Jesus "Jai" Infanzon's introduction to Yamaha's V-Max musclebike came when he borrowed one from a friendly Yamaha dealer in Andorra and rode it over the Pyrenean mountains from France to Spain. Although he was impressed with the power and acceleration, he found the handling severely lacking on the twisty mountain roads. Years later, after he'd tired of the usual race reps and a brief dalliance with the chrome encrusted joys of Hardly-Ridables, Jai bought a V-Max new. He then enlisted the help of France's top V-Max man, Pascal Schlitz, who had made a reputation for himself while working under the Tuning Formula banner before going solo with OTEC. So over a couple of frog's leg brunches, Jai convinced Pascal that he was the man to mod the Max.
What began with the purchase of a few parts led to a friendship that saw Jai delivering the entire bike to Pascal and giving him carte blanche to transform the bike to Jai's idea of a 21st century V-Max. More power was the first objective and Pascal increased the engine capacity to 1500cc with a Wiseco big-bore kit using titanium cylinder sleeves, gas-flowed the cylinder heads and made special manifolds for the four Keihin 41mm FCR flat-slide race carbs. Pascal naturally fitted Carrillo rods to handle the extra power, and for the same reasons an OTEC lock-up clutch and an oversize billet aluminum oil sump were added to the mix along with a Samco silicon hose kit. Fortunate that he did as Jai then decided that nitrous oxide would be a good idea, so Pascal fitted a Dyna 3000 NOS system with a Schnitz NC-2000 progressive nitrous controller to produce even more horses galloping through the modified, ceramic coated Kerker 4-1 exhaust system.
Pascal also strapped on one of his patent chain drive conversions complete with a one-off aluminum swingarm that also doubles up as a reservoir for the air shifter.
Serious stuff.
A set of hlins forks and Beringer brakes updated the chassis to cope with the bigger engine, and so far there hasn't been a bike to put up a challenge!
Buyer's Box
1998 Yamaha V-Max
Front end: hlins forks, Astrum wheel, Beringer brakes
Rear end: Astrum wheel, Braking Wave rotor
Motor: Blueprinted, 1500cc Wiseco big bore kit, Carrillo con-rods, Dyna 3000NOS system with Schnitz NC-2000 progressive nitrous controller, Kerker exhaust, MRE air shifter, Otec clutch, nitrous
Paint: Mad Creations
Owner: Jesus "Jai" Infanzon
Builder: Pascal Schlitz at Otec-Formula, France