Well i've been bitten by the drag racing bug and i am wanting to get some advise on some more modifications what will increase my power and help lower my E.T..

The bike as it stands is a 2013 forty-eight sportster 1200cc with a full stage 1 kit with the screaming eagle race tuner and short shots with quiet baffels.

I've done somewhere around 30-35 passes across various test and tune nights and the bike is still going strong, my P.B so far is 12.9 @ 84 MPH

I bought the tuning lead and the tuning software but after a play with it i decided it was best not to screw with it, i've tuned with a microtec on a car but the screaming eagle tuner baffled me a little. is there much headroom above the stage 1 tune where i should get a worthwile gain without cam upgrades ?

I am in the Logan area of QLD so a recommendation of a good tuner would be greatly appreciated, I considered gasoline alley but i want to hear from other people before these guys tune it. I have also heard good things about procycle dyno, i sent an enqiry but they never replied.

as for upgraded intakes, has any particular brand of intake that has been proven to make more power ? i currently have the K&N filter in the standard airbox and i'm unsure if there is any gains to be had changing to another filter.

also i would appreciate any recommendations for what i should do to upgrade the clutch, so far the bike has about 10'000kms on it and last time ran it down the strip after several runs that night, the clutch whilst it wasn't slipping it just didn't feel like it was launching out of the hole as well by the end of the night. When it comes to clutch recommendations please bare in mind that i still regulary ride this bike on the street so something with good road manners would be a plus.

 

hopefully you guys can steer me in the right direction..

A Pic of my P.B. Run

Energy one clutch is fantastic.

Also look into using an 883 counter sprocket.

The tune is as good as the person doing it. Sadly there are a lot of cowboys tuning these things so going with someone with the runs on the board is the best bet.

Hi Lucifer,
that looks like a good upgrade, i went onto the energy one website link you provided and went to buy it but got a message saying they don't ship to my address in queensland.
Did you buy direct from them or did you order this kit from a local supplier ?

Hi Brash,
So i'm guessing the 883 front sprocket is bigger with will give be a shorter final drive and closer ratio, yep that will help bring down the 60ft, currently i'm finding im almost on the rev limiter in 4th crossing the line so i might need to use 5th if i do this, it's worth trying. how many teeth larger over the 1200cc sprocket is it ? will i need to run a longer belt or is there enough adjustment in the rear wheel ?

As for tuners i was hoping to get feed back from forum members living in my area to hear of their experiences with the tuners in my area. until i find a good one i was tempted to do some runs with the SEPST dongle on the bike and datalog and have a go at playing with the auto tuning function and see what happens.

Good on you for having a go mate.

Willowbank brings back some memory's i used to ride my twinky Dyna up there when i had time , thsts ride up from Sydney & race in the Screamin Eagle series Morgan & Wacker ran, was great fun. i learnt a lot doing that too. one friend who is a long time Harley Drag Racer the dealer would give him a stock ( bone stock ) Dyna twinky 88 about 2001 year? but he showedd me this bike had 5k on clock. 1st pass was low thirteen 13sec then as the qualifying pass's went the motor freed up he went quicker each pass but never touched the bike at all had stock pipes stock muff stock aircleaner it was bone stock. never checked tyre pressure never looked at jets or timing or even fuel it had a full tank at start. by end of the day it was runing consistent 12.70 95mph he was about your size too, just reved motor to rev limiter cut in & then backed off a bit let clutch go she would wheelstand but kept it WOT just used clutch a bit, then shifted clutchless till 4th gear went through speed trap WOT in 4th gear. he also won elimination as was dial your own time just had to be 12.99 or quicker dial in time. his 60 foot times always about 1.7 .

if you want an energy one clutch i have one i'll swap for yours, i think stock best, but if that plate wears get an extra stock plate put in. don't waist $ as the clutch can't help you go quicker. take the aftermarket pipes off they are just show & noisy, put stock headers back on put slip on muffs like stock just low restriction & good if you get tappered end. can you tell me what you did? like what was your sixty foot time? what gear did you go through speed traps in? how did you shift gear? like did you use clutch? or did you shift clutchless? some use different ways but don't matter just need to shift really quick as one second goes real quick. best to not make changes till you can do say 5 pass's all same time, also that trap speed a bit slow means not much HP. but if you answer the questions i might be able to help. & good luck at it! Also important to remember car idea's don't work for street bike racers. i learnt that hard way, i used to drag race cars long time ago , then started with street bikes ( bikes are hard !!! ) also that stock bike i told you about, when he had ran it consistent 12.7 every pass, M&W would put air cleaner re jet Carb ( b4 EFI TC came in on dyna's ) put Screamin Eagle slip ons on stock head pipes , put Screamin eagle ignition as had higher rev limiter left stock cams in stock heads he would run consistent 11.9 just a stock 88, they had a guy who worked for them tuning named Dave HD gave him a brand new sportster he used to do head work & dyno tuning at M&W bris i saw him runing in 10's on that sporty 1200cc stock frame stock wheel base foot shifting no wheelie bars street tyres stock looking pipes but no baffles. he was good & good with Sporty's should still be around don't think would be at that dealer now but he's a queensland guy ask around.

 

Hey Blackout, sounds like your doing everything right!

much better seeing time slip, as thought you said trap speed was 84MPH but that was your half track speed, your trap speed 100MPH so everything fine as is, leave bike as it is! you can run low 12's with that now just have to work on getting your sixty foot time down!

Think about five years back, i meet a guy at Sydney Dragway one wednesday night on a Sporty like your's but not a 48 had the larger tank 19" front wheel all black. HD had there xr1200 that they had used in last race ( the 6 hour ) at Oran Park raceway a few weeks before ( that track gone & houses there now ) anyway this guy was his first time at track i was there with my 01 Dyna twinky 88just getting practice for Screaming Eagle racing i was talking to the guy he just raced against the HD's own XR1200 with same rider who had raced the bike for 6 hours ( pro road racer good guy too ! ) the xr1200 won, but i looked at time slip and saw both bikes had same trap speed, so that told me both same power to weight, but the xr1200 did 12.40 the stock sporty with same pipes you have & same basicaly as yours did 13.20 but both did 104mph trap speed the xr1200 did 1.65 sixty foot time the other sporty did 2.0 60ft. i told the guy you can run same time as that xr1200, he would not beleave me, but on same bike same night as was he got the bike to go 12.60  104mph no tuning no nothing just learning to ride it.

All you need to do is get that 60ft time down , did you miss any shifts? if you did not miss any shifts, look at the other time slips and you will see the quickest pass had the quickest 60ft time, the harder you can launch off the line the better , also a shift light is good as you can find best shift point set it and the light helps you be consistent. saw that guy i taled about few month back bike still stock just he put stock head pipes and tappered end muffs on with nothing in them was runing 11.9 still stock just no aircleaner but that's not real good for motor but good air flow bests those SE 90 degree bent forward ones most seem to use as straight air flow just had a radius at mouth to smooth air flow but ok at track not recomended on street as dirt gets in. you could try removing the quite baffle's at track but i would say you can run easy low 12's just get 60ft down give it enough rev's before shifting especialy first few gears, shift fast hold in 4th like you did. try shifting by puting slight load on gear shift while wide open throtle then when it's time to shift back off with a load on shift it will just change real quick no clutch. but get sixty foot down ! don't try too hard don't miss a shift and you will be seeing low 12's soon.

 

Also saw reaction time a bit slow get that down if you want to win races

Hi mate, 4 tooth difference off the top of my head 34 vs 38. Can get away using stock belt and adjust on the rear axle blocks

I am yet to do this on my bike but it's on the cards, I tuned a converted 1200cc iron and it was a lot of fun with the shorter gearing and a fair bit quicker to approx 120kph than my bike.

That bike actually was good to ride in 5th at about 90kph, didn't lug the engine at all and was right in the sweet spot at 110kph where as the 1200 gearing you have to be doing about 130 before the engine feels smooth and in the meat of it's operating rpm.

It's worth a shot, you can find the sprockets for bugger all $$$.

 

Note: this will throw out your speedo, I don't know about the SERT but on powervision you can adjust the pulses per km tab and calibrate it to read whatever you want.

yeah true, that one extra shift might make him slower in the end too.

But for grin factor alone the 883 gearing is awesome. Makes rolling skids/wheelies easier too

Well guys, i really appreciate the valuable input. It's given me a bit to think about.

Next time I'm home from work i will head out to the drags again and see if i can improve on my 60ft times by basically being less of a pussy and launching harder with more rpm !
I spoke to procycle dyno today and threw some ideas around with the bike. I'm thinking i would like to do any future mods in stages, firstly i will try and see if i can better my 60ft with the package i have and do it consistently, I would like to maybe look at upgrading to a D&D bobcat 2onto1 system procycle said they have made good power with them. I spoke to them about the issues with the speedo calibration and i was told that the SEPST doesn't have the functionality to alter the VSS signal to calibrate the speedo but if i wanted to stay with that tuner i could install a device inline to the VSS wiring that's made by S&S that will correct the signal back to the ecm to read the correct speed.

So knowing that i think the 883 sprocket would be worth trying.

one more question regarding rear suspension preload, i'm running stock(=shit) 48 suspension, when I've been at the drags I've been preloading the rear shocks to the max preload setting thinking that it would push the back wheel into the tarmac harder with the weight transfer on launch, is my theory on this correct or would i achieve a better launch with less preload and a softer rear end ?
I tried different settings, i carried the preload spanner in my jacket, but honestly i didn't notice much difference but that could be just the way I'm riding it.

Actually one of the other things i thought i might add is i thought a 2-Step Limiter or a Staging Rev Limiter might be worth trying also to make my 60ft's more consistent.
I was reading about guys on the XLForum that are running them and there 60 time's were a fair bit faster once they had them dialed in nicely.
I could hide it behind the battery cover with an arming switch so it's active when I'm at the drags, From what i have read they hold your set staging RPM when the clutch switch signal is detected, you hold the throttle pinned and when you drop the clutch your unleashing all you've got.
I'm still trying to figure out which brand might be a good one to go with, MSD seem to make a really small one that i could hide on the bike easily for somewhere around 200 US.

Don't need the two step rev limiter, try to keep things simple.

i have a series of small LED lights that i can set to come on at any rev like set a light to come on at what ever rev you want to go out the hole at , then other lights to come on at the shift rev.

the two stage rev limiters are good on all out race bikes but can trick you up on a street bike, i always say, Too many tricks & you trick yourself. the rev you launch at not that important, some people find holding a set rev when they get into stage best, other's like to rev motor back off rev motor again & as last amber comes on give it one big rev let clutch go quick then pull clutch in a bit as you go out the hole to control wheelie. everyone does it different. i used to just leave bike as it was as i road on street, & ride like i was going off a set of traffic lights quick & i could do 1.65 but averaged at one time 1.7's when your doing consistent 1.7 60foot you know your going ok. but weather & track preparation, Harleys do there quickest times on a hot day. it's a fact, but dyno's might show more HP on cold day. also you can have different air quality one day than another & see higher trap speeds with better air.

The lower your bike is the better, but work on being consistent first the worry about change, that trap speed you done was ok so you have ok Power with pipes you have. i have D&D 2 into 1 Race pipe on my old Carb Buell works great never dynoed it but bike flys. only thing i don't like is they are very very heavy in the muffler. you want to keep bike as light as you can as it's power to weight, a Dyno won't care if your bike is light or heavy all it does is measure TQ & HP but at the track its POWER TO WEIGHT!!!!!! keep it light.

good luck

Also if you can get a Hammer Performance Aircleaner kit , & take the bafflesout the muffler you have now you would see a gain.

Krash,
Thanks again for the valuable information.
I really like the Hammer Performance air cleaner the bellmouthed backing plate is a really nice design which would flow great !

Can you show me your LED Setup you were talking about ? i was looking at maybe one of those pencil autometer shift lights but maybe have an isolation switch as it might give me the shits on the street.

blackout what revs are going over the line at you should be about on the rev limiter as you cross

Hey Blackout sorry was slow, the one i have is from Ecliptech inovations, from victoria, guy very helpful, it could piss you off on the street at first but i'm used to mine n love it as tell's me when i'm at slowest rev i've set a light to come on at, also must be a million ways you can custom set it up yourself, the guy will put any colour cobination you like i have blue & red the blue first then at shift point i want i got four red lights come on the blue lights i have come on in 1000rev increasements love it it also can be set up to warn if regulator over charging battery , and tell's you how many volts battery has when you first turn the switch on before starting, but tells you in lights, direction explains it all e mail tony@ecliptech.com.au        also i've never had water get into it , but tony told me if you hosed water directly at it, that could possibly happen. he seemed like a good guy good support to & i got the goods right on time too. and best its australian!!!

Hey Krash Kinkade,
where did you wire your shift light into?

Iron  My Bike is a Carb so could be different ?  I hate electric's so don't touch myself, but it would wire from ignition , it just works out rev from frequency. the one i have  was simple to wire up & the guy the other end of tht e mail will give you all the advice he was tops!