Norton Dominator 88
Norton Dominator 88 Background & History
The Norton Dominator 88 was Norton’s first major improvement made to it’s first twin, the 500cc Norton Model 7. The Model 7 had used Norton’s old ‘garden gate’ frame (with rear plunger suspension) from the Norton ES2 line of singles. The new Norton Dominator 88 would use Norton’s new, revolutionary frame, the “Featherbed Frame”. It transformed Norton’s 500cc vertical twin into a whole new bike, with otherworldly handling compared to the machines of the day.
The Norton Model 7 was Norton’s first twin-cylinder motorcycle. Like most British motorcycle manufacturers of the day, they had focused exclusively on single-cylinder machines until then. Triumph shocked the world with the release of its 500c 1938 Triumph Speed Twin and soon nearly every other manufacturers rushed to bring their own vertical twins to market. World War 2 intervened before things really heated up, but when civilian production resumed again in 1946, the rush was on. BSA launched their first twin in 1946, Ariel followed in 1948, Matchless/AJS in 1958, and Royal Enfield in 1949. Norton’s first entry into the vertical twin fray was in 1949 with the Norton Model 7.
This 1957 Norton Dominator 88 shows just how handsome they were...and fast!
Norton Dominator 88 Engine Design
Norton poached engine designer Bert Hopwood from Triumph to design their new vertical twin engine. Hopwood had worked under legendary designers Val Page at Ariel, and Edward Turner at Triumph. He had assisted Turner in the design of the seminal Triumph Speed Twin. Where Triumph used gears to run its two cams, Hopwood positioned the single camshaft in the front of the engine, chain driven off the crankshaft. Spark was supplied by a Lucan magneto located behind the cylinders and driven by a chain. For lights, a Lucas dynamo was located in front of the cylinders and also chain driven. The crankshaft rode on two main bearings (no center main bearing) with the timing side on the right and the drive side on the left. The cylinder block and head were cast in iron, and the head featured cast-in rocker boxes rather than bolt-on boxes like the Triumph twin.
The new Norton Model 7 engine would be fitted into the frame and running gear of Norton’s single-cylinder ES2. This included Norton’s ‘garden gate’ frame with rear plunger suspension instead of a swing arm.
The Norton Dominator 88, and all subsequent Dominators, used the Featherbed Frame. They're easy to spot because of that graceful curve of the frame from behind the gearbox to the rear of the tank.
Norton Dominator 88 Development
Parallel to the development of the Model 7, Norton was developing an all new frame, the likes of which had never been seen before. The Featherbed Frame, as it was nicknamed, (so called because of it’s smooth ride).
The Norton Model 7 stayed in production from 1949 through the 1955 model year. By this time, it had been supplanted by the 500cc Norton Dominator 88 which used the excellent Featherbed Frame rather than the old garden gate frame of the Model 7. In the 7 years of Norton Model 7 production, the bike went from being Norton’s premium motorcycle to becoming its entry-level twin, once the Dominator 88 and Dominator 99 and other subsequent models filled in the higher positions in the product lineup.
The Norton Dominator 88 used the same engine as the Norton Model 7. Now you can see that gentle curve in the frame in the right of the frame. It's a Featherbed!
Norton Dominator 88 gets the Featherbed Frame
The Norton Dominator 88 used the same 500cc twin-cylinder engine as the Norton Model 7, but now it was mounted in the Featherbed Frame. It completely transformed the bike into perhaps the best-handling motorcycle in the world at the time. The Featherbed was created in 1949 for the Norton Manx road racer. It took until 1952 for it to find it’s first use on a street bike, the Norton Dominator 88. The Featherbed Frame was built out of two 20-foot lengths high-strength Reynolds steel tubing, each bent in one piece to form one side of the frame. This unbroken line started at the steering head, looped down around the engine then up over the tops of the shock absorbers, all with smooth, graceful bends for strength. The entire frame was welded together, an uncommon practice at the time. Most frames were held together with brazed-on lugs, which were heavy cast pieces that held the ends of the tubes together. They were heavy and not very rigid. The Featherbed was the opposite, it was light, incredibly strong and totally rigid. The McCandless Brothers (who invented the frame) built in an ideal frame geometry for high speed stability and handling and it worked! Any bike with a Featherbed Frame could out-handle anything else on the market.
The Norton Dominator 88 stayed in production from 1952 to 1966 by which time a 500cc twin just wasn’t competitive anymore. Norton went through a series of displacement increases to the little 500cc twin, all the way up to 850cc! Next up was the Norton Dominator 99 which had been bored and stroked out to 600cc. The race was on!
The Little Engine that Could. It grew from 500cc all the way up to 850.
Norton Dominator 88 Books
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