Dyno Day - VFR1200F

With a whole 90 miles on my new bike I decided to let Salt Lake Motorsports (SLMS) here in UT finish breaking her in on their Dyno. It was a cool 70 degrees when we started and 80 when we finished.

My two goals were:

1. Finish breaking her in across the entire rpm range in multiple gears.
2. See how significant the hp loss really is in 2nd gear

So we rolled her into the dyno truck...


All tucked in and ready to go...


While we were running her through the break in process, I took a video of that pesky exhaust value. You can see it open at the beginning of the video, but with all the noise from the fans and the bike you can't really hear the noise difference. On decel, at the end of the video, when the valve closes, the bike gets super quiet.
[video=youtube;1-HgH50DvHo]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-HgH50DvHo[/video]

Finally, what I'm sure people are waiting for... My end dyno results... Here's the graph for a 4th gear pull from roughly 2K to redline. (139.89hp)


I've found that the dyno at SLMS tends to be a bit conservative, so the 140hp seems right in line of where it should be. Note that we were at roughly 135mph in 4th gear. :smile:

Finally, we clicked her down to 2nd gear and did another run...


Ouch... You can see the GIANT flat spot in the curve where Honda basically says f'you... I kind of wish Honda would let me control the bike with my throttle hand instead of taking control away from me the rider. I'm perfectly comfortable spinning up the rear tire on corner exits, I guess I'll just have to do it in 3rd gear. Hopefully a little Power Commander action will be able to fix this.

On a final note... I don't have torque curves this time because we didn't feel like ripping the body work off to get to the ignition where we'd normally get an rpm reading from. We need engine speed if we're going to figure out torque. Maybe next time!

 

Damn that is a crazy power curve..... hopefully it can be remedied with a PC... impressive peak though! :thumb:

 

Correlates well with what the mags say...

Cycle World claiming a 25 horsepower and 10 ft-lb torque deficit between 4000 and 6000 in second.

And yet it still manages a 10.2 second quarter mile and 2.6 seconds zero to 60? With about 600 lb? I suppose except in first it doesn't see 4000-6000, but for normal street riding, that's right in the thick of things. Annoying. To say the least...

 

That doesn't look like anything a good pipe and a PC5 with a proper custom map wouldn't correct. And then some I'm sure.

 

I am really interested in these new VFR's but want to read more about the injection design and try to figure out what Honda is doing to control the power output down low before i buy one.

If it's a simple matter of a gear position switch being used to knock the timing back, i can fix it, however , the interweb seems short of technical data covering any type secondary butterfly's that could be ECM controlled or with combination of above switch to pull the power down like they have done.

Can someone point me to a Honda released OEM parts list or an article related to the general injection/engine design?

BTW, conservative dyno- yes it was. Can you post the TQ graph ? Thanks.

 

BTW, conservative dyno- yes it was. Can you post the TQ graph ? Thanks.[/QUOTE]

He said he did not do a TQ run because he didn't want to remove the body work. So I would assume that he isnt going to post a TQ graph.

 

I see that "now" after rereading the post. Thanks.

EDIT:

I see something else as well --- 4320 feet above sea level. Didn't help matters.

 

Someone else did a dyno run on his VFR1200 blog with almost the exact same HP readouts. He did have torque specs on his, I'll see if I can dig them up and link to them.

 

I had seen that blog earlier this week. Somethings wrong though because the HP/TQ crosses at like 7000-7500 rpm. I believe Akrapovic's dyno to be an accurate example, less tuning of course.


When Yamaha released the new VMax they just about gave out all but the white papers on it. Perhaps Honda will weigh in and give us the low down on cam centers and the likes :smile: Then go on and tell about the over the counter HRC parts yet to be released :biggrin:

Now that was a ramble for ya :smile:

 

Good observation but look closer. The hp and tq on these graphs are shown in different scales. There is a different y-axis calibration on the right for torque. If they were plotted on the same scale the curves would indeed cross at 5250RPM.

The separate scale is done to show a more accurate representation of the torque curve. Otherwise it would appear very flat at the bottom of the graph.

here is my blog entry:

Honda VFR1200FA Owner's Weblog: Dyno Run

 

Did they comment on the rear cylinder head using some form of V-Tec?

I just found photos illustrating such in a press kit Sport Rider has on the web . No wording but the photos speak volumes.


2010 Honda VFR1200F - Sport Rider Magazine