- This topic has 46 replies, 11 voices, and was last updated 14 years, 6 months ago by eternal05.
SV650SF/ABS
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October 9, 2009 at 6:58 pm #22743AParticipant
Chill bra, get that thong out of your buttcrack, you like carrying extra weight that’s fine.. how often do you get to use that ABS anyhow?
October 9, 2009 at 6:58 pm #22745megaspazParticipantI try not to use it. it’s just a just in case thing. i have activated it once at the track when coming up to a slower rider who unexpectedly corner parked it hard on t10 which is a fast corner. But that was my mistake in first picking the lane position directly behind said rider. Don’t do that anymore…
October 9, 2009 at 7:04 pm #22746AParticipantStill fail to answer my question: how often do you get to use your ABS? once a week? once a month? every day?
I trust myself not to lockup the brakes over any mechanism.. that’s how I roll.. rather than carrying 7 lb. extra pound on the bike that may or may not work and require more maintenance.
Any time you have to brake hard to avoid hitting another rider, means that you’re not watching far enough ahead… If you have to depend on ABS to save you from impact on the track, perhalps you shouldn’t ride on the track.
October 9, 2009 at 7:07 pm #22747Gary856ParticipantI get around 52 mpg on my ’07 SV650N (some freeway and street and many moutain twisties) and thought that mpg is pretty decent. Except the low fuel light starts blinking around 150 miles, some times as low as 140 miles, which is annoying. I’d much rather have a 200 mile/tank range.
The SV has strong torque and very strong engine braking so it can feel abrupt if you’re not smooth with the throttle. Slamming the throttle shut in low gears feels like putting the brakes on and it’ll throw your body forward.In terms of the power being linear, I feel my YZF600R is more linear than the SV; more twist, more power, and it keeps building as the rpm climbs.
October 9, 2009 at 8:25 pm #22748eternal05Participant“Any time you have to brake hard to avoid hitting another rider, means
that you’re not watching far enough ahead… If you have to depend on
ABS to save you from impact on the track, perhalps you shouldn’t ride
on the track.”You realize that at track days there are people who don’t act predictably right? The reason that riders on the track can ride up each others asses is because they are predictable, and everybody assumes that certain conventions will be followed. I’ve almost been taken out by noobs several times, and the best you can do is just to be as ready as possible for sudden and unpredictable things like that.
On the street though, this stuff happens all the time. Pedestrians, cyclists, other cars, dogs, will all do really sudden and unpredictable things, and you can’t always predict having to stop. If it’s raining and you’re going around a corner with no adjacent sidewalk at a good 25 mph clip and 2/3 of the way through the turn you run into a ped, tell me you wouldn’t rather have ABS there…just in case?
Before this turns into any more of a flame war, here’s the deal as far as I can see it:
1) 7 Pounds of sprung weight isn’t going to be a dealbreaker to most people on this forum. I’m guessing by the MASSIVE windshield on your gladius that it shouldn’t matter to you either, or you’d be riding a faired bike whose aerodynamics didn’t cost it 20+ mph in top speed and substantial loss of acceleration, not to mention acting like a sail to interfere with handling. But you didn’t because you ride for fun in comfort, like everybody else here. Either that or that’s what you use your..interceptor is it?…for. The point is, most people here would rather have a safety feature than avoid suffering a near-imperceptible decrease in turn-in rate and slightly lower speed. I mean, SafetyFirst talked about carrying a backpack before, so what the hell does he care about 7 pounds?2) As far as ABS goes, you shouldn’t ever have to use it. But that’s the point, you _shouldn’t_ have to use it, but in a real panic situation, if you get on the brakes a bit too hard, or even if you don’t but you happen to hit a bump and upset your suspension, or you hit a patch of sand or gravel, or it’s rainy, or any of a host of other things occur, you might lock a wheel, and in that not-too-unimaginable case, you don’t die with ABS. I don’t know what reviews you’ve been reading, but most of those I’ve seen have said good things about ABS: namely that it stays out of your way (doesn’t disrupt feel) until it saves your ass. Some have had problems with the BIKEs they were on, but not usually the ABS itself. Check this out:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6kO6ltk3a0
Whether or not a racer wants ABS on a racebike is a totally different question, but the point is, to me the issue of “do I have the extra $500-$1K” and “does ABS complicate maintenance” are the only real valid concerns for a guy like SafetyFirst. Start climbing the ranks of club racers before you start whining about the weight difference.
October 9, 2009 at 8:41 pm #22751megaspazParticipanti thought i answered that and who said anything about relying on ABS? i don’t lock the brakes up at all. Just that one time on the track. coming up on a new rider in A group I’ve never seen ride before who actually shouldn’t have been in A group and took an 80 MPH turn at 40 MPH. There’s certain expectations of riders at the track and this rider didn’t meet them. Anyhoo, if you’re thinking I shouldn’t be riding the track, there’s experts out there who say differently and have cleared me to go race with the club officially. But, my guess is that you’ve never done a trackday at an advanced pace and you’re idea of fast is rolling around at 70 mph on the highway. S’all good. carry on.
October 9, 2009 at 9:42 pm #22754megaspazParticipantfwiw, you can go another 35-40 miles after the gas dummy light goes on. I’ve gone 185+ miles on a tank of gas before chickening out and refueling.
October 9, 2009 at 9:58 pm #22755SafetyFirstParticipantWho knew 7 pounds would cause all this noise? briderdt makes a good point. Putting down the bag of potato chips, laying off the adult beverages and putting the foot rubber to the people track while the bike is garaged for the winter is enough to lose 7 pounds off the average rider without going to Biggest Loser extremes.
eternal05 is right, I do ride with a backpack to and from work. A pair of jeans, a collared shirt,a pair of sneakers, a half-cover for the bike, and my lunch is probably about the same weight that’s being complained about. I don’t notice the difference, even on my wee power 250.
And what’s this ‘low fuel light’ that Gary856 speaks of? I like gadgets. And my 250 has none. Heck, I don’t even know exactly which direction my turn signals are blinking without actually looking down at them.
October 9, 2009 at 10:35 pm #22760eternal05ParticipantThe SV650SF-ABS would be an excellent choice of next bike. It has a ton of power (0-60 is about the same as a GSX-R), handles really well, is more upright and therefore more comfortable than a supersport (though the SF SV does have a more aggressive riding position than the standard SV naked that’s discontinued), and thanks to being a V-Twin, will be very easy to ride with a broad powerband in any gear.
October 9, 2009 at 10:55 pm #22764Gary856Participantmegaspaz, you’re right that when the low fuel light starts blinking on the SV (at least the second gen) there’s still just over a gallon of gas left in the tank so you can easily stretch it to 185 miles between fill ups, but doesn’t that blinking light drive you crazy? On my two other bikes I fill up after 200 miles, and I can stretch them to 220-230 miles or a little more if I had to. Seems like a small difference, but on my SV when the light starts blinking I’m always like, what, didn’t I just fill up a couple of days ago?
October 9, 2009 at 10:58 pm #22765Gary856ParticipantTo those people who worry about 7 lbs, 10 lbs, or even 20 lbs, on a street bike, I say get a life, loose some weight.
October 10, 2009 at 12:10 am #22768megaspazParticipantthe only time the blinking bugs me is on the track… The dummy light comes on around 89-90 miles and I actually have no idea how many laps after that i can run… so on the track, if the light goes on, i go off and refuel… running out of gas on the track sucks… happened to my buddy once and we all laughed at him… :p
October 10, 2009 at 12:22 am #22770eonParticipant
Great, I now have the mental image of Megaspaz riding around the track with his butt camera showing us a rapidly disappearing thong. Time to go lie down.And FWIW, I think very few street riders are able to match the braking abilities of ABS in wet conditions. Unless you have done it, I suspect you are overestimating your abilities.
October 10, 2009 at 12:46 am #22771megaspazParticipantdoubt many street riders here have had to go from 110+mph to 40mph in the span of 2 brake markers. But even expert racers can’t out break ABS when the wheels lock, proven in countless vids on the net.
October 10, 2009 at 12:54 am #22772SafetyFirstParticipantWould the position of the SF compare to what I’m used to in my 250? I have listened to what you’ve said about the GSX-Rs riding position, leaning over the tank just joyriding around town, although looking uber cool, looks like it’d be tiring after a while.
As much fun as it is to hear that lil’ 250 makin’ noise at the peak of it’s powerband just to make it move, there are times when I just want to have a mellow ride without that little voice in the back of my head telling me that if I needed to get the hell out of dodge in a hurry and I’m below 8K, I’m outta luck cause it’s a slug.
Basically, if I’m getting this right, I can spend more brainpower worrying about handling the thing and less worrying about where the engine speed is at.
All that having been said, I still think I’d keep around the 250 if i got n SV, just because it’s a fun little bike.
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