The seed of this project grew from one man’s desire to have a 500cc two stroke enduro bike capable of taking on the notorious Roof of Africa Extreme Enduro.
Riaan ‘Riempies’ Pretorius loved the 500cc two stroke monsters of the 1980s, but could never afford one. Now that he can, there are none that can be bought new. So he asked Koos Zietsman if they could build one for their enduro team, Team Matjien.
Koos loves big dreams but Riempies had to ask a few times, Koos needed to be sure. Riempies spotted a kit in Canada and brought the engine concept to Koos. After doing sums of extras, freight, import duty, and VAT, and so on Koos said – “This is expensive, let’s just make one ourselves!”
And that’s how we get to here and now. Koos assembled a highly competent team of design engineers and got sponsors and partners involved. The PZ490 enduro bike successfully completed the Roof of Africa in November 2023. Now another 500cc monster project, the PZ500 is being developed in the wings solely for the purpose of an attempt to break existing world land speed records for this class.
The videos on our YouTube channel will give you more insight into the way the project came into life and evolved, we hope you enjoy the journey with us.
Latest posts
- Video of PZ500 square engine machining
- CAD animation of the PZ500 square engine
- PZ500 square engine machining progresses
- More on the PZ500 square engine
- Square engine casings taking shape at P&C Technologies
Contact us
- E-mail teammatjien@gmail.com
- Phone +27 82 783 7463