Clutchless Gear change

Originally Posted by Sid Squid

getting neutral while still rolling makes all the difference.

Good write up Mr Squid. One question (and I am not being pedantic, I really want to know the answer):

How do you get a gear from a standstill when you have no clutch. Do you just loose all mechanical sympathy and jam a gear or do you paddle the bike upto 5 mph and jam a gear. How do you stop from stalling.

On the SV you have to pull the clutch in to start the bike so you cant turn the bike off, kick it into gear and then use the starter motor to get you going (or can you). Can you do this on any bike???

[Sid Squid]

Originally Posted by Scoobs

How do you get a gear from a standstill when you have no clutch. Do you just loose all mechanical sympathy and jam a gear or do you paddle the bike upto 5 mph and jam a gear. How do you stop from stalling?

If there's any sort of incline and/or the bike is light enough, just paddle away and stick it in gear, it'll be a bit jerky but as long as you get it moving a bit it'll be OK, you needn't worry to greatly over wear/damage as long as you don't have the tickover set at 17,000rpm. If you're careful neutral isn't hard to get from 2nd without the clutch, it has the advantage of not being speed sensitive - there's no bits to speed match when going in to neutral, of course it still needs 2nd unloaded with a dab of throttle to make the change, but the exact amount of throttle, (within reason of course), isn't critical.

Originally Posted by Scoobs

On the SV you have to pull the clutch in to start the bike so you cant turn the bike off, kick it into gear and then use the starter motor to get you going (or can you). Can you do this on any bike???

Well the clutch cable is broken, so you can do what you like with the lever it don't matter. On an incline or if you really can't get it moving by paddling, you could kill the motor, put it in first and use the starter, but don't make a habit of it, if you really must, then at least help it as much as you can with a push. What I prefer is either stall it where you need to stop, get neutral and restart, or preferably, get neutral before stopping, then your mate gets off his bike and pushes you away when the lights change, you then grab a gear and get going. This has the advantage of wearing your mate out rather than the starter clutch/motor etc, which is much more expensive, .

Can you do it on any bike? Yes, lighter bikes are easier of course.

Cheers Sid looks like I'm doing my changes just fine... I'll leave the downs alone.

Thanks for all the views. I was out today and yes it is smooth and easy once you know the right way to go about it.

Originally Posted by Jelster

Technique is simple, as you accelerate put a bit of pressure on the lever, dip gas, move foot, back on gas all; done ready for the next one....

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Originally Posted by Sid Squid

Loads of useful info.

Ta for that. All mentally stored away for the point in the future when the clutch cable does fail.

Originally Posted by Ceri JC

All mentally stored away for the point in the future when the clutch cable does fail.

Reminds me of the day I learned clutchless gear changes in a car. Had
to learn the hard way: clutch failed on the M25, so I quickly learned to perform
clutchless changes on the hard shoulder, then continued my journey to Heathrow,
parked in a multistorey garage, picked up the person I was meeting, and
eventually made my way back to Brighton.

Never tried clutchless gear changes since that day, neither in a cage nor on my bike.