular construction would allow slightly more flexibility. If you watch a F2 Baker or Windle in the Isle of Man they handle better over the bumps. If you watch an LCR you can see they are more rigid. My thoughts anyway.

From my understanding this whole post is in regards to the CRMC so that's why I said about the results.

Also that is my point with the handling if we're talking CRMC we don't race on road circuit's only "nice smooth" Tarmac so I would say a rigid chassis where you can fine tune your suspension would be preferred.

The tubular chassis is fully developed, the chassis builders know where the limit is they know how thin they can go with wall thickness and flex vs weight the tin chassis is all assumption I still believe with the right design it would be stiffer and lighter, the fact someone mentioned the cars were alluminium shows you how much stronger the monocoque design is. Now all we need is someone to stump up the money and let the challenge begin. Come on Ed! Lol

[jkr46]

back again, especially after the last few posts where the Beemers are mentioned...

Who will give the proof that there were pre-1973, 1000cc BMW's(or even more, because I hear the rumours that the fastest Beemers around are 1200/1300cc) being raced...?!

I will give you the answer: no one, because they didn't exist...

Or is it that because of the classic class limit being 1300cc that any engine can be raced at a larger displacement as that they were raced in the period?

From my eyes only Imp's and Vincent should be allowed to race with 1000cc, because that were the two (widely used) engines in the period with such displacement.

Just my two cents.

John, The biggest BMW using a standard crankcase is 1070, to get anything bigger you would have to move the barrel studs out for a bigger bore, that would mean either modifying the crankcase (welding the area around the c/case to be able to have enough material to move the studs and bore out the c/case mouth to accept the liner of a new barrel) There is another way, this would special barrels (a lot Longer) to sit on the top of the crankcase mouth without the need for a liner fitting into the c/case,you would need some very long rods, this would obviously make a very wide engine. I don't think anybody would do this. Or the other way would be a longer stroke and i am not sure there is enough in the c/case to achieve this.

This is incorrect I'm afraid john, there is a very fast bmw engine in the crmc and I assure you it's stroked.

[666]

I Have been wrong before I only said that i wasn't sure there wasn't enough room to acheive this. Who's using that then? I don't recall seeing it in a CRMC prog. Does this constitute cheating. If you don't want to say on here perhaps you would like to pm or phone?

[kew]

I Have been wrong before I only said that i wasn't sure there wasn't enough room to acheive this. Who's using that then? I don't recall seeing it in a CRMC prog. Does this constitute cheating. If you don't want to say on here perhaps you would like to pm or phone?

Oh no, don't pm or phone, tell us all so that we can hang, draw and quarter him / them.

[sidecarracing]

thanks for the replies people.

Just put the discussion of the bored/stroked Beemers a side for a minute and get back to the "normal" 1000cc BMW engine, BMW introduced the R100 in 1976 so why is it that these engines are used in pre-73 Classic Sidecar Racing...?

[jkr46]

It's all a bit off topic and perfectly within the rules so we'll leave it there.

[666]

thanks for the replies people.

Just put the discussion of the bored/stroked Beemers a side for a minute and get back to the "normal" 1000cc BMW engine, BMW introduced the R100 in 1976 so why is it that these engines are used in pre-73 Classic Sidecar Racing...?

I don't think there are any major differences. Its possible that they are just more readily available.

[Kieran Clarke]

Who has the stroked engine Jason?