Flemming Graversen and GM dispute

[Humphrey Appleby]

24 minutes ago, uk_martin said:

Exactly this. If there is a patent infringement, let the patent lawyers sort it out. If there is no patent on the GM designs and products, then more fool GM. OK so patents cost money, but if you don't have one you can be copied. Look at the computer mouse...nobody bothered patenting these, and now anyone can produce them. The price you pay for not paying the price.

Patents only last 20 years though, and I'd guess the GM design is now a fair bit older than that. Any subsequent improvements may be patentable, but I'm not sure that you could basically stop someone building a GM after all this time. 

Edited March 19, 2021 by Humphrey Appleby

[fatface]

On 3/15/2021 at 11:32 AM, Humphrey Appleby said:

From the article, they don’t seem to be threatening legal action, and only issuing empty threats. So presumably the GM design is no longer patented (or never was) or the FGM one is sufficiently different.

Exactly. Have they patented the design? If so, it's an an open and shut case. If not, why the hell not? 

[Daniel Smith]

Just had a look at patent law, haven't gone into great detail but, it does say you cannot patent a product that isn't significantly different from anything else. 

So that would suggest that Speedway engines cannot be due to the simplicity & similarity of it's mechanical workings. 

GM, JAWA, Godden, JGM, Gerharx etc all legally have a free reign on each others equipment to make modifications and/or copies.

 

 

[racers and royals]

Google translation of latest Speedweek article

Can a tuner simply copy parts of an engine or an entire unit? GM sees itself duped by Femming Graversen and is preparing a lawsuit against the Dane.
The Italian engine manufacturer GM is a top address in rail sports alongside Jawa and GTR. But almost no one of the drivers from the Speedway GP right down to the B license or the sidecar class builds the engine into the chassis of their bike the way it comes off the rack. Most of them trust the skills of tuners who conjure up one or the other horsepower from the already expensive aggregates. That costs a lot of extra money.

Only the users of the engine from the Swiss Marcel Gerhard make an exception here. The GTR developed by the former long-track world champion should, according to him, be just as good as a fully tuned GM or Jawa, but last much longer and therefore cheaper.

The problem in prototype sport in rail sport is the lack of fixed specifications regarding durability, apart from a maximum speed of 13,500 rpm in the European Championship and the World Cup. There is no trace of the homologation of an engine, i.e. the stipulation of a certain minimum number of pieces per racing series.

"We don't want to tell people which parts they have to install by, for example, homologating a special piston," emphasized Armando Castagna, the highest track sports official of the FIM motorcycle association, most recently to SPEEDWEEK.com. And: "Our philosophy is that we open the market to as many manufacturers as possible."

The dispute between GM boss Vittorio Marzotto and the Danish tuner Flemming Graversen, who looks after a number of top pilots, especially from the financially strong speedway GP scene, shows that engine manufacturers and tuners can get into each other properly .

Graversen is said to have copied their engine exactly, according to GM, with which Marzotto does not agree and wants to file a suit against the Dane in court. In addition, the Italian warned the speedway pilots against using the services of Flemmig Graversen. You would never get original parts from GM again in the future, and bonuses for World Cup victories and other perks would also be canceled.

Lukasz Malaka, journalist for the Polish website “po-bandzie.com.pl”, asked Vittorio Marzotto how far the case against Graversen had progressed. After that, Marzotto would have followed up with a top GP driver who, according to him, worked exclusively with Graversen, but has not yet received any feedback. Marzotto expects the intended driver to be intelligent enough to make the right decision, because his door could close forever.

Marzotto also made it clear that there was no problem with someone buying their new or used GM and then hiring them at Graversen. However, if someone were to buy a copy of their GM, they would end up working with them permanently. Graversen would employ morally reprehensible practices. Therefore, GM's lawyers are currently preparing a lawsuit against Graversen.

 

[Fromafar]

33 minutes ago, racers and royals said:

Google translation of latest Speedweek article

Can a tuner simply copy parts of an engine or an entire unit? GM sees itself duped by Femming Graversen and is preparing a lawsuit against the Dane.
The Italian engine manufacturer GM is a top address in rail sports alongside Jawa and GTR. But almost no one of the drivers from the Speedway GP right down to the B license or the sidecar class builds the engine into the chassis of their bike the way it comes off the rack. Most of them trust the skills of tuners who conjure up one or the other horsepower from the already expensive aggregates. That costs a lot of extra money.

Only the users of the engine from the Swiss Marcel Gerhard make an exception here. The GTR developed by the former long-track world champion should, according to him, be just as good as a fully tuned GM or Jawa, but last much longer and therefore cheaper.

The problem in prototype sport in rail sport is the lack of fixed specifications regarding durability, apart from a maximum speed of 13,500 rpm in the European Championship and the World Cup. There is no trace of the homologation of an engine, i.e. the stipulation of a certain minimum number of pieces per racing series.

"We don't want to tell people which parts they have to install by, for example, homologating a special piston," emphasized Armando Castagna, the highest track sports official of the FIM motorcycle association, most recently to SPEEDWEEK.com. And: "Our philosophy is that we open the market to as many manufacturers as possible."

The dispute between GM boss Vittorio Marzotto and the Danish tuner Flemming Graversen, who looks after a number of top pilots, especially from the financially strong speedway GP scene, shows that engine manufacturers and tuners can get into each other properly .

Graversen is said to have copied their engine exactly, according to GM, with which Marzotto does not agree and wants to file a suit against the Dane in court. In addition, the Italian warned the speedway pilots against using the services of Flemmig Graversen. You would never get original parts from GM again in the future, and bonuses for World Cup victories and other perks would also be canceled.

Lukasz Malaka, journalist for the Polish website “po-bandzie.com.pl”, asked Vittorio Marzotto how far the case against Graversen had progressed. After that, Marzotto would have followed up with a top GP driver who, according to him, worked exclusively with Graversen, but has not yet received any feedback. Marzotto expects the intended driver to be intelligent enough to make the right decision, because his door could close forever.

Marzotto also made it clear that there was no problem with someone buying their new or used GM and then hiring them at Graversen. However, if someone were to buy a copy of their GM, they would end up working with them permanently. Graversen would employ morally reprehensible practices. Therefore, GM's lawyers are currently preparing a lawsuit against Graversen.

 

Marzotto wasting time and money .IMO

[Rich]

Is there any such thing as a standard, off the shelf, GM engine ?

[Fromafar]

1 hour ago, Rich said:

Is there any such thing as a standard, off the shelf, GM engine ?

Don’t think there is these days.If I remember correctly they weren’t very reliable when they 1 st come on the market.

Edited March 20, 2021 by Fromafar

[uk_martin]

On 3/20/2021 at 10:15 AM, Daniel Smith said:

...it does say you cannot patent a product that isn't significantly different from anything else....

Yes and no.

When you see all the patents taken out by Apple, Samsung, Motorola etc it makes you realise that even the slightest changes CAN be patentable if they result new or significantly improved performance, or something different to what's gone on before. One mobile phone isn't significantly different from any other mobile phone, BUT one tiny aspect of the latest mobile phone can be significantly different from the others, just like one aspect of the 2021 GM motor could be significantly different to the 2020 (or the 2015 or the 2010 GM motor) and that's what could be re-patented. Finding, explaining the and acquiring the patents on those differences is where patent lawyers make their money. Unless of course GM don't want to pay...

[Rich]

On 3/20/2021 at 7:33 PM, Fromafar said:

Don’t think there is these days.If I remember correctly they weren’t very reliable when they 1 st come on the market.

As far as I'm aware, GM engines have always come in kit form, then assembled to the riders / tuners own specification, not always using GM standard parts.

[Fromafar]

4 minutes ago, Rich said:

As far as I'm aware, GM engines have always come in kit form, then assembled to the riders / tuners own specification, not always using GM standard parts.

Would think there were riders who bought a GM engine ready to race.Could be wrong though.

[old bob at herne bay]

From Flemming's website (courtesy of Google Translate

The Dane Flemming Graversen, currently one of the most sought-after tuners in the speedway scene, is now coming onto the market with an in-house design: a DOHC cylinder head for the short-stroke GM engine. The aim of this new design was to achieve a higher torque in the lower speed range in order to improve the acceleration after the start. Therefore, the maximum speed is only 11,000 rpm. but an increase in performance between 2 and 3 hp compared to the series was achieved. The camshafts are driven by 2 chains, whereby the chain coming from the crankshaft drives the inlet camshaft and a second chain then branches off to the exhaust camshaft. The camshafts are mounted on one side in needle bearings and on the other side in ball bearings, which keeps friction losses low. By using light metal materials with very low weight and machining with the latest CNC milling technology, the weight of the The complete engine, as offered by Graversen, weighs 27.2 kg, only about 1.2 kg more than the production GM. As is usual with four-valve engines, the spark plug is placed exactly in the middle of the combustion chamber. The inlet valves have a plate diameter of 34 mm and a shaft diameter of 5 mm. The plate diameter of the outlet valves is 33 mm and the shaft diameter is also 5 mm. The valves face the combustion chamber at an angle of 22 °.

 

So he has built a completely different cylinder head  (double overhead camshaft ) completely changing the characteristics of the original GM, but re uses the the GM "bottom end" ?  Lots of tuners have done his in the past ... adding  new top ends to existing bottom ends.  So don't see an issue. Sounds like GM need to step up and offer thier own dohc motor  ? 

 

[uk_martin]

Didn't Weslake have a DOHC engine out in the 1980's? It never really caught on did it? From what I remember riders always thought that the SOHC was a step up in complexity from the pushrod 2-valve JAWA's and didn't want to take another quantum leap forward in complexity (& consequent cost) . I wonder how it will pan out this time.

[Sings4Speedway]

7 minutes ago, uk_martin said:

Didn't Weslake have a DOHC engine out in the 1980's? It never really caught on did it? From what I remember riders always thought that the SOHC was a step up in complexity from the pushrod 2-valve JAWA's and didn't want to take another quantum leap forward in complexity (& consequent cost) . I wonder how it will pan out this time.

From more recent memory didn't jawa release a demo DOHC engine that was being backed by Sam Ermolenko? All went quiet after they were found to be wildly oversized?

[Technik]

The Jawa DOHC unit was very top heavy & did'nt suit the more light weight riders.

[Daniel Smith]

6 hours ago, Technik said:

The Jawa DOHC unit was very top heavy & did'nt suit the more light weight riders.

Wasn't the other issue that the tracks had more shale than today & rider's couldn't stop the engines spinning to hard & couldn't never get the setups right between tracks?? 

Whereas today, this idea may now have substance with a better pull at the low end on today's super slick circuits?? 

[IronScorpion]

Is any one using the Flemming  Graversen top end or is the dispute still ongoing in what riders can use? I have not seen any pictures yet of riders using it & thought it would be more suitable to the British tracks over the Swedish or Denmark tracks although I have no knowledge of shape or size of tracks in those 2 countries.