Kawasaki Vulcan Motorcycles, page #42

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Moto blog

Old boys up front and where are the new 600 Gixers?

As I’ve been gagging for the new race season to kick off so it was almost a pleasure getting up at stupid 0 clock to watch the World Superbike Championship  opener at Phillip Island last weekend. I have to say Messrs Burnicle and Whitham were on form although I was disappointed there were none of the usual verbal attacks on each other that always add to the entertainment.    I’m sure they will put things right soon but the world superbike regulars must have been disheartened that Moto GP veterans nailed five of the six available rostrum slots.

Steam Punk Bike

This steam-punk inspired bike is the work of LA based sculptor and, er, free thinker, Baron Margo. From what we can work out is uses an early eighties air-cooled Z1000 Kawasaki as a base and is cloaked in this hand beaten alloy and copper bodywork. Can’t imagine it’s much fun in a cross wind, though.

Kawasaki ZX-10R vs Mazda RX-7 [video]

The sport of drifting in the car world has been entertaining motorsports enthusiasts for years, spawning national race series across the globe.  And this genre is now gaining a foothold in the motorcycle world. In the video below, we see these worlds collide as a Corvette-powered Mazda RX-7 battles a stretched Kawasaki ZX-10R in a drift competition produced by Icon Motorsports. The Ninja is ridden by Nick “Apex” Brocha, smoking his ZX’s fat rear tire against the RX at Sandia Motorsports Park in New Mexico.

Home-built Wheelchair Thrills Easyriders Bike Show [video]

The name Matt Cuddy should need no introduction to Motorcycle.com readers. Not only does he have more than 5,000 posts on our forum, he’s also written dirt bike tests for us, including the 2010 and 2011 Kawasaki KX450F reviews. Making this accomplishment more noteworthy is the fact that Matt is a paraplegic – he was hit by a car several years ago while riding his motorcycle.

Whitham's blog 4

We all like to save a shilling if we can, especially these days, but sometimes, doing a job yourself, cutting corners and generally grubbing round being tight fisted actually ends up costing you more money than biting the bullet and putting your hand a bit deeper into your pocket to get a proper job done. The problem is, I come from a long line of, erm, frugal Yorkshire b####rds going back generations, and I seem to be hardwired as a bit of a skinflint. My dad, although never actually short of money, that I could remember, didn’t like spending it.

How to wheelie ten tonnes of Z1300

Yes, the video may be old (that's Barry Sheene doing the voice-over) but it's still worth seeing. This mad Fin was the inspiration for every stunt rider you've ever seen. Forget the White Helmets or Dave Taylor, he practically invented stunt riding all by himself.

2011 ZX-10R onboard lap.. worked out nice

I've been playing around with video cameras in the office here for a good year with varying degress of success. The GoPro we use is great - when it's behaving. But I've had too many sessions where it doesn't like the SD card I fed it, the batteries die as you're leaving pit lane or you record a perfect lap, but with the camera pointing at the sky, or the tank.

Kawasaki Z1R.

These two beautiful Z1R Kawasakis appeared at the annual Mooneyes Yokohama Custom show last weekend. With one sporting a street/strip look (spot the belly-scraping ride height and rigid rear struts) and the other undergoing a sort of modernisation, they both reminded me just how handsome and unique the original slab-sided Z1R was.  Judging by some of the other wild and weird exhibits I made a mental note to myself: must make sure I'm in Japan this time next year.

It's clear even at night: Losail fries your brain

It's 17:55 local time here at the Losail circuit just outside Doha in Qatar. I'm here for the launch of the 2011 Kawasaki ZX-10R. We've only had two sessions on the bike.

ZX-10R. Worth the weight?

The whisper on pit lane is that 2011 will be a good year for the green K. Our moles within the racing circles tell us that apart from more power and less weight (always handy), the new ZX-10R's main advantage is not these two factors but rather its improved weight distribution, weight transference qualities and grip levels. Studying Tom Syke's lap time data from Kawasaki's public test sessions it seems it's much easier for him to maintain consistent fast lap times back-to-back over the whole range of tyre degradation and fuel load changes.