Building a

Record Breaker

Now that I knew a good deal more about

how and why hydroplaning happens, it was

time to introduce our planing surface to

our Suzuki.

HARLIE had created a 3-D computer

model of the planing surface and mated

it to a 3-D computer model of the bike to

see where best to attach it. He was making sure

that his design was millimetre perfect. As he put

it, ‘Five minutes putting right a mistake at the

design stage could save five hours trying to fix

the same thing in the workshop.’ I was reminded

of what my old boss used to say: ‘Measure twice,

cut once.’ Clearly, the same thing applied for

design engineers working with computers.

Charlie agreed, then laughed and said: ‘But it’s

still not always a good idea for a designer to be

hanging around a workshop when they’re trying

to put together something you’ve designed!’

C

The 3-D model was all very well, but to see how

it would work on the actual bike Graham and

Charlie made a template of our planing surface

out of cardboard to try it against the bike. At

Rattery in Devon, just outside Torquay, we got

together with fabrication engineer Dave Main

and welder Richard Mumford to turn Charlie’s

design into an actual metal object. Using the

cardboard template at Richard’s workshop, it

was clear how the planing surface was going

Top: Component parts

for the planing surface

cut from a sheet of

aluminium, along with

some welding rods.

Bottom: Electronic CAD

drawings supplied by

Charlie were loaded into

the incredible water jet

machine.

176  hydroplaning motorbike