Ballistic on a budget: Part 3 ...........
Bruce gets to grips with the project R1’s spec
If you’re following British Superbikes you’ll know just how frantic and full-on the 2021 season is. So much so that the lads have barely had time to pop home and change their underwear in between meetings, which has meant progress with our R1 project bike has been steady to say the least.
Actually, steady is an exaggeration… there’s been zero change since our last catch-up, but that’s not such a bad thing. Since we got this ball rolling, transforming a streetbike into a track weapon, there’s been little opportunity to sit back and take in the brilliance we’re crafting. Every new part fitted has been followed by another new part in such quick succession that there’s not really been chance to calibrate and capitalise on the goodies joining the mix.
To sit in a workshop and build a bike over a few days is one thing, but doing so trackside, in between sessions, with the aim being to test and assess each new component before the next is affixed, has been a challenge. If we didn’t have a legend like Chris on the spanners, defying the odds and setting new PBs with every task undertaken, this gig would have meant a world of pain. You get the gist; its been pretty full-on. So when Chris made the suggestion I got out on track and spun some laps on my own, to get better acquainted with the Yammy, I figured why not.
There were upsides to his absence, including being several bacon butties better off, and without Taz at Cadwell I’d be guaranteed to be the fastest rider on the bike that day. The more I thought about it the more it made sense, so fresh Michelin Cup2s were fitted, the bike got loaded, and I rocked up for a scorching afternoon at my favourite circuit.
If you’ve been following the build you’ll probably remember that last time we were out on track the focus was on weight saving, braking and handling. A lot of improvements were made to the R1 and the benefits found were obvious as we rattled through the procession of parts just in time to beat the mother of all downpours, which rendered the track fit for kayaks but not much else.
I was really gutted about that because I was keen to get my head around the virtues of the new Öhlins suspension that had picked up the accolade for being the shiniest and priciest of components we’d thrown into the build. Admittedly, the bike had felt good on the KYB road suspension, but this was our chance to turn ‘good’ into ‘great’ with a bit of fine tuning of the base setup Chris had dialled into the new pogos.
That was a major aim for me on my return trip, with another big aim being to alter the bike in every way possible to suit me and my riding style. Taz and I are worlds apart in size, pace and our number of Instagram followers (lucky for him I don’t have it). The point I’m getting at is this was my time to make the bike my own, without any compromise, but before doing so I simply went out and spun some laps.
The R1 really is a beautiful, fruity bike on track, and it took only a handful of corners to remind myself of its brilliance. With the correct gearing, proper brakes and the exaggerated riding position thanks to the GYTR rearsets and seat unit, it felt an absolute weapon… in more ways than one.
While I was warming up into the day’s antics, the Yamaha wasted no time in trying to throw me over the back on more than one occasion. I like my wheelies as much as the next man, but learnt very quickly I lack the necessary reactions and skills to govern the best part of 200bhp when it decides it’s time to loft the front skyward. For Taz, the rear brake’s second nature, but for me, holding a racing line challenges my brain hard enough.
The other thing I picked up, with a few circuits under my belt, was the sheer aggression of the traction system, and the throttle pick-up too. I couldn’t work out which was worse, but I knew the R1’s plethora of electronics needed a good seeing to the minute I got back in the paddock. As
for the suspension, the bike felt pretty decent. It turned quick, it held a line, and my only real issue was its tendency to back-in on the brakes, especially into Mansfield. It was an issue that could be bettered through setup, I knew that, but I also wondered whether my choice of engine braking was the root cause? There are three tiers on the R1, gifting the rider the chance for more or less resistance at the back wheel. Typically, more engine braking will help turn tighter through corners, and less will aid higher corner entry speeds. In theory the former would’ve been my choice at Cadwell, but it was worth exploring how the bike behaved with less intervention.
Armed with an ice cream, fresh pants and the bike’s YRC settings on the dash, I began to make this beast my own. Taz, being the talent he is, had switched off the LIF(T) control altogether, which explained the wheelies. At Cadwell, the last thing you want is a system that’ll cull your power at places like the Mountain, the crest on Park Straight and the multitude of other places wheelies simply happen, especially as you punch out of slow bends such as the Chicane and the Hairpin. With this in mind, I took a punt and selected the least intrusive level of three wheelie control options on tap. The engine braking system was weaned off too, and I set the traction to the second of its five levels.
The other big thing I did was to put the throttle map to ‘B’ in a bid to tone down the delivery’s testosterone level. This bike is seriously fast, which I love, but the harshness of the initial pick-up is about as loveable as a punch to the nose… which this thing will give you if given half a chance. The upside was I could still keep the motor’s power output at its highest, so I figured my alteration wasn’t going to stifle the joyride that much. If anything it would mean I could access more of the bike’s potential sooner, with a lot less wrestling needed. Or at least that was my hope. In truth, I’d not really played around that much with the R1’s tech before so setting it all up was a bit of a guessing game.
Speaking of which, I was tired of the confusion caused by the race shift pattern on the GYTR rearsets. I normally ride road bikes, so my days of raceshift, despite acknowledging its benefits, are well behind me. It’s amazing how something so simple as deciding which way to pressure the gear selector, when firing into a corner and focussing on your entry, can fry your brain. I’d had a few sketchy moments in that first session, so decided to do something about it
by quickly and easily flipping the selector stem to the opposite side of the pivot point, meaning I was back on road shift.
The time had come to return to the track and see whether I’d bettered the bike or rendered it unrideable? It soon transpired the R1 was a much more manageable and enjoyable bike than it had been during our first round of speed dating, with the biggest difference being the less intense delivery of the throttle. It meant I could be more aggressive in my actions and ask more meaningfully for drive, rather than being a wuss and winding open the noise tube with nervous anticipation. The bike was still backing-in here and there, and it suddenly felt a lot more physical to hold a line through corners, so I made a note to look again at the engine braking when I was back in the paddock. The other thing I was eager to change was the traction control, that even on level two proved way too keen and restrictive for my liking now that my pace was increasing.
The R1’s tech is good, but I’ve known smoother systems, and my only hope was that by switching to level one, the least intrusive setting, the ride would be bettered. There are certain things you can change on the fly with the Yamaha, using the selector on the left switchgear, and the traction level was one of them, so I carefully picked my moment to glance away from the track and thumb through the dash’s menu to make that alteration. It was definitely the right call, but the occasional cull of power as the system reared up genuinely got me thinking about switching the TC off altogether. On my GSX-R1000 race bike, I had such a great traction system dialled in that would step in if it was really needed but not until that crucial point of no return. It was awesome and it was also the performance I was hoping the Yamaha’s system could match, but with the stock algorithms, it just couldn’t.
The same could be said of the wheelie control that largely did a great job of keeping the front wheel low under harsh acceleration, but every now and again the system would cut in really abrupt. There wasn’t much that could be done about it, other than to suck it up and crack on.
I was now riding the bike at a fair pace, pushing the suspension for the first time and getting to feel that the R1 was actually a bit too soft. It was agile enough through the slower changes of direction, but hard work to keep a line on some of the faster bends when winding on the gas, especially around Chris Curve. The engine braking experiment had also backed up this thinking, with the logical reality being the front was too soft, diving and making the rear light. I also got the idea the rebound was too slow, after a few dramas on the final crest in Hall Bends where the bike almost kept oversteering when I was wanting it to change direction – the suspension was running at the bottom of the
stroke… and staying there. If you’re used to riding on track and pushing, you’ll know that problems that weren’t there before soon start rearing their head the minute you get a lick on, and that’s what I was now finding.
With the second of my three sessions completed, the time had come to get on the blower to Chris and whittle my heart out. Ultimately, there were quite a few changes we could have made to the bike to try and improve the feel and firmness, but to keep it simple he advised stiffening the bike by three clicks of compression, with a similar treatment for the rebound, to improve the Yamaha’s composure. The wheelbase and ride height of the bike was pretty mint, so that all got left alone. This was my first time working on Öhlins FGRT200 forks, and I was pleasantly surprised to find the forks were split with compression in one leg and rebound in the other. Why not? It made life pretty simple, and the same had to be said about the simple process of slotting an Allen key in the top and winding away. The TTX rear shock was a little harder to adjust, mainly because of the confined space the units nestled into, but after suffering a few bloodied knuckles and swearing like I had Tourette’s, the deed was done and the bike was set for its return to the track.
I couldn’t wait to see what, if any, differences had been made to the handling on that third and final outing. In reality, the changes weren’t too substantial so the result wasn’t light and day, but the R1 definitely felt better at holding a line and I could trust the front end more through faster bends, with a much more reassuring feel from the bike as I put it through its paces. In reality, I should have probably gone harder still with the front, because it still felt a little low in the stroke when I was working it hard into Coppice in particular, but at least we were going in the right direction. The backing-in was lesser, and the Yamaha was more composed under heavy braking, so that was another bonus.
As for the electronics, they were the best they’d been all day with most options weaned off to their lowest levels of intervention. The last and only tweak I made to them for the final outing was to put the engine braking in the middle setting and I liked the way it felt. In fact, the whole bike was feeling pretty awesome, predictable and fun. On the one hand it would have been nice to have bolted some more goodies onto it while I was at it, but the bigger picture had been to get a grip of where the project’s at. At the risk of sounding boring, the R1 felt all the trackbike I could ask for, but the truth is there’s still so much scope to make it faster, lighter and more sophisticated with the GYTR components Chris has got lined up for the next instalment.
The bike’s now over with him for a bit of surgery at the MCAMS team base, which I’ll talk more about in due course, but for this final chapter of this £10k build, the big guns are coming out and I’m gagging to see just how much better the package can be made. If the progress so far is anything to go by, it’s going to be pretty damn tasty.