New Bike

[TZMike]

the 140/70 rear is probably slightly less heavy than the 150/60. As long as traction/handling is not affected that's not a bad thing either...

Thanks for the updates- keep them coming

 

[Treachery]

Great post, guzz. Those of us in the States will be living vicariously as you get settled in on the 390.

What were the OE tires, and what brand did you go with on the new ones?

 

[guzz46]

The OE tyres were Metzeler M5 110/70 & 150/60, and I went for Dunlop Sportmax Alpha-13H 110/70 & 140/70, oddly there is very little info on the net about them, they aren't even on Dunlop's website, maybe they're only available in certain markets? but they're basically listed as being a road legal trackday tyre for light weight bikes, I think they replace the GPR70SP which was a very good tyre in its day.

A side note, I was reading about those after market Chinese levers on a gixxer forum and came across a guy who had been using them for a couple of days on his GSXR, they fitted fine but unawares to him they didn't allow the plunger to fully extend back out, and as a result pressure built up, locked his front wheel and he crashed, so I don't think I'll be using those after market levers after reading that.

Oh and Merry Christmas, it's the 25th down here today.

 

[guzz46]

For those worrying about scraping your pegs, you'll scrape your belly pan first, I was on another ride around the hills today, tipped it into a 90kmh-ish slightly up hill right hander while still on the gas and hit a big bump while most of my weight was still on the seat and scrapped the belly pan, the pegs didn't touch though.
I think the suspension has softened up a tad with use, so I added some more preload, now I'm at the maximum 10 clicks (full payload, as it says in the manual) with about 25mm of rider sag, I think the back end is about another 10mm higher now, so it will be interesting to see how it handles on the next ride.

A bit of white touch up paint and you'll never even know it was there I reckon.

 

[Treachery]

Hey, guzz- just out of curiosity, what do you weigh? (kg, pounds, stone...)

If'n you don't mind my asking...

 

[guzz46]

I'm 5"10 and about 72kg in street clothes, and about 80kg with all my riding gear on.

 

[Treachery]

Gotcha. I'm a nick behind you at about 62kg + gear. Our suspension settings will probably be close. Mebbe I'll put grip strips on the edge of the belly pan...

 

[JRRSKY]

Have you considered putting HID in those projector headlamps? It would look really good like Audi's

Both the lamps angle can be adjusted, so you have both low beams together so it looks better

 

[guzz46]

I didn't even know what one was until now, but it sounds like they're illegal over here anyway.

"HID conversion kits (an HID bulb with a high voltage power unit or ‘ballast’ which fits into the original headlamp unit in place of the original bulb with no change to the headlamp lens, reflector or housing) are illegal on any vehicle being used on New Zealand roads."

 

[VAG944]

I've never understood the fascination with the modifing the lights of vehicles?!?! The VW "scene kids" are always going on about LED tail lights...........I guess I'm more for performance than fashion! Meh.

 

[JRRSKY]

I didn't even know what one was until now, but it sounds like they're illegal over here anyway.

"HID conversion kits (an HID bulb with a high voltage power unit or ‘ballast’ which fits into the original headlamp unit in place of the original bulb with no change to the headlamp lens, reflector or housing) are illegal on any vehicle being used on New Zealand roads."

Oh it must have been very illegal over there, here in Canada we are okay, as long as it fits in projector style headlamps so it would not blind oncoming traffic. For most these headlights are purely an aesthetic thing, but HID actually improves viewing distance quite a lot, thats why many big trucks use it, it's definitely helpful here where there are a lot of unlit country roads. But I will be going more towards the LED route, not the cheap ass 30 LEDs type that you would find in a flashlight or ones that are on christmas tree. BMW and Audi have been using LED headlamps instead of HID headlamps now, it looks a lot better and brighter, the warm up time is instant too, meaning flashing highbeam would be so much more visible and BRIGHT!

But the bottom line is RC390 has not even arrived here in Canada yet, they are still taking orders and will be delivered in April/May, I am eager to ride this bike!!

 

[guzz46]

So I went for my first ride after maxing out the preload, and boy what a difference! its hard to describe what the difference feels like, but its kind of like your riding more over the front wheel, more confidence in the front end and more lean angle as a result, I wouldn't want to raise the back any further though (not that I can anyway) because anymore and I think it could get a bit hairy (twitchy) with fast cornering over certain bumps, you could probably get away with it on a smooth race track though.
From memory it has that same feeling I liked so much about the RVF, except it feels about 25kg lighter! and my RVF had the forks raised in the yokes by 10mm, and a 2mm washer under the rear shock to raise the back end.


But seeing as the old memory can be a bit inaccurate over time I put together this video for comparison sake, as I wanted to know how the RC compared to the RVF around my favorite hill, on the left is me on the RVF from 7 years ago, and on the right is me on the RC today, now when watching this consider that this was my first ride with the new shock settings, and I made a few mistakes too, so I could of done better, but from memory on the RVF I think I did it about as well as I could of.
Also remember that the RVF had 60hp at the rear wheel, and the RC only has a claimed 44hp, and this is uphill too, so I was pretty impressed with the RC, I thought it would struggle to stay with the RVF being a 373cc single cylinder going up against a 400cc four, but I was wrong, its at least as fast, if not faster around this hill.

[video=youtube;eAaJAxgsNag]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eAaJAxgsNag&feature=youtu.be[/video]

 

[Treachery]

That was the coolest thing I'm going to see today! Looked like when power mattered, the RVF would pull away, but the RC would "catch" up in the bends. Funny how you got balked by a car at the exact same time on both runs (at the end). Thanks for the post!

 

[guzz46]

I thought the same thing about the car, imagine if it was the same model, I think in a straight line drag race the RVF would be a bit faster, particularly at higher speeds, I think the RC would hold its own up to around 100kmh or so, and be quicker off the line being a single, but once I get some more time in the saddle I think I could ride the RC faster around the hills you saw in the video, it was only my second ride on the bike after having the 1000km service done, so I still have to fully get used to having an extra 3000 RPM to play with, there were a few corners where I should of been in a lower gear, and you really need to keep the RPM above 7k to really be moving along.

 

[TZMike]

So I went for my first ride after maxing out the preload, and boy what a difference! its hard to describe what the difference feels like, but its kind of like your riding more over the front wheel, more confidence in the front end and more lean angle as a result,

Would have been interesting to measure the rear tire circumference at the center of both the OEM tire and new tire to compare. The narrower rear may be slightly taller thereby making the rake a bit steeper giving you that feeling of riding over the front wheel. And raising the rear will give a bit more ground clearance too.

The bike sounds good in the video and that looks like a fun road. I can understand why you like it so much! Thanks for posting

 

[guzz46]

The 140/70 is a taller profile compared to the 150/60, that's one of the reasons why I got it, I didn't measure the tyre circumference, but I did measure the distance from the pegs to the ground on both tyres, and the 140/70 gave an extra 5mm of clearance under the pegs.
The bike came with the preload on the 3rd adjuster position I think, and I gradually upped that to the the 7th position, and that raised the back end by a good amount, but going to the maximum 10th position made all the difference, on most of my other bikes I've taken the approach of raising the forks in the yokes, but I knew the RC suffered a bit from ground clearance issues, so I raised the back instead of lowering the front.
That road is great fun, and heaps of bikers use it on the weekend, its the road to Akaroa, and some people have dubbed it the Akaroa GP, just punch Akaroa GP into youtube if you want to see more vids.

 

[VAG944]

Lots of epic roads in NZ. I have a friend in Takapuna (suburb of Auckland) and have driven the Coromandel peninsula, pretty damn amazing! Love New Zealand.

 

[guzz46]

I've been to Auckland before but only the city, I've only ridden in the south island.
Removing the mirrors and end bar weights and going with end bar mirrors will save another 1kg, looks better too in my opinion, you'll have to get creative with the indicators though.

 

[Treachery]

Hm. Hadn't considered bar-end mirrors. Gonna need pix of that and your answer on the indicator question.

 

[guzz46]

The bar end mirrors actually work better than the original mirrors, the original mirrors are much bigger but your arms are right in the middle of them, the bar end mirrors are smaller but there's nothing to get in there way.
There's a threaded nut on the back of the indicators, I just used a washer and a screw to hold them onto the windscreen, I'm not too sure if I like the look of them or not, sometimes I think it looks a bit odd, and other times I think it adds to the look of the front end.