amcn.com.au 65
1234Carruthers formed a close bond
with Roberts, culminating in
three world 500 titles
The Engineer
BY THE TIME Eddie
Lawson had claimed
his third world title,
Carruthers was a vital
part of Yamaha’s race
department.
“For want of a better
phrase, I was their
‘round-eye’ engineer.
When I went to Japan
I was the only non-
Japanese allowed in the
race design department
and dyno rooms.”
Yamaha trusted
Kel-san so much that
he was allowed to re-
engineer bikes.
“I had a lathe and
a milling machine in
the back of the truck.
One year the new 500
arrived, and it was
useless, so I machined
a millimetre off the
bottom of the cylinders,
modified the cylinderheads and changed the
port timing.
“Another time the
rotary-valve inlet
timing was all wrong,
so they sent complete
360-degree discs and I
cut them myself. Once
they even let me cut
the front-end off a 500
and weld it back at a
different angle!
“When I first went
to Europe with Kenny
we were basically on
our own; we had one
Japanese guy, who
basically just took
notes. The Japanese
engineers told me they
were learning from me
what it was all about.
It eventually got to
the stage where they
had learned a lot, they
became more involved,
and the bikes got
better.”