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To: BraveMan
Not to take anything away from this interesting engineering exercise/marketing toy,I feel compelled to pose the following:

1- Who or what company would be willing to write an insurance policy on this thing?

Answer: Nobody

2- Who is going to buy this?

Answer: Jay Leno, for one...and anyone crazy enough to "need" it.

If you can't insure it, you can't ride it on public roads. I doubt that it would pass muster with the DOT but does it really matter? If you can afford the selling price, chances are that you could also build your own road or airstrip to ride it on.

As for this machine reaching 250MPH......not likely without any kind of aerodynamic bodywork. If you've ever been on a "naked" bike, getting above 125mph or so without some kind of bodywork to slice through the air, your hands (and the rest of you exposed to the airstream) become one helluva drag. Just hanging on at 125mph+ on an unfaired bike is a feat in itself. Steering precisely at that speed exposed to the air directly is NOT easy. It doesn't matter how many ponies the motor can put out....without bodywork you MIGHT see something like 150mph. COnsider the following:

On Sept. 13, 1948, Rollie Free rode the first Vincent HRD Black Lightning to a speed of 150.313 m.p.h. at Bonneville. Rollie's leathers tore from early runs at 147 mph, he discarded them and made a final, heroic attempt without jacket, pants, gloves, boots or helmet.

The bike was capable but the rider provided enough drag to prevent speeds in excess of 147mph. He had to ride practically NAKED to get above 150. If there was bodywork...read: WIND PROTECTION, he would have been even faster. 147mph TORE HIS LEATHERS....wrap your mind 'round that for a second.

45 posted on 10/27/2003 2:06:14 PM PST by Range Rover (Karma is a boomerang...)
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To: Range Rover
....and I have it on fairly good authority that he had a BATHING CAP on in the above picture...that's not a helmet.
46 posted on 10/27/2003 2:09:12 PM PST by Range Rover (Karma is a boomerang...)
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To: Range Rover
If you can't insure it, you can't ride it on public roads.

Untrue in Floriduh! Just FYI. :-)~

53 posted on 10/27/2003 2:55:13 PM PST by JoeSixPack1 (POW/MIA Bring 'em Home, Or Send us Back!! Semper Fi)
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To: Range Rover
If you can't insure it, you can't ride it on public roads.

Actually you can but you just have to put a pre-paid insurance policy out .... you determine maximum liability and then you put that much into the insurance policy issuer's banks in something like an escrow account.

If you crash and die ... the other people you clobbered get it. IF you live long enough to cancel your policy then the company takes a cut and hands it back.

57 posted on 10/27/2003 3:07:53 PM PST by Centurion2000 (Virtue untested is innocence)
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To: Range Rover
Remember the Kawasaki Z1-R?

I had one of those things in 1978. It had a little bikini fairing with the instruments built into it.

I decided one day I would wring it out and see what she'd do. I picked out a nice, flat, straight country road, tucked down into the boy-racer crouch and turned up the wick. It seemed to get to 130 mph awfully quick, with a little throttle left over.

When I'd had enough, I rolled out of the throttle. When the beast got back down to 120 mph, I straightened up out of the tuck. Big, big mistake! The wind blast nearly tore me right off the bike. To this day, I don't quite know how I was able to hang on long enough to decelerate down to a reasonable speed.

That was my first and last ride over the Ton, on two wheels, anywhere.

I have a deep, viceral respect for motorcycle aerodynamics and how they relate to speeds above 100 mph. There are forces in play at that speed you wouldn't begin to imagine. I agree, the Tomahawk may well do 200+ mph. However, hitting the slightest bump at that speed would probably eject the rider into the windstream.
58 posted on 10/27/2003 3:11:41 PM PST by BraveMan
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