The RMZ450 Project

My RMZ450 is the first four stroke bike I've owned and raced. After many years riding two strokes I had a few test rides on borrowed CRF's and YZF's.

Given all the talk about two stroke machines living on borrowed time, I decided to jump camps and buy a four banger. I've always liked Suzuki's (my first ever bike was a big, bad DR350!) so an RMZ was the obvious choice.

I'm 5'8" and weigh 89kg (that's about 195lb for all my Imperial friends) so I was thinking seriously about a 450, not a 250. I had ridden a couple of 250 four strokes and while they were fun to ride I found myself wringing their necks to haul my mass along.

Given that there only a 10kg difference between the 250 and 450 I decided to get the 450, it was less hard work to get around on, the engine was more forgiving because of the extra power and I don't really struggle too much with the extra weight.



Now, keep in mind that I'm just a Clubman rider. A bike that's easier to ride and get along with will equate to quicker lap times for me than a razor edged, modified race machine. The mods I've done to my RMZ were designed to make it more comfortable to ride and less fatiguing over a longer moto (I count 15 minutes as a long moto at my age!).(click pic to enlarge)

The bike is well into its second season, it's done about 62 hours now and hasn't given me a bit of trouble. The valves are checked every 12 hours and are showing no signs of wear, I honestly believe this is due to the fact that I ride the bike low in the rev range. With all that bottom end torque there's no real need to rev it to go fast, just keep grabbing gears and you quickly get to where you need to be.

I haven't heard from any other RMZ450 owners who have had troubles with valve clearances either, unlike CRF's.

About the only whine I have is the four speed gearbox, I found it awkward to set up the gearing on the bike. I've tried a few different combinations and finally settled on a 14 tooth front and 47 tooth rear sprocket.

Apparently the '08 RMZ has a five speed box so that should make things a bit easier when choosing gearing.

There's a bit of a list of mods that I've done to my bike, some were for performance and a couple were just shiny bike bling, I'll list them below and link off to another page for each describing whether I thought the change was worth the time, money and effort.

Web www.motocross-racing-tips.com

Please note that to protect our younger visitors to Motocross 101, SafeSearch is turned on in these search results.