www.zxrworld.co.uk

As you may know, I'm buggering off for a two week lap of Europe on the ZXR next week, expecting to do at least 2500 miles through France, Belgium, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, possibly Italy, and a bit more France for good measure.

As this has got closer, I've been getting more and more stressed about the bike. I've swapped the clutch for the one out of the original L3 engine because the H1 clutch juddered like anything, taken everything off the top of the motor to glue the leaking rocker cover back down with instant gasket, sworn at stuck pins in my brake calipers while changing pads, sorted out (hopefully) the fuel starvation problem that stranded me on the M1 a few weeks back, and to top it off had to take the tank and airbox off again today because I didn't tighten up the coils properly when I sorted out the rocker cover. It would be fair to say I was starting to get pissed off.

However once I got it back together this afternoon I put my leathers on, put my earplugs in so I didn't stress about every rattle from the engine, and put about 90 miles on it around the local backroads, leaving bits of melted kneeslider in my wake. When I came home I left it out of the garage, and I've just been sat in the garden with my dinner and a pint of cider just looking at it.

I honestly can't imagine not having a ZXR400 in the garage. In fact I'm starting to speculate about what I'd have to do to make space for another one, and what I'd do with it. Make a track or even race bike? Build a 444 engine? Or make a 100bhp, V4, ZX-7RRV using the VFR750 motor I've got in the back of the garage (it fits - just, I tested it when I swapped the engines in the spring).



That is all.

Good stuff. I do know what you mean, they are very pleasing to the eye, even more so when they give you so much on the road. By november I WILL have anothere zxr. Saying that though, the GSXR is growing on me(handlings nowhere near as good though).

know how you feel mate ..

ive just arranged to buy another H1, and other than "cos i want it" i cant find any justification at all ...

spare track bike ?
444'd touring spec ?

um ...

Its just an absolutely fantastic bike. In the IOM I was saying to myself "How... How is that R1 going backwards??" my favourite turn of the whole course was near the end of the mountain section. You come down a slight hill, and its a long, sweeping right hander, every time, i took it at 90-100 and came out the other end right on the very edge, it was fantastic. If only I knew what the turn was called. (cargo shed any light on this?)

I love the bike so much, I can't see me getting rid of it for a long time.

Edit- Have a great trip. Id advise breakdown cover, just for that piece of mind, I went with these for the IOM..

http://www.rescuemycar.com/Breakdown/Motorcycle/

£40 for a years cover, pickup from anywhere in the uk and bought home. They do European cover aswell.

have fun.

Carole Nash policies come with UK and European breakdown included!

I like the sound of the VFR750 engine in the ZXR... Actually, I'd literally like the sound of it!

Yeah, I am insured through CN so automatically have euro breakdown cover. It'll be fine though. I hope.

Some more detail on the VFR idea:

It's been in the back of my mind for a while that the big V4 might be a viable transplant into the ZXR frame, as obviously it's only two (big) cylinders wide, which is probably similar to four small cylinders.

While I was swapping the engines over in the spring a VFR750FL motor came up on eBay - no photo, no proper description, no idea if it worked, and hence no real interest in it. I was the only bidder and got it for the mighty sum of £12.99 and a drive to Boston. Actually as it turns out it's a pretty clean motor on the outside and I suspect it could be made to run fairly easily - although it wouldn't have mattered to me as I just wanted it for a size check.

I've tried it in the frame and I wasn't being entirely truthful when I said it fits in the previous post. It's very tight getting the rear cylinders between the frame spars - they come back in quite a lot. So I couldn't push the engine back far enough to get the rear sprocket in the right place.

However I'm pretty sure that the only thing stopping it fitting was the engine mounting lugs on the rear cylinders. I think if these were machined back the head itself will just about fit. I can't quite decide whether to try and just machine them back enough or take them right off. There's about a million engine mount points on the engine (ok, five on each side). I think it's a semi stressed member in the VFR, so I'm sure I could get away without using those ones.

You'd have to be a bit clever about plumbing it in - I don't know what rad clearance will be like once the engine's in the right place, and the exhaust from the rear cylinders would be a challenge. But if you could do it and fit it all under standard bodywork it would be a brilliant stealth bike.

I'd love to have a go at this, but it's a long term thing. I need to get the GS project finished and back on the road, and the CG125 put back together and sold. Maybe then I can think about buying another ZXR frame/rolling chassis and have a serious go at the VFR engine.

I always just assumed there's no way a 90 degree V4 or V-twin would ever fit in a bike made for an IL4.

I would have thought the tank and airbox would have been the main issue on the ZXR for clearance, as well?

As far as the rad goes, they run very cool and only use a rad about half the size of the ZXR, so that shouldhelp things, and the oil rad was about 2 rows of fins and that was it!

It's also the same lump as in my FM which is still happily piling on the milage at over 110,000 miles!

Jamz wrote:I always just assumed there's no way a 90 degree V4 or V-twin would ever fit in a bike made for an IL4.

I would have thought the tank and airbox would have been the main issue on the ZXR for clearance, as well?

As far as the rad goes, they run very cool and only use a rad about half the size of the ZXR, so that shouldhelp things, and the oil rad was about 2 rows of fins and that was it!
...

A V-twin would go in easy. Who's going to build a MilleZXR then?

obviously it's pretty unlikely that a VFR airbox will fit, although you never know. Certainly I'd have no expectation that the VFR airbox and ZXR tank would play nicely together. But the option's always there to make a smaller/reshaped tank and just have a cover to look like the original - see the roger middleton bike or what I'm planning on the GS.