Back in the shop

Steven31371 · Apr 8, 2022

Still a couple more weeks before the big instal session, but got a few things done, changed the eccentrics in the IMA triple tree to adjust the trail and front end feel a bit, while having the front end apart I had them put on the Titanium front Axle and the Brembro GP4-MS front Calipers.

Overall a very happy Motorsports day today, after being in the shop for nearly a year I also got my Motec Porsche set up for E85 home

my God it’s fast now…savagely fast

TomFoolery · Apr 9, 2022

Looking good Steven!

Are those Tillett B6s? I have been eyeing those, but I dont want to give up the heated seats so....

The zip tie in the fork leg looks like you have plenty of fork travel you are leaving on the table. May want to take out a couple of turns of preload.... talk to your suspension guy though.

Steven31371 · Apr 9, 2022

TomFoolery said:
Looking good Steven!

Are those Tillett B6s? I have been eyeing those, but I dont want to give up the heated seats so....

The zip tie in the fork leg looks like you have plenty of fork travel you are leaving on the table. May want to take out a couple of turns of preload.... talk to your suspension guy though.

that fork travel was just from the shop to home, a few miles, not spirited….usually its About an inch from bottom

Yes to the Tillets, love ‘em, putting those in took 120 pounds out of the car, and in the XL size are remarkably comfortable on long drives, even for a big old guy like me lol

The shape is perfect

Steven31371 · Apr 9, 2022

At the track for some learning today….fucksake im slow, one of the slowest ones in the slow group lol

and even though I shouldn’t care at this phase while learning I DO ............. CARE hahahe

but, I’m resisting the urge to act on that caring about not being fast and focusing on learning and improving my riding mechanics and just ....... DEALING with the humiliation or I’ll never get faster.

after the first session I realized what a bear this bike is to learn on, so I neutered it a bit and put it on low power mode with the least engine braking….had too much engine brake and too twitchy of a throttle to learn the subtleties corner entry speed and roll on throttle etc for a newby.

might bring the track Gixxer next time….although, I feel like if I can learn to ride this beast well it’s all gunna be easy from there

each session I feel the improvement though so it’s encouraging….gunna need

I need ALOT MORE laps though

TomFoolery · Apr 9, 2022

Steven31371 said:
At the track for some learning today….fucksake im slow, one of the slowest ones in the slow group lol

and even though I shouldn’t care at this phase while learning I DO ............. CARE hahahe

but, I’m resisting the urge to act on that caring about not being fast and focusing on learning and improving my riding mechanics and just ....... DEALING with the humiliation or I’ll never get faster.

after the first session I realized what a bear this bike is to learn on, so I neutered it a bit and put it on low power mode with the least engine braking….had too much engine brake and too twitchy of a throttle to learn the subtleties corner entry speed and roll on throttle etc for a newby.

might bring the track Gixxer next time….although, I feel like if I can learn to ride this beast well it’s all gunna be easy from there

each session I feel the improvement though so it’s encouraging….gunna need

I need ALOT MORE laps though

Don't be hard on yourself. Read my post in the Kramer thread - I never start on the V4. Always start and warmup on something easier, then when you are in the zone and in good physical shape, get on the V4 - it's a hard bike to ride fast.

A big part of track riding is physical fitness and seat time. Good things will come when you keep doing the basics right over and over....

Jolly Roger V4 · Apr 9, 2022

Steven31371 said:
At the track for some learning today….fucksake im slow, one of the slowest ones in the slow group lol

and even though I shouldn’t care at this phase while learning I DO ............. CARE hahahe

but, I’m resisting the urge to act on that caring about not being fast and focusing on learning and improving my riding mechanics and just ....... DEALING with the humiliation or I’ll never get faster.

after the first session I realized what a bear this bike is to learn on, so I neutered it a bit and put it on low power mode with the least engine braking….had too much engine brake and too twitchy of a throttle to learn the subtleties corner entry speed and roll on throttle etc for a newby.

might bring the track Gixxer next time….although, I feel like if I can learn to ride this beast well it’s all gunna be easy from there

each session I feel the improvement though so it’s encouraging….gunna need

I need ALOT MORE laps though

You at Chuckwalla today?

I'll be there tomorrow

DV4 · Apr 9, 2022

Hang it there, it gets easier. The 80/20 rule applies, 20% effort gets you within 80% of your best lap time, the other 80% effort to get to an ever harder and diminishing target! Grab the gixxer and be ok with a crash (hopefully not) one thing possibly holding you back is a very expensive bike that you don't want to make mistakes on!

Steven31371 · Apr 9, 2022

TomFoolery said:
Don't be hard on yourself. Read my post in the Kramer thread - I never start on the V4. Always start and warmup on something easier, then when you are in the zone and in good physical shape, get on the V4 - it's a hard bike to ride fast.

A big part of track riding is physical fitness and seat time. Good things will come when you keep doing the basics right over and over....

the last session was much better, started to put the pieces together a little bit abs my form improved, still slow but a improvement in one day, and I had fun so all good. Bike performed really really well those GP4-MS and Sicom Rotors/Pads combination was phenomenal, and it steered really well at least for my riding level pulled really hard off the Apex and felt nice and stable

For sure I need to get in better shape, and frankly get smaller, 250 is a little big for this lol, will probably go down to about 210 pounds.

Steven31371 · Apr 9, 2022

Jolly Roger V4 said:
You at Chuckwalla today?

I'll be there tomorrow

no, Streets of Willow, then Fontana after the bike it’s out of the shop this next time.

chuckwalla and big Willow are definitely on my to do list, I’ve done both of them lots of times in the cars but they both look like really fun bike tracks, night and day difference between the two but that’s cool for me because they’ll both develop different skill sets, chuckwallas a lot more technical than big Willow….could use some experience on that…whereasbig Willow is less technical but super fast so it will help calibrate my brain to some of these 130 mile an hour curves lol

Steven31371 · Apr 9, 2022

Paul G said:
Hang it there, it gets easier. The 80/20 rule applies, 20% effort gets you within 80% of your best lap time, the other 80% effort to get to an ever harder and diminishing target! Grab the gixxer and be ok with a crash (hopefully not) one thing possibly holding you back is a very expensive bike that you don't want to make mistakes on!

speaking of, I came into turn 2 a little too hot today and went off track, was hinky there for a bit but kept the bike up.

in case anyone is wondering about CF wheel durability, Streets of Willow has a REALLY rough runoff patch with a bunch of jagged concrete broken up and mixed into the sift ground.

went over a few of those rocks with a 250 pound rider on board and the wheels held up great without a mark on em.

I can’t think of a much better test than that hahaha

Steven31371 · Apr 9, 2022

Steven31371 said:
Pretty happy with these:

View attachment 41416 View attachment 41417 View attachment 41418 View attachment 41419 View attachment 41420 View attachment 41421 View attachment 41422

4Evo Titanium front axle with nut and washers, and various titanium bolts and screws.

The machining on these are really good.

a side note on the 4Evo titanium axle…really good machining, too good, they are machined to the EXACT size of the axle holder, so we had to do a little polishing to get it to fit.

Now that capitalism is well instilled some of those eastern block former Soviet Union countries are turning into some really good machining and precision manufacturing centers like Germany was at its best, when they had a chip on their shoulder trying to prove how good they were.

and they still charge very fair prices for good work unlike Germany

Jolly Roger V4 · Apr 10, 2022

Steven31371 said:
no, Streets of Willow, then Fontana after the bike it’s out of the shop this next time.

chuckwalla and big Willow are definitely on my to do list, I’ve done both of them lots of times in the cars but they both look like really fun bike tracks, night and day difference between the two but that’s cool for me because they’ll both develop different skill sets, chuckwallas a lot more technical than big Willow….could use some experience on that…whereasbig Willow is less technical but super fast so it will help calibrate my brain to some of these 130 mile an hour curves lol

Yep, I came from cars too. Big difference between them. SOW fun for bikes and great place to learn. Fontana I feel great for cars on the Roval layout but terrible for bikes. Chuckwalla only riden on bikes and seems a little tight for me for cars. You really need to do Laguna now that all the track days this year are 105db. Two days in August Mon and Tue. A real track as far as track width and carrying some speed in the corners. I did big willow in many cars but not bikes yet. I might do Fontana this summer as Chuckwalla closed for the heat.

TomFoolery · Apr 10, 2022

Steven31371 said:
the last session was much better, started to put the pieces together a little bit abs my form improved, still slow but a improvement in one day, and I had fun so all good. Bike performed really really well those GP4-MS and Sicom Rotors/Pads combination was phenomenal, and it steered really well at least for my riding level pulled really hard off the Apex and felt nice and stable

For sure I need to get in better shape, and frankly get smaller, 250 is a little big for this lol, will probably go down to about 210 pounds.

That's good, you are making progress. Don't be too conscious about your weight. General fitness, core strength, leg strength are more important than just weight. Work your lower body regularly and you will be fine even if you don't lose weight. The bike surely has the power to offset the weight, its whether you can manage the weight around is the question, and you can, if you are fit.

Steven31371 · Apr 10, 2022

TomFoolery said:
That's good, you are making progress. Don't be too conscious about your weight. General fitness, core strength, leg strength are more important than just weight. Work your lower body regularly and you will be fine even if you don't lose weight. The bike surely has the power to offset the weight, its whether you can manage the weight around is the question, and you can, if you are fit.

so far I’ve been fine moving around on the bike, there are only two problem areas….my neck gets tired as hell looking up and around the next curve, it’s actually bad enough that it was inhibiting me by affecting my visibility on some of the last laps in a session…but that’s easy to fix by relaxing more while in session and working out the neck with some back arches on the head, maybe with a helmet on.

the other issue is in high speed straights, I’m simply too big to tuck properly behind the windscreen, and when I get above about 135 mph any tiny movement the wrong way I’m catching wind resistance air that’s unsettling the whole bike. I usually just ride through that for brief pulls on the street, but at the track with a hard braking zone coming up and trying to keep a good racing line it was an annoying issue….not major, but annoying. And those high speed straights are clearly this bike’s super power out there, I was running down BWM 1000 RR’s like they were standing still….

my weight wasn’t the issue, it was my size in getting into a proper tuck.

youpaiyou · Apr 10, 2022

Nice seeing you again. That was a lot of fun! I’ll probably see you at Fontana.

Steven31371 · Apr 10, 2022

Jolly Roger V4 said:
Yep, I came from cars too. Big difference between them. SOW fun for bikes and great place to learn. Fontana I feel great for cars on the Roval layout but terrible for bikes. Chuckwalla only riden on bikes and seems a little tight for me for cars. You really need to do Laguna now that all the track days this year are 105db. Two days in August Mon and Tue. A real track as far as track width and carrying some speed in the corners. I did big willow in many cars but not bikes yet. I might do Fontana this summer as Chuckwalla closed for the heat.

man I think the Spark exhaust will exclude me from Laguna lol

I’m not even sure the catless Akra system would be legal there

Chuckwalla, Las Vegas, and both Tracks at Willow Springs will probably be my haunts….Fontana is just so close (an hour drive) that I’ll probably go there a decent bit out of convenience.

Big Willow is the fastest average track speed road course in North America I think.

probably close to hundred mile per hour or above average speed for the track.

DV4 · Apr 10, 2022

TomFoolery said:
That's good, you are making progress. Don't be too conscious about your weight. General fitness, core strength, leg strength are more important than just weight. Work your lower body regularly and you will be fine even if you don't lose weight. The bike surely has the power to offset the weight, its whether you can manage the weight around is the question, and you can, if you are fit.

I was really surprised at how much difference cycling makes, just a few hours a week with maybe a 50k ride thrown in.

Steven31371 · Apr 10, 2022

Paul G said:
I was really surprised at how much difference cycling makes, just a few hours a week with maybe a 50k ride thrown in.

that makes total sense

Steven31371 · Apr 10, 2022

TomFoolery · Apr 10, 2022

Paul G said:
I was really surprised at how much difference cycling makes, just a few hours a week with maybe a 50k ride thrown in.

.... yeah. Cycling is great for motorcycle racers. Really gets those quads and lower back in shape.

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