Motorcycles

Lazareth LM 847: The 470-horsepower, tilting 4-wheel motorcycle you've been waiting for

Lazareth LM 847: The 470-horsepower, tilting 4-wheel motorcycle you've been waiting for
Lazareth LM 847: a machine that takes horsepower to the extreme
Lazareth LM 847: a machine that takes horsepower to the extreme
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Lazareth LM 847: front right swingarm with independent shock and rim-mounted brake disc
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Lazareth LM 847: front right swingarm with independent shock and rim-mounted brake disc
Lazareth LM 847: odd rear suspension arrangement seems to damp both regular suspension motion and any motion that would move one wheel inependently of the other - for example, cornering lean angle changes
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Lazareth LM 847: odd rear suspension arrangement seems to damp both regular suspension motion and any motion that would move one wheel inependently of the other - for example, cornering lean angle changes
Lazareth LM 847: reverse action levers
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Lazareth LM 847: reverse action levers
Lazareth LM 847: Panigale tail section
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Lazareth LM 847: Panigale tail section
Lazareth LM 847: a machine that takes horsepower to the extreme
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Lazareth LM 847: a machine that takes horsepower to the extreme
Lazareth LM 847: carbon aero fairings in front of the wheels
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Lazareth LM 847: carbon aero fairings in front of the wheels
Lazareth LM 847: a back end fatter than any Kardashian
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Lazareth LM 847: a back end fatter than any Kardashian
Lazareth LM 847: wide handlebars are probably needed to move that dual hub-steered front end
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Lazareth LM 847: wide handlebars are probably needed to move that dual hub-steered front end
Lazareth LM 847: rider is draped over a 4.7-liter Maserati/Ferrari engine
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Lazareth LM 847: rider is draped over a 4.7-liter Maserati/Ferrari engine
Lazareth LM 847: not your practical commuter
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Lazareth LM 847: not your practical commuter
Lazareth LM 847: twin chain drive at the rear end
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Lazareth LM 847: twin chain drive at the rear end
Lazareth LM 847: hideous and compelling
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Lazareth LM 847: hideous and compelling
View gallery - 12 images

Can motorcycles undergo meiosis? If so, Ludovic Lazareth's LM 847 looks like it's got stuck in the process of cell division. Built around a gigantic, 4.7-liter Maserati V8 engine, this terrifying tilting quad bike picks up where the Dodge Tomahawk left off, with four single-sided swingarms, rim-mounted brakes, dual hub-centre steering and a bunch of other crazy touches. Oh, and 470-odd horsepower tearing up the bitumen through a single-speed viscous clutch automatic transmission.

French motorcyclists have lived the last 30 years under a strange and annoying law that restricts all motorbikes to a maximum of 100 horsepower. Every bike released in Europe needed a French version made, complete with electronic or mechanical restrictors to choke it down to a power level deemed safe and proper by the local bureaucracy.

A French R1 would pull like a standard bike up until that magical horsepower limit, then crap itself and wheeze its way up the useless top half of the tacho like it had been shot. It might as well have been; superbike class sales figures in France plummeted because the experience of trickling around on these crippled thoroughbreds was just so depressing.

The spread of European Union road regulations is rarely something high performance vehicle lovers tend to celebrate, but in this case, French bikers have something to cheer about in 2016 – the 100 hp law is dead! Viva la mandatory ABS.

What better way to party, thought famed custom creator Ludovic Lazareth, than with a machine that takes horsepower to the extreme?

Lazareth LM 847: rider is draped over a 4.7-liter Maserati/Ferrari engine
Lazareth LM 847: rider is draped over a 4.7-liter Maserati/Ferrari engine

Lazareth's LM 847 is, to the objective eye, a conflation of impractical ideas, awkwardly overengineered into a hulking mass of unrideable ostentation that will probably never turn a wheel on the road.

If that's your assessment, fine; it's never stopped Lazareth before. His outrageous vehicles are about making statements, visual and mechanical, and in that sense the LM 847 has plenty to say.

The heart of the matter is a ludicrous motor: the 4.7-liter, 32-valve V8 from the Maserati Quattroporte, a 620 newton-meter bone crusher that puts out exactly 4.7 times the old horsepower limit.

Lazareth LM 847: twin chain drive at the rear end
Lazareth LM 847: twin chain drive at the rear end

One rear tire was never going to be enough to put 470 horsepower to the ground, so Lazareth supplies two, each with its own chain drive, and each on its own hefty single-sided swingarm.

The obvious choice here would be to suspend each wheel individually, but Lazareth has no time for obvious choices. He mounts a TFX rear shock transversely, in a fashion that looks like it will not only damp bump-handling movements that affect both rear wheels, but also any motion that moves one wheel relative to the other – for example, cornering lean angle changes. How this works dynamically on the road, who knows?

Lazareth LM 847: odd rear suspension arrangement seems to damp both regular suspension motion and any motion that would move one wheel inependently of the other - for example, cornering lean angle changes
Lazareth LM 847: odd rear suspension arrangement seems to damp both regular suspension motion and any motion that would move one wheel inependently of the other - for example, cornering lean angle changes

At the front end, there's another two giant single sided swingarms, each featuring its own hub-steered front wheel with a Buell-style rim-mounted brake. This time, each gets its own shock, as well as an unsprung weight figure that'd probably be admirable on a B-double truck.

Between the front and rear wheels are split carbon fiber aerodynamic shields that work together when the bike is upright to give the impression of a third tire … Or that the whole monstrous thing is just one two-foot wide piece of rubber.

Lazareth LM 847: front right swingarm with independent shock and rim-mounted brake disc
Lazareth LM 847: front right swingarm with independent shock and rim-mounted brake disc

One hint as to how hard that front end is to steer comes from the gigantic width of the handlebar poking up out of the airbox. Lazareth has been quoted as saying if he can't make something work beautifully, he'll hide it, so lord knows what that steering mechanism looks like under there. The bars are made even wider with the addition of bar-end mirrors (that'll be annoying when you're lane-splitting through traffic to get to work), and the levers are reverse-action, because screw you, he's Ludovic Lazareth.

Lazareth LM 847: reverse action levers
Lazareth LM 847: reverse action levers

Not a bolt on this crazy creation is anything like any other bike you've seen this side of the show-only Dodge Tomahawk. From the winged front lamps, to the rude, stout air intake behind the screen, to the incongruous footboards, to the fact that it runs a single-speed transmission with a hydraulic coupling and electric reverse, it's a complete original …

… until you notice he's stuck a Ducati Panigale tail section on it, virtually unchanged, and somehow made it work visually despite the fact that it's fixed to a 2.6 meter long, 400 kg, tilting quad bike.

Lazareth LM 847: Panigale tail section
Lazareth LM 847: Panigale tail section

Lazareth is a sick man. This bike is a sick experiment. I can't even imagine how a human would fit on it, let alone find the throttle stop on an engine so violently powerful. But I love it, and I'd give it a go in a second, and I'd be delighted to hand it back half an hour later, wide-eyed and trembling, to this French Dr. Frankenstein. The scariest thing is, he's surely elbow deep in something even more bizarre as we speak.

Source: Lazareth Motorcycles

View gallery - 12 images
19 comments
19 comments
ShermanAckley
While this looks interesting, it is nothing more than a play on the 2003 Dodge tomahawk concept....
WilliamLambWiegmann
it has four wheels, in the USA it is a CAR and will have to meet auto standards..that said, it looks like it is as ride able as the dodge tomahawk, which was not ride able because it couldn't turn...
gizmowiz
It's too big and fat and slow and impractical to sit on. You would be much better off taking the rear electric motor from the Tesla--470 HP itself--with one fourth the weight and one tenth the size and making a terrifyingly maddening rocket with the 500 ft lbs of torque. That would blow this thing away and weigh less than half what this behemoth does.
wanderkip
As for any previous negative comments, or those to come... "Screw you, he's Ludovic Lazareth". And if you had any cajones, you'd build your own damn bike!
dah551
The Tomahawk is a much more artful "motorcycle" than this one. It was more refined and clean not to mention more powerful. Dodge could register it as a motorcycle because of the four wheels and didn't want to do the work to set it up as a car so they sold them as art. Bike had to be disabled. Neimun Marcus was selling them for about 550K. The user could have it (enabled) again. It had a 2 speed gearbox tied to the Viper V10 and was estimated to go over 300 MPH though nobody is insane enough to try.
Keith Reeder
"While this looks interesting, it is nothing more than a play on the 2003 Dodge tomahawk concept"<br><Br> If only Loz had mentioned that. In the FIRST PARAGRAPH...
Douglas Bennett Rogers
Four wheel bank-to-turn is the outstanding feature.
Calson
The worst part about limiting the horsepower of superbikes is the loss of all the organ donors. Motorcyclists are usually the perfect donor as they are too young to have had damage from smoking or alcohol or coronary problems and with the brain damage they die quickly before there is much deterioration. Big "negative" impact when California enacted its motorcycles helmet law with the loss of young donors.
blitherer
With 2 front and 2 rear tires, it's an automobile and will never pass inspection or licensing in the USA.
ArtofSpeed
Just because you can doesn't mean you should, nice workmanship, but a wast on such a cumbersome pig.
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