I've been driving for the past year with a 17 tooth front sprocket hoping for better performance. Today I put the stock 16 tooth back on and this is what I noticed;
It is easier and takes much less clutch to get it going.
Once going it pulls good, boarderline great through all gears.
I think maneuvering through traffic will be so much easier with the stock gear (I need to test this without killing myself)
It seems to rev better and shift different with the stock gear (I'm not sure yet if that is a positive or negative)
Either way it all depends on what you want, performance or lower RPMs. 500 rpm is the difference and that's a fact. That's how many RPMs you save running a 17 tooth front sprocket. To me no big deal for now. Next week when I sit on it for 26 miles at a time will tell. But again it's $12 and 15 minutes of work to change,  no big deal.

Performance, the only thing gained by the 17tooth sprocket and maybe increased highway MPG's, I doubt city/traffic riding your saving any thing since your increasing load on the motor and revs. If you want performance go with 15 on the front.....If you ride more highway its not suggested.

A 17T is what I used when I got 69.8 Mpg, it worked great for my kind of riding, I enjoyed the relaxed Rpm's on the open road. Now gone, my GS was my Lightweight Touring Bike 

I guess I should have said I was hoping for much higher top end which was achieved with 17T but only 4 more mph. I like the pull much more than 4 mph.

Quote from: ron freeman on April 27, 2014, 03:39:40 PM
I guess I should have said I was hoping for much higher top end which was achieved with 17T but only 4 more mph. I like the pull much more than 4 mph.

If speed is what you wanted, you bought the wrong bike to begin with, if you are totally wringing out your GS it sounds like you may be ready for an upgrade?

I like the GS and have grown to accept it for it's strengths and weaknesses. It's a good little bike and I like to ride it. Even if I did upgrade I'd keep the GS, I'm sentimental like that.

I would of loved to buy a cbr600rr or a GSXR750 but they awe way out side of my price range. My insurance would of been double, and I would end up dead (my wife, or wrapped around some thing off the side of the highway.

But I've ridden both bikes and loved he power but hated how hard I was to throw it though the tiwstys. The gs is hard to beat in the tiwstys.   


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