In 1973 Kingston Racing Motors introduced this new British Worldbeater. KRM was a division of Steel Fabrications, a boiler manufacturer in England. The design was from Jack Williams, the man behind the AJS 7R and Matchless G50. Designed to compete against the all conquering Yamaha 350, the engine was an aircoooled 4 cylinder 4 stroke with double overhead cams and 2 valves per cylinder. Looked good, seemed possible but other than the article in Cycle magazine describing the launch, I don't think it ever went further.
I remember seeing it in the window of Peters Motorcycles in Hull. It was track tested, I believe by Dick Pipes, but was deemed to be uncompetitive against the then new TZ350 Yamaha.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment. I wonder what happened to it!
ReplyDeleteFascinating bike! But you've got to wonder why they'd decided to jump right in with a four-stroke four to compete against a too-smoke twin. I'm sure the Brits had the engine building chops to pull off a good four-stroke, don't get me wrong. But as to the Yam 350 even at so early a stage it should've been obvious to anyone that the brilliant thing was the simple design & the light weight thereby? If they'd gone after it with another two-stroke, we might've seen the ARMSTRONG twins a good ten or fifteen years earlier and at a time they might've been all the more successful, too.... To think, if they had developed this beast as a 500cc-650cc street burner, better yet 750cc+, it might've had a serious impact on the touring & Superbike scene in the decades to come! A beautiful lil' racer indeed - But couldn't you just see it with a luggage rack & paniers, candy paint tank & side-covers, chrome pipes with reverse megs ... well that's as far as I'll say 'cause I don't want to visualize it with buckhorn handlebars or a batwing fairing. Ugh.
ReplyDeleteRemember seeing this at a bike show in the seventies, probably Earls Court. it was hailed as the answer to Japanese domination of the time.
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