Norm
Senior FZ6 Advisor
!0,000 RPM’s-The Final Frontier
Mr. Fizz is an accommodating type. Sure, he’s a rascal if he wants to be, but he lives to please. It’s a rare rider that walks away feeling either cheated or over-matched. He’ll howl at the moon or purr like a kitten. It’s your choice and depending on what kind of rider he pairs with, his other side may stay dormant indefinitely. There are the “kids” as I call them, the 18, 19, or twenty-somethings, who wring out every gear. Maybe they know what they’re doing. Maybe they don’t. Older riders with plenty of experience know 10,00 rpms like the back of their hands. And there are the older folks who ride him much like a scooter. Then there are those like myself who know what Mr. Fizz can do and must test this now and again. What happens at 8000 RPM’s? 10,000? 12,000? What does twice the horsepower of a Silver Wing feel like?
Up till recently I did not want to know the answer to those questions. It’s not that I wasn’t curious. I did try a number of times. I don’t know if I can explain it to you. I’d run the gear and watch the RPM’s climb but there were two phenomena that made me back off. First was his roar. That noise is loud and menacing. It is in sharp contradistinction to his normally scooter like hum. You are at once calling attention to yourself from anyone within 50 yards. I cannot tell you it is unpleasant. It shrieks strength and dominance, even if its rider has neither of these characteristics. I liken it to a turbine engine, which has no business attached to such a small machine.
The second is what some have termed a turbojet. Others say it feels like the second two cylinders just kicked in. What happens is that the Fizz suddenly escalates his acceleration. There appears to be a precise moment when acceleration goes from fast to ridiculously fast. For you Spaceballs fans it feels like “ludicrous speed.” It’s not as if you are in danger of falling off, unless this is your first motorized bike ever and you just twist the throttle all the way back. I was cured of this when I raced the choppers. The Silver Wing nearly left without me. No, once you experience the power of 600 cc’s this is one mistake you won’t make again. What I am afraid of is that this acceleration is, in and of itself, dangerous. Spending less and less time touching the tarmac the rubber points of contact seem to float you off the ground. This is at once exhilarating and scary. But there is something else, something much scarier than this.
I remember the old muscle cars. My friends had them. A Corvette engine in this or that. A big block V-8 with a turbocharger. I remember them shifting and I remember being thrown back into my seat so that for an instant, a long instant, I could not lean forward. Talking stopped immediately, and everyone looked forward. The engine was on stage, front and center, and nobody interrupted its performance. Multiply this feeling times 3 or four and you begin to understand. You are not in a cage. The wind despises you for trying to slice through it so quick and the bike’s HP to weight ratio mocks your prior experiences. Your mouth goes dry, you suddenly have tunnel vision. You see nothing to either side of you, only forward, and all you think about is letting go of the throttle; not what you had for breakfast, though perhaps you should for that is in danger of leaving you, one way or the other; not which road you’d like to try next, nor how many miles to the gallon you're getting today. You do not even FEEL the rest of your body; only what is needed, your right hand, your eyes, eventually your left foot.
If you can ”stay the course” as the Fizz takes control of your universe I assure you that this will be the ride of your life. When you finally shift, the turbo feeling strikes again, as a bigger gear takes over, already in its power zone, and runs the chain around that much faster. The Fizz has a very narrow friction zone, more so than many bikes. While I am able to learn that zone changing from car to car in a matter of minutes, it has taken me the better part of these past 7 months to master it on the Fizz. I can now, as a friend recommended, start on a steep hill rolling off the right handlebar brake to the throttle without using the foot brake. This is the best test to see if you really know your vehicles friction zone. That is when I began my 0-60 runs. Maybe it was 0-80. I don’t know what my times are. I don’t really care. They say the Fizz can do it in 3 seconds, 3.4 on the outside. A liter bike can do it in two and a half or so. I know my first half-second is still not where I want to be. I was faster on my Silver Wing there. But that’s where the race ends and it ends abruptly. My friend Rollie had predicted: “When you get your sea legs on that thing you’ll leave me like a bad penny.”
I cannot imagine what it is like to run at these RPM’s through turns. Any twitch of your throttle hand instantly thrusts you forward or back. The hundred tiny adjustments we all make for varying turns at varying speed make this challenge beyond my reach. I don’t think I’ll try it on a road or a track. It’s too late in my life for that. I don’t want to intentionally elevate my risk of killing myself. And I’ve become quite fond of Mr. Fizz as well.
Mr. Fizz is an accommodating type. Sure, he’s a rascal if he wants to be, but he lives to please. It’s a rare rider that walks away feeling either cheated or over-matched. He’ll howl at the moon or purr like a kitten. It’s your choice and depending on what kind of rider he pairs with, his other side may stay dormant indefinitely. There are the “kids” as I call them, the 18, 19, or twenty-somethings, who wring out every gear. Maybe they know what they’re doing. Maybe they don’t. Older riders with plenty of experience know 10,00 rpms like the back of their hands. And there are the older folks who ride him much like a scooter. Then there are those like myself who know what Mr. Fizz can do and must test this now and again. What happens at 8000 RPM’s? 10,000? 12,000? What does twice the horsepower of a Silver Wing feel like?
Up till recently I did not want to know the answer to those questions. It’s not that I wasn’t curious. I did try a number of times. I don’t know if I can explain it to you. I’d run the gear and watch the RPM’s climb but there were two phenomena that made me back off. First was his roar. That noise is loud and menacing. It is in sharp contradistinction to his normally scooter like hum. You are at once calling attention to yourself from anyone within 50 yards. I cannot tell you it is unpleasant. It shrieks strength and dominance, even if its rider has neither of these characteristics. I liken it to a turbine engine, which has no business attached to such a small machine.
The second is what some have termed a turbojet. Others say it feels like the second two cylinders just kicked in. What happens is that the Fizz suddenly escalates his acceleration. There appears to be a precise moment when acceleration goes from fast to ridiculously fast. For you Spaceballs fans it feels like “ludicrous speed.” It’s not as if you are in danger of falling off, unless this is your first motorized bike ever and you just twist the throttle all the way back. I was cured of this when I raced the choppers. The Silver Wing nearly left without me. No, once you experience the power of 600 cc’s this is one mistake you won’t make again. What I am afraid of is that this acceleration is, in and of itself, dangerous. Spending less and less time touching the tarmac the rubber points of contact seem to float you off the ground. This is at once exhilarating and scary. But there is something else, something much scarier than this.
I remember the old muscle cars. My friends had them. A Corvette engine in this or that. A big block V-8 with a turbocharger. I remember them shifting and I remember being thrown back into my seat so that for an instant, a long instant, I could not lean forward. Talking stopped immediately, and everyone looked forward. The engine was on stage, front and center, and nobody interrupted its performance. Multiply this feeling times 3 or four and you begin to understand. You are not in a cage. The wind despises you for trying to slice through it so quick and the bike’s HP to weight ratio mocks your prior experiences. Your mouth goes dry, you suddenly have tunnel vision. You see nothing to either side of you, only forward, and all you think about is letting go of the throttle; not what you had for breakfast, though perhaps you should for that is in danger of leaving you, one way or the other; not which road you’d like to try next, nor how many miles to the gallon you're getting today. You do not even FEEL the rest of your body; only what is needed, your right hand, your eyes, eventually your left foot.
If you can ”stay the course” as the Fizz takes control of your universe I assure you that this will be the ride of your life. When you finally shift, the turbo feeling strikes again, as a bigger gear takes over, already in its power zone, and runs the chain around that much faster. The Fizz has a very narrow friction zone, more so than many bikes. While I am able to learn that zone changing from car to car in a matter of minutes, it has taken me the better part of these past 7 months to master it on the Fizz. I can now, as a friend recommended, start on a steep hill rolling off the right handlebar brake to the throttle without using the foot brake. This is the best test to see if you really know your vehicles friction zone. That is when I began my 0-60 runs. Maybe it was 0-80. I don’t know what my times are. I don’t really care. They say the Fizz can do it in 3 seconds, 3.4 on the outside. A liter bike can do it in two and a half or so. I know my first half-second is still not where I want to be. I was faster on my Silver Wing there. But that’s where the race ends and it ends abruptly. My friend Rollie had predicted: “When you get your sea legs on that thing you’ll leave me like a bad penny.”
I cannot imagine what it is like to run at these RPM’s through turns. Any twitch of your throttle hand instantly thrusts you forward or back. The hundred tiny adjustments we all make for varying turns at varying speed make this challenge beyond my reach. I don’t think I’ll try it on a road or a track. It’s too late in my life for that. I don’t want to intentionally elevate my risk of killing myself. And I’ve become quite fond of Mr. Fizz as well.
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