Granted, it's programmed destruction aimed at absorbing most of the energy from the shock and these are very violent crashes, but how does carbon fiber on a supermoto react in case of a violent crash? How dramatic are the scrapes?
I had a KTM 450 as SMbike in also full carbon fibre. Even the tank covers and the rear fender. I crasehd in 2004 more than 50 times with that bike and had no broken or crashed part.
I my opinion it is solid enough. But lighter than platic.
Even with the carbon rims I had no problems.
From a motocross view point, I would like to see the tank narrow. Going through turns and over whoops, the stock wide tank put's too much stress on the hip joints.
Carbon fueltank, very nice but difficult to massproduce for a low price.
We have started to make a mould, it has to be in 4 pieces due to undercut. We stopped due to high costs.
To make a one-off is no problem, styrofoam and laminate with prepreg carbon fibre. aceton to clean it out. 3-4 wks to harden it.
Massproduce is expensive. The company who does our casting with our mould for the rear fender is doing the luggege crates for Airbus and also part for Porsche, frame work for Konigsegg and so on, they can finnish the mould for the fueltank, if we get an pre order about 50pc we can make the mould. Price for the fueltank will be around 500Euro/450USD, if we can order 50pc.
Check out our fender at www.carbon-performance.com
We will show one of our carbon bikes at the motorshow in Gothenburg-Sweden in Jan 2006 in the Husaberg stand.
Photos will be availeble in end of Jan 2006.