Needs a life
Full throttle!
Posts: One MEEEEEELLION
posted June 25, 2006 09:05 AM
2006 Kawasaki ZZR1400
Kawasaki's ZZR1100 and ZZR1400 -respectively the first and last words
in speed, power and distance. PB rides the old to meet the new...
Words Dale Lomas Photography Gary Freeman. Jason Critchell
Flat on the tank
Head bobbing, dipping behind the screen for
a few seconds before emerging for a better
view of the autobahn ahead. I'm trading
aerodynamic efficiency for a longer, less
hospitalised life. The power is awesome, the
speed incredible. I'm doing a mile every 20
or so seconds. A police officer would point
out that in the time it takes to move my
fingers from the bar to the brake lever
I could have penetrated two buses full of
nuns and orphans. The pieces from the
explosion would actually burst into flames
spontaneously as they tear through the
atmosphere, probably. All this, and more,
goes through my head a dozen times every
second. But 1 just don't care.
This is legal. This is real.
This is why PB loves ZZRs.
No, this isn't the new, 200bhp-at-the-spec-sheet ZZR1400. This is the gritty, lumpy and thoroughly unsanitised 1990-version. The original ZZR, on its way to visit its 2006 offspring. I love it and I hate it in one great, big, ambivalent, emotional gush.
Bought from the small ads for just £975 with a year's MoT, this is a piece of history. Well, the kudos and strata upon strata of flies and grime are the only history this bike has got, to be honest. But one major service later, new fork seals and new tyres included, and the old bruiser just shines on through.
We've covered 1457 miles up to this point. In just two days. First there was a mercy dash shipment of fireproof suits to the Classic Bol d'Or (see p77), then there was the GPS-guided cross-country thrash from Magny Cours up to the German border.
Now we're on the autobahn heading past Ramstein US Air Force Base, soft panniers swaying in the 160mph slipstream. Cordura one-piece inflating like a crisp bag.
The 5-Series Beemer is nothing but a twinkly blip in the ZZR's Hubble-like mirrors. The 911 is a trickier proposition though. We're deadlocked. The ZZR is pinned by the headwind at 166mph, the 911 likewise. I wonder whether the US Air Force are picking us up on the radar as the elevated highway turns north. The headwind is receding. The speedo's climbing, and I commit to overtaking the Porsche. Flash. See my indicator? We're coming past.
ZZR1100 meets ZZR1400 >
We've arrived
Arriving at Nierstein, on the Rhine no less, at a Best Western hotel bedecked in Kawasaki flags, I roll around the back and find a line of 2006 ZZR1400s and a gaggle of Japanese engineers armed with polishing rags. The old black-and-blue ZZR1100 turns heads as we trundle past. I impudently pull to a stop at the end of the shiny line.
I'm immediately approached by Yuji Horiuchi, Project Leader of the ZZR 1400. He's keen to shake my hand. Back in 1988 he designed the ram-ad system and airbox of the first ZZR, now he's the Project Leader for the ZZR 1400. Horiuchi and I spend some quality time comparing the old bike with the new.
The differences are obvious, the similarities more subtle. Back in the day, this ZZR was built to be Kawasaki's fastest ever bike. Over the years this philosophy was contaminated as the legend turned into a bastardised tourer. The ZZR 1200 appears in my mind and then trips off my tongue into the flamethrower gaze of Kawasaki's big man.
'The new bike captures the spirit of the ZZR,' exclaims Horiuchi-san.' It is not like the 1200. We have built this as the benchmark. The flagship. This is Kawasaki.'
Big silver panels allow access to inside of airbox-cum-chassis.
The black bubble in the left one is the intake air temperature sensor
Ram-air
Kawasaki introduced ram-air on the 1990 ZZR1100. But gone is the peashooter intake of the old bike. Replaced with this baby-eating monster. Even Kawasaki aren't willing to credit it with more than a 10bhp boost though.
> RIDING IT
The most amazing thing about the new ZZR is the lack of ferocity below 5000rpm. Under this it feels like a pussycat. No worries about highsiding it at 5mph, for example. In fact, leaving the ZZR1100 at the hotel and sliding through the rush-hour traffic of Nierstein on the new 1400, it's hard to believe this is a new, high technology engine. The old 1100 feels like a monster. The carburation on the old bike is, well, carburation for a start. From carburetors. It's smooth, organic and torquey enough to spin the 170-section tyre if you're not careful You know you're riding a powerful bike when you tootle the 1100 around.
By contrast the 1400 feels like one of those big-capacity, small-output bikes that manufacturers pitch at the size-conscious Japanese market. All weight, no torque.
Then we hit the ring-road. And the power step at 6000rpm is more like a sheer power cliff, ascending a thousand feet into the clouds. This isn't a bike. It's a personal teleporter, the likes of which shouldn't be available to the bike-buying public.
On-cam, as my dad likes to call it, the ZZR is an unstoppable force. Between the 110 lb-ft peak torque at 7500rpm and the probable 170bhp at 10,000rpm, vision narrows and breathing slows. There are few places on Earth where you can explore these rev ranges at wide-open-throttle. The A63 autobahn to Frankfurt is one of them. And about 20 miles of concrete disappears behind us in under seven minutes. Effortless would be a misnomer - the concentration required to use this power is draining. But it's satisfying and life - affirming.
> Exhaust
Simple 4-2 system uses two catalysers and weighs the same as a 1948 Ural outfit. Ditch it, find power, lose weight. You know that 187.5bhp isn't enough. Do it.
' If you want to see for yourself how fast the ZZR1400 is, go to http://video.google.com and type PBS14 into the search box
Kawasaki ZZR1400
> Radial-mount four-piston calipers
Diminutive calipers are further dwarfed by the bulk they're in charge of stopping. But they work well. ABS version seen here will not be sold in the UK -thank God. Some ABS systems are really good. This one isn't.
>RIDING IT
When it comes to circuit stuff. the smaller ZX-10R will most definitely stuff the 1400. And the 12R will probably beat it too. But where the 1400 excels is at 170mph, cranked over, crossing catseyes. The stability is impressive, as is the turning speed. Ground clearance isn't amazing but it's more than adequate for what 99 per cent of riders would demand. Certainly it's enough to scrape a slider without decking out. The suspension itself is far less track focused than the ZX-12R and the harsh compression damping is nowhere to be found. The fully adjustable upside-down forks also carry some fantastically powerful four-piston radial-mount calipers.
Interestingly, the swingarm looks meaty, but it's designed to carry less rigidity than previous versions fitted to the 12R. All this is in aid of the aforementioned excellent stability.
Scooting down the fast lane of the autobahn at around 150mph, the throttle open a mere whiff, t he ZZR feels comfortable. Even as the grass bankings are replaced with the weathered struts of a massive valleyspanning bridge. There's metal rimmed gaps every hundred meters, the sort of thing that normally makes your sphincter twitch at speed. But it's no bother. Neither were the mountain roads this morning. On the roads and twisties, the ZZR is well designed and more than adequate. At high speeds it excels.
> 190-section rear tyre
Standard fitment is a Bridgestone BT-014, but not a stock type. The type': is specific to the ZZ R1400, designed for 'really fat bikes going really fast' is what Bridgestone didn't say.
> Retrospect
Ground-breaking in the 90s. Iconic 16 years later
Words Jim Moore Illustrations Kay Lee
ONE WORD summed up the ZZR 1100's performance for PB in 1990. 'Shattering.' At the time Kawasaki's new flagship was 10mph upon its predecessor, the ZX-10, and a massive 16mph faster than Honda's once magnificent CBR 1000F. Mark Forsyth, PB's then road tester, howled a ZZR through the timing lights at 173mph, shortly before slinging it up Bruntingthorpe's runway at the same speed. Both survived.
In fact, the ZZR11 soldiered on as Kawasaki's big, bad bruiser for a further 12 years. While sportier litre bikes of the early 90s, like Yamaha's FZR 1000 Exup and Suzuki's GSX-R 1100, were culled in favour of lighter, sweeter-handling replacements, the ZZR's role as a super-fast sports tourer afforded it longevity. Fast, stable, comfortable and reassuringly solid, that was the ZZR.
Things could have turned out very differently though. Speed was an emotive subject back in 1990. Cretins within the EU had made the unqualified link between velocity and accidents, and figured we all needed less powerful, slower machines in order to be protected from ourselves. UK importers were already bound by a gentlemen's agreement limitinag bikes to 125 bhp, but a new road bike capable of two-and-a-half rimes the national speed limit was music to the antibiking lobby's ears.
Their argument was nonsense, of course, and the race for more speed was back on by the mid-90s, with Honda's Blackbird raising the bar to 178mph. The ZZR 1100 was treated to major a update in 93, with a stiffer frame, twin front air intakes, plus styling and detail tweaks. Despite the changes it was only 1mph faster (5mph in derestricted form) and still very much the same beast. Not that that was a bad thing. Even the ZZR1200, which replaced the 1100 in 2002, was a chip off the old block, if a little more touring oriented. The new 1400 has a lot to live up to.
1990: ZZR1100 C7
Grunt. The ZZR11 had it in truckloads. UK bikes were restricted to 125bhp (the factory
claimed 145bhp full power), yet the 11,500rpm redline was relentless. Its motor, developed from the original ZX10, raised the bar to a new level. Ram-air and efficient aerodynamics played their part too. Suzuki's GSX-R11 and Yamaha's Exup were mighty fast but ZZR became a new byword for speed.
KAWASAKI ZX-10...The original ZX-l0, with its huge beam frame, claimed 131bhp and in super-slippery clothes, was 0.5mph faster.
Introduced 1988 Capacity 997cc Top speed 162.8mph
SUZUKI GSX-R 1100K Oh dear. Not light, flickable and ready to rumble as a good GSX-R should be. Podgy, ill-mannered and brutal. Bloody fast though
Introduced 1989 Capacity1127cc Topspeed 160mph
2002: ZZR1200 C1H
No Hayabusa beater but it was never intended to be. The ZX12R didn't appeal to many ZZR1100 owners, but a bigger more comfortable version of their own bike did. Based on the old 1100 (the motor was bored and stroked to give 1164CC) and refined for a more milemunching bent, the 1200 was everything a ZZR was never meant to be. It wasn't fastest, it was a comfortable tourer that just happened to be faster than an FJR or Pan European.
2000: ZX12RA1
Kawasaki's return to the speed arena was inevitable, but in 1999 the company faced a major problem. The Hayabusa. All 190mph of it. The men in green could have made something
bigger and faster. Too easy. Smaller and faster would get them noticed. It was close but not quite enough to relegate the GSXR1300R to second. ln truth, the 12R lacked a clear identity. was it a sportsbike or a sports tourer? No one knew. SaIes were poor and it will be dropped for 2007.
YAMAHA FZR1000 EXUP
More powerful than Lawson's early 500GP bikes: handled too. Refocused the race for speed towards pure sports bikes. Introduced 1989 Capacity 1002cc Top speed 172.5mph (derestricted)
KAWASAKI ZZR1100
Those with an insatiable thirst for speed in the early 90s bought a ZZR Capable
of eating whole continents for breakfast.
Introduced 1990 Capacity 1052cc Top speed 173mph
SUZUKI GSX-R1100WP A rutting rhino of a bike. Big. bullish and possessing little in the way of early GSX-R agility. But it was fast
Introduced 1993 Capacity 1074cc Top speed 174 (derestricted)
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posted June 24, 2006 07:44 AM
