By blue2bikes
April 7 2005

‘Big bang’ engine technology is here to stay in the British Superbike championship, but will be banned from World Superbike competition. It is a subject which provokes differing views.

With the Virgin Yamaha ‘big bang’ engine now firmly racing in the British Superbike series, and with Stuart Higgs - the man in charge of BSB - not having received a single complaint about the newly configured Yamaha R1 engine, it has come as a surprise that the World Superbike series will indeed be banning such a configured engine from running in the championship.

Although present technical regulations do indeed allow this type of engine to take part in the WSBK series, it has been confirmed by Marco Della Monica, spokesman for FGSport, that they will be changing the rules to stop such engines from racing within the series.

There are differing views on why this is taking place, but it is thought that the organisers hope to keep racing bikes similar to bikes which the general public can buy, and the organisers hope to keep a level playing field when it comes to competition, and financial input into development costs, to help smaller teams to stay competitive.

The main modification to a ‘big bang’ engine is the camshaft, which allows different timing configurations compared to a standard engine, with the other modifications being altered fuel mapping for the injection system.

Although reliability has been an issue with the ‘big bang’ engine, Yamaha have changed the normal configuration of such an engine’s firing order, where two cylinders fire together - as in the two outside cylinders fire together, and then the two inside cylinders fire together, making basically a big twin. They have instead opted for the 1-2-1 firing order, which is easier on the engine.

Sean Emmett, Virgin Mobile Samsung Yamaha
• photo © Raceline Photography

Yamaha have always been at the forefront of crankshaft and engine development, and it comes as no surprise that they have come up with a configuration that works and is also reliable. No doubt it won’t be long before these engines are available for the general public to find in their new machines.

Stuart Higgs said, “We have known about Virgin Yamaha’s plans for quite some time now, and we considered their plans for a long time and finally agreed that the new ‘big bang’ engine was indeed within the rules, so we gave our consent. Some people might say that Honda have a large advantage over everyone else, due to the amount of testing time they have completed in the closed season, so I don’t see that the financial side comes into it.

“In fact, we looked very closely into it, and found the increase in cost negligible for the Virgin Yamaha team. Perhaps if the Virgin Yamaha was winning races by 30 seconds or so we might have expected some complaints, but we haven’t received one e-mail or phone call from any team with regards to the Virgin Yamaha bikes.”

So what now for the ‘big bang’ engine? Read into the above what you will, but you can be sure it will be around for a good long time, and don’t be surprised when other manufacturers take the same step to up the power of their own machines. It is my own personal view that bikes found for sale on the high street are indeed developed from within racing, and this is what brings the bikes forward.

Yes, some people may say that they now have an advantage over others, as the engines are not on sale in the high street shops, but do we stop development? Rest assured that if another manufacturer had come up with the simpler way of getting the ‘big bang’ engine to work, and be as reliable as the Yamaha, they would have done it ages ago.

I guess there will be modifications coming out to Yamaha machinery, which will be available to those who wish to change the configuration of their own bikes - as indeed there is going to be for those who own Kawasaki bikes that are run by the Hawk Kawasaki team, who will be selling add-ons for those who wish to change their machines.

Changing the rules to stop developing engines is not on, in my mind, as surely the rules laid down at the beginning of the season should stay the same throughout. Where would the WSBK be standing had a ‘big bang’ engine been running in the series now under the present ruling, which allows such changes?!

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To buy the photographs shown above, visit Raceline Photography