Contributor Tim Huber just sent me a link to a BBC Documentary about Japanese bullet trains. Great, you say, but what does that have to do about motorcycles? Turns out that Richard Hammond (the host of the program) uses a motorcycle/sidecar combination to demonstrate centrifugal forces and how that can lead to train accidents (specifically the JR Fukuchiyama Line derailment of 2005). But here’s the thing – neither of us can figure out what bike is being ridden in the demo. Can you?
The clip starts at 25:45, and the video I’ve embedded below should start at that point:
At one point you can clearly see a BMW logo, and from some camera angles it sounds like a Flying Brick. Other camera angles make it sound like a diesel truck, and it doesn’t help that the video resolution is so poor:
The top of the forks look like they’re from a late 90s BMW, but none of the bodywork or the gauges look familiar to me:
So, what the heck is this thing?!