Buell set up a large drawing board in the “barn ... - Whitehorse Gear

Erik was watching the ambitious Barton motorcycle, which costarredwith David Essex in the B movie “Silver Dream Racer,” whenthe TZ’s chassis broke. The Barton looked to be the answer to his problems,so he bought the Barton bike in late 1980. Actually the bike wasjust the beginning of his problems.The second solution got about as far as you might imagine. It wouldreappear after the first solution collapsed but we will get to that later.The Barton bikes had shown potential with 500cc engines but thelarger 750cc displacement did nothing to help their already questionablereliability. In addition, the chassis was decidedly marginal. Not todisparage Barton—after all it was a couple guys in an ancient abandonedchurch attempting the impossible—but their lack of resourcesresulted in a motorcycle that was not going to take Erik into the upperreaches of the AMA pro ranks. However, it was fast. Erik felt he couldfix the problems. He was, after all, very knowledgeable about motorcyclechassis design.Did we say the Barton was fast? It was very fast. Erik would eventuallyget it to 178 mph with a peak horsepower of 163 at 10,500 rpm.This was more than enough to compete with the ubiquitous TZ750 inAMA F1 racing. There was of course one small issue. Its very flexibleframe would wind and unwind itself under hard cornering. The resultwas unpredictable handling. If the motor had given you a nice broadpower curve, you could ride around the handling. Trouble was thepower band was about as wide as a matchbook and when the power hit,all the matches lit at once. Plus, it liked to seize—often and withoutwarning. The thing was a wicked, mean, and nasty SOB but when itwas right it had the power to kick the TZ750’s butt; a very seductivepackage for a determined young engineer/racer.With Carmine Vara, his friend and partner in the enterprise theycalled Ermine Racing, Erik struggled with the Barton through 1981 butthe beast was constantly breaking. Erik was constantly calling Englandfor parts. They persevered, intrigued by its potential.Then fate intervened. In early 1982, Erik learned that Barry Hart(the mad Welshman behind Barton) had gotten a job offer from Britishbike maker Armstrong that he just could not refuse. The idea of an actualsteady income was too much to pass up so he took it. Barton partswould become unavailable. Erik, as he likes to do, jumped in with bothfeet, buying the whole Barton deal, lock, stock, and porous crankcasecastings. He really had little choice. If parts became unavailable, Erikwould not have a bike to race in F1. Going back to race a productionCarmine Vara and Erik producedthese packets in an effort to attractsponsorship for what wouldeventually become the RW 750.They got no takers.21