Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

Kawasaki ZRX1100 (Le ft) Th e ZRX Is 'un to ride , but it is no Ninja in the curves. It's big , and it 'eels like it. (Right) Fu ll retro: T he Works Pe rf onna nc e sh ocks are new, but they are actually moderinized replicas shocks that were de signed 'or Ed die Lawson during the Superbike wars the earty '8 0 s. 0' 0 ' he woul d bu y u sed if h e co ul d even p e rform an c e and look s of th e fi nd one, and th en add th e afte rm arke t ma c h in e . St artin g up fro nt , W o od stuff, and he'd have eve n m ore ti ed up pl aced a ca ll to Lockha rt Ph illips and into it: " obtained one of its Speeds c reen wind - On c e th e b i k e w a s ba ck i n t act, sh ie lds al ong wi t h a se t of Ca rb o n W o o d di d go th e afterm arket route, Fiber turn signals. Motion Pro Carbon se l e cting sev eral top -she lf c om po - Fiber levers wer e ord ered to co m p le- nents as w ell as some les s expensiv e m en t th e stock cont ro ls, a ll of w hich replac emen t it em s to spruce u p th e ar e m ounted to AFAM' s snazzy supe r- Of all the stuff that got slapped onto this particular Kawasaki ZRX1100, maybe no other item screams perform ance as much as the Hindle exhaust system. Located in Port Perry , Ontar io, Canada, the company is the brainchild of Lang Hindle, a form er CMA road racer who act ually competed aboard a ZL-1 during the heady days that signaled the beginning of modern Superbik e racing . Upon retiring in 1982, Hindle decided to start sell ing exhaust systems out of his garage, hand -building stuff that he had designed and built himself when he was racing. Today, Hindle operates out of a 12.000square-foot shop. It's still a fam ily business, with Lang' s 25 -year-old son Lee heavily involved in the business. When they got wind of thi s project, they sent us one of their stainless-steel systems along with a titanium-s leeved mu ffler. Right away, when we pulled it out of the box, we co uld tell that is was a lot differ ent than other systems that we had seen. It also felt extr emely light. Acc ord ing to Lee Hindle, that's ju st one of the things that sets Hindl e exhaust systems apart from the competition. " We use top -gra de, air craft -quality materials." Hindle says; "The pipe and mu ffl er internals are all made of 22-gauge stainless, and then we give the custome r a choice of an aluminum, Carbon Fiber or titanium sleeve on the muffl er. Ours are the lightest stainless systems on the market today. For the ZRX, that system weighs about eight to eight and a half pounds.' Hindle says that the systems are designed from front to rear, with the prim aries being tuned for top -end. whil e the center sectio ns are tweaked for midrange and the elbows control bottom -end power characteristics. ' One thing that we don't do is we don 't build a commercial system and then a race system : Hindle says. "Ours are one and the same." Hindle does have different race and street muffler designs, however. Our pipe came with one of their ti -steeved Race muffl ers. We cring ed at the idea of rude vibes on the street. but the Race muffler was less menacing than we anticipated, adding a deep tone to the exhaust note without excessive rasp. "We act ually produce a Stealth muffler for the street, which actually works better on some bikes with CV carbs because they like that restriction,' Hindle says. "On the dyno. there's hardly half-a-horsepower difference between our Stealth and Race mu fflers in most cases. The biggest difference is that a Stealth will be about two or three decibels louder than a stock muffl er. A Race is about five to six decibles louder, but even then our pack ing is designed to kill some of that high- pitched sound that wakes up your neighbors or has the cops chasing after you. It' s not really quiet, but it's not obnoxious either." Finally, Hindl e claims some pretty substantial performance gains with their systems . Usually, Hindle says, it's about 10 percent, but he figured our system would free up about 20 -22 horsepower over the restri ctive stock tubes. "And that's without rejetting," Hindle says. "When we design our pipes, we do it with out rejett ing or remapping. We prefer to go with what we can control, and that's the pipe. That' s why we suggest that all of our customers try the system with the stoc k jetting first." If they're so bitchi n', then why haven't you heard more about Hindle in the Unit ed States? You will soon, says Lee Hindle. " We reall y pi ck ed up a lo t in th e Am erican market last year, which was ou r fi rst ye ar with Parts Unlim ited ." Hindle says. "Doing well in the Am erican market is reall y import ant to us, and we woul d love t o get m o r e involved with a factory lAMA ] Superbike team. We are expanding already , though. We ju st doubled the size of our faci lity , so we m ust be do in g something right.' 22 NOVEMBER 29 , 2000' cue I III n e vv os b i k e - b e n d alu minum ha n dle b ar . Corbin's Gr eg ' Hurley shi pped o ut o ne of its trick -look ing G unf ighter se at s, complete wi th green piping to m at ch th e stock hu e th at adorn s th e rep lac ed bodyw o rk. Competition Werkes came in w it h a set of t r ick aluminum foot p eg s a n d o ne o f its popular fend er el imin ato r k its . Internally, the eng in e is stock spec ., although Ka wasaki road ra c e crew chief AI Lud ington , the m an resp o nsi bl e fo r th e prepara ti on of Eri c Bo st rom ' s facto ry equipment, offered us a few t ips o f h is o w n . L ud ing t o n, w ho happens to own a ZRX I I DO, told us that sw itch ing to K a w asa k i stock Ni nj a ZXI I cams in co m b inatio n with a g ood afterm arke t p ipe and a j et kit c e n bring an i n crease o f around 35 horsepo wer at th e rear whe el. That's a 3 0 percent increase over a sto ck b ik e. Ludington also suggested sw itching to a 520 chain for added kick. "I t 's kind o f a b as tard set up," Lud ington said . "You h ave to u se a KT M rear sprocket an d th en mill the face of a Honda F3 countershaft so th at it will fi t. You go u p o ne tooth in the rear a nd dow n o ne tooth in the front, and it make s a h u ge d i fference i n roll -o n t ests ." Good t ips, all o f th em , but for th e m oment we w ent wi th just th e j et k it and th e pipe, ch oosing a F ac t o ry jet k it along w ith a sta in le ss steel/ti ta n iu m ex haust sys te m fr om the Hind le fo lks up in Can ad a (see side b ar). Fi na lly, W o od upg r aded the sus p en s i on , e lec t i ng to go w ith R a c e Tec h 's Go ld Valve kit a nd .9 0 k g / m m springs u p front . The Rac e Tech gang al so se t th e f ork up fo r agg re ss iv e sport ridi ng . O u r ex pe rience w ith Race T ec h ' s products and services has be en no thing b ut positive , and this case was no d ifferent. Out bac k , damaged sto ck shocks p recip itated a swi tch to tricker dampers . Works Performa nce 's " Ra ce r" shocks now res i de in their plac e. Aside from the fact tha t their gold an odized bod ies e n h a n c e t h e looks of th e machine, the p iggyback un its are rebound and preload adjustable. Co incidentally, the shocks are upd ated replicas of shocks tha t were made for Eddie Lawson when he rode the factory green machi nes back in the early ' 8 0 s. The combina tion of all the ha rd work adds up to a special m ac hine in Wood ' s ey es. So much so , t hat h e swears he won 't even th ink about selli ng it, ev en though Kawasaki has decided to b ui ld a ZRX 1200 fo r all 50 sta tes . That's okay with W ood. M ore u pdating is i n the works , including , perhaps so me of Lud ingto n's ide as along with an update to a set o f really trick Dymag wheels from St reetfighter. But w hether o r not Wood continues to tinker w i th it , h e can r e st e a sy k nowing th at th e project was successfu l o n a ll f ron ts, in clud ing th e m o st im porta nt on e. " My w ife actu a ll y li kes it , " W o od says. "She told m e th at sh e th ought it looked really n ice." Th us gua rante eing that b o t h are keepers. CN AFAM 5953 Engineer Dr. Huntington Beach, CA 92649 7 14/ 379-904 0 Com petition Werkes 209 Carriage Ln. Roseburg, OR 97470 54 1/6 73 -6059 Corbin 2360 Technology Pkwy. Holli ster, CA 95023 83 1/ 634 - 1100 Dr. John's 116 1 North Cosby Wy, Unit C Anaheim , CA 92806 714/ 630-4075 Factory 2 1 Gold en Gate Dr. San Rafael, CA 9490 1 415 /721 -4964 Fast Lane Cycles 5402 System Dr. Hunti ngton Beach, CA 92649 714 /3 73·4312 Hindle 140 North Port Rd. Port Perry , Ontar io, Canada L9L1B2 905 /985-61 11 Lock hart Phill ips 151 Calle Iglesia San Clem ente, CA 92672 949/498 -9090 Long Beach Motorsports 329 1 Cherry A ve. Long Beach, CA 90807 562/ 427- 277 9 Motion Pro 119 Independence Dr. Menlo Park, CA 94 025 650/329 -0427 Race Tech 1501 Pom ona Rd. Corona, CA 92880 909/279- 6655 Work s Perform ance 2 1045 Osbome si, Canoga Park , CA 91304 818 /70 1- 10 10

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