Life on a Honda 2008 CBF1000A purhcased on Facebook Marketplace. A Flog's Blog

[facthunter]

I Can't stand Bikes where you are always looking for a Higher gear, especially on long trips. The endless buffeting behind semis and busses with the Occasional Rock or tyre tread, is One of the reasons I hate Riding on fast highly trafficked Roads.  I once did over 1100 Kms in one Hit. The last 350 of it being in Heavy rain. I don't recommend that.  Nev

[pmccarthy]

Hop on a Honda, and go! 

 

An advert from about 1968 I think.

[onetrack]

It looks like a new sprocket is coming up? Getting gearing right for highway cruising is important. When I ran a lot of Holden utes, we would change the rear axle ratio to a higher ratio, to improve fuel economy, reduce engine and increase engine longevity. We would go from a 3.55:1 rear axle to a 3:36:1 for the 6 cyl engines. Just enough difference to stop the engines from screaming their guts out at highways speeds. Too often, the factory gearing is too low.

 

The earlier Landcruiser traytops and troop carriers with the 4.5L V8 diesel are notorious for too low gearing. The 4.5L V8 diesel was doing 2600RPM at 110km/h, that's revving too high for such a big donk. Toyota fixed the Landcruiser gearing in 2017 and raised the 5th gear ratio by 15%. Interestingly, aftermarket suppliers can supply a modified gearbox mainshaft with a 5th gear that is 20% higher.

 

My 2013 2WD diesel (N70 series) Hilux was too low geared for highway work. About 2 years ago, I took off the 15" wheels (fitted with 205/70R15 tyres) and fitted a set of 16 wheels from the later N80 series 2WD Hilux. These 16" wheels are fitted with 215/65R16 tyres - slighter lower profile than the 15" I took off, but still larger diameter overall (by about 4%).

 

The improvement the 16" wheels made was just amazing. Fuel economy improved, engine revs and noise went down, and I didn't notice a great deal of difference in pulling power on hills. I'm alert to engine lugging by coming down too low in 5th gear at lower speeds, and change down to 4th at any sign of engine lugging.

 

Edited 7 hours ago by onetrack

[facthunter]

Depends on where your torque is at a Maximum with a Turbo diesel. Revving the guts out of them will Kill them.  Cook them and they will Fail. Keep the Insects out of your radiator. Nev

[Jerry_Atrick]

Given most of my riding will be at 70mph I am going to speak to my mechanic about the sprocket option.

[nomadpete]

13 hours ago, Jerry_Atrick said:

After today's ride. I may need the CBT you refer to!

 

Here is the map of toiday's ride:

 

Yep - that's how far away the CAA/CASA medical examiner is. We have a closer CAA examiner, but she works part time and is booked up months ahead. All up, 5 hours in the saddle - mainly motorway and dual lane carriageway A roads (like motorways) + single lane A roads. It was a grey day today, to boot!  

 

The ride there wasn't too bad,. This time I remembered by ear plugs - made a big difference. But my helmet isn't as comfortable as it was when I first tried it on. I am going to have to put it up for sale, swearing on mt first and second born's life it hasn't been dropped - which it hasn't been.. Of course, I would never trust anyone to be honest, so I am not sure why I would ask anyone to trust me, but there are plenty of helmets for sale of farcebook marketplace, so will see how it goes. 

 

But, apart from having a purpose for this ride, it gave me a lot of time to really assess the bike. And since the route took me within 200m of the location I purchased it from I don't need to go over old ground.

 

On the motoraway, I stayed mainly at 70mph, except for where there were roadworks, or on the way home, queues south of Bristol thanks to peak hour traffic queuign to get off the motorway at various junctions. I did occasionally take it up to slightly past 80, but sat mainly at 70. 

 

The good bits:

• Oodles of power throughout the range of speeds/gear combos. 6th pulls at 40 miles and hour or beyond 80. 
• Comfortable riding position, egronimically as one would expect (mainly). 
• The Delkovic cans aren't too imposing, but have a reasonablye good warble/grumble sound. 
• Bike is well weighted, handles well on the motorways and twisties and despite its weight/size is very easy to ride. 
• It puts a smile on one's face
• The storm guards worked a treat - I did have to only intermittently put the heated grips on - and even then I would argue I was being way too soft. 

 

The bad bits:

• For touring, it revs too high for the touring speeds in my opinion. It makes it quite noisy. It could use another gear or one can purchase aftermarket sprokects with one tooth less than the standard, but that negatively impacts acceleration. 
• It's thrirstier than I thought. People on forums qere quoting 200 - 225 miles on a 19 litre tank. I was lucky to get 180., Howeve, I checked the CBF1000 forums and did some research, and although the owners manual is OK with 95 RON, the forums are reporting best fuel efficiency with 98 or better RON. 
• The side stand is piddly  and hard to deploy while seated on the bike. 
• The hydarulic hoses from the brake master cylinder block the fuel gauge - you have to always look over them.
• The oil level viewing glass is recessed too far and is a pain to check unless it is on its centre stand (not always practival due to cambered surfaces).
• The obvious stator issue - Should be good for a while, but one needs to check the oil is topped up!
• None too impressedd by the dipped and high beams... But, it could be because they are old globe.  May get touring lights anyway. 

 

The "ain't perfect, but doesn't really matter bits:

• Buffeting is worse than I thought given the screen it has. 
• Wake turbulence from trucks seemed to throw one around a liltte more than expected given the weight of the bike. I guess being slightly taller makes it more susceptible.

 

 

 

 

That's some serious riding, Jerry!

Good onya.