Now that I am back home from a brief escape to warmer climes, we’ll get the Test Your Gearhead Knowledge train back on the tracks again. Last we left you, the guys at Valley Head Service had contributed a couple photos of an old and rare engine being machined at their shop back in the day. As it turns out that little mill was a Rolls Royce piece that powered a Wraith from somewhere back in the 1930s or thereabouts. Believe it or not, a couple of you were darn close to nailing that one right on the head.
Ok, today we’re throwing a double feature! The first engine needs to be identified and we can tell you what it is. The second engine we have zero clue about so we need to be educated. A reader sent the second photo to us with the simple question, “What the hell is this?” When we responded with the same question to the reader, he let us know that he is in the dark as well.
Test your gearhead knowledge! Tell us what these two oddball mills are!
Top engine is a Honda NR motorcycle V4 for MotoGP racing. The rules wouldn’t let them run a V8, so they siamesed the pistons to make it a V4.
Matt is right I rememger reading an article in a technical journal about how Honda got the rings to seal on the flat portions of the bores!
Yup . Beat me to the punch and hit the nail right on the head . Honda’s MotoGP Big Bang motor
Triumph maybe?
The second pic is a TWN Triumph Werke Nuernberg (German Triumph Division, they split up some time ago and TWN was the name they went by after the split) twin piston single cylinder engine. I think this is the 125ccm, 7,6cui version.
The second one is something German……….From what I can read on the casting. Does the reader have a better picture?
I agree with Matt on the top photo. As for the bottom photo,the “twin”lettering resembles a Triumph emblem,while the other wording looks to be German/Bavarian.Looks like a primary drive enclosure on the left side,so likely motorcycle.Looks to be a two stroke,unless the cam is overhead.BMW,Zundap? was there some collaboration between Europe and England between wars?
First one NSR750 Honda
Secound a Norton……….
It is indeed a German ‘Triumph’ motorcycle, built by TWN (Triumph Werke Nurnberg). It was what they called their ‘split single’ engine design. See link below for more info:
http://www.classicmotorcycles.org.uk/bikemuseum/museum_twn.htm
Split-single two strokes were popular at one time http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split-single
There were a few Sears imported Puchs around SoCal in the ’60s. Jerry Kugels racing partned Big Red Holmes had one.
Too easy, Matt got it right from the start.
Velam Isetta 2 stroke 236 cc
Its a Rare 8-valve-per-cylinder arrangement of 1979 Honda NR500 V4 GP motorcycle engine with oval pistons and dual piston rods. The DOHC 500 cc engine delivered over 115 PS@19,000 rpm (170 kW/liter).
you guys hit it right about the Honda N GP engine, i think the second one is a Villiers 250