World Exclusive Drysdale History Part 2/5: 25 Years on From Creation of First 750-V8

Full inside story of the Australian-built V8 Superbike in limited series production for the past 25 years, plus details of some of lan Drysdale's many other innovative creations

- By Alan Cathcart

MUSICAL MULTI

1998 saw the construction of the Drysdale 750-V8 Superbike racer, for Motorcycle Motion Team riders J.J. O’Rielly and Andrew Willy to race in local events under a special dispensation allowing prototype one-off machines of Australian manufacture to compete in Superbike racing, by waiving the volume-production homologation rule – same as in Italy to let bikes like the Ducati desmoquattro, various Bimotas, the Benelli Tornado triple and the short-stroke race version of the Aprilia RSV1000 to be developed on the racetrack. Hey - if some creative use of the rule book is good enough for Italy, it’ll work OK Down Under, too! But after initial oil-surge problems ran a bearing on the crank at the 1998 Oran Park 6-Hour race (resolved by baffling the sump), the Drysdale V8 motor proved fundamentally reliable in the half-dozen other races it contested.