| Author | Message | ||
     Reepicheep |
Well, 11% lower gearing will net 11% higher average acceleration, but result in a lower theoretical top speed. So maybe by "more top speed", they meant "more top end", which was a wrong way of saying "it accelerates harder", by which they mean "on average, it accelerates harder, though you have to shift sooner".  | ||
| Busykat |
Buelet, My top end was only 115 mph as indicated on the speedo. As it turns out, the ECM governed the top speed of my XB12XP. I had a technician program a non-cop bike V.I.N. into it and viola, 135 mph. Changing the primary to a XB9 lowered the top end to 131 indicated, (bouncing off the rev limiter). The only mods to my bike are the primary swap, a K&N air filter, and a crank case breather mod; however, it was hitting those top speeds before the breather mod and K&N air filter. | ||
| Bike_pilot |
FWIW 11% lower primary gearing won't give 11% more acceleration 'cause you've gotta shift earlier. It does provide a slight benefit in that it tightens up the gaps between gears and helps make use of the Buell's narrow power curve to keep the rpms nearer the point where peak power is made. You do get 11% more torque to the wheel in a given gear for a given rpm, but you are going 11% slower | ||
| Busykat |
"11% more torque to the wheel in a given gear for a given rpm..." Therefore... Torque moves things. More torque=quicker movement. Also, the gaps in the transmission aren't effected; the RPM change is still the same betwixt gears as before the swap. (Message edited by Busykat on October 29, 2011) | ||
| Ronmold |
Where do you guys live where you can drive triple digits without the fear of getting thrown in the slammer? Almost every time I get the urge to drive in a "spirited" manor I see one of Minnesota's finest coming around the next bend. Must be a sign that my wife is praying for me!  | ||
| Buelet |
Busykat - Interesting... 135 to 131 wouldn't bother me, but now I'm doubting my own knowledge base! I wonder if I wasn't in 5th gear after all when I was on my rev limiter and I was topped out at 117? If I find out that I had a gear left, then I'm going to feel kind of silly! Ha! This will require further research... after I replace my front tire with one that has some more tread left! Thanks to everyone for the input. | ||
| Reepicheep |
You will be shifting sooner, but there is always another gear to go to. So it will accelerate about 11% faster, but reach a theoretically lower top speed. In practice of course, if you are in a drag race where you need 3 shifts and the guy next to you only needs 2, you loose some of the acceleration you gained by shifting. Which is why they gear bikes for particular tracks, if they can nail the ratios just right, the rider can consistently make a few less shifts every lap, which adds up over a race. | ||
| Panhead_dan |
Mine would not hit the rev limiter in fifth gear with stock gearing. It ran out of steam at about 120 mph. With the lower gearing it will hit the limiter and that happens north of 130. The wheelies are better too.  | ||
| Blake |
>>> the Buell's narrow power curve Huh? Which 600cc IL4 Buell are you riding? My Uly pulls strong through over 2/3rds of it's rev range. No downshifting needed for routine passing. With a 600cc IL4, you need two. | ||
| Blake |
We need the wider ratio primary, but we need a 6th gear to go with it too. | ||
| Buelet |
Wow - you'd think you'd think a guy knows his Uly after 50k miles, but this thread has left me with more questions than answers! But I know that I still love my Uly even if it isn't one of the other multiple personality types! Haha! Must go do some more research!!  | ||
| Froggy |
You say that now. Ride an 1125CR and you will notice that your Uly is lacking a bit in the low end power department. Oh, and the high end power department too. Oh and the slow speed driveabilty department. Oh and the not-vibrate-your-fillings out department. (I think I'll stop here and enjoy my ability to accidentally pull the front wheel off the ground at 130mph ) | ||
| Ulynut |
No power, huh?.... | ||
| Skyclad |
Damn Buelligans | ||
| Froggy |
Look how sloppy that is, with all the bouncing trying to maintain a balance, working with a narrow power band with low output and high altitude. This is how it is done. | ||
| Blake |
The point dear FrankenFroggy (happy Halloween) is not to tout the peak HP, but to rebut the silly claim of a narrow power-band. That said, from what I recall, the Buell 1200 cc engine outperforms or matches the Rotax up until nearing the 7,100 RPM rev limit of the air-cooled twin. Yes, from there, the Rotax still has another 3,400 RPM and 43 HP to go. Concerning vibration, from what I've seen reported, within the top of its rev range, the 1125 vibrates WAY more than any Uly, irritatingly so. Anything above 2500 RPM is very smooth on the Uly. Cruising at 80 to 100 MPH in high gear is shockingly smooth on every Buell air-cooled twin I've ridden. Don't be threatened by those of us who prefer simple air-cooled tech and no valve adjustments to higher performance. Let's see what the EBR 1190AX offers Adventure Sport riders. It may be the bike to seduce me back onto a liquid-cooled motorcycle. I really like the Buell spec'd Harley engine. It's a shame that it didn't have the opportunity to evolve even further, shedding more weight, and gaining more displacement, more power, higher rev range and efficiency via the XBRR architecture. Buell wanted to implement it. They were denied the opportunity. The same for a turbocharged version. Both would have been wonderous. But I digress. | ||
| Blake |
First video shows a bike popping a wheelie at speed. This demonstrates power among other things. Second video shows someone riding a wheelie, an exercise demonstrating balance and control above all else. It has little to do with power. | ||
| Froggy |
It matches, but it also has more displacement. The 1125 does more with less, then you aren't out of steam when things are just starting to getting good.
Over 6000rpm there is some buzzing, but it is NOTHING like what the XB does throughout its ENTIRE range.
You say that now, but when you do the same on the 1125, you will notice how terrible the XB is. If you think the air cooled Buells are smooth at those speeds, then you will think the 1125R isn't even running.
No valve adjustments, but you are stuck with more frequent and more involved maintenance. The valve adjustment is easier than changing spark plugs on the XB anyway.
Too bad the AX isn't 1190, I do not know what cooling it uses off hand, if any.
No, it just shows me when I am bored getting stuck behind a car.
No, it just shows No_rice and how much more skill he has than me. | ||
| Hughlysses |
You say that now, but when you do the same on the 1125, you will notice how terrible the XB is. If you think the air cooled Buells are smooth at those speeds, then you will think the 1125R isn't even running. I've owned both bikes and I disagree completely. The 1125 definitely has gobs more power above ~7000 RPM, but when I get to that RPM I'm already running faster than I'm comfortable on the street. If what you say is true, the 1125R must be a LOT smoother than the 1125CR, because my Uly is much smoother than my CR was at any speed above 2500 RPM. Froggy- we get it; you love your 1125's. The questions are: (1) Why do you feel the need to come to an XB-specific forum and bash XB's at every opportunity (something neither you nor Blake would tolerate from a rider of any other brand) and (2) Why are you still holding on to the 2 or 3 XB's you have if you think they're so inferior?  | ||
| Arcticktm |
I remember when this thread was about changing to XB9 primary gearing... Anyway, I did it several years ago and still like it a lot. No noticeable change in MPG, but I live in the good stuff, so I only take a big highway trip about once per year (where it is still around 50 mpg at 70 mph or so). I would not want to run all day at 80 mph+, but I don't like doing that anyway. I have no idea what the top speed of my bike is before or after the swap. If I was really worried about that, I likely would not have bought a Uly (or any big, tall adventure bike with a massive drag coefficient). At the risk of being chastised severely, I would agree with the narrow power band comments, if you are talking RPM range. With such a low red-line, and with most Uly's not running very smoothly below 2k (or even 2500 for some), that leaves about 4k RPM to work with. the motor doesn't seem to pull really strong until about 4K, so that leaves me with 2000-2500 RPM of "sport" to play with in the fun stuff. I am not complaining at all. That is the very nature of this 2 valve beast, and I expected that when I bought it. IMHO XB9 swap = Good unless you are a big time highway cruiser, or obsessed with seeing how fast you can get your speedo to read. | ||
| Bike_pilot |
Don't feed the trolls and they'll go away  The 9 swap sounds quite nice, I'm really thinking about trying it out myself. Its not like you can't bolt the 12 stuff back on if it doesn't suit. | ||
| Rodclement |
Well...I know nothing of primary swaps but am happy with how my Uly handles, I am a 90% highway/cruise rider so it works for me, not that I am worried about loss of top speed in any case. I do feel that power under 2K rpm's could be better so I would be interested in trying the swap for that reason. If I read this thread right, the swap will give me better power band in lower rpm's at the loss of some top end speed, and maybe some fuel usage loss, is this correct? If so this seems like a great trade off when I am stuck in Parkway traffic riding in that 2K powerband! rod | ||
| Tankhead |
I remember when this thread was about changing to XB9 primary gearing... Funny stuff ArcticKTM. LOL When I owned the City-x and drove across country, there were a few times that I did try to shift to fifth but I was already in it. But when I got into the mountains I was all about the gearing and took full advantage of it. I am looking forward to the swap. I was going to get the E#B#R race ecm but I think I will give Al my business instead. | ||
| Hughlysses |
OK, back on topic (more-or-less)... It would be expensive to engineer and fabricate and a royal PITA to install (I can't see splitting the cases just to have better gearing), but I think ideally I'd like to have a wider ratio transmission, with about the same 1st gear as the XB9 primary arrangement but the same overall 5th gear as the XB12 primary. Stock XB12 (overall) is: 1st- 3.972 2nd- 2.838 3rd- 2.1105 4th- 1.749 5th- 1.5 With the XB9 primary you get: 1st- 4.44864 2nd- 3.17856 3rd- 2.36376 4th- 1.95888 5th- 1.68 What I think I'd like is something like: 1st- 4.44864 2nd- 3.2 3rd- 2.3 4th- 1.8 5th- 1.5 I'm sure designing the actual gearset would be a very involved process (you have to make number of teeth, pitch circles, and ratios work out), and picking the actual ratios is a puzzle (you don't want too big of a ratio change between any two gears). It would be really interesting to know if you could pick through the HD/Buell parts bin (and maybe Baker's as well) and come up with a wider set of gears that would work. | ||
| Froggy |
It is, the CR is nice but the R is superior for soaking up the slab. Between the fairing and the smoothness I can ride further in a day without exhaustion.
I didn't bash, I just mentioned to Blake that he would change his tune and see the light after some seat time on another bike. His mentions of smoothness are all relative. I used to think the XB was great and smooth, then I tried something else and haven't looked back.
Resale. The XB ain't worth much to start with, then on top of it who would pay any money for mine? 50k miles, crashed multiple times, next to no original parts left on it, and the parts that are on it are from various other Buells, it isn't street legal anymore, it has electrical issues that I'm too lazy to fix (broken wire coming off ignition). If the insurance wasn't cheap, I probably would of offloaded it already. Oh, and I can say I have 5 Buells, working on my way to collecting them all for a museum How much would you give me for mine after seeing this? 
Breather reroute is cheaper and easier to do and will help. Changing the gearing won't help as much. | ||
| Bike_pilot |
I wouldn't want bigger gaps than the XB gearbox already has. Only way to really fix it is another gear imo, but its tolerable as-is and might be better with the xb9 setup. | ||
| Etennuly |
One thing I am not seeing in top end testing is repeated testing. The way these ECMs learn is the more you hammer it the faster and quicker it will run. If your normal ride is to lope around below 65 mph and you don't hammer it to the redline when shifting your top end will be lower than if you take it out and really hose it good first. Redline it through the gears a number of times, then see if the top end numbers move up. My '06 really comes to life if I ask it to. Running it hard will wake up it's ability to run faster. I have been out on it at times where some friends inspired me to really crank on it for a while. On the next outing it it will be noticeably more lively even running normally. Froggy vs. the rest of us.....it is a matter of frequencies. Froggy is a young fast moving techno-geek who is slight of bodily size, most of us, on the other hand, are larger, older, and not moving about in space with the same kind of speed that Franken-Froggy  maintains at rest. Therefore he is tuned to be happier with a hi frequency buzz, where the rest of us get a therapeutic relaxing feeling out of a larger low impedance movement of the air head's parts. | ||
| Blake |
What Hugh said Frank. Yours is the same silly arguments offered by the Buell/Harley engine naysayers going on 13 years here. nothing more irritating that a buzzing hand grip and/or seat and/or foot pegs. If perfect smoothness were something important to me, I'd never ride a twin cylinder motorcycle. The thought of an electric motorcycle holds virtually no appeal for me. Besides being MUCH simpler, the air-cooled engines are also significantly more efficient, something I know you appreciate. Checking/adjusting eight valves is easier than changing XB spark plugs? Not the way smart/lazy folks do it. I doubt that's true in any case. You know the AX displacement? What is it? | ||
| Blake |
Vern, >>> The way these ECMs learn is the more you hammer it the faster and quicker it will run. Not sure that's right, since the ECM only learns in closed loop mode, which is steady cruising mode, no? | ||
| Eulysses |
I switched to the XB9 gearing a couple years ago...stock XB12 low gear was too much a clutch slipper and 5th was too fast anyway...and so it remains. Yes, sometimes I try to shift from 5th to 6th on a long ride...but content to sit back and honor my promises to my wife. Eulysses |
