Al_in_Philly
Autocross Newbie
- Location
- Philadelphia USA
I've now firmly decided to leave my R alone outside of cosmetic mods. Beyond the car being so amazingly well set up from the factory, as well as avoiding any warranty concerns from modding the engine, my motorcycle just convinced me to leave well enough alone with the R's mechanicals. Let me explain.
My "other car" is a 2005 Yamaha FJR1300, a pretty damn good bike when I purchased it new. But like so many of you in this forum, I have a compulsion never to leave well enough alone when it comes to machines that move me down the road. Stock, this bike is awfully quick getting to 60 in 2.9 and through the quarter mile in the upper 10's according to the mags which tested it (in later iterations, Yamaha slowed things down a notch). Of course, that wasn't good enough for me. So I dumped the really restrictive stock exhaust system (4 into 2 into 1, then a single cat, and out again through two quiet mufflers), and threw on a set of Holeshot 4 into 2 race headers (1/4" wider OD) straight into a pair of Two Brothers full flow carbon cans. Then K&N filter and a dynotune of a Dynojet Power Comander netted me 159 horsepower and 102 lb.ft of torque--stock was supposed to be around 128-30 HP. Now it lifts the front wheel of this 600 lb sport tourer at 90 mph as I shift into third. And on the occaision that I've done some street racing, that big sport tourer now stays neck and neck with Hayabusas and ZX14's, until past the century mark, much to their amazement (always with some laughter). Sounds great right? Read on.
Well then the reasonably well sorted suspension wasn't up to taking on the speeds which I found myself riding at, so I upped the front spring rates and installed a custom built Wilbers rear shock. Now I had a bike which not only breathed some fire, but would handle too. But then the brakes started getting mushy--seemed that I was boiling my fluid, bringing it down from daily 100+ mph runs (if you ride any sort of sportbike, you know what I mean). So I then managed to fix that issue by installing Galfer wave rotors and using ATE brake fluid; thing is those Galfer rotors reduce unsprung and rotating weight, as well as dissapate heat much better than the stock rotors, but they only last about 8-10K miles. Still, although all of this has cost some serious bucks, I had a bike that was about as quick and sure footed as most anything on the street, yet can carry me and a passanger comfortably for hours on end. Hold on, I intimated this didn't have a happy ending.
Then things really started to get interesting. At about 10K miles the bike started jumping out of second gear. It seamed that I had banged up the dog gears a bit from hard shifting, costing me almost $2K to replace the first two gears. Then again, after another 8K miles, the same two gears went again. Understand that this transmission only has 5 gears, instead of the usual 6, so that the gears themselves could be made even beefier than if there were 6 sets within the transmission case. I had also been experiencing some clutch slippage, so at the point of that transmission work, I changed out the stock diaphram clutch spring for a Barnett competition clutch basket with 6 HD springs, which really worked well. Then last spring, the bike started to jump out both first and second gear whenever I'd open it up more than half way; Christ, I was only 5K miles out of that last trany rebuild! I nursed it through the rest of the year, waiting until February to finally bring it in. This time it seems that every single gear set was either eaten or warped from handling the power from the engine (OK, as well as my inability to lay off the power wheelies), thisb time costing me almost three grand. F#*k, all for making a very fast motorcycle, blisteringly fast.
Which brings me back to modding the Golf R. I think I've learned my lesson: unless I win the lottery, I'm going to be content with driving just a really great ride, one which ought to last a while, and if it doesn't I can have it worked on under warranty.
Sorry if all of that was a little long winded.
My "other car" is a 2005 Yamaha FJR1300, a pretty damn good bike when I purchased it new. But like so many of you in this forum, I have a compulsion never to leave well enough alone when it comes to machines that move me down the road. Stock, this bike is awfully quick getting to 60 in 2.9 and through the quarter mile in the upper 10's according to the mags which tested it (in later iterations, Yamaha slowed things down a notch). Of course, that wasn't good enough for me. So I dumped the really restrictive stock exhaust system (4 into 2 into 1, then a single cat, and out again through two quiet mufflers), and threw on a set of Holeshot 4 into 2 race headers (1/4" wider OD) straight into a pair of Two Brothers full flow carbon cans. Then K&N filter and a dynotune of a Dynojet Power Comander netted me 159 horsepower and 102 lb.ft of torque--stock was supposed to be around 128-30 HP. Now it lifts the front wheel of this 600 lb sport tourer at 90 mph as I shift into third. And on the occaision that I've done some street racing, that big sport tourer now stays neck and neck with Hayabusas and ZX14's, until past the century mark, much to their amazement (always with some laughter). Sounds great right? Read on.
Well then the reasonably well sorted suspension wasn't up to taking on the speeds which I found myself riding at, so I upped the front spring rates and installed a custom built Wilbers rear shock. Now I had a bike which not only breathed some fire, but would handle too. But then the brakes started getting mushy--seemed that I was boiling my fluid, bringing it down from daily 100+ mph runs (if you ride any sort of sportbike, you know what I mean). So I then managed to fix that issue by installing Galfer wave rotors and using ATE brake fluid; thing is those Galfer rotors reduce unsprung and rotating weight, as well as dissapate heat much better than the stock rotors, but they only last about 8-10K miles. Still, although all of this has cost some serious bucks, I had a bike that was about as quick and sure footed as most anything on the street, yet can carry me and a passanger comfortably for hours on end. Hold on, I intimated this didn't have a happy ending.
Then things really started to get interesting. At about 10K miles the bike started jumping out of second gear. It seamed that I had banged up the dog gears a bit from hard shifting, costing me almost $2K to replace the first two gears. Then again, after another 8K miles, the same two gears went again. Understand that this transmission only has 5 gears, instead of the usual 6, so that the gears themselves could be made even beefier than if there were 6 sets within the transmission case. I had also been experiencing some clutch slippage, so at the point of that transmission work, I changed out the stock diaphram clutch spring for a Barnett competition clutch basket with 6 HD springs, which really worked well. Then last spring, the bike started to jump out both first and second gear whenever I'd open it up more than half way; Christ, I was only 5K miles out of that last trany rebuild! I nursed it through the rest of the year, waiting until February to finally bring it in. This time it seems that every single gear set was either eaten or warped from handling the power from the engine (OK, as well as my inability to lay off the power wheelies), thisb time costing me almost three grand. F#*k, all for making a very fast motorcycle, blisteringly fast.
Which brings me back to modding the Golf R. I think I've learned my lesson: unless I win the lottery, I'm going to be content with driving just a really great ride, one which ought to last a while, and if it doesn't I can have it worked on under warranty.
Sorry if all of that was a little long winded.
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