fd swap?

[motoman]

I have the stock final drive on my 79 standard, 750 drive on the midnight special. It definitely does not "neuter" the bike. I did not see any increase in mileage, just don't always think i need to shift while cruising at highway speeds.

Has anyone ever done the final drive swap on a standard with the 17" rear wheel? I would be interested in knowing how that performed.

Several I know of and have ridden. 3Phase's I have ridden, him and I swapping bikes the couple times he's been here. Didn't ever really notice it lacking anything. Initial starting a bit 'soft', but other than that not much difference. Obviously at the strip, 60ft.times would suffer, but I tend to like riding mine more than 1320ft..............unless of course it's NHRA sanctioned which shortens it to 1000ft. now as a result of a catastrophic fueler crash a few yrs. back, ran out of 'runout' and hit concrete barriers IIRC. I prefer mine stock as JetM stated since most of its duty is in the mountains at +10,000ft and locally here at 5000ft.......just runs more efficiently and still don't mind 'slabbing' it out across I-70 a few hundred miles letting it runout at 5,000rpm @73mph GPS'ed. The 17" I'm sure helps drop the R's a few hundred. Other than tuning and riding a bit, never spent any time on a Special/XJ to take notice.

[fredintoon]

Hi Mark,
FWIW, my stock final drive is just perfect for sidecar work.
Conventional wisdom sez that means it's geared too low for riding solo but that in turn depends on how much faster than the speed limit you want to travel.
Supposing that the fastest one can ride ticket free is 70mph, then stock gearing has the motor spinning just nice.
For those accepting the ticket risk and cruising at 100mph, stock gearing gets a little buzzy.

[jetmechmarty]

Has anyone ever done the final drive swap on a standard with the 17" rear wheel? I would be interested in knowing how that performed.

DAVINCI has it on his standard.

[jetmechmarty]

That and I wouldn't want to neuter my bike.

I must learn to be more careful with my tongue-in-cheek remarks lest we have to spend a weekend drag racing. It will be very difficult to find a straight piece of blacktop where we are going.

[DiverRay]

I ran the 750 on my '79 standard and liked it. It dropped the RPM at cruise, and I can still take off two up and loaded with no problem. As others have said, it's up to you and your riding style.
The big thing is reducing the RPM on the highway, and the hills around here I just used one gear lower for most of the time. JMHO, YMMV, Yada Yada Yada.

[James England]

Has anyone ever done the final drive swap on a standard with the 17" rear wheel? I would be interested in knowing how that performed.

All my comments are based on the 'Euro' standard 17" wheel. It's all we had over here until the advent of the 'US' style bikes.

[James England]

i like the bike the way it is and have no complaints about mpg's or speeds through the gears.

There's your answer! Leave it as it is.