Cycle News

2015 YAMAHA YZF-R1 AND YZF-R1M FIRST RIDE P52 and for the new exhaust. The KYB shock uses the monocross link and is fully adjustable, including high and low speed compres- sion and rebound damp- ing, and the spring rate has been increased five percent for better track performance. The 43mm KYB forks with 120mm of stroke have increased internal rigidity and are double- damper style forks, with compression and rebound adjustment available in both forks with 15mm of preload adjustment. Help- ing increase the rigidity further is the front axle which has been increased in diameter from 22mm to 25mm. On the R1M these forks and shock are of course Öhlins electronic units, labeled Electronic Racing Suspension (ERS). Unlike the KYB units, the Öhlins has compression damping on the left and rebound on the right. Spring rate is increased by 15 percent over the standard R1 and in automatic mode it varies the rate up to 80 times per second by an electric stepper motor. This system was actually first used in WSBK back in 2008 with Troy Corner and Noriyuki Haga, until it was banned. Rear spring rate is in- creased by two percent. In A-1 and A-2 modes you can go into the automatic modes and adjust the preset parameters plus or minus five stages of com- pression or rebound, and with the Communication Control Unit and associ- ated app you can do it on your tablet or phone. A-3 is a non-adjustable mode. If you like, you can go full manual and create your own preset settings. Cast magnesium wheels make a huge dif- ference to handling. They only use five sprocket bolts and in total weigh 1.9 pounds less front and rear than previously. Reducing the inertia moment (front by four percent and rear by a massive 11 percent), as well as the near two pounds of unsprung weight, dramatically helps direction change speed. New ADVICS Monobloc four-piston, radial mounted calipers replace the six- piston units from before, as well as a new radial Nissin master cylinder and lever assembly. Fluid is now squeezed down a stainless steel brake line. Interestingly, Yamaha has adopted the standard bolt pitch of 108mm, which makes it easier to fit higher spec aftermarket calipers if you wish. The brakes are fitted with the new Unified Brake System (UBS), which activates the rear brake in proportion to front brake pressure. Use of the track ECU disengages this feature. The 4.5-gallon fuel tank (which is polished on the R1M and looks totally rad) is now a three-piece aluminum design, giving a weight saving of 3.5 pounds over the old tank. The tank's shape has very deep knee indents and almost feels Ducati-like in its slimness. It's also a bit lower than before to help you tuck in better. That 3.5-pound saving is significant because it's off the highest point of the bike and helps further with side-to-side agility in cornering. The development team worked hard with the M1 MotoGP machine to style the new machine. Avail- able in three colors (Team Yamaha Blue, Raven, Rapid Red/Pearl White, and carbon-fiber for the R1M), the bodywork is now easier to tuck behind and based on many tests the new bike has eight percent less wind resistance over the previous bike. A higher windscreen also helps protect the rider more at high speed. The front now houses super-trick LED daytime lights and head- lights. The main headlight is disengaged when you run the race ECU, hence the reason the lights are not running in any of the R1M shots seen in this article. The reach to the 'bars has been increased by 55mm and the seat to foot- peg distance increased 10mm, which is great news if you're a taller rider. The seat itself is much flatter than before, all aimed at letting you move around more when cornering. Again, this was a feature taken from the M1. Tires are the new Bridgestone Battlax RS10, designed to offer greater stability and more consis- tent behavior over long runs. However we rode with the racing-orientated RS10 Type R on the stan- dard R1, which provided excellent side grip as well as acceleration perfor- mance. On the R1M we had slicks, the Racing Bat- tlax VO2, which allowed us to really explore the po- tential of the new machine. And it's got heaps. >>THE BRAINS Electronically, the R1 is a cut above anything Ya- maha has put on the street before. There's more acronyms than you'd find at NASA, all doing different things but all reporting back to the same guy. That guy is the six-axis Inertial Measurement Unit, or IMU, first used in MotoGP in 2012. The IMU's gyro sensor measures the bike's pitch, roll and yaw, and com- bined with information from the G-sensor which mea- sures forward-backward movement, as well as up- down and left-right angles, it then communicates to all the different systems to give you a faster, safer riding experience. The 10-stage Traction Control is a bank angle sensitive system, meaning it looks at how far the bike is leaned over as well as throttle position, to give you the optimum amount of TC intervention for a given acceleration. The Slide Control is a bit dif- ferent in that it will let you hold a drift under power and works with the IMU's yaw sensor, plus your continued on page 54

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