Taking over from the old but reliable Honda 600cc engine block to power the Moto2 category from 2019 was not a sure bet for Triumph. However, after four years of good and loyal service, the results are more than positive for the Hinckley firm, which has shown that it has nothing to envy of the Japanese giant in terms of reliability. Building on this first step successfully completed, Triumph will offer a more advanced version of its engine from the 2023 season.
Obviously, the British block benefited from the advantages of a cylinder capacity of 765cc compared to the 600 Honda, but matching the Japanese manufacturer on its primary quality still deserves a hat-off, especially since Steve Sargent, Chief Product Officer of Triumph, said on crash.net that the engines were not always spared. As a reminder, the British three-cylinder is limited to 12 rpm as standard and its Moto650 version to 2 rpm. Or more…
Steve Sargent : " If you really want to test the robustness of your engineering, put it in the hands of these Moto2 guys, who are desperate to prove that they are capable of being MotoGP riders. If anyone is going to push it to the absolute limit, it's these guys. We find that the engines are abused quite heavily, over-revving to 15 (on downshift), and that's something we never see on a road bike. So one of the key things for us is when the engines come back every three rounds to be taken apart by Trevor (Morris, ExternPro), are there any components that are wearing out more than expected? Are there any components in the engine that could fracture or something? But I'm sure Trevor will back me up in that generally every opened engine looks new. »
This reliability proven on circuits on four continents has allowed Triumph to further develop its competition engine for the 2023 season and many elements have been modified.
The three-cylinder thus gains 5 horsepower and 400 rpm thanks to an increase in the compression ratio, but not only that, since we also note, and above all, a new cylinder head, new valves, camshafts with a new profile offering more lifts.
To cope with these additional mechanical constraints, pistons, connecting rods, valve springs and even crankshaft have been modified, which leaves little of the original other than the crankcases... At least for the moment, since the lessons of all this R&D carried out in the intermediate category of Grands Prix will undoubtedly one day end up on production motorcycles, as revealed by the manager of the Moto2 program for Triumph.
« We were able to show that this is the same component that we have been using in Moto2 for three seasons, which we know can live at over 15 rpm regularly without any problems. So this all helps to get back into road motorcycle development. It's also the same team that makes both the road bike and the Moto000 engines. We do not operate a separate racing department. This means that a lot of what we learn not only helps us think about where we want to take the Moto2 engine, but also how much of that we can bring into the standard Street Triple as well. »
