The Place

Hi all just after a bit of help from more wiser people,OK after buying a f2 a while back I'm getting her sorted,I'm brand new to this but not to racing(ex solo ehhem),I'm hoping to have my first outing sometime soon to see if it floats my boat which I'm sure it will,my only concern is the motor is a 06 r6 2co which is due a refresh,after reading and hearing of engine fails of this motor which I'm sure I only hear of these because it's what I have,and the scary price of fancy valves and the price used motors etc,do you think that fitting a thundercat motor to spend a few seasons getting the hang of things and of course cheaper bills,I have two r6 2co motors needing refreshes which I can do myself,but not having a budget of an average MotoGP team cost always has a big affect on things,thanks for taking time if you reply.

Thundercats are too old now Scott. The new Yamahas are no better or worse than a Honda or Suzuki. It depends what your motor is like and as with a solo , how you ride it. A Thundercat was an expensive engine to get quick anyway .The valve issue is the same for all the later engines with Titanium valves although Yamaha seem to have more problems than the others. Just get on it and enjoy lol.

Get it checked out before you go out by someone who builds sidecar engines. I am sure Geoff will do it for you and pretty close as well

Dry sump or baffles system to prevent oil sliding to one side.

I ran this motor with what turned out to be a sketchy baffle. The original came from Ireland (in the bike) and went on to do 10 race weekends on this side of the Atlantic before the big end of a con-rod failed and pooched everything but the bottom cases and gearbox. It did spend a few seconds upside down while running which was likely a contributing factor. The only wrenching was a couple of valve adjustments, a few compression tests and annual synthetic oil changes. We obtained 2 more motors and had them completely rebuilt to stock specs (with cams degreed to 108 on both sides) by a respected engine builder. One of those blew out all of it's coolant (twice) up on Pikes Peak. Felt it tighten up at the end of the next race (60 hours of commuting between events so didn't have time to change it). Overhauled again, damage constrained to a bit of scuffing and wear consistent with running too hot. Other overhauled motor finished the season.

For IOM we obtained a 3rd low mileage (< 5K km) motor and ran that with a proper baffle for a weekend at Cadwell plus an afternoon of testing at Jurby and 5 laps of the TT course. Only issue was a gearbox problem (which likely existed before we obtained the motor) shifting from 5th to 6th. Reinstalled one of the overhauled motors and did 3 more laps of the TT.

Those same motors have already done 2 days of testing and 4 races at Brands a couple of weeks ago (not sure if they got any more rebuild attention, I suspect not although the stock motor is probably on a shelf awaiting gear box parts that arrived on the Brands weekend).

So I would say they are pretty reliable. My only advice is if you are using the stock clutch stop then make sure you safety wire the lock nuts AND the cable (to prevent it from slipping off the stop). Oh and apparently you need to take a phase out of the stock rectifier when you run at the TT (or it overheats and fries the ECU).

Good Luck,
Chris

Thanks for you help guys,I'll just sick with r6 motors cheers Scott