Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
jkuenstle.de

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

9 pictures

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
gold & Goose

1/9
Current three-cylinder: Triumph Speed ​​Triple.

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
jkuenstle.de

2/9
Current three-cylinder: Triumph Daytona 675.

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
jkuenstle.de

3/9
Current three-cylinder: Triumph Rocket III.

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
jkuenstle.de

4/9
Current three-cylinder: Triumph Tiger 800.

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
jkuenstle.de

5/9
Current three-cylinder: MV Agusta F3 675.

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
fact

6/9
Current three-cylinder: Triumph Tiger Explorer.

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
jkuenstle.de

7/9
Current three-cylinder: Benelli Trek 1130.

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
fact

8/9
Current three-cylinder: MV Agusta Brutale 675.

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
Rivas

9/9
Current three-cylinder: Triumph Street Triple.

counselor

technology & future

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

test & Technology: three-cylinder motorcycles
Three cylinders are enough?

Triumph celebrates sales successes with him, MV Agusta wants to build on glamorous times with him and Benelli at least managed to come out of oblivion. We’re talking about the three-cylinder. Does he have potential for more??

Michael Pfeiffer

07/05/2012

Overview three-cylinder

For many years it seemed clear: the recipe for success for sales records must be a four-cylinder. Heralded by the long legendary Honda CB 750 Four, the Japanese manufacturers pushed one bestseller after the other into the sales rooms. CBR, GPZ, GSX-R, FZR, YZF, VFR, GSX or ZXR, a never-ending flood of interpretations of the same theme over and over again. Four cylinders have to be there if you want to combine power, torque and smoothness in the best possible way. A piece of wisdom that even boxer builder BMW has been using pretty well for a number of years.

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But like so many things, even the best gets boring at some point if you keep being presented with it. Therefore, in recent years Ducati and KTM have been able to stand out, for example with robust two-cylinder engines, as alternatives to be taken seriously. And those who could come to terms with a little less performance than the best turned to BMW for the Boxer, the Harley or even a concept that was already in the 70s
caused a sensation: the three-cylinder.

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance


Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance


Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance


Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Who do we owe the current development to? Clearly triumph. After some back and forth between row fours and three of a kind, Triumph owner John Bloor decided on a clear course. His brand should make the motorcycle world happy with all sorts of triples. Initially with rather heavy 750s and 900s, but then with the meanwhile rather sophisticated 1050s, lively 675s, 800s, a huge 2.3-liter triple and now, as can be seen in this issue, with high-torque 1215s. Now tens of thousands of triplets roll off the production lines for the British every year. Reason enough, for example, for MV Agusta to also rely on this concept. The super sporty F3 is the Italians first serve, a naked Brutale 675 will soon follow. Don’t other manufacturers now have to ask themselves whether they shouldn’t also rely on the magic number three?

Three-cylinder caused a sensation once before. Shocked at the end of the 1960s Kawasaki the motorcycle world with the ultra-powerful Mach 3. Wild 60 two-stroke horsepower from 500 cc, it couldn’t be more brutal. Suzuki quickly followed suit, with not quite as strong, but somewhat more reliable 380s, 550s and the water-cooled GT 750. The triplets were created because they were simply stronger than the twins that were widespread at the time. But four-stroke engines also came onto the market. Triumph Trident, Laverda 1000, even Yamaha made the world happy with the popular XS 750 and 850, robust touring motorcycles. With the two-stroke engines, Honda played the final three-cylinder chord with the NSR 400, with the four-stroke engines BMW with the poorly started and weak K 75. The motorcyclists had long since become hungry for power, the 95 hp, which the Laverda RGS 1200 pulled out as the strongest treble, was not enough for anyone more. Power became more important than sound and character. 100 hp from 750 cm3 or 135 from 1000 cm3 were just the beginning. 200 hp have long been possible with four-cylinder engines today.

Have we not now slowly reached a point where the performance of the four-cylinder is losing its meaning? Does it have to be more than 200 hp to be happy? Isn’t it enough if 130 horses served gnarled? In any case, the sales figures in the high-performance segment are not growing. With 100 to 130 hp, that’s where the music plays. Exactly where Triumph is with a multitude of displacement variants. And now builds one of the best motorcycle engines with the drive of the Explorer and the Trophy. With a great running culture and power delivery from 1200 rpm. So even where two-cylinder engines shake unwillingly or even die off. And yet with a good 130 hp peak power, enough for most purposes. And for which four-cylinder engines from super athletes have to be throttled again and mutate into relatively temperamental beings. It is not only from this point of view that three-cylinders can be described as the best of two worlds. There are also very tangible technical reasons for this.


Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance


Debus

MOTORCYCLE thought experiment: build a crisp seventy-five out of a supersport thousand.

To this end, MOTORRAD is doing a little thought experiment and cutting a BMW S 1000 RR, the most modern four-
cylinder on the market, a cylinder from. The resulting S 750 RR would certainly be able to inspire the athlete fraction. The Bayern triple would produce around 150 hp and could hold a candle to a Ducati 848 or even a Suzuki GSX-R 750. And how wonderfully this racer would scream at 14,000 rpm cannot be imagined beautifully enough. The larger displacement V2 of the Ducati could only be brought to this level of performance with the greatest technical effort. And the torque curve is certainly even more restrained than the 190 PS Panigale in the big super sports cars. In order to bring a 750cc Suzuki four-cylinder to this level of performance, one must also reach into the bag of tricks. Even higher speeds with a shorter stroke would be necessary, with correspondingly complex valve control and high friction losses. BMW, but also all Japanese four-cylinder super sports car manufacturers, would definitely have the opportunity to bring really robust triplets onto the market. Which, by the way, would also be ideal for corresponding naked versions. Against this background, it becomes completely incomprehensible why the Japanese manufacturers are still building 600 series four-cylinder engines. These expensive high-speed concepts could long ago be replaced by three-cylinder engines that are much cheaper to produce, as outlined above. Nobody forces us to exactly 600 cm3, right??

In the athlete segment, the three-cylinder could provide a changing of the guard and new impulses. Thanks to Triumph, the process has long since begun with naked bikes and travel enduros and, more recently, also touring machines. The next step would be for one of the five big ones to get into the triple issue. At least at BMW there were already such considerations. A small sports engine with 675 cm3 was tested some time ago. And the long-buried MotoGP project also had a triplet derived from a Formula 1 engine.

There are still few signs in this direction. The big manufacturers are still eyeing each other. The chance for Triumph, MV and Benelli to celebrate successes with characterful and relatively inexpensive machines. And to put a smile on the faces of the owners. And because we’ve seen that delighted three-cylinder smile so often, MOTORRAD recommends the Big Five to act as soon as possible. Three cylinders are enough for many purposes. And be it just this, to finally provide some variety again.

Three-cylinder info

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance


Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance


Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance


Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance
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Pictures: test & Technology: three-cylinder motorcycles

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

Mutschler

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

jkuenstle.de

Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance

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plus and minus

+ Sound full of character: No engine concept sounds so wonderfully hoarse, hissing and yet sporty as the three-cylinder.
+ Lower friction losses than an in-line four cylinder due to fewer moving parts. This potentially makes it more economical.
+ Easily drivable even at low engine speeds and therefore the best touring characteristics, no chopping and shaking as with large two-cylinder engines.

– Vibrations have to be combated: three-cylinder in-line cylinders require a balance shaft for comfortable running.
– No large-scale manufacturer engaged yet. So the three-cylinder is something with a certain exoticism and limited to a few brands.
– Top performance limited: with reasonable effort, 160 HP is the end of the line up to now. Each further expansion stage means breaking new technical ground.


Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance


archive

New registrations of three-cylinders in Germany.

New registrations

The number of newly registered three-cylinder engines in Germany is slowly rising and has now reached a market share of five percent. The year 2012 is heading towards a new record. The lion’s share of the triplets is provided by Triumph, and there the 675 Street Triple. Those who received a lot of praise in advance MV Agusta F3 and 675 Brutale are delayed after coordination problems in the delivery.


Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance


archive

Performance measurement.

Performance measurement

What would happen if you cut off a cylinder from a BMW S 1000 RR? The 750 engine, which is 25 percent weaker, would be able to compete with a Ducati 848 Evo with a V2 engine or a Suzuki GSX-R 750 with an in-line four-cylinder. And could revive such an almost forgotten class. Seen in this way, the treble in this size seems to combine the best of two worlds: high performance and characterful torque from the cellar.


Motorcycles with three cylinders at a glance


jkuenstle.de

Editor Stefan Kaschel (46) on the advantages of a three-cylinder and the fact that triumph and the triple are by no means self-evident.

comment

If you look back on things, it seems clear: this was the only way it could work – and the triple could only come from this corner of the world. Namely from Hinckley near Birmingham, where the charismatic John Bloor wanted to breathe new life into the British motorcycle industry with the old name Triumph. But it wasn’t quite like that. When the brand was reborn, in addition to the 750 and 900 three-cylinder units for the large 1000 and 1200 cc engines, the British naturally opted for in-line four-cylinders, and later, when the TT 600 wanted to enter the then still flourishing supersport market, the in-line four was the first Choice. The reason: With the same displacement, four cylinders can simply tickle more speed, at least without charging. 

Today it can be considered lucky that all the inline four from Hinck-ley flopped (Japan could do better!) And that John Bloor followed the old Churchill motto “no sports”. Only in this way could the triumphs unconditionally turn to the triple. And only in this way could one of the most magnificent motorcycle engines ever be created. What is meant is the 675 triple, as it stands in the Daytona in a very unique way right in the middle between two-cylinder and four-cylinder and thus embodies the best of both worlds. Regardless of whether it is speed or torque, whether it is a country road or a race track – this engine can do everything, and everything really well. No wonder he’s in his second career in the Street Triple as enthusiastic as a naked bike drive as in the Tiger 800 as a travel enduro power plant. Of course, the big Triumph triplets are great engines too. But the 675 is unbeatable for me. At least until now.

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