My name is Kevin. Im on a ton of boards, all with the same user name.

Little about me. Ill be 31 in May, did 4 years active duty Marine Corps right after High School. Since then Ive basically been doing Car Stereos, Alarms, remote starts, and all that fun stuff. Got married almost 2 years ago to Jessica, we started dating in 2002. Dated a little bit in HS in 95. Shes a Dr of Pharmacy. We just closed on a House in Alton IL about 2 weeks ago. We both grew up in this area, we moved to Memphis while she did her residency.

Ive wanted a ZX14 for a couple years now, but while living in Memphis, I rode with a pretty aggressive group called MSSR, and didnt want to give up my R6 or R1 on those type of roads. Very tight back to back twisties out there, and not a second on the highway, or any cruising at all. Now that ive moved back to IL, I spend more time cruising, and on a normal day, all the turns are pretty wide open/higher speed turns. So after last summer I decided its time to sell the Yamahas, and get a ZX14. There is one good road I hit thats almost an hour away, that has some tight turns, but I dont end up out there very often, so I figure its time for a change.

Ive owned mostly Yamahas, I learned how to operate a bike, when I was 15. I say operate, because I feel I never truly learned how to ride until I moved to Memphis, and got my ass off the highways, and learned to get off the seat and nail those corners. Since then ive had a couple R1s, and couple R6s.

So on that note, Ive found the ZX14 I want, probably picking it up Wed. Its an 07, Plasma Blue, with under 5k miles. And really just a couple of basic bolt ons. He has a couple different wind screens for it. He got a DB, and didnt like the where the wind was hitting him, so he picked up that supposedly higher than stock, but not a DB. It has a PC3, Brocks Megaphone exhaust, the long one that still angles up towards the tail. Hes removed the secondary butterfly's, and its been lowered 1 inch, and a undertail kit. Tires are a dual compound dunlop, with under 50 miles on them.

My plans, raise it back up to stock height, tune the suspension for handling, get it to my tuner and put on the dyno for a custom map, before it goes to the dyno ill either do a K&N or BMC, depending on which one I read ZX's supposedly like better. After that, not sure how much Ill really do to the bike. I plan on getting the rims powdercoated black, and at that point Ill do ceramic bearings as well. But that will probably wait until next winter.

Well, that Me in a nut shell. I guess I could of just said Hi, but im bored, and talk alot. lol

Do you know me, or just do a google search?

That was my 07 R6-S that I just sold a couple weeks ago actually. Also had a Red R6, Black 05 R1, Charcoal 07 R1.

Car wize, you could of found:

Orange Daytona Charger
NBM Camaro
Red C5 Corvette
Blue Versa
Silver Juke
Green TSi Talon
Black Talon
Black 79 280zx
Silver 79 280zx
Red 300zx
Blue Del Sol
Blue Civic Hatch
Orange Probe
White 82 Camaro

Ive had more, but didnt take pics of all them, so they probably wouldnt be found online. lol

You said your name was all you used. Just curious was all. See, I'm bored too. I'm not confused. I just have an itch up there is all.

Yer creepin me out Hubster!And WOT is that Yammi doin on here...they make guitars fer gosh sake!And pianos...and....sheesh.

This is OUR big Brother.

THIS....is a Yamaha????????????Believe it or not...this pic was with the images of Yamaha Guitars...I've NO idea WHAT kind of guitar it could possibly be...but it was right there with em!

* Last updated by: blue07 on 2/27/2011 @ 1:43 AM *

Welcome to the forums! I don't believe you'll find a better resource for all things relevant to the '14. As I'm sure you've found already, we have a crap-ton of info in other topics here, from the tires to the handlebars. I'm certain you already know this, but the '14 will NOT keep up in corners with literbikes and smaller so please don't try. She can corner, just not near as aggressive as these others. Ask me how I know..

I spent almost 6 years in the USN, half of that time as an HM3 with my field med service school from Camp Johnson, down the road from LeJeune. I had way more fun in my BDU's as an in-the-dirt corpsman than in those retarded dungarees at the clinic. Never met such a comraderie as the Corps. I consider myself proud to have known so many and it made me wish for a full-fledged Marine Corps version of a doc vs a Navy one. The Navy just didn't have the brotherhood the Marines did and I was honored they treated me as their own. I got out because of the bureaucratic nonsense and all the red tape they began instituting.

When I first joined, I felt pretty confident I'd make a career out of it, but way too much bologna there towards the end. I found out later that the ship I was on (USS Wasp LHD-1) started allowing enlisted women aboard and, what once was a very well-oiled machine, became much less so from the distractions of the women and their general lack of desire to work as hard. Granted, I'm not chauvinistic, just prefer what works best for our military which seems to be keeping women off the front line and out of situations that are more grueling/demanding.

I'm 36 now and didn't get my start in aggressive style riding until I bought my first bike a couple of years after joining the Navy. It was a '94 Yamaha FZR600 and I think about that bike even to this day. Had a lot of fun and she wasn't afraid to lean. My very first experience on motorcycles was when I was around 11/12 and rode a cousin's Honda 125. What a great bike, and more power than you'd think. I found myself making excuses just to ride it again. I guess that's how my passion with motorcycles got started. It's always been in my blood and, like most others here I'd imagine, much to the chagrin of friends/family.

Hope you enjoy your new ride, watch out for the texters, pretend you're invisible, wear gear all the time and stay safe!

Welcome! Almost any question you might have about the ZX14 (if not the meaning of life) has been answered on this forum, so use the How-To section and the search feature. This board is organized pretty logically too.

Just a note you mentioned putting K&N or BMC on it, I assume you mean air filter? Don't bother. Brock's Performance has dyno charts up on their website (or did last year) that prove the OEM air filter produces as much horsepower and torgue as the aftermarket filters, and that a "race" filter only makes the money in your wallet go out of it faster.

I'm glad to see you raising it back to stock height. Clearly you value handling and performance over posing.

Welcome!

I'm prior military and late 30's. 1st bike I rode was a Honda trail 70???? Been inlove with bikes ever since.

Let us know when you get the new toy and how you like it.

I know that the ZX14 wont keep up with the R1 or R6 in the corners. Thats why I didnt get one when I lived in Memphis. Hell, out there I prefered the R6 to the R1, Im a pretty big guy, so I still always took the R1 out, so I had the power to keep up with them out of the turns. Even on the R6, Id be at 10-11k, and go WOT out of the turns, and still get left behind, but with my weight, I slowed that bike down big time. On the R1, I didnt have any problems keeping up, besides skill going through the turn, it was never the bikes fault.

Im about to leave here in a couple minutes and go look at the bike one last time. Should be buying it on Wed. Also found out today im getting over $4,000 back in Taxes, so that was the only thing that I was concerned about. If I was going to owe a ton in taxes, it was going to put a damper on things. But 4k back means I probably wont even take out a loan at all. Ill probably still just take out a 2k loan, just so I can leave my "oh shit" fund untouched, and since I did just close on a house a couple weeks ago, id like to have that just incase something random pops up.

I guess if the BMC and K&N has been shown not to add anything, I just wont worry about then, and run the stock filter.

Oh, and I know what you mean loadedmind, you will never find as good as a group of people to work with like the Corps. Some units do suck, but as a whole, they are amazing.

Ive ridden my buddies ZX14 out in Memphis a couple times, but he as only about 150lbs, and had the suspension tuned to be as soft as possible for highway cruising, so It was completely backwards of how I would need it set up.

* Last updated by: Kolk1 on 2/27/2011 @ 4:01 PM *

I swear my 14 handles the twisties better than my RC51 did!!!! BS ALERT!!!

OK... it's no track master, but it's the most fun bike I've owned!

Went and looked at the bike, its spotless just like ive heard from everybody that knows the bike.

The one good news thing I found out, I thought it just had the brocks slipon, it has the brocks full system.

Welcome to the Forum Kolk1, Many Good people here and plenty of info to browse.

Snuffy

G'day mate you will enjoy a ZX1400 FOR SURE great forum here too

13.5 more hours and Im picking it up. lol. Its 8:30pm right now, and im meeting him at 10am tomorrow. :)

S'WEEEEEEEEEEEEET!

Leaving in 40 minutes.... Cant sleep, I keep having messed up dreams. People stealing my cash, or he wrecked the bike last night, just a bunch of random craziness. Am I obsessing too much? lol

Well, I got it home about 1/2 hour ago. The full brocks exhaust, and a ton of other random parts are all sitting in the garage waiting to go on. But anyway, heres a couple pics. Not sure why its cutting off the pics, they work fine on the other boards.

* Last updated by: Kolk1 on 3/4/2011 @ 7:51 AM *

Looks clean! Congats and welcome to the forum.

Pics need to be resized or they get cutoff... or if you upload them to the forum, it resizes them for you.

Very cool, clean 14. Can't really tell, but those tires look near brand new.

Tires are a set of Dual Compound Dunlops, im not sure which model, but they have less than 100 miles, front and rear. There was a winter sale, and he put them on, then didnt put 50 miles on the bike since then over the winter, then I put about 20 miles on the tires today heading home.

Just got back from the bike shop, bought a new set of stands, since I sold mine last fall. Weather is supposed to be horrible for about the next week, so im going to go ahead and tear it down, and do the exhaust, and put the stock dog bone back on. Well, im still debating on that, should I put the stock one back in, or just put the Muzzy one to the stock height setting? I mean, right now I dont see why I would ever lower it, but things change and who knows. So im not sure if I should pull it and sell it, or just put it back to stock height.

Edit: They are Sportmax Q2's

* Last updated by: Kolk1 on 3/3/2011 @ 7:57 PM *

Cropped pics down to 75% of the original size, so now they fit.

Kolk1..nothing like that new bike feeling. Even at 2 years with my baby, I still go out to the garage and just smile...

Cleaned it up a little today, as a storm is rolling in. I cant wait until Monday so Ill have time to swap over the exhaust.

One thing I forgot to mention, and cant wait to get rid of. He put on OEM style, but Fake Carbon fiber mirrors, and levers. He gave me the stock levers, so Im going to swap those very soon, but I need to find 2 OEM mirrors. I hate the fake Carbon fiber checker board stuff.

Welcome to the forum, that's a great looking bike you have there. The plasma blue's are the best :)

Went ahead and put the exhaust on the bike today after work. Sounds WAY better in the garage, but its only mid 30s, so im not going to ride it tonight.