Yamaha YZF-R1 5VY part 4 How 8 goes into 1!

Poor PB is rueing his choice of track-day steed – but with some patience and research he may just have tracked down some rare parts…

- PAUL BERRYMAN

A quick recap of thisR1’s story so far would be; browse, buy, seize, strip and oh bugger!

The crankshaft and rods were now junk. Claimed by the destructive cocktail of abandoned clutch plates and flywheel magnets circulating amongst the oil, replacement parts to rebuild the motor were needed.

As the owner of a 2004-2008 R1, shopping for used engine parts you’ll soon find you’re fighting over scraps, each burdened with the age-old ‘supply and demand’ premium. The detaching flywheel magnet issue on this generation of R1 ensures significant demand for both whole engines and major internal components too. Crankcases are common, and cheap, the important stuff that goes inside though? Not so much! That tells you all you need to know; as you’d expect for a 15-year-old sportsbike, plenty of these engines have made it on to the secondhand market, but the vulnerable bits (cranks, rods, gearboxes, flywheels) have already been snapped up. Damn.

After enough internet searches to drive me slightly mad, but only coming up with motors that had ridiculous £1500 price tags, unknown provenance or scrap-ready parts that had been scraped out of already blown engines, it was time for lateral thought. The good news is I like finding workarounds to problems – I’m almost indefatigable when it comes to proving I’m a smart arse (you don’t say, PB? – Bertie.) The task in hand was to find a crankshaft, connecting rods and as many other 5VY compatible engine parts as possible to make the required rebuild happen.