1962 Norton Works Daytona 88 racer
Вставка
- Опубліковано 5 вер 2024
- Video is dedicated to the memory of Heinz and Karen Kegler.
This 1962 Norton racer is one of three built by Doug Hele and the Norton racing department for the Daytona race that spring. Specially built to meet American Motorcycle Association racing rules, it had to use a production frame and engine castings and kick-start mechanism. Engine had larger than production rod journals, bucket cam followers with longer pushrods and needle bearing camshaft and timing gears, right and left handed Amal G.P carburetors. Transmission was close ratio with "Daytona" first gear, the smallest first gear a kickstart would work with. Special alloy tanks and Manx wheels, swingarm and forks.
Bike was tuned and maintained by Heinz Kegler for 46 years. Heinz worked at the Norton experimental Department as a test rider/mechanic from 1959-1962, then moved to the USA and was the racing and technical head there from 1963-on at Berliner Motors, the New Jersey based Norton distributor. When new racing bikes were had for the 1964 season, Heinz personally adopted this 1962 bike as his own.
Heinz refined the bike through the 1960s, adding Carrillo steel connecting rods, Mahle pistons, Oldani front brake and a Shaftleitner six-speed gear cluster.
These 1962 bikes won the 1963 Canadian National Grand Prix outright with Jim Varnes riding. Before that they won races at Laconia New Hampshire. Through the 1960's Heinz and rider George Rockett won individual FIM road races and 500cc points championships. Heinz was proud that he and George ran the bike in the World Championship 67' Canadian Grand Prix, qualifying and finishing 6th behind Hailwood, Agostini and Mike Duff etc.. Bike was raced into the early 1970's with Chuck Dearborn doing the riding for Heinz. In the 1980's Heinz took it to a few vintage racing events.
Fantastic. What a bike. I need to see and hear more please.
Roger
Wow! Awesome bike with a very cool history. I'm sure you are proud. It's a beauty.
Thank you so much for posting this, beautiful sound.
Wow just wow truly amazing!!
What a hell sound! Legit!
Thanks, but there is no reason for me to be proud, I have nothing to do with the bike except for being it's caretaker until it goes to the next good and appreciative home at some point in the future. At this point we don't own these old bikes, they own us.
sweet norton dude!
Yes it is a neat bike, so is your Matchless G12, my father was a dealer for those and still has a few....
Its a good effort to keep this bike mate...awesome video
fabulous
very nice
best wakeup call ever!
beautifull
What camshaft did that use
Sure sounds good. How did it do at Daytona?? Had an Atlas for 20 years.
Excuse me, I would ask you: is better Norton Dominator 88 (500cc) or Norton Atlas 750 (750cc)?
Never understood why they didn't run these with a full-on effort in the IOM TT. I think it was intrafactory politics, the British disease :(
Tony Curr The singles were faster, that’s the reason.
Norton had been bled dry by the London based AMC group by 1962 and closed the race shop. If Doug Hele had been allowed to continue developing the real Domiracer project with the Lowboy frame and proper engine development it would have been world beating.
This bike came about as a compromise for Daytona because the AMA complained the Lowboy was not a production frame.
Murray, Norton DID run twins in a full-on effort at the 1962 TT but it did not go well. They had three Domiracers with wideline frames there, the lowboy frame was dropped after 1961 because it could not qualify in USA events as a "production" frame or bike as the wideline/slimline Dominator could, so it was a dead-end and they moved on. Rudy Thalhammer was to ride one of the 1962 bikes in the TT but he rode it into the front of a truck in testing before the race, a fact that can be looked up in many places. The other two bikes were tried by top riders including Minter but they opted to go with a traditional Manx during the race, which they were much more used to as far as weight distribution and power delivery. So it was not a matter of Norton not trying, it was a matter of bad luck and maybe not enough testing with the top riders on twin cylinder bikes. Three 500 twin racers such as the one above were of course sent to the USA built around slimline frames so they would have the best chance of qualifying under rules that said they had to be "production" bikes. The USA was Norton's largest market and cash-cow by far, so they dictated much of what Norton did in the 1950s and 1960s. Even if Norton had developed the bikes for years more, they would have done no better than the Manx, because in the early 60s the Honda 4-cylinder GP bikes were already out along with two-stroke 250cc bikes that were already about as fast as any 500cc four-stroke. The USA sanctioning body gladly and finally said the featherbed Manx and G50 Matchless were "legal" for racing after 1962, when the bikes were largely obsolete and no longer a big threat to the Triumph unit-twin or the 750cc Harley twin. I have minutes to the USA sanctioning body meeting in late 1961 that outlawed the lowboy frame Norton wanted to offer as a complete bike and in kit form, but if it was not allowed to race in Norton's largest market then it was a waste of time and thus the switch to common featherbed frames for all 1962 racing.
If anyone wants to get hold of me please email me at Nortonshit@yahoo.com. I am not a fan of UA-cam or Google so I prefer not to do any more with them than I have to. Thanks....
@dommiebroiler It is interesting to see any 500 Dominator racing projects. If you need any details or specs get hold of me at the regular email address, nortonshit@yahoo.com. Thanks.....