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| Stuart Hooper with his ultra-fast single-cylinder Velocette-based 732cc special, with his record speed of 183.37mph |
Hooper and his team of Velocette arch-enthusiasts have brought the bike to Bonneville as well as Lake Gairdner, and are currently, as far as I know, the World's Fastest single-cylinder motorcycle with a 'normal' riding position. A full 'cigar' body would likely net them the World's Fastest without an asterisk! As generally reliable as the Velo has been, there's still drama on the salt; imagine a 'hiccup' from a nitromethane backfire locking the rear wheel at 150mph...read on.
From Stuart Hooper yesterday:"The Big Velo has run another year on the salt at the 2014 Lake Gairdner speed trials and ended the week with a new record run of 183.374 mph ...295.112 kph
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| After a pounding on a rutted salt surface at over 170mph, pushed by the hammering pulses of a big single-cylinder engine, this chain has cried enough! |
It was not all plain sailing this year as dyno time was cut short by a last minute main bearing failure necessitating a new scratch built crankshaft. This lack of final tuning led to the first couple of runs being hampered by some massive nitro backfires almost stopping the back wheel around 150 mph. Luckily the engine is built like a tank and somehow withstood this brutal punishment. After 3 days of work searching for the correct set up and a salt surface that was very soft and rutted like a sandy motocross track and an engine that was starting to show metal in the oil ,a rear chain that was threatening to self destruct from the sledgehammer blows of the big supercharged single firing once every wheel revolution, the organizers opened a new track which gave us our one and only chance for a record run. The gearing was raised and the supercharger drive altered ,fuel changed back to straight methanol and with a last minute start line ignition timing alteration and fingers crossed we were off.
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| A mechanical tell-tale shows the maximum revs of the 732cc engine; 6600rpm. A 'normal' Velo engine is redlined at 6200rpm, but racers occasionally took them up to 7200, which is very hard on their roller big ends. |
With very little warm up the almost 100mph first gear launched us down the track with a light hand on the throttle because on an earlier run, almost uncontrollable wheelspin had started a tank slapper and almost ended the weeks fun..... I short shifted into second and again into third at less than 150mph and did not use full throttle until well tucked in behind the screen and the bike started to dodge and weave across the ruts caused by some of the Hyabusas and big cars that had run before me. The revs started to creep up past 6500 as the engine temps approached melting point and the Velo started to waltz a little on the soft surface as the final mile marker flashed by and I reluctantly closed the throttle on another year on the glorious white expanse of the Australian salt flats.
The question now is......Just how fast can a Velo go ?"
