history
Friedl Munch became famous mostly thanks to his Mammoth bike which is now well-known in every corner of the world. This car-engined motorcycles built between 1970 and 1980, in limited edition, had multiple versions, starting with a 996cc streetbike and ending with a 1278cc roadster with 104bhp. In case you're wondering why it's being called a “car-engine motorcycle” find out that it comes with a car double-overhead cam inline four cylinder engine.
During the World War II, Friedl Munch worked as a mechanic at Luftwaffe and used to ride Horex bikes. Moreover, he even worked in a Horex shop building during the '50s. However, he couldn't create his own motorcycle until 1964 when he finally managed to produce a 498 cc bike.
Trying to improve his first bike, he managed to launch a new motorcycle one year later when he launched a bigger and faster vehicle, dubbed Mammoth. Although it was produced for approximately 20 years, only 500 Mammoth motorcycles have been built, but only a few of them could be seen nowadays.
In 1967, Munch and his new American partner, Floyd Claymer, tried to revamp the Indian brand and made a 500cc engine which was never released on the market. However, this partnership ended in 1969 when Munch and Helmut Fath, who won his second world title in 1968 with his own designed motorcycle, signed an agreement to work on new bikes.
Their main goal was to challenge the MV Agusta in the Grand Prix races but unfortunately, they only gained the fourth place. Munch didn't give up and struggled to set a new world speed record which previously belong to MV Agusta.
One of the ways through which he attempted to beat the record was the Daytona Bomb, a 125bhp, 1370cc bike which could run with a maximum speed of 174mph. However, in order to set a new record, the motorcycle had to keep the maximum speed for one hour.
Unfortunately, the bike had a tyre problem after only three laps of the Speed Bowl so Munch's dream looked quite impossible. Seven years ago, the company rolled out a new Mammoth model which came with a 1998cc engine with turbo system, delivering 260hp at 5650 rpm. However, the production was limited to250 models so only a few of them could be seen these days.
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