COMPANY TIMELINE

Nippon Gakki Co. Ltd is formed

Founder Torakusu Yamaha dies

Yamaha Motor builds the YA-1

Yamaha design 250cc YD-1 twin

Yamaha enter 250GP racing

Phil Read wins the GP world title

Production overtakes Suzuki

Four-stroke XS1 is launched

Production tops one million units

Agostini wins 500GP title

Cyril Neveu wins Dakar on an XT500

YPVS power valve is unveiled

FZ750 debuts a five-valve head

The first Deltabox frame is built

Doohan wins WSB race on an FZ750

EXUP valve is used on the FZR1000

The YZF-R1 is launched 2006

R6 gets ride-bywire throttle 2009

Ben Spies wins WSB title 2013

Yamaha launch the MT-09

Yamaha launch the MT-07

The three-wheeled Niken is launched

building Toyota’s 2000GT car there, they built their first four-stroke road bike – the XS1.

As production hit 574,000 units, the 1970 650cc parallel-twin XS1 was seen as a supersport bike but more importantly this style of engine was ‘cleaner’ than two-strokes, allowing Yamaha to continue to sell in America where emission’s laws were taking force. Sales cleared one million units in 1973, and the 1970s and 1980s saw Yamaha’s four-stroke model range expand through bikes such as the XT500, XS750, XS Eleven and XJ range. But two-strokes weren’t forgotten and Europe’s less stringent regs saw the FS1-E and the air-cooled and then watercooled RD range and finally the TZRs endear Yamaha to generations. Then in 1985 the FZ750 used a radical world-first five-valve head design with three inlet and two exhaust valves helping to allow it to produce more power. Two years later the Deltabox aluminium frame was debuted on the FZR1000 (the FZ750R also had one) and the EXUP low-end-boosting exhaust valve arrived in 1989. Two-strokes may have been the choice for GP riders or track fans but road riders wanted the convenience of the four-stroke and Yamaha developed a range of sporty bikes to satisfy demand. Not only that, they also made the world-conquering Ténéré (Yamaha have won the Dakar nine times, seven with a Ténéré, twice with an XT500), the FJ1300 and V-Max with its V-Boost system and finished the 1980s off with the homologation special OW01, by which time Yamaha’s worldwide sales had crossed the two-million mark. Yamaha pushed the boat out in the 1990s and as well the GTS1000 with its hub-centre steering, a forerunner to the adventure bike, the TDM850 was launched alongside the YZF range and even the trellisframed TRX850, which featured the first vertically stacked gearbox. But it was as the 20th century drew to a close that Yamaha shocked the world with the YZF-R1, YZF-R7 and supersport YZF-R6. Entering a new millennium, Yamaha’s innovations didn’t stop. The 2006 YZF-R6 was the world’s first production motorcycle to have a ride-by-wire throttle and the R1 the next year (which reverted to a four-valve head) the first to have variable length intake funnels (aside from a limited edition MV). In 2009 Yamaha launched the crossplane R1, the first ‘non-conventional’ inline four sportsbike, the mid-2010s was the radical MT range and the threewheeled Niken seriously challenged motorcycle convention in 2018. If you need any more convincing that Yamaha are a company with engineering and innovation at their core, consider this. When the financial crisis hit in 2008, the man in charge of Yamaha who gave the green light to invest in a fresh new range of MT models when most other manufacturers were cutting back on R&D was Kunihiko Miwa. The same man who in back the late 1990s was project leader for the YZF-R1, YZF-R6 and YZF-R7. That decision led to the MT-09 and MT-07, two bikes that have formed the core of Yamaha’s growth in the 2010s thanks to their CP3 and CP2 engines. So on reaching retirement age, let’s hope that Yamaha are not a company reaching for the pipe and slippers and that the three tuning forks will be seen on many future generations of machines.