Finished bike pics and Magny cours GP circuit.....
10
Finally finished putting the GSXR 1000 F1 TT bike back together in time to go riding round the F1/Moto GP track at Magny Cours, France. We went with the European Superbike School and spent the first day on the club track, which is an entirely separate track to the main GP circuit. It’s very tight and twisty, lots of corners etc, with the longest straight about 650 yards long. Spent most of the time in 3rd gear, only just getting into 4th on the straight and a couple of 2nd gear corners along the way. It’s a very physical track and you really have to muscle the bike around. No good on a tuned GSXR 1000! More of a 600 or 250 track. Still, we enjoyed ourselves…before the big event.
The following day I spent the afternoon, open pit lane, on the GP circuit. You really have to reconfigure your brain as to the sorts of speeds you can do around this circuit.
You exit the pit lane onto a really long right hand bend, known as Estoril, which leads onto the long straight. Round here I was in 3rd gear, knee on the deck winding the power on to get a fast exit onto the straight. Exit is over 100 mph, and then it was tuck in and wind on the throttle…. Until you are flat out in top, then its brake hard down to the first gear Adelaide hairpin. I really don’t know how the F1 cars get round here, it seems way too tight. Then its back on the gas, through a quick chicane and through another left hander, up towards the Imola chicane, and everytime you go through there you think, I know I can go through here faster, must brake later next time, then it’s a slow right hander, back on the gas towards the main stand, another right hander, another chicane onto the start finish line when you are really hard on the gas heading back down, through two very fast left hand sweepers to the Estoril fast sweeping right hand corner which leads onto the straight again.
All I can say is that it is THE fastest circuit I have EVER ridden on. The man who designed the GSXR 1000, must have ridden round here on a 600 and thought to himself, I need the same handling, but 50 more BHP. He then went away and came back with a GSXR 1000 !!!!!
The F1 TT bike was just absolutely awesome. It was the first time out since its rebuild, with new swingarm, suspension etc. Apart from a few extra clicks of rebound on the back, I didn’t change anything. It is an absolute missile. It WAS the fastest bike there by a long way. Many of the other people were on CBR 600rr’s and Ducati 998rs, fireblades etc, and my GSXR 1000 was going past them like they were stuck in 4th gear. A good friend of mine on a new Kawasaki 636 was flat out on the straight, showing 165 in the speedo, when I went past him like he was stood still. I have no speedo on the bike but I must have been doing 185 mph. He said it was demoralising, the speed at which I was leaving him. He was flat out, and I was still accelerating!!!! He tried to catch me at the hairpin on the brakes, but the PFM brakes and the AP master cylinder on the F1 bike were just unbelievable, easily stopping me from over 180 mph each time into the first gear hairpin. If I had taken more gearing options, I reckon i could have gone faster still.
It’s difficult to explain the absolute ballistic nature of the bike. It pulls so strongly, in every gear, you just know you can catch anyone. On the exit from the Estoril bend, if there was anyone between me and the kink on the straight, I new I could catch them in time for the hairpin. Not only that, but it went round the corners better than any bike I have ever ridden. It struggled on the really tight and twisty track, but on the bigger GP circuit, it was like riding a 600, but with twice the power. It did not feel like a 1000. It was just planted everywhere.
I lent the bike to some of my friends, some of which had standard GSXR 1000’s, and they were amazed at the power and the control. I had a job getting it back from them. I was using a Rennsport rear medium slick with a Rennsport soft front and although the bike puts out 178 rear wheel HP, I had no scary moments or slides etc. It was just brilliant and I could not stop grinning. If any of you guys EVER get a chance to come over to Europe to ride a bike, I would put Magny Cours up there, one notch behind Jerez as to the two best tracks to ride on. I will certainly be going back to get some more track time next year.
It was also the first time out for our new Translogic quickshifter. I have used other quickshifters in the past and had previously had set up problems etc, but the Translogic one was fantastic. Its an amazing feeling to be accelerating as hard as you can, with the throttle wound on to the stop, the rev light comes on at your desired point and you just move your left foot to click the next gear. The quickshifter senses you want to change gear as there is a sensor rod attached to the gear lever and it cuts the ignition for a fraction of a second to allow the gear to slot home, then it seems to instantaneously bring the power back in whilst you still have the throttle pinned. It’s like having an automatic gear change, ONLY FASTER. I cannot recommend this quickshifter highly enough. It preformed faultlessly and incidentally, is the only quickshifter available that does not get the Fi light flashing in the dashboard. It’s also used by crescent Suzuki in the UK, and some of the AMA teams. Once we got our head round the instructions it was easy to fit and set up and I would recommend one to anyone. One clever thing, is that it does not cut the ignition in the first 25% of the rev range, So you can leave it switched on all the time, and around the pits etc you just change gear as normal, but once you start building the revs, no need for the clutch or to back off the throttle AT ALL.
Anyway, I have some pics coming from when were on the track, but here are some pics of the finished bike as we were unloading from the van this morning.
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Just waiting on the new rear stand bobbine to fit the Spondon swingarm, then all I can say is roll on next years TT. We now have a bike that is capable of a top 10 place. All the handling problems from last year have been sorted out, just got to get the financing in place for the races.
Mr Gixxer is finalising some of the fundraising plans as I write this, but if anyone out there owns a company/business etc and wants to sponsor us directly please send me an email for more info. I will post some more pics in due course when we get them back from the labs
Eric
The following day I spent the afternoon, open pit lane, on the GP circuit. You really have to reconfigure your brain as to the sorts of speeds you can do around this circuit.
You exit the pit lane onto a really long right hand bend, known as Estoril, which leads onto the long straight. Round here I was in 3rd gear, knee on the deck winding the power on to get a fast exit onto the straight. Exit is over 100 mph, and then it was tuck in and wind on the throttle…. Until you are flat out in top, then its brake hard down to the first gear Adelaide hairpin. I really don’t know how the F1 cars get round here, it seems way too tight. Then its back on the gas, through a quick chicane and through another left hander, up towards the Imola chicane, and everytime you go through there you think, I know I can go through here faster, must brake later next time, then it’s a slow right hander, back on the gas towards the main stand, another right hander, another chicane onto the start finish line when you are really hard on the gas heading back down, through two very fast left hand sweepers to the Estoril fast sweeping right hand corner which leads onto the straight again.
All I can say is that it is THE fastest circuit I have EVER ridden on. The man who designed the GSXR 1000, must have ridden round here on a 600 and thought to himself, I need the same handling, but 50 more BHP. He then went away and came back with a GSXR 1000 !!!!!
The F1 TT bike was just absolutely awesome. It was the first time out since its rebuild, with new swingarm, suspension etc. Apart from a few extra clicks of rebound on the back, I didn’t change anything. It is an absolute missile. It WAS the fastest bike there by a long way. Many of the other people were on CBR 600rr’s and Ducati 998rs, fireblades etc, and my GSXR 1000 was going past them like they were stuck in 4th gear. A good friend of mine on a new Kawasaki 636 was flat out on the straight, showing 165 in the speedo, when I went past him like he was stood still. I have no speedo on the bike but I must have been doing 185 mph. He said it was demoralising, the speed at which I was leaving him. He was flat out, and I was still accelerating!!!! He tried to catch me at the hairpin on the brakes, but the PFM brakes and the AP master cylinder on the F1 bike were just unbelievable, easily stopping me from over 180 mph each time into the first gear hairpin. If I had taken more gearing options, I reckon i could have gone faster still.
It’s difficult to explain the absolute ballistic nature of the bike. It pulls so strongly, in every gear, you just know you can catch anyone. On the exit from the Estoril bend, if there was anyone between me and the kink on the straight, I new I could catch them in time for the hairpin. Not only that, but it went round the corners better than any bike I have ever ridden. It struggled on the really tight and twisty track, but on the bigger GP circuit, it was like riding a 600, but with twice the power. It did not feel like a 1000. It was just planted everywhere.
I lent the bike to some of my friends, some of which had standard GSXR 1000’s, and they were amazed at the power and the control. I had a job getting it back from them. I was using a Rennsport rear medium slick with a Rennsport soft front and although the bike puts out 178 rear wheel HP, I had no scary moments or slides etc. It was just brilliant and I could not stop grinning. If any of you guys EVER get a chance to come over to Europe to ride a bike, I would put Magny Cours up there, one notch behind Jerez as to the two best tracks to ride on. I will certainly be going back to get some more track time next year.
It was also the first time out for our new Translogic quickshifter. I have used other quickshifters in the past and had previously had set up problems etc, but the Translogic one was fantastic. Its an amazing feeling to be accelerating as hard as you can, with the throttle wound on to the stop, the rev light comes on at your desired point and you just move your left foot to click the next gear. The quickshifter senses you want to change gear as there is a sensor rod attached to the gear lever and it cuts the ignition for a fraction of a second to allow the gear to slot home, then it seems to instantaneously bring the power back in whilst you still have the throttle pinned. It’s like having an automatic gear change, ONLY FASTER. I cannot recommend this quickshifter highly enough. It preformed faultlessly and incidentally, is the only quickshifter available that does not get the Fi light flashing in the dashboard. It’s also used by crescent Suzuki in the UK, and some of the AMA teams. Once we got our head round the instructions it was easy to fit and set up and I would recommend one to anyone. One clever thing, is that it does not cut the ignition in the first 25% of the rev range, So you can leave it switched on all the time, and around the pits etc you just change gear as normal, but once you start building the revs, no need for the clutch or to back off the throttle AT ALL.
Anyway, I have some pics coming from when were on the track, but here are some pics of the finished bike as we were unloading from the van this morning.
Just waiting on the new rear stand bobbine to fit the Spondon swingarm, then all I can say is roll on next years TT. We now have a bike that is capable of a top 10 place. All the handling problems from last year have been sorted out, just got to get the financing in place for the races.
Mr Gixxer is finalising some of the fundraising plans as I write this, but if anyone out there owns a company/business etc and wants to sponsor us directly please send me an email for more info. I will post some more pics in due course when we get them back from the labs
Eric
