Quick Shifter. how does it work? | GTAMotorcycle.com

Quick Shifter. how does it work?

B

BondJamesBond

Well-known member
Forum Sponsor
I'm looking at a picture of a factory quick shifter and the claim is that it allows for faster more precice shifts without the clutch. How? I don't see anything on the kit that connects to the clutch mechanisms. How does this thing work?
 
My older 1199 had it and I do not call it a precise shifter. There were times which shifter stayed in the same gear despite your hard foot effort. I still prefer the traditional shifter at least for urban riding.
 
Vfrdiscussion forum has a few threads about quick shifter for the new vfr.
 
Quickshifters do not work with the clutch. The clutch remains fully engaged through the up shift.

There is enough slack in the cush drive, chain and transmission to allow for extremely quick up shifts.

Looks like a standard QS install to me.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Looks like carbobncat is correct!

I did a google search and found a few web sites that explain how quick shifters work. They usually cut power to the transmission (in 80 milliseconds or so) and allow the gear shift. It's usually done by modulating fuel or spark.

So the next question -- Does the average urban rider and sometime touring rider need a quick shifter? I was thinking it may be bit of a safeguard for those bad shifts that can happen from time to time. A quick shifter would give you some latitude for making mistakes. BUT -- It also stops you from getting better at shifting.... sooooo ?
 
A quickshifter is so you can keep the throttle pinned while shifting and not lose a couple tenths per lap.
 
I absolutely love Quick Shifters, but they are not necessary on any street bike.
BondJamesBond said:
Looks like carbobncat is correct!

I did a google search and found a few web sites that explain how quick shifters work. They usually cut power to the transmission (in 80 milliseconds or so) and allow the gear shift. It's usually done by modulating fuel or spark.

So the next question -- Does the average urban rider and sometime touring rider need a quick shifter? I was thinking it may be bit of a safeguard for those bad shifts that can happen from time to time. A quick shifter would give you some latitude for making mistakes. BUT -- It also stops you from getting better at shifting.... sooooo ?
Click to expand...
 
BondJamesBond said:
So the next question -- Does the average urban rider and sometime touring rider need a quick shifter? I was thinking it may be bit of a safeguard for those bad shifts that can happen from time to time. A quick shifter would give you some latitude for making mistakes. BUT -- It also stops you from getting better at shifting.... sooooo ?
Click to expand...

No. In fact, a quick-shifter can be a royal pain for street riding. An OEM installation may be different, it may account for some of the issues. But ...

When street riding, I always feather the clutch during gear changes - lightly almost-but-not-quite disengaging it - so that the gear change is as bumpless as possible.

I have a quick-shifter on one of my bikes, which has seen the drag strip a few times, and that's why I put it on. This is the aftermarket PowerCommander one which cuts fuel delivery.

The problem with having this during normal riding is that if it cuts the engine during my clutch-feathering, the engine loses revs and instead of being a smooth gearshift, it becomes a HUGE jolt. If it does its thing at full throttle (me not using the clutch) it's fine. If I do my thing at part-throttle (without the quickshift) it's fine. When both try to act together ... Bad!

YES, you can set up the quick-shifter so that it only acts above a certain RPM, but typical PowerCommander, it's inconsistent and sometimes does its thing below that RPM. You can set it to only quick-shift near redline, and if the PowerCommander were to reliably do that, that's fine, but for commuting, obviously it isn't going to do anything.

I mostly-fixed this issue with a $4 microswitch installed to detect the position of the arm that disengages the clutch. If the clutch lever is not pulled in, the switch is closed. If the clutch lever is pulled in even slightly, the switch opens and blocks the signal from the quick-shifter switch. It's not perfect; if I get the timing of clutch and shifter off a bit it will still let the quick-shift happen even though it's already in the next gear. But it works about 95% of the time and I can deal with the rest.

An OEM installation might be smart enough to handle this properly; that needs to come from owners of bikes with OEM quickshifters ...
 
what these guys say.. the quickshifter is designed to work best under heavy load at full throttle. Track toy.
 
When I shift while accelerating hard I don't use the clutch just let off the throttle for split second. I understand you don't have to do that with a qs but what happens if you do? It's not exactly hard to roll off for a fraction of a second but I guess it'd be nice not to have to. I get the feeling that most guys reviewing qs don't realize that you don't need the clutch with any modern sport bike. On the track I guess it translates to consistency..
 
jcbarnar said:
I get the feeling that most guys reviewing qs don't realize that you don't need the clutch with any modern sport bike. On the track I guess it translates to consistency..
Click to expand...
Nooooo wayyyy.. and now you tell me that!!! I would have podium everytime if I had known that, damn it
Forum Sponsor
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom