Mark Pavletich ( far fight ) has developed this Yamaha OW-01 bike that he rode successfully for them in the 1989-90 season in the national championship production racing class . I borrowed the bike and rode it in an AMCC race and promptly fell in love with it , subsequently buying it from Paul . “ Of course , it wasn ’ t long before the urge to tinker took hold . The machine became my road bike for the next 22 years . In that time its power output rose from a standard 125ps to 160ps at the back wheel by the mid 90s . A very fast road bike for that time indeed . A lot was learnt about what works and what does not work in the Yamaha Genesis motor . So , when the new campaign began , there was a big pool of existing development knowledge to draw on .”
“ Whilst convenient , it can lead to some weaknesses when the original 90ps at the rear wheel of the 1985 FZ750 transforms into the 175ps developed FZR1000 race bike motor . The philosophy of Paul ’ s race bike would be that the machine would need to have a power delivery biased towards torque and rideability . This was necessitated by the fact that Paul is a big guy and New Zealand race circuits are all about acceleration and braking .”
SHOEHORNED “ The fitting of the FZR1000 motor into the OW chassis only required fabrication of upper side engine mount plates . These were supplied by Syd Chaloner , who had bought my old number one road bike motor for his ex-Andrew Stroud OW-01 . Syd had an extra set fabricated for Paul ’ s new bike . The reason it is such a straightforward fit is that the 750cc and 1000cc motors ’ crankcases are almost identical . There are some very small differences relating to cylinder head stud height and the oil cooler / filter mount point in the front of the crankcases . The crankcase is basically the same for all the 750s and 1000s from the 1985 FZ750 to the 2003 YZF1000R ThunderAce . Gotta love those accountants …
30 KIWI RIDER