Next, they needed some body work for streamlining so they called Kent Richie of Air Tech in Vista, California, and told him about the project and how they wanted to streamline the bike and yet show off as much of the engine and driveline as possible for the S&S anniversary bike show. Kent said he could help with that, but he would need to see the bike as a roller to get some ideas and match the bodywork to fit what they were developing.
The Bennetts were pleasantly surprised when they arrived at Air Tech, not only to see the facility, but the hundreds of plugs and molds they had available to choose from. Kent took some measurements, walked into his shop and came out with a Can-Am fairing that they could cut and modify and eventually use on the bike. Kent then measured the seat and tail section area and showed Bob a mold he thought would work with little modifications to the bike. With the rolling chassis well on its way, Eric and Bob needed to get back to set up the drivetrain.
As mentioned prior, the engine is an S&S 126ci TCSA engine available through G2 Motor Sports/Star Racing in Americus, Georgia. The Bennetts purchased a 4-inch stroke flywheel assembly from G2 with the pinion and sprocket shafts pressed and welded in place for added strength, then had 4 3/8 inch bore iron cylinders made to their specifications by Axtell Sales. To get the compression ratio of 16.1:1 they were looking for, a call to Victory Valves was placed and they had titanium valves made with flat valve faces to not only give them a much lighter valve train but also decrease the cylinder head volume by 8cc in each head. Next, Terry Stewart of Shaker Products who represents CP pistons took down all the critical information he needed, and picked up the cylinder heads to have them colorized, a process used to reverse engineer the piston dome and valve relief. Terry came back four weeks later with the finished product. End result, 16.1:1 static compression.
The heads were taken next door to Branch/O'Keefe Cylinder Heads where John O'Keefe removed the iron valve guides, ported and polished the heads, installed new bronze valve guides and new titanium valves. The heads were flow tested at 12 inches of water and flowed over 213 CFM at .800 valve lift.
Knowing the cylinder head flow rate, they had Cycle Rama grind some cams. With the combination of cam lift and rocker arm ratio, they ended up with .805 lift on the intake and .760 lift on the exhaust. This along with everything together the Bennetts figured the bike should hit and surpass their expectation of 200 mph.
Once the bike was all done and before it would ever see any salt it made its way to LaCrosse, Wisconsin. First to be part of the top 50 world-class builder show then judged in the T-Series class. The Bennetts took home First place bragging rights for their class. The bike was well received and as the bike came off the truck, Howard had said "This was exactly what we expected to see from you guys, hope it's as fast as it looks."
Once the bike did get out to the salt, on the first few passes the bike was running great, but there was a small wobble in the bars at around 157 mph, so to play it safe Eric backed off and pitted the bike. By the time this hits newsstands, the Bennetts will have the bike fixed and back out in the salt hoping to hit the 200mph mark.
Special Thanks To: Gard Hollinger, LA County Chop Rods, Mike "Fancy Pants" Hardin, Mark "Semericle" Etheridge, WPC Treatments, Performance Machine.
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