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Wednesday, 08 September 2004 |
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Page 1 of 4
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Trackside Wheaties by Mike Emery ~ Photos by Jones and Riles
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| So here we are, Homestead-Miami Speedway in sunny Florida, and Kawasaki's opening salvo for the 2004 open class arms race. The venue is very Daytona-ish, but with a balanced mixture of infield twisties and some NASCAR banking. Having ridden here before, I've got to claim some local knowledge, but this is a big liter bike compared to the cream-puff supermoto that I rode before. |
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Now this bike is a very important one for the big K, and whilst here, they did throw a little curve ball at us in the shape of a certain Dunlop rear tire not seen this side of the All-Japan Superbike Series. A ringer? Definitely, the tire was exceptional in its performance, especially on a bike that offered some insane high-side abilities and some very decent claimed performance figures.
Dunlop has seen fit to develop a tire specific to the 10R, called the D218ZR. However, we never got to ride a street version to see how good it was, hence the need for the secret sauce alternative - how naughty.
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First sight of the bike gives way to a warm fuzzy familiar feeling, and it certainly looks a lot like the smaller sibling, the 6R/RR. The biggest difference, apart from motor size is that new slim-line frame, it's a little unusual. It has a very slim profile that's not obtrusive in anyway. That bigger motor is bolted into an aloo-min-ee-yum twin-tube backbone that arches over the engine, rather than around it. Construction is a thin-walled casting with pressed aluminum sheets welded together for optimum strength. This frame spec boast lightness, excellent high-speed stability and responsive handling, yet is no wider than those cheeky little 600cc-class sportbikes.
Interestingly, if you overlay the frontal profiles of the 6R and the 10R, bar mirror placement, they are almost identical.
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Now plenty of manufacturers over the years have come forward to say that they offer an open class motor in a 600 package. That's never been strictly true because although these bikes have been light, they've always been a little bulky, mostly around the middle and that extra power has sometimes been a little unsettling (chassis-wise) no names, named here but that's just how it's been.
First thing you notice with this bike is the way it turns in, like a 600, and the way you can pick it up, coming out, like a 600 again, but with horses that work with the chassis rather than against it. The most unusual part of this bike is the fact that it's 5mm shorter than the 6R/RR.
Basically this is a 600, with a 1000 motor stuffed into it. Period. Shall I end the review now? No, let me heap some more praise on the thing, and then offer a sucker punch or two, read on.
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Motor-wise this bike also featured a couple of Kawasaki firsts. The engine utilizes a stacked shaft design that sees the crank axis, input and output shaft in a triangular layout to reduce engine length. With a bore and stroke of 76 x 55mm, the ZX-10R engine's features a one piece cylinder and crankcase assembly as an aid to weight reduction and increased rigidity. This might be a problem, as Yamaha has realized (and modified) on its own R1.
The trouble here is twofold, first it's hard to bore and secondly, if you ever bust one, you'll need to remortgage your house to pay for the new cases and the consequent labor bill. However, resident 2Dub expert, DaveW assures me that the strength offered outweighs any negative attributes, but then again, he smells of hamsters and his momma wears combat boots. |
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