Ride says “Never quite as fashionable as Honda’s Blackbird or Suzuki’s Hayabusa (partly because it was a few mph down on them) so has not held its value well.
What a load of tosh!! A Blackbird couldn’t stay anywhere near one of these in any way shape or form apart from on the brakes or in the comfort stakes. If you ever read any straight line drag race competitions as published in Performance Bikes and other mags you will see standard ZX12′s regularly in the top 5 fastest entries. They were the joint fastest production bike with the Hayabusa until the ZZR1400 came out, but the ZX12 will leave the GSXR1300R for dead around the twisties or on a track day. Busa’s just don’t have the ground clearance.
The one I owned was an early un-restricted version which put 210mph on the clock, it did have a tooth less on the front sprocket so was at least 10 or 15mph out. With the catalytic converter removed as well it was the fastest thing I have ever ridden. When I hopped onto my mates 1999 R1 I wasn’t sure if I was riding a 600 such was the power difference.
On the road in general a well set up ZX12R will get from a to b faster than anything else. You can cruise at 160mph comfortably, you can do the same speeds on bumpy roads with unshakable stability that a sports bike can only dream of and that’s without the need for a steering damper. Admittedly my bike came from a guy that worked for K-Tec suspension, so the forks were re-worked and the rear shock was uprated. Ground clearance was a little more than standard as it rode higher at the rear and the level of adjustment was amazing.
Going into corners hot was interesting as a closed throttle would load up the front and cause the front to slide. Using the throttle to balance things up would soon see the rear spinning up through the turn. As fat as the bike was such was the feedback from the chassis that you could maximize speed through turns by accounting for both wheels sliding. The bike is around quarter of a ton wet so if you can’t stand both tires moving through the turn you’ll never corner it fast. If you are brave you should keep with most sports bikes. The biggest problem on a track day is how early you need to brake, and losing time out of turns as the back lights up the tire while all the sports bikes hook up and clear off. I think I managed a 1 minute 23 around the old Snetterton circuit where standard blades and GSXR1000′s were doing 1 minute 16′s.
Fuel consumption was still 35mpg on a race track riding as hard as I could which I thought was impressive. The brakes however were less so with the lever losing feel and causing a lockup with 160mph still on the clock coming up to the bomb hole. Then the lever was coming back to the bar in later sessions, on the road it wasn’t too bad and braided hoses helped quite a lot. Be careful with wheelies, the long wheelbase makes them hard to control and the bike often lands heavy and will soon blow fork seals.
With prices starting at £1500 these are a huge bargain, but don’t risk riding with old chains, tires and brake pads etc as you will be kissing your ass goodbye should anything go wrong at 200mph. If your not interested in high speed and want a big tourer buy a Blackbird instead.
