Lean and Mean

[rboe]

Honda designed the bike primarily for the home market where the national speed limit is 100kph, about 62mph. So no mistake (but one could say the American market was short changed a bit). I have not noticed the same feeling/effect on my bike. My Griso really wants me to speed up so perhaps that colours my perception.

[Cormanus]

Like EmptySea, I've spent a fair bit of time at highway speeds and have never noticed the bike wanting to slow down; nor have I felt that the bike was holding back.

[CIP57_imp]

Always felt the FI was spot on when my bike was stock. Never felt any hesitation or the feeling the back was holding back. However, every bike has its own character within the same model and can be tweaked with a PC5 and a good tuner.

[DGShannon_imp]

Always felt the FI was spot on when my bike was stock. Never felt any hesitation or the feeling the back was holding back. However, every bike has its own character within the same model and can be tweaked with a PC5 and a good tuner.

Below 3,000 rpm, mine is just amazing. So smooth, great torque. Makes me feel for others here on the forum reporting problems with theirs. However, once I cross 3,200, on up to 4,000, there is a character change. Never stumbles, feels rough, etc. as if FI was off, but it just becomes strained feeling. Almost choked down. Looking at the PCV map, elsewhere in the forum, I see that the greatest correction numbers appear right in the rpm range where I sense this. Gives me some confidence that all I am feeling is the FI shifting into a too lean state. If further break-in doesn't change things (engine loosens up a bit more) I will certainly try a Power Commander. I was hoping someone else may have already experienced the same, and could say for certain that doing so would resolve the problem.

[Gumby 1100_imp]

Always felt the FI was spot on when my bike was stock. Never felt any hesitation or the feeling the back was holding back. However, every bike has its own character within the same model and can be tweaked with a PC5 and a good tuner.

Below 3,000 rpm, mine is just amazing. So smooth, great torque. Makes me feel for others here on the forum reporting problems with theirs. However, once I cross 3,200, on up to 4,000, there is a character change. Never stumbles, feels rough, etc. as if FI was off, but it just becomes strained feeling. Almost choked down. Looking at the PCV map, elsewhere in the forum, I see that the greatest correction numbers appear right in the rpm range where I sense this. Gives me some confidence that all I am feeling is the FI shifting into a too lean state. If further break-in doesn't change things (engine loosens up a bit more) I will certainly try a Power Commander. I was hoping someone else may have already experienced the same, and could say for certain that doing so would resolve the problem.

I think that you just need to complete breaking in the engine and you will find that it smooths out and frees up a lot. Mine seemed somewhat strained and buzzy at first above 3000 RPM, but is much better now that I have a few thousand miles under the belt.

Also, it may just be my imagination, but I installed a K&N OEM Air filter after only 1000 miles and it immediately seemed less strained at 3000 RPM and above.

[gossman_imp]

I think we imagine too much, just saying

[DGShannon_imp]

Always felt the FI was spot on when my bike was stock. Never felt any hesitation or the feeling the back was holding back. However, every bike has its own character within the same model and can be tweaked with a PC5 and a good tuner.

Below 3,000 rpm, mine is just amazing. So smooth, great torque. Makes me feel for others here on the forum reporting problems with theirs. However, once I cross 3,200, on up to 4,000, there is a character change. Never stumbles, feels rough, etc. as if FI was off, but it just becomes strained feeling. Almost choked down. Looking at the PCV map, elsewhere in the forum, I see that the greatest correction numbers appear right in the rpm range where I sense this. Gives me some confidence that all I am feeling is the FI shifting into a too lean state. If further break-in doesn't change things (engine loosens up a bit more) I will certainly try a Power Commander. I was hoping someone else may have already experienced the same, and could say for certain that doing so would resolve the problem.

I think that you just need to complete breaking in the engine and you will find that it smooths out and frees up a lot. Mine seemed somewhat strained and buzzy at first above 3000 RPM, but is much better now that I have a few thousand miles under the belt.

Also, it may just be my imagination, but I installed a K&N OEM Air filter after only 1000 miles and it immediately seemed less strained at 3000 RPM and above.

Thanks for the feedback. Here is hoping I experience the same.

[Dakota_imp]

Always felt the FI was spot on when my bike was stock. Never felt any hesitation or the feeling the back was holding back. However, every bike has its own character within the same model and can be tweaked with a PC5 and a good tuner.

Below 3,000 rpm, mine is just amazing. So smooth, great torque. Makes me feel for others here on the forum reporting problems with theirs. However, once I cross 3,200, on up to 4,000, there is a character change. Never stumbles, feels rough, etc. as if FI was off, but it just becomes strained feeling. Almost choked down. Looking at the PCV map, elsewhere in the forum, I see that the greatest correction numbers appear right in the rpm range where I sense this. Gives me some confidence that all I am feeling is the FI shifting into a too lean state. If further break-in doesn't change things (engine loosens up a bit more) I will certainly try a Power Commander. I was hoping someone else may have already experienced the same, and could say for certain that doing so would resolve the problem.

I think that you just need to complete breaking in the engine and you will find that it smooths out and frees up a lot. Mine seemed somewhat strained and buzzy at first above 3000 RPM, but is much better now that I have a few thousand miles under the belt.

Also, it may just be my imagination, but I installed a K&N OEM Air filter after only 1000 miles and it immediately seemed less strained at 3000 RPM and above.

I think that you just need to complete breaking in the engine and you will find that it smooths out and frees up a lot. Mine seemed somewhat strained and buzzy at first above 3000 RPM, but is much better now that I have a few thousand miles under the belt.

Also, it may just be my imagination, but I installed a K&N OEM Air filter after only 1000 miles and it immediately seemed less strained at 3000 RPM and above.
The rings will seat very quickly; is highly unlikely that a modern engine is changing in a way that is discernible thousands of miles into it's life unless it has a design or manufacturing defect. People just get more used to the sound and feel and think that the bike has changed.

[dave]

Within the third thread I read here this morning, two different people referred to the CB's fueling as "lean". And one added "probably due to emissions regs."

Perhaps its a exception, but my CB has never had the slightest issue with fueling with the OEM setup. Its the smoothest running bike I've ever ridden, and I've ridden a LOT of bikes. Honda has published a great amount if detail on the effort they took to produce a linear power delivery for this bike.

Did/does your bike run poorly in the lower RPM range as delivered? Was it bad enough you felt modifying the FI system at your expense was necessary? Did you discuss the issue with your Honda service dept? If so, what did they say about it?

My bike ran poorly between 2k and 3k RPM from day one. I returned the bike to the dealer the very next Saturday after purchasing it. The service manager rode my bike and declared that it ran "normal". I returned my bike to the shop a total of four times. (The last 2 times was so that an official Honda Factory representative could ride my bike, and one time so that this representative could witness the diagnostic test being performed). Two separate diagnostic tests were performed, each with the same results - "Normal". I requested that Honda perform a vacuum test (I had an independent mechanic do a vacuum test and the results showed the throttle bodies were not synchronized) but they gave me multiple excuses from "We don't know where to measure the vacuum on this bike" to "The vacuum cannot be adjusted on this bike". I performed the simple fix to calibrate the TPS described in this forum, and my bike has never run better. BTY - I am very disappointed with the way I was treated by the "Official Honda Factory Representative". I asked that he contact me each time that he visited the dealership to look at my bike, and my request was ignored each time. I had several conversations over the phone with Honda Factory Representatives, but it was very clear that the two individuals I was speaking to were not very technically knowledgeable. I was finally promised that Honda would perform their own vacuum test on my bike just to verify if the results that I had obtained were accurate (I provided Honda a photograph of the electronic vacuum gauge reading hooked up to my bike), but Honda reneged on this promise. Honda actually suggested to me that my bike ran the way it did because of the emissions requirements, and that I may want to look into the after-market for a solution. I knew from the posts on this forum that my bike had a problem specific to it, and that what I was experiencing was not a common issue with all CB1100s. The bottom line: I was not going to purchase an after-market item (Power Commander) to "fix" a problem on my brand-new bike that should have been fixed properly under warranty. It's fixed now, and it runs the way it always should have, the same way almost every single visitor to this forum's bike runs.

This is the Motorcycle.com dyno chart from their '13 CB1100 review. The editor notes that it "looks like it was drawn by hand to produce the most linear power band we can remember seeing..." That's hard to reconcile with "lean fueling."

Here's the entire review:
http://www.motorcycle.com/manufacturer/h...91637.html

My first ride on my new CB1100 and I was very disappointed for exactly the reason you stated above. Fortunately, as the miles increased the bike ran better and better (stronger). I have never had a bike change in performance as drastically as this one as the engine broke-in.

[DGShannon_imp]

Always felt the FI was spot on when my bike was stock. Never felt any hesitation or the feeling the back was holding back. However, every bike has its own character within the same model and can be tweaked with a PC5 and a good tuner.

Below 3,000 rpm, mine is just amazing. So smooth, great torque. Makes me feel for others here on the forum reporting problems with theirs. However, once I cross 3,200, on up to 4,000, there is a character change. Never stumbles, feels rough, etc. as if FI was off, but it just becomes strained feeling. Almost choked down. Looking at the PCV map, elsewhere in the forum, I see that the greatest correction numbers appear right in the rpm range where I sense this. Gives me some confidence that all I am feeling is the FI shifting into a too lean state. If further break-in doesn't change things (engine loosens up a bit more) I will certainly try a Power Commander. I was hoping someone else may have already experienced the same, and could say for certain that doing so would resolve the problem.

Installed the Power Commander V on Friday, with the bike showing 285 miles on the odometer. Headed out for a 300 mile ride on Saturday. Most happy to report that the "strained" or "choked down" feeling is completely gone! When you look at the out of the box PCV map, and where it's values richen up the mixture, it seems that what I was feeling was the slight lean condition imposed upon the bike by Honda having to meet EPA requirements.



Since the bike was so incredibly smooth otherwise, I was deeply concerned that installing the PCV might have some adverse consequences. Seems most apparent that DynoJet did their homework as all you get from installing this unit is improvement.

While riding it post installation, I finally figured out how to verbalize what I was feeling. Before install, I would get the bike running along at 65, and then take my eyes off the gauges. Continue along just sensing the bike, hearing and feeling the engine as it speaks to you. Check the gauges a few miles down the road, and low and behold your right wrist compensator had let the speed drop back to 55 mph. The engine was subtly communicating that it just wasn't happy at the higher speed. Do the same now, with the PCV installed, and when I look back at the gauges again, I would still be at 65, if not 70!

Other threads have questioned why we spend money on performance mods, for these bikes, since that is not really what they are about, and just buying a (often cheaper) prepackaged plastic covered rocket straight off the showroom floor is money better spent. In this case, I wasn't looking for more speed, horsepower, torque, noise, etc. but instead was hoping for a bike that performed a little closer to what the Honda Engineers would have like to have given us before the EPA got in their way. In the case of the PCV, I think it fulfills that task very well, on our bikes.