More power from your Suzuki Hayabusa with Yoshimura st-1 camshafts
February 4, 2010 - Alan Dowds
Japanese tuning gods Yoshimura pass down nuggets of bhp-boosting goodness for Suzuki's Hayabusa ... Scroll down for the full story
All you Hayabusa owners out there are probably still in a state of shock after seeing how much power BMW's new S1000RR makes. Yes, with 180-odd bhp at the tyre, the Krauts have made the most powerful bike ever. Not litre sportsbike, but any road bike, of any capacity. Including the doughty 170-ish bhp Hayabusa.
So what to do? Well, here's a start. Throwing a set of Yoshimura's stage one performance camshafts into your 'Busa will unleash a few extra ponies, but more importantly, will allow you to get the most out of other tuning mods. On their own, with a 4-2-1-2 Yoshimura road exhaust, and no fuelling mods, the cams add 3bhp. But expect that to rise once you add in a full race 4-1 exhaust, Power Commander and race air filter.
We spoke to a Hayabusa tuner, who said that while the Yoshi cams are a little pricy compared with less exotic choices, they will be a reliable, well-engineered solution. One problem with current Hayabusas is their titanium valves, which are a two-piece design. They're fine with standard cams and springs, but if you add race cams, you often need to fit stronger springs to retain valve control. The stress of these stronger springs can cause valve failure (it pulls the heads off 'em). But the Yoshi cams will be designed to work with stock valvetrain parts, so there'll be no chance of any problems.
He recommended fitting them after the pipe/PC/filter setup, but for maximum normally-aspirated power without big-bore kits, suggested using them alongside a set of high-compression drop-in pistons.
More info at www.phoenixnw.co.uk. And for Hayabusa tuning, we recommend Big CC Racing in Wokingham www.bigccracing.com
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