Suzuki GSX-1000R K6 Turbo

by Mick Hodge

"All is right with the world", I thought as I nailed my K6 through a set of sweeping bends, flat out in fourth. I hit fifth, then sixth. The urge to catapult me into next Wednesday was still there but it felt tame. I was getting used to it. No longer did I think "you fast fast melonfarmer".

Hmmmm.

I had been lucky enough to ride a couple of K7's and despite their similarity I thought one of them could be made into something that rocked my world, even just a small bit, for a little bit longer.

So I took the trip to the dealer with my bike all polished and glossy, a genuine 5k showing, and some new spunky unchewed and unfrazzled rubber hoops up front and back.

I took a deep breath as the figure for the change-over assaulted everything in my twisted and scrambled mind. It simply could not be. Did they have footage of me misusing their product? My poker faced stare remained unchanged, cool and calm, as deep with inside I crumpled to my knees, my head on the floor, bawling my eyes out.

Kee-rist almighty! The new one is not that bloody special compared to the K6, in fact without playing with it, it's longer, heavier, slower, and not as black as mine.

I declined the offer as politely as I could and headed for the door, my mouth dry and my stubborn bulldog thought processes working overtime.

How much faster could I make it go with a budget of the change over figure. Maybe a little bit more: upwards of five grand buys lots of go faster bits. Lots.

Well stuff em, I thought, why not make it really quick?

Another item to be ground into a V shape

When I was 19 I turbocharged a Harris framed 1200cc Kwaka. A few months later I added a nitrous kit. The results were undeniably spectacular: 175bhp with another 50bhp on the blue button.

These buggers are working overtime now

The plumbing is more impressive with the fairing off. And Boris is a bit easier to get on with too.

"Blah blah blah long swingarm blah blah"

More gratuitous plumbing shots

Getting on the gas out of corners is now... er... better

And it would still go round corners.

And I'm still here to tell the tale.

New turbo systems work so much better than the suck through carby versions 20 years ago. Kawasaki with then ground breaking GPz 750 turbo got it right with a blow through system and fuel injection. This had to be the way forward. Once you've experienced one you'll never ever forget the spine compression and lack of blood in the whites of your eyes that one of these curly metal puppies can deliver. A few phone calls later and a quick trip west and Jamie from S&R Pro and I had exchanged dollars, telephone numbers, and some vague promises on how long the joyful snail goodness was gonna take. I had giggled and sniggered a lot.

We had also established that he thought I was a little unhinged due to the fact I was:

1) unfamiliar about the full potential of modern turbo chargers and how far they had come, and 2) I was not going to lengthen the swingarm,

I like the ability to go round corners, I told him. Besides, how much harder would modern stuff pull???

Then several phone calls were received, and it seemed that I would be riding it down to the Island of Phillip.

I had taken to grinning at all sorts of times of the day and night at the mere thoughts of huge horsepower, really huge horsepower, driving something I knew cornered and stopped well. The day arrived and we found Jamie outside looking at the bike.

Then he then looked at me, kept grinning and started shaking his head.

At his request I went for a quick blatt around the block and managed to wheelie it in fourth. Easy, and unprovoked. Yum.

My smile broadened. Jamie's didn't. He mumbled something about long swing arms which fell on deaf ears.

The numbers are sensational: 245hp at the rear and 3 times the torque of a standard GSXR 1000.

That's more than a Rocket 3, and the motor is still stock.

But it's the rideable way its all delivered that makes the modern art of mappable ECUs and fuel injection, combined with a moderate 5psi of boost, so utterly delightful. Every one pound of boost from here on is worth nearly 25bhp, so boredom and needing more is easily fixed.

Maybe.

At 5,000 rpm things are on the cook and the turbo is spooling up. Acceleration is a lot faster than normal. By 7,000 rpm it's all down to throttle control and position as to how high you want the front wheel in the first four gears. And you can provoke it in fifth.

By 9,000 rpm you need to have picked a dot in the distance because that is where you are now currently riding. And you're still accelerating.

The remaining 4,000 rpm are an exercise in how good your eyesight is and how much g you want to pull. Bear in mind that if you change up at this point you will still be in the middle of the enormous wall of horsepower, so it will do it all over again regardless of what gear you're in. It pulls in fourth like a stock one does in first, but it still goes round corners a lot more successfully than I do. Photographers moan as you flash past, desperately trying to not let it hit boost because pulling slow wheelies for the camera on this thing is virtually impossible. We all have seen the glorious scene in Mad Max II where they hit the nitrous and the film is speeded up as the truck rockets forward. This is like that, in any gear.

There are nine injectors in this system, one of which pumps more fuel than four of the smaller ones collectively. If you ride it carefully you will average more miles than a stock bike out of a tank full of motion lotion thanks to the better intake swirl and the turbo's increase in torque allowing you to use higher gears and less revs. But, when you're in maximum warp speed Mr Zulu mode, it will be doing about 8mpg, or in km per litre, not a lot!

The one thing every power junky is obsessed with is a huge big gee gee figure that they can flop out to impress the less well endowed. Huge big horsepower figures look good on the brochure, but they don't really mean a lot in real drivable terms. But they do give you some indication of top speed (which is now in excess of 320kmh, easily). And when combined with the weight they probably give you a good indication of how fast you will get there.

But the magic thing is the giant gobs of tarmac-wrenching rubber-chewing torque. Imagine just rolling on the throttle and getting the same drive as if you just cogged it down three whole gears.

<Sigh>.

Lovely, easy acceleration that just comes on harder than a kiddy fiddler at a Wiggles concert. Huge stomp like, low down grunt, pulling tractors out of ditches, arm stretching, eye ball pushing roll on wallop and so much of it, all the time, whenever you want it. Imagine a big block V8 that revs like a 500 four cylinder two stroke, everywhere.

Power to burn tyres, fuel and anything that gets in your way. And I do mean anything. As the famous quote goes 'Get a turbo and run out of excuses.'

If you were to undertake this little project in your own back yard, the fitting of all the extra injectors/computer processors etc would make it an exercise in patience for the uninitiated.

But once everything is in place the system is easy to follow and work on. It fits beautifully and actually looks like it was designed to be there. Me thinks Jamie is a little bit special.

The motor runs considerably cooler now with all those redundant air intakes blowing a gentle gale over the top and back of the motor, regardless of temperature or traffic conditions. The air sucked up from the floor and blown across the injectors without having time to warm up in traditional hot air box means your combustion air charge is cooler.

The down side of all of this doesn't get explained when you're justifying the dollars to all the loved ones who are now missing every other meal. But, consumables wear out quicker: tyres, brake pads, chains and sprockets.

And you do have to change the oil a bit more often. But as there is now a huge gap around the oil filter, because those pesky exhaust down pipes are merely a memory, this is a cinch. I think the buzz achieved is well worth the little extra in running cost. I haven't asked the starving loved ones for their opinion.

Would I do it again?

Yup. Without a doubt.

I'm in the middle of building something even quicker as you read this.

You see, it's all a matter of conditioning.

It's amazing what you can get used to given half a chance.

Having Moto GP power at your finger tips is far more challenging and addictive and gives a far better rush than anything white and powdery that comes in a polythene bags and gets delivered by a large man wearing too much jewellery.

More boost, please.

Nothing exceeds like excess...