no wonder this thing is so difficult to learn on

[calispec]

i recently posted on here about my purchase of a 1991 Honda Hawk 650. And in the last couple weeks i've been going out and playing "parkinglot warrior" and "neighborhood terrorizer". During this time I've been struggling with riding as smooth on my new Hawk as I could on the GS. I't just seemed sooooo much harder to go smoothly on, hard to start smoothly, shift smoothly, and accelerate smoothly it just seemed really jerky like the bike just constantly wanted to pull about 3x harder than i wanted. I've known all along that the V was a torquey engine but I man it just seemed really pronounced....

well i just found out why. I was chatting with the prevous owner (the guy that owned it before the guy i got it from) online today and mentioned this to him and he said "well, going back to the original front sproket might help" !!?!?!?!?!?!1

I said, "WAIT!!!! WHAT?!?!?!"

Aparantly when he did the stage 3 jetting, pod filters, and supertrapp exhaust he also went down "a tooth or two" on the front sprocket for the acceleration. Well, that just figures. Talk about exacerbating a problem. I'm sure I would have/will eventually be wanting this done but right now it just feels like this makes the bike that much more unstable/harsh to me, esspecially at the low speeds i'm spending all my time at right now. A tinsy bit too much throttle and this thing just jumps.

Well, i don't think i'll be tearing into the thing to swap the sprocket back at this point so i guess i just have to deal with the steeper learning curve for a while. The good thing is i'm still scared enough of riding to keep myself responsible and gentle with the trottle.

[GeeP]

Slip the clutch.   

Motorcycle clutches are specifically designed to modulate engine power to the wheel at low speeds.  Add some throttle, eeease the clutch out.  Once the clutch is all the way out crank 'er open.  Seeing that the bike may be 1-2 teeth down on the front sprocket you may not need much throttle at all.

At low speeds (below 10mph) you'll always have to slip the clutch.  Try it, you'll find it much less jumpy.