Firstly, Norton Villiers- a small time pirate who thought Norton wasn't owned or policed by anyone, so put "Norton" on some cheap and nasty imports and made up a hairraising tale on how he was rightly Villiers and hence Norton in his publicity. Norton America's lawyers stopped him in the end, due to my continuous protests. That is all history, and was a very brief exercise.
Secondly, the Norton "Dementis" V8, as it was called amongst old hands in the Norton company, was a total fraud. It was based on two (disguised- but compare the technical details) Kawasaki ZX7R top halves fitted to a common crankcase, something that people Down Under have done as a private exercise in the sheds of their sheepfarms. Its creator, the self-confessed "Greatest Engine Designer of all Times" has disappeared from the face of the earth completely, after leaving several very costly- to his clients- unsolved mechanical problems. As I understand it from reading an American judgement in favour of Kenny Dreer/Ollie Curme (Norton America) against the previous "owners" of the trademark in the States, it was the disguise/front for several investment fraud companies which used first the "March", later the "Norton" name.
There was a "test" in Motor Cycle News- I forget now if it was of the four-cylinder version or the "Dementis", which admitted the bike fell to bits when under way, and the then MCN journalist Terry Snelling admitted to me the "action photos" were made by rolling the bike down a slope without the engine running.
