ERGONOMICS

The first thing you notice on the YB4 is the low seat. It’s a bike you feel as though you’re sitting in rather than on. The fuel tank is long and the bars seem a good arms stretch away. It doesn’t have the sharp racing feel that a modern bike gives you but the low handlebars help pull your body forwards into a sportsbike-like crouch.

CHASSIS

The YB4 sports a more recognisable twin spar aluminium frame. I say recognisable, but 30 years ago when nearly everyone else was using big steel cradles to house heavy Jap engines, the lightweight ally frame was about as trick as they came. Pioneering at its best, we say.

SUSPENSION

The YB4’s forks have Maxton GP20 cartridges and the same Maxton GP10 shock that’s fitted to the modern bike, albeit with a remote reservoir connected by a steel braided hose. There is full adjustability at both ends thanks to some classic Maxton technology!

ELECTRONICS

Now this is where the poor old YB4 struggles to compete. No fly- by-wire throttle and fuel injection, instead we have got a throttle cable and some big fat flat-slide carbs. The YB4 might have been a pioneering bike in the 80s, but back when computers were the size of coal sheds even Bimota weren’t about to pull a TFT dash out of their arse.

MOTOR

Bimota chose to power this bike with a Yamaha FZ 750 lump. And with a more than respectable (for the 80s) 120bhp, who can blame them? A six-speed, double overhead cam, water cooled engine is exactly the kind of thing you expect to see on a sports bike of today. Credit where it’s due, Bimota, you knew what you were doing when you shoe-horned Yam’s FZ 750 motor into your YB4.