1985 V-max

While the sporting FZ750 lasted a respectable six years (1985-1991), that year’s cruiser offering from Yamaha lasted a lot longer and became a legend…

Well, firstly – was it a cruiser? Probably not, but it was in production from 1985 until 2007. That’s some going, but then the V-max was unique. It wasn’t a cruiser, it wasn’t a sports bike, but it was some strange mix of the two that became a legend. That legend began when Akira Araki and a group of Yamaha engineers went to the USA in the early 1980s to soak up the Stateside motorcycle culture of the time. He and the other engineers witnessed a drag race from one side of a bridge in Mississippi to the other.

Years later, he recalled: “The racers started from one end of the bridge and the finish line was the opposite side. It was a simple rule. The first concept I imagined from this impressive race was to make a bike, which is strong along straight lines and really fast. It was the birth of the V-max concept.”

Launched in Las Vegas in October 1984, the engineering team had worked alongside the GK Industrial Design Laboratory, headed up by Kenji Ekuan. He was responsible previously for the classic shape of the Kikkoman soy sauce bottle. It looked butch and beefy, and at its core was a V4 engine of 1198cc with the associated V-boost system. This system offered low-down punt and a top-end rush.

V-boost opened butterfly valves in the intake manifold between the first and second and then the third and fourth cylinders starting at 5750rpm – as shown on the tank-mounted tacho. The valves opened gradually until they were fully open at 8000rpm. The two huge scoops on either side of the bike fed the carbs and just made the bike look bad-ass! Even back in 1985 the V-max’s claimed power output of 145bhp was seriously huge, and all of it was pumped to the Tarmac via a fat, 150-section tyre.

Updates were few: there was a new rear wheel in 1986 and updated forks and brakes in 1993, but that original machine was perfect and little needed to be altered. Today you can pick one up from around £3000…