.

  1  |  2  |  3  |  4  |  5  |  6  |  7  |  8  |  9  |  10 

 |  11  |  12  |  13  14  |  15  |  16  |  17  18  Next

AG 100 1982-
AG 175 1982-
AG 200 1985-
AX 125 1970
BT1100 Mastino Concept 2002
BT1100 Bulldog 2003
BT1100 Bulldog 2004
BT1100 Bulldog 2005
BT1100 Bulldog 2006
.  
CS 200 1971
DT 125 1972
DT 125 1973-74
DT 125 1975-76
DT 125 1977
DT 125 1978
DT 125E 1978-79
DT 120MX 1980
DT 120MX 1981
DT 125MX 1982
DT 125LC 1983
DT 125LC 1984
DT 125LC 1985
DT 125LC Disc 1985
DT 125R 1986-87
DT 125R 1988-89
DT 125R Ténéré  1989-90
DT 125R 1990-91
DT 125R 1992-93
DT 125R 1994-95
DT 125R 1996-97
DT 125RE 1998
DT 125RE 1999
DT 125RE 2000
DT 125RE 2001-02
DT 125RE 2003-04
DT 125RE 2005-07
DT 125RE Everts Replica 2005
DT 125X 2005-07
.  
DT 175 1974-75
DT 175 1976-77
DT 175 1978
DT 175 1979
DT 175 1980
DT 175 1981
DT 200R 1984-85
DT 200R 1986-87
DT 200R 1988-89
DT 200R 1990
DT 200WR 1991-92
DT 200WR 1993-96
DT 230 Lanza 1997-98
.  
DT-1 250 1968-70
DT-2 250 1971-72
DT-3 250 1973
DT 250 1974-75
DT 250 1976
DT 250 1977
DT 250 1978
DT 250 1979
DT 250 1980
DT 250 1981
DT 360A 1973-75
DT 400 1974-75
DT 400 1976-77
DT 400 1978-79
DX 250 1970
Ego Solariz 2017-
Exciter 150 2015-17
Exciter 150 2018-
Exciter 150  GP Edition 2018

  1  |  2  |  3  |  4  |  5  |  6  |  7  |  8  |  9  |  10 

 |  11  |  12  |  13  14  |  15  |  16  |  17  18  Next

Yamaha Motorcycles, under this motto, employing all its creativity, and with a very strong spirit of challenge, became what it is now: one of the biggest players in the worldwide motorcycling scene.
But Yamaha's history doesn't start with motorcycles..

It is back in 1877 that Torakusu Yamaha started with the Nippon Gakki Company that later would become Yamaha Corporation: an important manufacturer of fine musical instruments.

As the company grew, they explored several fields of opportunity in the textile industry and others.

During the World War II, the company set up a factory to produce airplane propellers. This plant played an important role in Yamaha's entry to the motorcycle industry as you will see.

After the war, Yamaha Corporation had to find new ways to use the tooling and experience that had been accumulated during their times in the airplane industry, and it was then when Yamaha Motor Corporation was founded.

It's important to mention that even though this new company was just another branch of Yamaha Corporation, it was placed under an independent management. In this case, under the guidance of Ginichi Kawakami; which turned out to be a brilliant move.

Before producing their first motorcycle, Ginichi Kawakami traveled a lot establishing what would be very useful relationships. He also sent out his engineers to Europe and had them learn how to build motorcycles, particularly from DKW; with whom they kept an underground and unofficial long lasting relationship.

One proof of this is that nowadays, the only two manufacturers in the world of mass-produced five side-valve engines are Yamaha an Audi (DKW - Auto Union).

One of the most important legacies from this international relationships were all the skills learnt by Yamaha's engineers on two stroke engines know-how. Other manufacturers as Suzuki would not reach the same level of development in this area till seven years later.

Not to wonder why the first bike from Yamaha Motorcycles the 125 YA-1 was fairly a faithful copy of the 1949 DKW RT 12. The only two important differences were the four speed gearbox instead of the original three speed gearbox, and a gear transmission replacing the primary chain drive.

IMPORTANT MODEL FROM YAMAHA MOTORCYCLES

Yamaha YA-1

Even though the Yamaha YA-1 - baptized "Acatombo" (Red dragonfly) by its fans - had "nothing in special" and was more expensive than its competitors, it almost immediately became a great success.

It was reliable: before putting it into the market, the prototypes were tested along 10,000 miles of rough rides . Even the big boss himself, Ginichi Kawakami, rode the bike without any incident from Hamamatsu to Tokyo.

It was beautiful: with this model Yamaha was the first manufacturer to put special attention to the decoration of the motorcycle. This task was given to GK Design in Tokyo. It's worth mentioning that this firm has designed the "look" of most Yamaha motorcycles to date.

It was fast: the YA-1 obtained excellent overall results in the most important local races of that time: Mount Fuji (third place) and Mount Asama (first place).

In fact it was this aggressive attitude in the sporting world that helped Yamaha Motorcycles gain fast acceptance even though they made a late start in the motorcycle scene in comparison to Honda and Suzuki.