Good decision Kenny !

Only one or two sales of your goodies should defray the cost of purchasing the engine. We wait with baited breath.......

From my experience with buying from Kenny he's putting these things out at not much above cost price and it will take a lot more than a couple of sales to defray the costs of the test-bed engine and shipping. He is like Kev - an enthusiast who is willing to provide a service to us with low/no profit margins and selling into a foreign market unless Yamaha do eventually decide to set up the infra-structure in the USA to be able to sell the XT660 there. We benefit from this enthusiasm and the fact that he may be able to develop a product which suits both the XT660 and the quads over there. I am sure we all wish him success and try to help him by giving him firm orders once he has been able to develop and cost the modifications.

Kenny is providing the possibility of getting reliable performance parts at well below the prices charged by OTR and as such will open up the European and Australian markets as well as the Eastern Europe market which from the evidence on this forum seems to be very keen to purchase such parts.

Monty,

Fully agree with your statement. Anything that gets us away from OTR and their stubbornness and high prices can only be a good thing for all of us, and hopefully at some point OTR will realise this and start to reduce their prices ( dream on :) )...

WB

I really love what I do.... I don't know what volume of business OTR does, but I can tell you that I can count the number of parties interested in my products for the 660's on one hand. One of the things about race engine builders vs sales driven builders is the fitment and quality of their product. I have found that even the most respected names in race engine parts will only send out a product that fits the production pieces they have on hand. And since they don't have time to develop each and every product, they are at the mercy of shops to give them proper information. What we usually end up with is a factory fitment with slight changes. As large as the ATV market is over here , we had no proper fitting pistons. I had never met an engine builder that knew how important deck clearance is for efficiency and power, until I designed "corrected" deck height pistons, now it's all the rage.

I would be willing to bet the OTR CP pistons still install at .050" below the deck. My pistons on the other hand will install at .015" below. This is kind of a hard change to quantify on a dyno, but in real world use, it is noticeable, and only lots of real world testing and experience lead you to this kind of careful design work. We are very lucky to have people like Freez and Kev over here to set the pace and push the limits.

The most interesting part of this whole deal for me is the cultural differences. Americans want a screaming fire breather out of the box, then they will have to turn down the heat to get what they really needed. Europeans, on the other hand, tend to start out very conservative then turn up the heat to get what they want. Australians tend to be in the middle, but still somewhat aggressive. This is quite an interesting social experiment, and a wonderful experience for me. I am learning that the XT market will start low and ramp up as it proves itself worthy. The US market is the opposite.... they will instantly jump on almost anything, and the sales will fall off.

This is really fun, and I would like to thank you guys for letting me be involved.

Thanks again,
Kenny

Great work Kenny. Are you using stock valves with this head?

Yes indeed. I was really concerned about leaving power on the table due to bore shrouding. So we decided to go after the hard to get airflow.... The stock valves are very high quality, they are just small. I think this is gonna be a very solid combo with great power numbers and OE durability.

Great head flow Kenny well done mate. Have you sorted the rings out for your pistons now, I know you were out of stock for a while?

One thing I am after is a stroker kit for my XT & have had great difficulty in finding a stripped XT & Raptor motor to compare cranks. If I could ask you to have look once you get Frans old motor, that would be great.

Kenny, I got the OTR head+cam on my 103mm JEpiston and gave me a lot of HP+torque. But as I'm hugry for more power I would like to try a raptor head with oversize valves + special cam. I'm would like to do this mod next winter. What HP/torque gain you think this will give with a +2TB?.
Let's not underestimate OTR, I think they also do a good job. In Europe parts like pistons, valves etc are very expensive, this quite common.

Who/what is OTR please?

sorry, OTR is Off the Road; www.offtheroad.de
It's a German XT part supplier