Six-Cylinder Streetfighter Shootout of the Future: Honda EVO6 vs BMW Concept 6

There are currently two motorcycles that have six-cylinder engines, and both of them power big and bulky touring machines: the BMW K1600 and Honda Gold Wing.

Both engines are large-displacement, high-torque powerplants that create sweet-sounding exhaust music, and we’ve wondered what other uses could be made from these unique engines.

We’re not the only ones, as designers from Honda and BMW have both shown concept motorcycles built around these motors, making us wonder if we might one day see a version of either enter production.

Honda was first to the game when it unveiled the EVO6 at the 2007 Tokyo Motor Show. A “Pride Fighter,” according to Honda, it was a bold concept streetfighter based around the company’s flat-Six engine from the Gold Wing.

Two years later, at the EICMA show in Italy, BMW teased visitors with the Concept 6 streetfighter model based on a previously unseen inline six-cylinder engine that later debuted in the K1600 GT and GTL.

This year’s launch of BMW’s K1600 series strengthens the possibility of a production version of the Concept 6 becoming reality in the not-too-distant future. The EICMA show might’ve been BMW’s way of doing market research on the Concept 6’s viability.

With four years having passed since a public appearance of Honda’s EVO6, the promise of that model coming to fruition dims, but like the limited-production, high-concept 2005 Rune that utilized the Gold Wing mill, we could be pleasantly surprised. It could be that Honda is just sitting on its hands waiting for the global economy to recover.

With neither bike a sure thing, we decided — in the spirit of a good, old, black and white Godzilla movie — to create some science fiction of our own; to pit one concept model against another by extrapolating information from the current models they’re derived from and combining that knowledge with the limited facts presented by the respective manufacturer.

The introduction of the BMW K1600 series sheds light on what the Concept 6 is capable of achieving. In its current touring guise the inline six-cylinder engine produces a claimed 160 hp and 129 ft-lb of torque. It’s likely a streetfighter like the 6 would be given performance tuning to bump up peak output somewhere near 180 hp at the crankshaft.

The larger displacement GL engine (1832cc vs 1649cc) cranks out a relatively paltry 118 hp but a more respectable 125 ft-lb of torque. The extinct Rune used hotter cams and 12-hole injectors to achieve a slight power upgrade, but we’d hope there’s more oomph than that lurking inside. In terms of sheer horsepower numbers, the Beemer will have a clear advantage.

The Rune, carrying about 840 lbs, could cover a standing-start quarter-mile in 12.5 seconds. In contrast, the lighter and more powerful BMW GTL can perform the same feat in the low 11-second range.

Obviously Honda must contend with this performance imbalance for its EVO6 to compete with BMW’s Concept 6. Perhaps underneath the EVO’s stylized cylinder-head covers is a new DOHC valvetrain and four-valve cylinders, which would go a long way in bringing more horses to Honda’s trough. The addition of gasoline-direct-injection technology would allow a bump in compression from its current 9.8:1 ratio to a figure commensurate with BMW’s 12.2:1.

According to Honda’s press material, the EVO6 is to utilize an automatic transmission, with two automatic shifting modes in addition to a bar-mounted toggle for operating the six-speed gearbox manually. With the introduction last year of the dual-clutch transmission in the VFR1200F, we’ll assume that technology would make it to this concept, and, likely, to the next Gold Wing.

BMW makes no claims to advancing transmission technology. In fact, the Concept 6 closely resembles the company’s own K1300R, making it even more feasible that we’ll see this bike in dealerships as a pseudo replacement to the 1300R that isn’t imported to America. The K1300 platform will provide a base from which to construct the Concept 6 streetfighter, although a completely new frame will be necessary to hold its wider engine.

Besides the engine, the EVO6 shares little to nothing with other Honda models. The aluminum twin-spar frame on the Gold Wing is replaced by one with an aluminum backbone that uses the large engine as a stressed member. The EVO’s rear suspension is via twin dampers with remote reservoirs that appear to be sprung by air, leaving open the possibility of remote suspension adjustment (the current Gold Wing has an onboard air compressor for preload adjustment).

Up front the Honda wears a standard inverted fork, while the Concept 6 utilizes BMW’s Duolever front suspension technology borrowed from the K series. In the rear each bike sports a shaft final drive and a single-sided swingarm, just like their corporate brothers.

Exhaust routing on both bikes is highly stylized, with the BMW showcasing a six-into-two-into six system, each side featuring a trio of rectangular exhaust outlets. The Honda’s upswept GP-esque exhaust system appears to be a six-into-six format. It would be challenging for either system to meet EPA regulations, but some under-engine canisters might allow the basic designs to carry into production.

Visually the two bikes are keenly different from one another. The BMW is futuristic and stealthy in appearance; a motorcycle Hollywood would use in an upcoming sci-fi flick. Its “split face” design echoes a David Robb-penned theme seen in other BMWs, with the nose blending into the sidepods and carbon-fiber fuel tank.

The Honda portends the brute force of a refined muscle car on two wheels, assisted by its fattish 220mm rear tire. Its handlebars are positioned higher than the BMW’s. Of note are the peg feelers on the EVO6, perhaps a sign that it might see a production line.

"The completion of this model run doesn't herald an end to this fabulous motorcycle,” Honda Motorcycle Division Vice President, Ray Blank, once said about the Rune: “Nor to Honda's determined pursuit of bringing concepts to production reality."

Of motorcycles currently in production, the Star/Yamaha VMax would be the closest match to this conceptual pair, boasting high-end features and a monstrous engine like these prototypes. However, the VMax’s near-$20K price has hurt its sales, a situation that might give pause to BMW and Honda.

Resting on a 66.9-inch wheelbase, the VMax scales in at 684 lbs full of fluids and boasts nearly 200 hp. The K1600GT already weighs just 703 lbs wet, so the Concept 6 could easily match the Max. But for the EVO6, that giant Gold Wing engine will ensure an optimistic mass of just below 800 lbs.

So, which would be a more desirable streetfighter grande? We’re not sure, but we’re betting BMW’s Concept 6 will be the first one you’ll see at a dealership.

As we noted in our K1600 Unveiled article, “BMW would be foolish not to amortize the cost of developing that powerplant by including it in another platform, and we’re reasonably sure BMW understands that, too.”

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Source : http://www.motorcycle.com

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Posted in: Automotive,BMW MC,Honda,motorcycle

2012 Kawasaki ZX-14R Review

It’s neither easy nor politically correct to build the most powerful streetbike ever offered to the public for mass consumption, but that’s what Kawasaki has done with the incredibly potent new ZX-14R.

The ZX-14 has been a major player in the hyperbike wars since its introduction in 2006, becoming the only machine that could hold a candle to Suzuki’s mega-powerful (nearly 160 hp) Hayabusa that was introduced back in 1999. The ZX-14 cranked out a remarkable 171 hp on the dyno and must’ve worried Suzuki’s marketing department and engineering team, as they released a more powerful Hayabusa in 2008 with a bigger engine that produced around 165 horses.

Kawasaki surprised us with a revised ZX-14 in 2008, just two years since its debut, to meet the revitalized Suzuki challenger. While the Kawi remained the smoother and more accommodating choice, emissions regulations took a chunk out of the ZX’s top-end performance. Running excessively rich to preserve its catalyzers, the ZX spat out 10 peak horses less than the original.

his obviously didn’t sit well with Kawasaki, so they’ve now responded with the ZX-14R for 2012. Note the addition of the R to its name. Kawi’s engineers made a host of upgrades to the ZX’s powerplant, most notably by adding 4mm to the engine’s stroke that ups displacement from 1352cc to 1441cc. This 6.5% size increase plus hot-rodding tricks like hand-finished intake ports, more radical camshaft specs, a compression ratio increase and tapered exhaust headers has resulted in what Kawasaki claims is the most powerful mass-produced motorcycle engine in the world.

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Source : http://www.motorcycle.com

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Posted in: Automotive,Kawasaki,motorcycle

How cybercrime hijacks your computer

International police have teamed up with civilian specialists from Microsoft to inflict a devastating blow on internet crooks. Lia Timson reports. 
 
At exactly 11am on March 16, data centres in seven US cities heard an unusual knock on the door.
US Marshals bearing search warrants wanted access to the premises and their computer servers. Tools were immediately downed. No one was allowed to leave.
But the bulletproof-clad law enforcement officers did not conduct the ensuing searches.

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In an unprecedented move, they stood aside and watched as civilian computer forensic specialists and lawyers bearing the Microsoft logo on their tags seized hard drives and severed internet connections.
Their actions were repeated with the help of police in the Netherlands a few hours later.
In the days that followed the raid, more than a million unsuspecting computers in homes and offices all over the world, including Australia, rang for their masters in vain, reaching instead newly established links into Microsoft's internet security labs.
It was the audacious private legal coup that outmanoeuvred canny cyber criminals and the usual slow progress of police investigations.
A civil court in Seattle had a few days earlier granted permission for the world's biggest software maker to dismantle the world's biggest known spam botnet, Rustock.
Botnets are robot networks of infected personal computers - our computers - at the mercy of cybercrime bosses. They are used to automate the distribution of spam, viruses and phishing, and counterfeit drugs. They are also deployed in money laundering, online advertising fraud and bringing down websites, an action known as a denial-of-service attack. Most users do not know if their computers are infected.
Rustock had hidden 96 command and control centres in the servers housed in those eight locations.
At its peak the five-year-old botnet was believed responsible for 30 billion spam messages daily, mostly peddling fake Viagra, Microsoft-branded lottery scams and bogus news items leading to malicious websites that installed malware on victims' machines. One Rustock-infected PC was sending 10,000 emails hourly.
Viagra's manufacturer, Pfizer, provided evidence and a private cyber security firm, FireEye, intelligence for the civil action.
Patrick Ford, Pfizer's global security chief and a former FBI agent, told Fairfax Media the company bought advertised drugs to test.
Products pretending to be Viagra, the anti-inflammatory Celebrex and the hypertension medicine Norvasc, among 50 others, turned out to be generic drugs, placebos or a cocktail of wrong doses and chemicals including rat poison.
''We gave the courts something they could have a good understanding of. Not only people's computers get a virus and machines are compromised but it is bad in a health safety sense,'' Ford said.
He said innocent people were unsuspectingly drafted into botnets. ''You become an unwitting partner in the criminal organisation by clicking on those things.''
According to the security company, Symantec, Rustock's downfall caused global spam volume to drop from 121.5 billion emails a day last year to 36.9 billion. Last month it was still below 40 billion, or 72.6 per cent of all global email traffic.
Adrian Covich, a security expert at Symantec, says spam won't go away. There are at least two other botnets ready to take over Rustock's reins.
New Microsoft intelligence recently showed 702,860 infected computers, identified by their IP addresses, were still reporting for Rustock work in June.
It is a 56.12 per cent reduction on the 1.6 million IP addresses commanded before the takedown but those computers are not clean yet and infected computers are more likely to be redeployed.
Symantec estimates there are up to 5.4 million personal computers operating under the control of 10 major botnets at present. Waledac, Rustock and Coreflood may be down but Bagle and Cutwail are still active. Grum recently earned the nickname ''son of Rustock'', while Dark Mailer and Harvester have increased their output since March.
Even when arrests are made, crime bosses move their servers and domain addresses to other jurisdictions. The Rustock civil action was thus a masterstroke. Its conductor, Richard Boscovich, the senior attorney at Microsoft's Digital Crimes Unit, is a former US Department of Justice white-collar crime prosecutor.
Without a full understanding of how botnets worked and with no technical training, the legal eagle admits to being overwhelmed when asked to advise on the takedown.
''I'll be frank, I was really worried because [I thought] 'what exactly am I going to contribute to these guys?' '' he said. ''I'm not anengineer, you know, I'm a lawyer … I started thinking out of the box and it just came to me. I went back to the basics of law school to see what we could do and that's how I came up with the first legal strategy.''
He used an ex-parte ''John Doe'' legal action to sue unknown defenders without the other party present. Such action is commonly used to seize counterfeit goods such as luxury handbags.
''It was amazing no one had used the ex-parte restraining order [in technology] this way before,'' Boscovich said. ''The judge could've said no, but it was a smart calculated risk - you can't be too risk averse.''
Microsoft is now in the process of advertising in newspapers in Russia, where it believes the bot masters live, giving them due notice to reclaim the servers. It does not believe they will.
Eugene Kaspersky, owner of the Russian anti-virus software company Kaspersky Labs, said in May that cyber criminals are very difficult to locate. ''Cybercrime is integrated into the computer world like in Australia sharks are integrated into the beautiful ocean.
''Cybercrime is organised, but not like the Mafia … [They're] interconnected groups that trade information, develop malware by request, then infect thousands of computers.
''They steal everything from the infected machines, even software licences that they sell on eBay, they steal pictures, scans of your passports, your driver's licence. Everything that is stolen from infected machines is sold. It's the criminal economy.''
James Turner, a security analyst with IBRS in Sydney, said cybercrime seems abstract and hard to understand until it happens to you.
''Every single dollar spent on computer security is wasted. It's money we could be spending on roads, on schools, on health, but we have to do it because we have to defend ourselves. We don't live in a world of unicorns, rainbows and cute baby ducks,'' Turner said.
Meanwhile, in April the FBI borrowed the lawsuit idea and took it a step further in dismantling another botnet, Coreflood. After obtaining a court order to hijack botnet servers, it sent infected PCs a ''stop'' command, effectively blocking the fraudulent online banking transactions they were enlisted to make.
But others have questioned the leading role of private companies in such criminal cases.
Critics say Microsoft's motives for dismantling botnets are more commercial than altruistic. Spam costs its Hotmail service millions of dollars a year in filtering technology and human resources - and still 450,000 spam messages bypass its filters every day. Its Windows market leadership is at risk if computers run on pirated copies, or users believe it is exposed to more viruses than competing platforms. And its trademark is under siege when lottery scams branded with its logos deceive unsuspecting citizens.
But Boscovich denied the company's actions were designed to solely protect its market positioning. ''We don't know if you're running a pirated copy or not - all we know is your computer is infected. Our operation is not an anti-piracy program.''
Dave Dittrich, a University of Washington researcher who provided expert advice in the lawsuit, said other technology companies should consider similar action. He had helped Microsoft take down the smaller Waledac botnet last year, a process used as a test case for Rustock.
''This is a model that is very expensive, very time-consuming and requires close collaboration with experts and academics,'' Dittrich said. ''But it is a sustainable model and I'm hopeful the [technology] community will start adopting it.''
A spokesperson for the Attorney-General's Department said 16,464 computers had been compromised each day in Australia in 2010-11, up from 11,215 the previous year.
The Australian Federal Police's Detective Superintendent Sharon McTavish, who is seconded to the Microsoft DCU in Redmond, said Australians were not immune to cybercrime. ''Ultimately the consumer is a threat to themselves. They are opening, there are clicking.''
Next week top lawmakers of Australia, the US, Britain, Canada and New Zealand will meet in Sydney to discuss how to respond to the growing threat posed by cybercrime.
Turner said it was idealistic to leave it to law enforcement alone.
''Sadly, they are not fully funded,'' he said. ''It is also unrealistic to expect computer users to always be right in defending themselves. We should be able to depend on software vendors, ISPs and law enforcement together.''
Microsoft admits to ''an aggressive roadmap'' to attack botnets but wants others to share the load. While the names Google and Apple do not cross their lips, Boscovich would like the industry to do more.

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Source : http://www.smh.com.au/

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Posted in: Computers,Technology