OB_Mr Bear
Registered
Keep in mind, Fitch, we are talking about big corporations here. If you know the inside story about some of these machines, there is a lot of company politics that goes on while they are under development. Personal rivalries, egos, lawyers, decisions made by committee. From across the ocean here, with the customers-eye view, there is no way to guess why they did what they did.
VegasDude has it right about the impact of the Hayabusa. You have to go back to 1973, to the introduction of the Z-1, to find a new machine that hit the sport bike world with this kind of impact. The ZX-11 ruled for years, but it was just an evolution of the ZX-10 and ZX-9 when it came out in 1990, and those were already pretty fast bikes.
Probably the biggest single breakthrough of the old Z-1 was DOHC in a street bike motor (903cc in an inline four helped too). The 'Busa upped the displacement ante also, but the 'Busa's big breakthrough is aerodynamics, probably the last frontier of bike performance.
Engine performance is kind of mature, going up in small steps. We have liquid cooling, computer controlled systems, pretty good stuff. Frame, suspension, brake, and tire technology is kind of there too. Some people are still screwing around with linked braking and stuff like that, but they are not going to make any huge breakthroughs. The action is in aerodynamics, and Suzuki made a big step forward with this bike.
That is where the corporate side comes in. If Suzuki made a big investment in wind tunnel technology to do the R & D on this bike, Kawasaki might not have the testing facilities in place to do the same level of aerodynamics work. Without it, they can tweak another ten or twenty HP out of their motor, and they are still just going to be punching a wall in top end performance. The June issue of Cycle World covers it pretty well.
It seems like up till now, treatment of motorcycle aerodynamics consisted of throwing a cafe fairing and lowers on and calling it good...kind of where performance cars were at in the 60's and 70's. That won't cut it anymore. If Kawasaki didn't do their homework on the ZX-12's aerodynamics, they are basically out of luck now. They can go rent a wind tunnel and try to come up with a band-aid solution, but to do it right it all has to fit together. The powerband and gearing have to match the aerodynamics.
If the Kaw can't match the 'Busa on top, they might punt it to their marketing department and sell it as a quarter-mile machine. "We didn't want it to be the fastest, just the quickest". Sure, ha ha.
VegasDude has it right about the impact of the Hayabusa. You have to go back to 1973, to the introduction of the Z-1, to find a new machine that hit the sport bike world with this kind of impact. The ZX-11 ruled for years, but it was just an evolution of the ZX-10 and ZX-9 when it came out in 1990, and those were already pretty fast bikes.
Probably the biggest single breakthrough of the old Z-1 was DOHC in a street bike motor (903cc in an inline four helped too). The 'Busa upped the displacement ante also, but the 'Busa's big breakthrough is aerodynamics, probably the last frontier of bike performance.
Engine performance is kind of mature, going up in small steps. We have liquid cooling, computer controlled systems, pretty good stuff. Frame, suspension, brake, and tire technology is kind of there too. Some people are still screwing around with linked braking and stuff like that, but they are not going to make any huge breakthroughs. The action is in aerodynamics, and Suzuki made a big step forward with this bike.
That is where the corporate side comes in. If Suzuki made a big investment in wind tunnel technology to do the R & D on this bike, Kawasaki might not have the testing facilities in place to do the same level of aerodynamics work. Without it, they can tweak another ten or twenty HP out of their motor, and they are still just going to be punching a wall in top end performance. The June issue of Cycle World covers it pretty well.
It seems like up till now, treatment of motorcycle aerodynamics consisted of throwing a cafe fairing and lowers on and calling it good...kind of where performance cars were at in the 60's and 70's. That won't cut it anymore. If Kawasaki didn't do their homework on the ZX-12's aerodynamics, they are basically out of luck now. They can go rent a wind tunnel and try to come up with a band-aid solution, but to do it right it all has to fit together. The powerband and gearing have to match the aerodynamics.
If the Kaw can't match the 'Busa on top, they might punt it to their marketing department and sell it as a quarter-mile machine. "We didn't want it to be the fastest, just the quickest". Sure, ha ha.
I guess I just didnt put two and two together.heheheehh