Steve Bones
Why No Innovation In Moto2? FTR’s Designer Explains
Source: MotoMatters.com | Kropotkin Thinks - ... that racing starts in just one more week - Monday, 22nd February 2010, 21:11 GMTWhen Moto2 was first announced, fans around the world consoled themselves over the loss of the 250s with the hope that the new class would bring a new wave of design innovation in motorcycle chassis. As the spec engine made innovation in the engine department a moot point, chassis builders, it was hoped, could give free reign to their imaginations and experiment with ways of improving on the basic chassis concept. And so the disappointment has been considerable as Moto2 bike after Moto2 bike has been unveiled, to reveal the same basic chassis and very little novelty indeed. About the most adventurous in terms of design that we have seen so far is the use of a trellis chassis in the RSV bike to be used by the Aspar team, and that can hardly be described as revolutionary. Other than that, there has been some small experimentation in the margins of bike design, with slightly non-standard subframe sections and swingarm mounts. I was fortunate enough to visit the workshop of FTR Moto in early February, the firm who are building bikes to be fielded by Alex Debon, Gabor Talmacsi and Andrea Iannone in the 2010 Moto2 season. At FTR, I spoke at length with the company boss Steve Bones and engineer Mark Taylor. During our conversation - a full report of which should be available some time in March - I put this point to both Steve and Mark, and their response was both surprising and illuminating. They pointed out that as much as they would like to incorporate a host of innovations which they have lined up for the next version of the FTR Moto2 bike, anything they attempted would have been rejected by the teams they were trying to sell their chassis to. "What surprised me most," Bones said, "Was how conservative the Moto2 paddock is." read more Read article
Gowland and Moto2 FTR at NEC
Source: Insidebikes | Carole Nash - Thursday, 26th November 2009, 10:30 GMTGraeme Gowland will appear at the NEC bike show this weekend alongside the FTR Moto M209 he rode second place in the final round of the Spanish Championship at Valencia on Sunday. Finishing overall in 12th position in the Extreme class race, Gowland closed in on class winner Rivas by 0.6s a lap with six laps to go. The machine will form part of a display at the NEC exhibition by Dunlop Tyres, the only tyre supplier for the new Moto2 World Championship from next year. Gowland will appear at the show after proving how successful a rider can be on the FTR machine. After finishing fourth in his debut race at Jerez, Gowland was able to improve his lap time on the M209 and set his fastest lap during the race last Sunday at Valencia. Commenting on the developments made by the FTR machine, Gowland said: “Every time I got on the machine we made huge steps forward…we know exactly which areas of the machine need to be addressed. “We made some changes to the set-up in the warm-up on Sunday morning at Valencia which were better again and we had a good race setting so the options for improvement keep coming, the potential is clear. “Considering the machine only ran for the first time six weeks ago and some of the other Moto2 machines have been running since January I think the future for the FTR machine is really exciting.” The Moto2 FTR has garnered a significant amount of interest in the sport and the bike will continue to be developed to the M210 machine with improvements and tweaks continually being implemented. FTR Moto director Steve Bones commented on the interest and support for the machine: ‘We’ve had exceptional interest when we first presented the machine in London six weeks ago then when we arrived at Catalunya for the Spanish round” “That interest and excitement was repeated at the Valencia MotoGP round and I now hope the visitors to the NEC Motorcycle show will also be pleased with what they see.” Read article
