The CB1100 Community Forum

Rode down to my local dealer today to pick up a gallon of GN4 for an upcoming oil change and the owner showed me a CTX? 700 With DCT (dual clutch transmission) that he took in on trade. Care to ride it? He says. Sure! say I. Never ridden a bike with DCT but have been wanting to. Last auto bike I rode that wasn't a scooter was in 1976 (CB750A).

The bike had a button on the right switch assy you pressed for neutral, drive mode 1st gear, or sport mode 1st gear. And a finger swith for upshifting and a thumb switch for down shifting on the left bar switch assy ( but you don't even have to mess with that if you don't want to). I decided to try drive mode 1st, and let the bike do the shifting. Start bike, click right hand button from N to D1 and give it the gas and it takes off. It quickly shifts itself into 2 nd and you feel a slight bump as it shifts. Then you feel the bump again and you are in 3 rd and so forth up to 6 th. As I slowed down to turn around I could feel the bumps reversing as it downshifted back to 1 st. Not alot of get up and go in Drive mode. Let me try Sport Mode, so I toggled the right button to S1 and took off. Much peppier in sport mode but it still wanted to shift early and did, bump, bump, bump bump up to 6 th, and bump bump bump down to first as I slowed down to turn around again. Time to try the left paddles. Take off and bump bump I'm all of a sudden up to third and haven't touched anything, so I thumb the left - paddle and the bike down shifts to second, then I accelerate and hit the finger trigger and shift third, fourth, fifth and sixth. Then start slowing and hit the thumb to downshift to 5,4,3, and let the bike downshift itself into 2 and 1 as I slow down to turn around.

My conclusion, it was weird and although shifting was seamless except for the bumps you felt as it chaged gears, I didn't like the bike deciding when I should shift ( even though my truck does it all for me). It wasn't as smooth as driving an auto car or truck. Hard to explain, you will just have to beg a ride for yourself to see what I mean. Definitly a new experience and one Honda believes in.

Can't imagine riding the new Africa Twin 1000 in the dirt with one of these transmissions.

Your conclusion seems to line up with the tests I've read. The system works very well but few would actually prefer the DCT.

Still a question whether the DCT proves to be a sales success for Honda. I tend to think not but I hope I'm wrong.

They'll get better, don't you think? Remember the 3-speed automatic transmission of the 1960s (and Paul Stookey's stand up act about needing your bands tightened)? They were clunky and not really good at all. The VW Jetta I sold recently had an amazing 6-speed automatic transmission. I was hardly aware of it changing and it mostly did it at the right time. Indeed I think it may have taught me a couple of things about using gears better. I can imagine DCT will get better over time.

For what it's worth, I rode a 6-speed NC750X in Italy last summer (arguably similar to the 700) and was less than impressed during spirited riding. The bike had a relatively low redline (5200 rpm?), so it made decent torque, but not much hp. I frequently banged into the rev limiter. But the Honda heated grips were awesome!

There was an interview with a Honda engineer on Visordown (I think) and he was talking about how they want to ,and are currently working to, adapt the DCT to Sportbikes -- the only problem being the weight penalty. Even with the 10kg weight penalty of the DCT one of their sport bikes fitted with a DCT would be faster than an equal manual transmission bike. Apparently if they could put a DCT on their Moto GP bike it would be faster than a bike of the same weight using their current seamless gearbox (I. E., the current RC213 with 10kg of ballast added).

According to one salesman I spoke with, what you won't experience during a "test" ride with a DCT is that the computer is supposed to learn your driving habits and start shifting the way you would. You rode a used bike that learned someone else's riding style is my guess (if the sales guy was right).

I owned the CTX700 prior to the CB1100. Mine did have DCT, and I thought it was incredible. I spent the first week or two pulling on the phantom clutch lever...

I have DCT on my Spyder and it's fantastic. Up shifting only happens automatically when it hits its rev limits, which has never happened for me. I always up shift with the paddle when I want. Down shifting happens automatically and is always waiting in first gear when the light turns green.

Wife has a Can-Am with their version of the DCT. Take a lot of getting used to. Fully integrated brakes also.If I had a reason to I could get used to it but my habits are so ingrained now it would be a fight to change. No interest.

Local BMW dealer has a Honda CT and a Yamaha 900 on the floor taken in on trade. Might have to test ride them.

(03-23-2016, 02:00 PM)LongRanger_imp Wrote: [ -> ]For what it's worth, I rode a 6-speed NC750X in Italy last summer (arguably similar to the 700) and was less than impressed during spirited riding. The bike had a relatively low redline (5200 rpm?), so it made decent torque, but not much hp. I frequently banged into the rev limiter. But the Honda heated grips were awesome!

Yeah, I read about other rider reviews about topping out too easily. It is a low revving producer. Bouncing off the top would be tiresome pretty quickly.