Too much weight for the GS?

[twocool]

WHOA where did I ever say "horsepower" = torque. Horsepower is a equation of torque, specifically Torque*RPM/5250=Horsepower

Power is merely a general term that describes force, torque is rotational force. I never said in any way in that first post that a 15T increased my "Horsepower" I stated it increased my power. If anyone has ridden a GS500 with 15T vs 16T they understand it has more power.

Past that, none of what I stated was "off" in any way. You can call me wrong all day long and twist words, if you think I was wrong prove it!

If power does not mean horsepower...then please define power......

Cookie

[Suzuki Stevo]

actually that is wrong, the entire point of a engine is to turn longitudinal force (expanding super heated nitrogen) into rotational torque (spinning tires). Don't listen to your vocational school. I went to Wyotech, the collective knowledge of the students outweighed the knowledge of the teachers. The books are great though! I kept all of mine and use them as great reference tools.

Motor easy Einstein...the guy worked for Cummings Engines and was just presenting the whole torque issue in a more fundamental form.

[crzydood17]

WHOA where did I ever say "horsepower" = torque. Horsepower is a equation of torque, specifically Torque*RPM/5250=Horsepower

Power is merely a general term that describes force, torque is rotational force. I never said in any way in that first post that a 15T increased my "Horsepower" I stated it increased my power. If anyone has ridden a GS500 with 15T vs 16T they understand it has more power.

Past that, none of what I stated was "off" in any way. You can call me wrong all day long and twist words, if you think I was wrong prove it!

If power does not mean horsepower...then please define power......

Cookie

power is force, it can be mechanical with the subcategories of rotational and longitudinal, electrical, and emotional.

We are dealing with mechanical in the subsection of rotational, thus torque.

Remember horsepower is only a function of torque, it is torque over time or RPM if you like. Horsepower is neither a technical term nor a universally accepted premise. Being merely an equation makes it hard to justify even using horsepower in a technical sense. I can make up a new equation and start rating cars in Crazypower. Torque is the only thing that a dynomometer can measure and then it uses the equation to make the horsepower figures.

[Janx101]

hmm .. Once again .. Its happened .. Note to self .. Avoid listening to religious discussions, political arguments.... And now (variously qualified levels i guess?) engineering devoted persons trying to prove that they are the 'most righttest! So nyah nyah!'
so long as the bike starts and runs smooth and you get a good ride on the day .. Who cares where the energy comes from? If it came from blue and orange cats but still made the bike run then that is enough for me
oh i nearly forgot .. The topic
CraigDaniel .. May you have nice touring rides with you lovely girl on the back .. Hopefully these nutcases can put their hackles down long Enough to suggest some good SUSPENSION solutions .. But there a lot of other thread info on which katana shocks fit which bike .. Quicker to search it i reckon

[CraiGDaniel]

hmm .. Once again .. Its happened .. Note to self .. Avoid listening to religious discussions, political arguments.... And now (variously qualified levels i guess?) engineering devoted persons trying to prove that they are the 'most righttest! So nyah nyah!'
so long as the bike starts and runs smooth and you get a good ride on the day .. Who cares where the energy comes from? If it came from blue and orange cats but still made the bike run then that is enough for me
oh i nearly forgot .. The topic
CraigDaniel .. May you have nice touring rides with you lovely girl on the back .. Hopefully these nutcases can put their hackles down long Enough to suggest some good SUSPENSION solutions .. But there a lot of other thread info on which katana shocks fit which bike .. Quicker to search it i reckon

Yeah guess my thread got hijacked and trolled, oh well. Same old standard shet for most forums. You're right we just want a stable, comfy ride. I have spent an hour searching but there doesn't seem to be specific info for my bikes year, either way i will keep looking. Or maybe someone will come back on topic and throw me a bone?

Lol, cheers for reply mate.

[ojstinson]

Absolutely----you ask a simple question and a bunch of eggheads morph it into a technical manual, and the next thing you know they are rolling around in the dirt in a double head lock.

[Dr.McNinja]

hmm .. Once again .. Its happened .. Note to self .. Avoid listening to religious discussions, political arguments.... And now (variously qualified levels i guess?) engineering devoted persons trying to prove that they are the 'most righttest! So nyah nyah!'
so long as the bike starts and runs smooth and you get a good ride on the day .. Who cares where the energy comes from? If it came from blue and orange cats but still made the bike run then that is enough for me
oh i nearly forgot .. The topic
CraigDaniel .. May you have nice touring rides with you lovely girl on the back .. Hopefully these nutcases can put their hackles down long Enough to suggest some good SUSPENSION solutions .. But there a lot of other thread info on which katana shocks fit which bike .. Quicker to search it i reckon

Yeah guess my thread got hijacked and trolled, oh well. Same old standard shet for most forums. You're right we just want a stable, comfy ride. I have spent an hour searching but there doesn't seem to be specific info for my bikes year, either way i will keep looking. Or maybe someone will come back on topic and throw me a bone?

Lol, cheers for reply mate.

We already did. This topic was "over" a page ago. The SV650 shock and Katana shock are both great options, and you can read more about them on the wiki.

The remaining arguments stemmed from me correcting someone on something that was so absurdly wrong that I couldn't contain myself. Anyone who tells you a 15T gave them ponies is wrong. That being said, I never accused anyone of saying it did. I was just making sure he wasn't going off the deep end and saying the 15T gave him more ponies. Which it doesn't. No matter which way you spin it and no matter what dyno you take a rip on.

Apparently he was referencing "power" in terms of the numbers his ass-dyno gave him.

[twocool]

power is force, it can be mechanical with the subcategories of rotational and longitudinal, electrical, and emotional.

We are dealing with mechanical in the subsection of rotational, thus torque.

Remember horsepower is only a function of torque, it is torque over time or RPM if you like. Horsepower is neither a technical term nor a universally accepted premise. Being merely an equation makes it hard to justify even using horsepower in a technical sense. I can make up a new equation and start rating cars in Crazypower. Torque is the only thing that a dynomometer can measure and then it uses the equation to make the horsepower figures.
[/quote]

I disagree and here is why....power is not force.....force is  force and power is power ...two different things....

Power is in units of work and time.....(force, distance and time to be exact)  whether it is horsepower, or watts or any other units of measure.   Force does not contain time....

Horsepower is a technical term....it is widely  used and precisely defined.....

You are correct that  power can be a factor or  torque and time  (or rpm).  But you are incorrect that power is force alone.

You made a premise that lowering the gear ratio somehow increases "power" and this is not true.

Let me give you an example...

Cruising along at 50 MPH....my tach will read 4000 RPM in 6th gear....

I shift to lower gear(5th) and the Tach will read 4500 rpm.....and maintain 50 MPH

What is the change in power?

Cookie

[twocool]

hmm .. Once again .. Its happened .. Note to self .. Avoid listening to religious discussions, political arguments.... And now (variously qualified levels i guess?) engineering devoted persons trying to prove that they are the 'most righttest! So nyah nyah!'
so long as the bike starts and runs smooth and you get a good ride on the day .. Who cares where the energy comes from? If it came from blue and orange cats but still made the bike run then that is enough for me
oh i nearly forgot .. The topic
CraigDaniel .. May you have nice touring rides with you lovely girl on the back .. Hopefully these nutcases can put their hackles down long Enough to suggest some good SUSPENSION solutions .. But there a lot of other thread info on which katana shocks fit which bike .. Quicker to search it i reckon

Yeah guess my thread got hijacked and trolled, oh well. Same old standard shet for most forums. You're right we just want a stable, comfy ride. I have spent an hour searching but there doesn't seem to be specific info for my bikes year, either way i will keep looking. Or maybe someone will come back on topic and throw me a bone?

Lol, cheers for reply mate.

Sorry for the side track....What year GS do you have?.....I can get you exact numbers form service manual....

But I'm pretty sure your weight is going to be "over" which leaves you little to improve the situation...

You didn't mention any problems starting off in first gear...so a new sprocket with less teeth wouldn't help the ride..........

Seems that the advice already given is what you need to do...set the shock to 7 or get bigger shock....

Cookie

[gtscott]

bolt the motor to an engine based dyno instead of a road dyno, that measures how much power the engine will have.
in cars at least, the diff ratio makes NO DIFFERENCE to the power produced by the motor, it just makes a difference to how you use that power

[crzydood17]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_(physics)#Mechanical_power

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torque

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horsepower

read up...

GTscott, your perfectly correct!

[Dr.McNinja]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_(physics)#Mechanical_power

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torque

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horsepower

read up...

GTscott, your perfectly correct!

Congrats on accidentally shooting yourself in the foot. In the horsepower article HP is abbreviated "power". Power is physics is the amount of work performed over time, and "work" when speaking a motorcycle or car is horsepower. I have no idea why you linked torque. Horsepower and torque are directly related, hence the term 'torque curve' when describing how much "work" a vehicle can do during the sample time. As RPMs rise torque has a tendency to rise, and subsequently HP follows. At the peak of a torque curve is where maximum horsepower is gained, meaning that at X RPM the vehicle will be most efficiently "doing work". Horsepower is essentially an esoteric unit that makes telling someone how "powerful" a car is within it's range fairly easy. You have to consider power/weight ratio too. But you said power, that's why I brought it up. The wikipedia article agrees with me. POWER is HORSEPOWER when talking about vehicles and engines. You could link wikipedia articles until the topic is locked but you won't be able to find evidence of otherwise.


The point of the story is by changing the gearing of a motorcycle you aren't improving anything but how quickly you will reach the optimum point in your torque curve. If you're putting 800 lbs on a performance modified GS500 that has, for argument's sake, 55 HP you're cutting the amount of work the engine could do under load by at least half.

The second point is, why not get a bigger displacement bike if that's the case. I'd imagine with that much weight on the bike 100cc scooters will be moving quicker than you.

[twocool]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_(physics)#Mechanical_power

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torque

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horsepower

read up...

GTscott, your perfectly correct!

Congrats on accidentally shooting yourself in the foot. In the horsepower article HP is abbreviated "power". Power is physics is the amount of work performed over time, and "work" when speaking a motorcycle or car is horsepower. I have no idea why you linked torque. Horsepower and torque are directly related, hence the term 'torque curve' when describing how much "work" a vehicle can do during the sample time. As RPMs rise torque has a tendency to rise, and subsequently HP follows. At the peak of a torque curve is where maximum horsepower is gained, meaning that at X RPM the vehicle will be most efficiently "doing work". Horsepower is essentially an esoteric unit that makes telling someone how "powerful" a car is within it's range fairly easy. You have to consider power/weight ratio too. But you said power, that's why I brought it up. The wikipedia article agrees with me. POWER is HORSEPOWER when talking about vehicles and engines. You could link wikipedia articles until the topic is locked but you won't be able to find evidence of otherwise.


The point of the story is by changing the gearing of a motorcycle you aren't improving anything but how quickly you will reach the optimum point in your torque curve. If you're putting 800 lbs on a performance modified GS500 that has, for argument's sake, 55 HP you're cutting the amount of work the engine could do under load by at least half.

The second point is, why not get a bigger displacement bike if that's the case. I'd imagine with that much weight on the bike 100cc scooters will be moving quicker than you.

Thank you Doctor!

Cookie

[crzydood17]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_(physics)#Mechanical_power

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torque

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horsepower

read up...

GTscott, your perfectly correct!

Congrats on accidentally shooting yourself in the foot. In the horsepower article HP is abbreviated "power". Power is physics is the amount of work performed over time, and "work" when speaking a motorcycle or car is horsepower. I have no idea why you linked torque. Horsepower and torque are directly related, hence the term 'torque curve' when describing how much "work" a vehicle can do during the sample time. As RPMs rise torque has a tendency to rise, and subsequently HP follows. At the peak of a torque curve is where maximum horsepower is gained, meaning that at X RPM the vehicle will be most efficiently "doing work". Horsepower is essentially an esoteric unit that makes telling someone how "powerful" a car is within it's range fairly easy. You have to consider power/weight ratio too. But you said power, that's why I brought it up. The wikipedia article agrees with me. POWER is HORSEPOWER when talking about vehicles and engines. You could link wikipedia articles until the topic is locked but you won't be able to find evidence of otherwise.


The point of the story is by changing the gearing of a motorcycle you aren't improving anything but how quickly you will reach the optimum point in your torque curve. If you're putting 800 lbs on a performance modified GS500 that has, for argument's sake, 55 HP you're cutting the amount of work the engine could do under load by at least half.

The second point is, why not get a bigger displacement bike if that's the case. I'd imagine with that much weight on the bike 100cc scooters will be moving quicker than you.

Let me bring this down for you



This is a lever, A lever is a simple machine that is not the same length on both sides of a fulcrum that allows a user to exert a small amount of force over a longer distance and multiply that force on the other end at the cost of distance moved.



This is a chain and sprocket, it has the same principal of a lever, the smaller circumference gear spins the larger one, depending on the ratio (teeth) the small gear makes X number of turns to get 1 turn of the larger one.

now lets get back from the basics, a stock GS500 has a 16/39 ratio that means that the gearing has a 2.4375 to 1 ratio, If horsepower/power is a equation of torque as stated above then any increase of torque is a increase in horsepower at the given ratio.

Remember we are not discussing horsepower at the crank, this is why I do not call it horsepower it is merely power.

So back to ratios
16/39 = 2.4375/1
15/39 = 2.6/1

anyone who has ever used a breaker bar or torque wrench knows that the larger your lever the more torque you can apply to the nut/bolt, the same goes with gears. The larger your X/1 ratio the more torque you apply to the wheel.

these are the ratios for the GS500 transmission
1st - 16.29:1
2nd - 11.76:1
3rd - 9.14:1
4th - 7.44:1
5th - 6.36:1
6th - 5.64:1

notice the very very large multiplication in all gears, now lets use this to calculate peak torque in each gear. the GS500 produces roughly 30ft/lbs of torque at 7500 RPM. Now its time to see the power of ratios

1st - 16.29:1  16T= 1191 Ft/lbs 15t=1270 ft/lbs
2nd - 11.76:1 16T= 859 Ft/lbs 15t= 917 ft/lbs
3rd - 9.14:1    16T= 668 Ft/lbs 15t=712 ft/lbs
4th - 7.44:1    16T= 544 Ft/lbs 15t=580 ft/lbs
5th - 6.36:1    16T= 465 Ft/lbs 15t=496 ft/lbs
6th - 5.64:1    16T= 412 Ft/lbs 15t=439 ft/lbs

Those are the peak torques of the gears at 7500 RPM the peak torque of the engine, quite impressive how low geared this bike is. There is a reason why we dyno cars in 4-5th gear because its the closest ratio to 1/1, if I dynoed a Honda in first gear it would throw down 1000+ftlbs of torque and 1500+horse power.

So in conclusion, you can argue it till the day you die, if you can't bring numbers please don't question mine. A 15T sprocket on our bikes makes more power at the wheel! There is no change in the power at the crank, but massive changes at the tire.

Also if I wanted a bigger bike I would buy one, I like my bike, quick as I need and 50mpg.

[twocool]

Nice numbers....

so all I gotta do is run with 16 th  and always stay one gear lower than you with 15

...then I always have more torque to the rear wheel than you...(except in 1st....)


Changing sprockets only really matters in 1st and 6th.....all you do is "shift" the chart.....

So, In fact with my 16 th....my bike will be FASTER in any given gear at a given rpm (say 7500 for instance where you are in the "power band" (except possibly 6th due to high wind drag) 

But you don't account for a number of other factors... like how flat and broad the torque curve is for the GS500........and redline is over 10K

Same for the HP curve....

the curves are fairly flat over like 2500 rpm range....so changing engine rpm like 300 or so is meaningless...

But I do agree with a couple of your premises:
Lower gear WILL give more torque when starting from a dead stop......Also WILL get heavy weight moving quicker.........this represents acceleration...and only applys to the BEGINNING of 1st gear.

But then again we don't really begin with a dead stop on the engine....we can rev up into the power band of the engine and transmit power smoothly via the clutch.......


But you are still missing two or three critical points in this discussion.........there is only one "power".....you can change the units of measurement...but power is power.....and power  is torque times RPM.

You are also missing that as torque goes up, rpm goes down...(like when you use a lower gear) they don't both go up like you stated in your "honda on a dyno" statement above.

You are also not completly clear on engine power vs power at the rear wheel....

Lastly you are confusing "power" with acceleration........

But other than that we agree completly!!  And thanks for presenting facts rather than personal attacks....

Cookie

[crzydood17]

please explain what i am not completely clear on, I have no ill will but you make statements with nothing to back them up other than "you are wrong"

your bike might have a higher speed but not be faster in any way, a 15T gs500 will kill a 16t

[twocool]

please explain what i am not completely clear on, I have no ill will but you make statements with nothing to back them up other than "you are wrong"

your bike might have a higher speed but not be faster in any way, a 15T gs500 will kill a 16t

well you have come up with some new kind of power...power is power period......power is torque time rpm..period....

shifting gears is simply a way to keep the engine in the power band.......I can put the engine into the power band in any gear (with the possible exception of 6th)

putting on a different gear ratio simply means that the shift points (relative to ground speed) are going to be different...that's all

The power of the bike is limited by the max HP of the engine........no matter how you gear it........

Lower gear does give (possible) advantage from a dead start....

Example of torque, power, rpm, and gear ratio:

My bike 16 th....your bike 15 th

we both are traveling at 50 mph....me in 6th gear....you in your (slightly lower) 6 th gear......

who is making more power to the rear wheel??
who is making more torque to the rear wheel
Who's engine is making more "power"  (horsepower)??

Neither...they are both exactly the same!!!!

Now I shift down to 5th gear (slightly lower gear than your 6th)......keep speed at 50....

Who is making more HP to the rear wheel?
who is making more torque to the rear wheel?
Who's engine is making more HP?

Neither...they are exactly the same!!!

You and I can keep down shifting to lower and lower gears..........the torque and the hp at the rear wheel will not change as long as we keep the same speed.....

Of course at some low gear we will exceed engine redline RPM........that would be the limiting factor

cookie

[crzydood17]

if me and you are traveling 50 mph in 6th gear and floor it, who accelerates faster? Me,
if me and you are sitting at a redlight, we both launch at 3000 RPM who launches faster, me

If me and you are cruising at 50 mph and you look at our tachs mine will be higher, though i will be using less torque than you to keep the same speed because my gearing allows for my bike to be at that speed easier. Remember its a lever, my gear is moving faster but doing easier work, your gear is moving slower and doing more work.

[mister]

Ok... crzy... here's where all the confusion is coming in...

The GS500 has HP of "X". And toque of "Y"

You said, "horsepower is only a function of torque". If that is the case - then - an increase in toque Must lead to an increase in HP as it is a function of torque.

Then, after much armwrestling we get this, "we are not discussing horsepower at the crank, this is why I do not call it horsepower it is merely power."

No, You (not we) are not discussing hp, you are discussing something else and You are calling that something else "power" and THAT throws everyone off, specially after saying, 'hp is a function of torque, I increased torque and increased power (but you didn't mean HP you meant the other thing you call power).

So how about this....

Lowering the front cog gives you Initial better acceleration and is less likely to lug the engine under load. We all agree on this. Forget the use of the word "Power". I am not going to read endless pages if information to figure out what You mean by the word power in this instance. This is a layman's forum where we don't all carry technical manuals in our head ready to decipher if the person meant power or Power or POWER or bippy dippies that imitate power.

In the end, if your 15 tooth front sprocket bike is up against a stock bike, all that will happen is... you will be off the line quicker and get "z" yards in front, at which point the stock bike will match you as it is now in the power band. And it will stay that way. Then in a vacuum, your 15th with peak out and the 16th will pull ahead. Anything to do with wind resistance making a difference on a bike like a GS with a 15 vs 16 front sprocket is to do with the rider and how much of a sail they make of themselves.

Arguing over "if I'm doing 50 and you are..." is pointless cause you/we can pick parameters to make our individual case the better... we can make up what rpm/gear either bike is in to make our own case the better. maybe opick a speed where the 15th is peak out and the 16 has some left, then you lose, but if it's a speed/gear combo that has the 16 peaked and the 15 one higher and some left, then we lose. In the end, we don't ride like this, we constantly change gears to give us the better mechanical advantage, as we deem fit at that moment.

After all is said and done: Lowering the front cog gives you Initial better acceleration and is less likely to lug the engine under load. So now can we move on?

Michael

[crzydood17]

not exactly, the 15t will pull the 16t till the end of 6th gear where in a vacuum yes the 16t would pull ahead but until then the 15t is always going to be quicker. But everything else you said is correct and I agree. Remember the internet is serious business.