I spoke to the three-time ACU Top Fuel Bike Champion Phil Baimbridge six years ago. During our chat, Phil said he was going to start building a new fuel bike and had a budget and a timescale of five years, in which he wanted to run the bike in the five second zone. The engine that was going to power the bike was not a four cylinder or a two cylinder, but a three cylinder, based on a Triumph Rocket 3 engine. This would be the first three cylinder in the world to power a nitro burning Top Fuel bike in Drag Racing.
Back in the 80s (1987) when Puma came into the Drag racing world of Top Fuel Bike. Phil Baimbridge, Brachtvogel brothers and Henk Vink were the first teams to have the production of the Puma crankcases. It was Phil who first run the Puma set up. Phil designed the cylinder head for the engine. Phil sold the bike to Steve Woollatt in 1989 and Woollatt still competes with the bike and still has that cylinder head on the engine 33 years later. During that period, it has had new Bronze Alloy Skulls fitted and the bike has won many championships in the ACU.
Phil contacted Al Smith to fabricate the chassis, tanks, wheelie bars, exhaust and other small components. Al has raced two cylinder powered engines, since his sprinting days of 1988. Two years later he raced in the Ultimate Street Championship in the Twin class at Avon Park. In 1992 he became a founder member of NAST.
So work started in 2015 and with no baseline for a three cylinder Top Fuel Bike. Neill Curtis did a lot of machine work on the race bike parts. Phil designed the cylinder head, manifold, injector and clutch. Bob Brookes also helped on the parts. The transmission was a two speed BJ. It was May 2017 that the engine was first fired up on petrol and then nitro. The first test was in July 2017 at Shakespeare County. The following year the bike was taken to Santa Pod to RWYB meetings, but the bike had too much power for the track conditions. In 2019 the team entered a BMW event for testing and Al got his licence with a time of 6.6secs. Later that year Al entered their first competition, final round of the European FIM Championships at the European Finals at Santa Pod. What a dream debut and a shock to the world with a runner up finish and a time of 6.27. In 2020 Bob Brookes left the team and Andy Kirk joined.
In 2021 Al won the Summernationals and almost won the ACU Top Fuel Bike Championship finishing runner up to Steve Woollatt running a personal best of 6.012 at the National Finals.
In September 2022 history was made at the National Finals during qualifying at Santa Pod in the ACU Championships. After doing a pass on test day, the team changed the clutch set up for qualifying. The bike left the start line and at the 1/8mile 3.85-196mph p/b. Al got to the end of the track and thought it was an easy pass low 6secs. The top end crew asked what he thought he’d run, Al said low 6s. No! He was told 5.932 at 230.08mph. The team were over the moon and even Phil Baimbridge had a big smile in the pits. It had taken a little longer, but Baimbridge had achieve his dream, having the first three cylinder powered engine to run a five-second pass at over 230plus mph. It is a great achievement for British Engineering.
Phil would like to thank, Al and Julie Smith, Neill Curtis, Bob Brookes and Andy Kirk for all their help and support. That is not the end of the story. Modifications are being done for 2023 season and maybe compete in Sweden.
Report by Steven Moxley