Engines, whose performance could be measured in "objective" terms, therefore received the lion's share of development. Engine development moved rapidly ahead of chassis, suspension, and tires, creating a succession of design crises that required new thought for their solution. Examples might be Rex McCandless's twin-loop swingarm chassis of 1950, Tony Mills's wide, belted Dunlop Daytona tire of 1974, and the present-day elaborations of Antonio Cobas's large-section aluminium twin-beam chassis of the early 1980s. I have the book, but it's nice to have as a pdf as well and a good reference for those who don't know about it. In each case, motorcycle performance had ceased to advance because of specific problems that could not be solved by traditional means. In general, the innovations that have broken these deadlocks have been creations of practical persons, not of theorists. The role of theory in motorcycle design has, if anything, suffered at the hands of history, for the strange forkless creations of ELF, Fior, and Bimota have come and gone without solving any actual problem.
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