Lightning Bolt is an American-built
streamliner motorcycle that held the
motorcycle land-speed record
The motorcycle land-speed record is the fastest speed achieved by a motorcycle on land. It is standardized as the speed over a course of fixed length, averaged over two runs in opposite directions. AMA National Land Speed Records requires 2 passes ...
from 1978, when
Don Vesco
Don Vesco (April 8, 1939 – December 16, 2002) was an American businessman and motorcycle racer who held multiple motorcycle land-speed and wheel-driven land speed records. In his lifetime, he set 18 motorcycle and 6 automobile speed records.
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rode it to , until 1990. It was also the fastest vehicle participating in the 1978 Bonneville
Speed Week
Bonneville Speedway (also known as the Bonneville Salt Flats Race Track) is an area of the Bonneville Salt Flats northeast of Wendover, Utah, that is marked out for motor sports. It is particularly noted as the venue for numerous land speed recor ...
with a one-way run. It was powered by twin
turbocharged inline-4 engines sourced from a
Kawasaki Kz1000
The Kawasaki Kz1000 or Z1000 is a motorcycle made in Japan by Kawasaki, manufacturing commenced in September 1976 for the 1977 model year. The Z1000A1 was an upgraded model to replace the 1976 Kawasaki KZ900 (Z900), which in turn replaced the Z1 ...
, with a combined displacement of 2,032 cc. The near-stock engines were linked at both ends of their cranks by two
Gilmer belt
A toothed belt; timing belt; cogged belt; cog belt; or synchronous belt is a flexible belt with teeth moulded onto its inner surface. Toothed belts are usually designed to run over matching toothed pulleys or sprockets. Toothed belts are used in ...
s and utilized the rear engine's gearbox.
Lightning Bolt was apparently succeeded by another streamliner based on two turbocharged six-cylinder Kawasaki motors (probably from the early-1980s
Kawasaki Z1300) that did not set records. Vesco turned his attention to automobile land speed racing in the 1990s with a six-wheel car called "Skytracker" that Vesco described as a "cross between a car and a motorcycle", then his final vehicle, the land speed record-setting #111
Turbinator.
Notes
References
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See also
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Motorcycle land-speed record
The motorcycle land-speed record is the fastest speed achieved by a motorcycle on land. It is standardized as the speed over a course of fixed length, averaged over two runs in opposite directions. AMA National Land Speed Records requires 2 passes ...
External links
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Motorcycles of the United States
Land speed record motorcycles
Feet forwards motorcycles
Streamliner motorcycles
Motorcycles designed by Don Vesco
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