www.VMaxGuru.com - The Guru's Blog for March 2009

3/31/09 The days are long, but the weeks fly by. I'm feeling February but it's the last day of March. I hope to complete my wood working project today so I can get back at this bike. Yesterday, (like today) I didn't have much to post to the site, so I cruised the groups and forums. It does not look like I am the topic of much conversation lately and I can live with that. So I started searching and cruising from place to place. Non V-max related sites so all of these entities posting to these places are unfamiliar to me. While I did, an interesting observational thought came upon me. Remember the movie Total Recall? People would have a vacation implanted via computers into their memories. They would continue on with their lives as if the vacation really happened. Substituting actuality for virtual reality as if it was actuality. Don't you think that is sort of happening now? People will give themselves a screen name and then become a semi alter ego that resides in a forum, chat group or in a game. They have a completely different life in "data land". I am not begrudging people that do it because I too, have fell into that lifestyle. It's very comfortable if one could allow yourself the liberty. As long as the bills are paid and the family is happy, there is nothing wrong with it. In time, it just seemed to be a life-"less"-style to me. I spent too much time reading about what other people did rather than doing. So I said, not me. Time to do my own thing. Now, I have a little site on the web where I say my real name, I put out test results and worry about what other people say about what I did. Hell, I get e-mail's if I don't make a daily Blog entry. It dawns on me, I am still in data land. An inescapable facet of intelligent modern life. So whatever side of data land you are on today, I hope you enjoy this as much as I do. For the record, I sill have stage freight and I feel like a fool talking to a camera with no one around attempting the oxymoron of technically entertaining. I refer to the video camera's little red record button as the "Duh" button. Try it sometime! At some point reality still has to happen so soon I will be in the shop, doing what I do, having fun acting a fool. I think some time ago I sorted out my semi self-gratifying reason why I do this. In time, I think this bike will be another legend and I want to be associated with it.

Reality is what happened in hindsight, what you are experiencing now is just perception. With this, I bid March a fond adieu.

3/30/09 Late entry tonight. Busy day at work. First, I failed to mention a revelation I had during our trip to Kennedy Space Center. From the iMax theater film to numerous videos I observed, it seems that if one breaks the surly bonds of Earth, they could expect to enjoy a subtle yet endless supply of classical music in the ambience of outer space. Next, I spent a little time tonight looking at the TPS data again. I took the liberty of looking up the Stock ECU (SECU) with the same signals described below. I wanted to look at the soft limit curves again. So here it is:

This run started at a lower RPM than the Race ECU (RECU) below. You can see the soft limit at the very end. I think this one was not done on the dyno. You can compare it to the Race ECU below. I will be wood working more tomorrow. I hope to have a chance to try a new idea or two if I get the chance while some glue is drying.

3/29/09 I had another good idea, those square mirror bolts Dave sent me got me to thinking. If I could put a little bail in that bolt head, I could use a double snap or a small lock to hang my helmet on the bike! Not bad eh? When I get out from under my current obligations, I may give that a shot. Next, the TPS sensor. This may be my biggest mod to date OR it may be a rabbit trail. Again, this is my Blog where I am documenting my thoughts, so here is my logic. Below is a graph from my LM-2 data logger.

What you see in the graph above: the black line represents the bike's RPM. The blue line represents the bikes accelerator position sensor (APS). The APS is connected to the bike's twist grip. It is the input from me turning the "accelerator". I have to re-train my brain for this because I keep getting them backwards. The green line is the throttle position sensor (TPS). This sensor is attached to the servo that opens the throttle plates. It's purpose is to provide the feedback loop to the ECU as to where the servo has moved the throttle plates. This TPS curve happens the same way almost every time I move the throttle to wide open. As you can see, the two follow each other at first. The servo opens the throttle plates to about 30% open, then the ECU slowly opens the plates in correlation to the engines RPM. As you can see, once the bikes RPM approaches 5k rpm, the plates are completely open. After that, the YCC-I lifts the long stacks off of the short ones so the engine can have the air it needs for that RPM. I am sure this curve is optimally tuned to the stock configuration. The good part about this setup, a fuel tuner would not have to worry about that dead zone pie slice formed by the APS and TPS because the throttle never went beyond this opening. In a general sense, you would only need to tune within the boundaries of the green line. My intention is to determine if an aftermarket intake or exhaust system could benefit from tricking the throttle plates into opening sooner. From my initial "key on bike off" testing, I was able to add a small or large increment of throttle opening to this curve. This is the ground floor of this idea. It has promise. Tomorrow is a work day. I dream V-Max so if anything good pops into my head, I will let you know in the morning. Night!

While I was waiting on the router yesterday, I spent a few minutes testing the TPS idea. I can get the throttle plates to go wide open with just the key on. I have also figured out how to adjust this in proportion to the stock opening rate. I will have to fine tune a circuit to do this but I can't hardly wait to test what this does to the bottom end. The circuit I am working on will have the ability to incrementally add throttle plate opening angle to the base opening timing under full throttle. I fixed a few Youtube links to play in higher quality last night on the Seen This? page. Wood working project again today.

Mr. Guru,

I've recently discovered your website and love the great work you're doing! I got my first Max on 13 Feb of this year. I was able to ride it for one weekend before having to leave it under the care of my father. I'm currently serving in central America until late October. I was doing okay without the bike for about a month, but then I came upon your site. Now I've got the urge to ride so bad and I'm stuck down here for another six or seven months. I blame you! lol

Joey Parton

I really enjoyed this. Thank you. See more of his fantastic pictures on the Submitted Bikes page.

I had been riding around with the Allen bolts out of my seat until today. I noticed I had a little trouble closing the seat after the last fill up. I guess I tweaked the latch on the center seat leaning the bike to move it around my truck in the driveway. I need to get to the Max Tuner and accessories under the seat to goof with them every now and then so I decided to get some quick release pins. I have measured them and I think they are 5mm with a grip of 26mm. I am going to search for them on the internet tonight. Anyone find some, drop me an e-mail. If not, I will have some made and maybe see if anyone else is interested. So far, it looks like they will be around $15 each for stainless ones. Bulk prices are better. My friend Dave that sent the bolts, don't worry, if I find them this one is on me.

So I hear that someone has a toy coming from Florida. Maybe I should be a copy cat too and expand my web services??? Oh well, have fun.

The EXUP video can be found here. I have to goto work for the rest of the day. My other project is this weekend. Any questions, e-mail me. We are coming up on the weekend. Go some place nice and snap some pictures!

Having coffee, editing video. My camera goofed on a lot of it. It's like 4 bars of new video alternating with 4 bars of the old video I recorded over. Never had this problem before. I may have enough to put something together. This sounds like a reason to buy a new HD camera! At least that is what I will tell the wife. I also forgot to mention that two days ago I purchased a sound meter so I can measure the sound pressure level from various exhaust pipes. Now, I may be on to my next big mod! During my probing yesterday, I may have discovered a cheap and simple way to get the servo to open the throttle plates sooner. It involves adding a RC network to the TPS. This may have as use in other servo controlled applications. I have to fine tune the idea. I will have to look at a way to fuel the new-found air charge if I can get it to reliably work. More on this one later.

3/26/09 The EXUP servo eliminator, done deal! I got it to work today. I shot some video of how the servo normally operates and how the eliminator emulates the operation. For now, this is not a mod many people will be interested in performing. I have future plans for this and I could use the space. This will also serve as a troubleshooting video in the future. Hope to get it edited and posted tonight if all goes well or while I have morning coffee if not. I also started working on the speed fix to take a single wheel sensor input. No payday yet. This one will take some time. As mentioned, my focus will change after tomorrow.

I was in the shop moving some things around when I decided something. For those of you who read my Blog on a daily basis looking for fresh V-Max info, I have some bad news, but this a good thing. I have an old project to finish and I will be busy on it this weekend, maybe a little more. Last year, for some unknown reason, I started a project that has since taken up over 1,200 hours of my time. This can be seen covered up in a few of my videos on this site. I decided this weekend, I would try to complete this project before Easter. When it is complete, I think it will be one of my greatest accomplishments. Nothing can prepare you for seeing it in person. To be honest, I don't know why I did this. I am a religious man. I believe and I am not ashamed of it. Until someone can explain gravity and instinct, I always will. So, you may hear from me over the next few days, just know I am busy with this:

If you wish to read more about it, click the player above again and it will re-direct you to my Youtube page. If you are going to send a link to a friend, do so from the Youtube page. I will take this down from this site in a few days. My belief is personal to me. For now I need the peace this project provides. If you are not religious or of another religion, I hope you can at least respect this for the art. This will be the sum total of matters concerning religion I will mention here. It is not what you are here for. I just wanted you to know about the upcoming break in activities and I am proud of what I have made so far. It represents some of my finest work. You will still hear from me, but I will not be testing much for a little while. I found a few things today that I am still probing.

News Flash! Liberty Tax girl was spotted yesterday! Apparently I had been overlooking her as she has laid down her torch and picked up a pizza! pizza! sign for Little Caesers! I kid you not. I will try to get a photo. Working in the shop today on the EXUP servo and speed fix.

3/25/09 Well, I did find something on the net. If you are a supercar fan, get ready to spend 10 minutes drooling. Click here and when you come back, if you want 10 minutes more, click here.

3/24/09 I hope I have responded to all of the e-mail tonight. Sorry, it has taken a while. I could not believe the wide range of professions I have seen e-mail from tonight. Literally from a Hells Angel to a Assistant Professor of Emergency Medicine. This just keeps getting more interesting by the day. An amazing bike that draws a diverse following! A man like me with my job and this motorcycle obsession, when a psychiatrist e-mails me I will know what he/she is up to. It ain't gonna be about no motorcycle, they will be drumming up bidness!

I have to say, out of all the things I have done on this website, seeing the V-Max owners and their bike (s) out in the various places is what I have enjoyed the most. So I am going to keep plugging this one. Please take the bike out, take a picture and e-mail it to me. If you have a video, upload it to your Youtube page or any video site that offers an embed feature. I will update the Submitted Bikes page with your embedded video. I am supposed to have a monster wheelie video soon!

Now some technical stuff. This is preliminary information that I will build upon. I am sharing my thoughts, so don't take this as gospel. I spent a lot of time with the EXUP servo understanding how it works. I have a solid understanding of it's electrical operation.

There are two wires that feed 13vdc to the servo motor. Black/red and a black/white wires power the servo motor. They reverse polarity to change the servo's rotation direction. The white/red stripe wire is the wiper arm of a potentiometer. This potentiometer produces a voltage that represents the servo's position. Position 1 is 4 volts and then position 2 is 2.6 volts. I have had my LM-2 hooked to the white/red wire. From the data, it appears 4 volts is closed and 2.6 is open. The same black/blue and blue wires that feed the other sensors with ground and 5 vdc also feed this potentiometer with ground and 5 vdc. The potentiometer inputs measure 10k ohms with the connector removed. I have gotten closer to getting an eliminator to work. One more day should do it.

Removing the ABS was something else I probed today. It looks like I may need to augment my speed fix to work with just a single wheel sensor. This should make a step toward being able to remove the ABS servo. There are more things to look at in this area. I did not spend a lot of time with it. I can't remember from the last time I fooled with it if there was a data signal present at the ABS unit or not. Work day tomorrow so I may not have anything new tomorrow unless I find something on the net. Oh, and thanks to the fellow that corrected the N2O (NOS). NO2 is a supplement I used to take when I lifted so I guess it was stuck in my head.

I had an e-mail come in about what fuel octane to run. I tested this issue some time ago. Here is a new page I made with the results and some reasons why.

It may be the trip to Kennedy Space Center, but I found this link to Google Moon fascinating. They actually have the spot marked where the American Flag is planted by the Apollo 11 crew. Google Sky is a good one also.

3/23/09 Well, it took me long enough! Here is the link to the Cat Sass initial testing results. I hope you can tell why it took me so long from the amount of detail in the page. Today is a work day for me. This will give you something to study for a while.

3/22/09 More bikes added to the Submitted Bike page. I had to start a Submitted Bikes Page 2 to keep the download time reasonable. Looks like the boys up north are starting to get the bikes out for a spin. Congratulations!! I took mine out yesterday and my big butt finally had a chance to feel a rolling smokie! First time it happened, I thought the tire still had gooey melted rubber from the dyno drum. Not so. Anytime in first gear above 20mph, whack it and it will go up in smoke. Blip into second and the same thing. This is almost addictive! The rear tire's are not going to last long. I am finishing up the Cat Sass page tonight (if all goes well). I will send out an e-mail when I finish it. I worked on the EXUP Servo eliminator some more. I know the easy fix is just to remove the cables from the servo and the servo can be left intact, I just really need the space to house the wideband O2 sensor connector. It does not fit well and makes my side cover bulge out.

3/21/09 First things first. With as much tact as possible, let me advise the following. Don't ever eat 18 dollars worth of freeze dried astronaut ice cream. It's been a solid two days since and Houston, we have a problem. With this, I hope to end the NASA paronomasia's (pun's).

Next, I wanted to show off something I was shipped from Dave Soli. Bolts to use in the mirror bosses. I removed my stock mirrors and installed bar end mirrors which leaves the threaded mirror boss open. It is almost impossible to find a custom bolt for the left hand thread right hand mirror boss. Click to enlarge:

He had them custom made from titanium because he didn't feel anything else was worthy. You can feel the difference in weight between these and regular steel bolt when you hold them in your hand. They feel much lighter than steel ones (or maybe I am just too proud of them). They are the right length to thread all the way down and snug tight. He had a few extra made. If you want to bolt something down in these holes, or just fill them with a nice bolt, contact me and I will get you in touch with him. Thanks Dave!

3/20/09 Talk about humbling me after something great happening. After breaking 200rwhp for the first time, I was walking around with a lot of pride. I opened up my e-mail expecting to see my friends telling me how great I did, instead the first e-mail was from my sister-in-law. I lost my breath. I instantly added it to my "Seen This?" page.

Apparently the altering the engines atmosphere with nitrous oxide is a viable option when attempting to increase the rear wheel horsepower. I installed a single nozzle N2O system from Schnitz Racing. I made a very temporary installation of a large N2O bottle I had here at the shop. The two small polished bottles I ordered with the kit would not last long for testing. I will install them this weekend. The single nozzle was setup to spray directly into the UFO air filter. I installed a #24 nozzle. I adjusted the UFO Max Tuner to add more fuel. I wired the switch and solenoid to the horn button as per instructions. I fired the bike up, made a few warm up passes. On the third pass, at the right time I blew the horn and bada bing!

Yesterday trip to the Kennedy Space Center was fantastic! Since it was my birthday, I got to do anything I wanted. Well, I ate eighteen dollars worth of celebratory freeze dried astronaut ice cream. One of the packs was a freeze dried ice cream sandwich, which means I had cake and ice cream for my birthday, astronaut style. The crowd was light and consisted of a lot of foreigners. There was hardly any wait for the rides like the Shuttle Launch Experience or the iMax theater. I turned to my wife and told her it was amazing to see what brilliant and talented people can do when they believe. During my visit to the Space Center, I happened upon this rocket engine:

After reading about the thrust and relative horsepower of this engine, I was quite impressed. From the specifications, it seems that in a contest of acceleration, a modification to my V-Max of this caliber would assure my bike would undoubtedly best any other make or model motorcycle in said competition. I inquired at the Information Desk as to where I could purchase one to bolt to my V-Max. I was surprised to discover this particular model is no longer being built or offered for sale. I attempted to purchase the floor model shown in the photo. Apparently the current owner has a sentimental attachment and I had to resolve to leaving empty handed. The staff at the Space Center did make some suggestions that may increase the performance of my V-Max in it's current configuration. They explained a method of altering the atmosphere of the combustion engine for incremental horsepower gains. I will be testing the theory today.

3/19/09 I feel bad not adding anything technical to the site in some time. Real quick, while the wife is getting ready, I have a few minutes. Here is a chart that shows some Cat Sass testing along with a new product we tested from UFO. The first test of UFO's Custom Velocity Stacks. I will have to look at the set-ups later to know for sure but I think the air box was off for the velocity stack run 16 (as it would be for racing). The air box was modified and has no filter in it for run 22. I am posting run 22 mainly to show the typical curve. I know the stacks did cost a few ponies from the peak HP we made that day. I will look thru the 40 something charts later. I had these stacks on the bike for Bike Week. When you look at this chart, if you are a drag racer, think of where your power needs to be focused. This is impressive for a bolt on and button hit of the Max Tuner. Please keep in mind when sharing this, we did not spend much time tuning the fuel curve. We was in a hurry to get ready for Bike Week and hunting for peak dyno horsepower. I over looked this until yesterday. Dyno is one thing, racing is another. Look at that bump! What's also impressive, this was Jon's first attempt at making a stack for this bike. Although this is already a VERY decent bolt on gain, Jon will be tuning and testing at this more as time allows.

3/18/09 Another day that did not go as planned. I am not trying to drag you along but my wife had a surprise birthday party for me a day early. Hope you understand. I got in late today. Nothing tomorrow. Maybe Friday.

I had a few spirited responses from yesterdays post. I think his page hit the same nerve on some people as it did me. I had a some V-Max pictures submitted in including a few from overseas. I am very interested to see where the V-Max ends up and what other bikes are in a V-Max owners stable. I have a 86, 88 and 09 V-Max, also an 03 FJR in mine. We may buy a Fazer for the wife this weekend if she likes it. There is one on this page. Today will be a short work day for me. Tomorrow is my B-Day. The big four oh snip!! (Have to keep my language family friendly) That's right, let the e-mails roll in now. I'm ready for it. No Blog tomorrow, we are going to spend the day at Kennedy Space Center. If I take any good pictures I will Flickr them. Maybe have lunch with an astronaut. Talk about having the ultimate trump card in the game of "One Up". One of our friends rides in the Iron Butt clubs, one of the club riders he is buddies with is an actual rocket scientist. Of course, my friend went around to everyone and told them "ask him what he does". It was fun to watch peoples reaction. Anyway, rabbit trail here. I hope to post some more things this evening about the Cat Sass and Drag Star. Keeping true to Jon's UFO theme, let's just say the Empire has struck back! Off to work.

3/17/09 Don't kill the messenger. I had not seen this before, you may have. I see some familiar forum names in the responses. The V-Max gets an unfavorable mention in a couple of places on another site called HubPages. Click here Another is here. At least he gave me a motto:

"Demonstrating once and for all that the company is run by a bunch of rabid motorheads with no perspective on reality, the star of the Yamaha 2009 lineup is none other than a 1.7 litre version of the most excessive motorcycle of a very excessive bygone era: the V-Max." Hal Licino

33mpg is bad? I wonder if he used methane gas to power his laptop while he pound this out because it sure smells like BS! We recycle, use green bags, moved toward a paperless office, re-insulated, new windows, purchased energy efficient appliances and installed new light fluorescent bulbs. I am VERY environmentally conscious. This guy is not a tree hugger on his high horse, he is a high browed ass on his slow ass. Can't I have one thing too excessive without the guilt trip? With so much envy in his page, he sounds like a closet V-Max lover. As with anything that happens on the computer that I really don't like, I gave the monitor a single finger salute and carried on.

I have caught up with the e-mail now. Hope to get some more pictures for the Submitted Bike page. I like to look at each persons twist on the base subject matter. "The most excessive motorcycle of a very excessive bygone era."

3/16/09 Today is a work day for me, so I have nothing much to post for the V-Max other than time is running out for me and the Drag Star. I think Jon has something up his sleeve and needs it back. We'll see. As for all of the e-mails last Thursday and Friday, I am still working thru some of them but I found a few that I would like to share. I have a reason for doing so. For me, it's not so much what they are saying, but who's saying it;

This is from a former diagnostic consultant for Snap On Tools: "I would like to say to you, thank you,,, you are a good guy who has done a really good thing for us bunch of V max riders and look forward to seeing the continuation of something new and satisfying. Best advise I ever got was on a Salada tea bag ,,, don't wonder what people think because they seldom do"

The self proclaimed biggest V-Max nut on the planet: "When I read your last Blog entry I was compelled to send you this email to let you know that there are guys like me out there that recognize the caliber of individual you are and that what you do is thoroughly appreciated!! PS. The 09 makes the Gen 1 look like the ladies edition I will continue to tweak and mod my monster and then go B King hunting !"

From a Hewitt Packard Storage Solutions Architect "I can understand you wanting to slow down a bit if you have other things to do, but I hope you don’t slow down because of critical know-it-alls. By the way, I use yard work to “think” too."

I am at the age to where I see the mistakes of young ones, and realize the value of an elders advise. I read this guys e-mail a few times. I love it. From an old guy that appreciates a quest, "Without question I see that you realize knowledge is something that can never be taken away and any knowledge that you give up to others is of no real consequence because you can always acquire more. Good luck in your pursuits with the VMax and other interests and maintain the curiosity for all that you do. I expect that I will "drop" in on your site from time to time to see what has intrigued you."

And lastly, my favorite. This guy types real loud, but you will see why it's here: "I HAVE FULL CUSTODY OF MY 6 YEAR OLD DAUGHTER & MY 9 YEAR OLD SON STEVE JR , STEVE JR FOLLOWS ALONG WITH ME & WHEN HE SAW THAT YOU WROTE MY NAME ON YOUR WEBSITE HE WAS REALLY EXCITED , SO KNOW THIS, YOU HAVE A 50 YEAR OLD & A 9 YEAR OLD THAT THINK THAT WHAT YOUR DOING IS FANTASTIC, SO KEEP UP THE GOOD WORK"

Glad to see you and your dad have something you like to do together. I wished you lived close, I would let you hit the button on the dyno and we could see what happened!

I would like to take this opportunity to say thank you to everyone that has visited my site. Especially those that took the time to e-mail me. I never intended on quitting, but I will have to tend to work. You folks will still hear from me as often as I can. Summer is a busy time for my tower company so there is going to be a few days coming that I will be away and can not get to the computer to update the site. For now, I hear rumblings of another 09 V-Max owner wanting to test some more mod's to his bike. I think Eleanor, my bike, could use a break from the dyno. So we may have some more things to look at soon. This love fest ends, but fun continues!

3/15/09 I added one more chart to the Air Box mod page. It shows one run made with the Race ECU. This will be it for tonight. Long day. I will catch up more in the am.

I was running late tonight, so I missed recording the launch. But I did take this photo of the vapor trail afterwards. I live on the west coast of Florida. Kennedy Space Center is 2 1/2 hours away by car. We are going there next week.

One correction to the Air Box Modification charts I missed in the original write up. Run #23 also had the foam rubber padding removed from inside the scoops. Yesterday I saw Esten's padding is still on my router table. I corrected it.

My wife and I had a good ride yesterday. If you are bored, I have posted a few pictures to my Flickr account today. I have some cleaning to do around the house this morning until the church next door lets out. After that, I will look at the Drag Star more. I think I have topped the horsepower the last time I had it and now I just need to tidy up the fuel curve. I have responded to all of the shorter "add me" e-mail request this morning. It's hard to surmise a personality with an e-mail with two or three line e-mail. Some of longer ones give me a chance. I have found a few to be well thought out. I will not name any names (well, maybe one), but I hope to put together snippets of them tonight. I also have planned to video the night launch of the space shuttle. I will video it from my yard. I have to put together the Cat Sass page too. My plate is full!

3/14/09 Wrapped up testing for today. The wife and I are going to take a ride on the FJR. I spent most of the day shielding the LM-2 wiring and hard wiring the RPM sensor rather than the inductive clamp. I had wired the rpm pickup to Injector 1 and pulled a Dyno run. When the bike is ran up 10k on the dyno and the throttle is released, the ECU killed all injector timing (no signal) until the bike's rpm fell below 2.7k to 3k rpm (tach says 3k, LM-2 says 2.7k to 2.8k). I knew this but didn't know for sure where it happened. The LM-2 seems to be working now. I even removed the copper heat sink. Seems to log O2 perfectly and has not went into "Sensor Timing Error" yet. I hope this is behind me. That was one hard problem to find. Time to go enjoy the beautiful day with my wife.

Holy smokes, I did not realize I was reading page one of a few pages of e-mail. I will try to respond to them tonight. Back at getting the LM-2 noise issue taken care of and hopefully some more Drag Star results.

Quick note this morning before I take the Wife to breakfast, thanks to everyone for the support e-mails. I hope I didn't sound like I made myself a victim of my own doings. I also do not really take the blame if something proves to not make a performance gain. That is, after all, why I am doing this. Results. Don't confuse a result with a failure. The winning objective is the test result. I have started a page for you to waste time watching things I bump into on the internet. It is here. I added a new one this morning. I moved the Sand Art page there to speed up the Blog load time.

3/12/09 I have to admit, something is bothering me. Here comes a rant. Everyone has their way of dealing with things and working them out. When I need to work something out in my head, I mow the yard. This mundane chore really gives me a chance to think over issues or problems. Well, today the yard needed mowing. While I bounced around on the mower, there is a saying that popped into my head. If you have nothing, anything is something. You see, I knew nothing about this bike when I picked it up at the dealership. When I pulled off the lot, it was great to smell the " new" burning off the pipes and to hear the exhaust note. Even hearing the pipes crack and pop for the first time when you shut the bike down was a discovery. Since that day I have over 300 miles and 6 tanks of fuel on my dyno. I have amassed a history of hundreds of dyno runs. It has been a blast. I took the thing half way apart and took the time to write it down, type it up and gave all this information away for free. Why? My main troubles are two fold. One is the perception of me being a production company for UFO rather than someone looking for results. Look, I only have one vendor participating in what I am doing. Maybe it's because I am only great in my own "little world" and only my friend knows about me. Maybe other vendors are put off by the one sidedness of my site, or not accustom to giving part s to be evaluated. Or maybe, just maybe, they are scared of the results. It dawned on me I should offer the following information to perspective vendors. This site is starting to average 700 hits per day. My e-mail list is nearing 250 addresses. Small by some standards, but huge to me. Since most of my new information pertains to the 2009 VMax and if most of these are 09 V-Max owners, this is starting to be a nice gathering place to showcase your product. There is a small audience of new friends. The second thing that bothered me was all of the negativity every single time something goes out. There is always " one" in every crowd. That is why I don't do much in the groups or forums anymore. Some are great. Some of them tend to be crowds of the "one". The more I mowed, the more I thought about it, the more I realized. There is a reason why they do what they do. If you have nothing, anything is something.

I rode around on the old VMax for so long wanting more, now its here and it's not enough. I want myself and everyone that rides a V-Max to stomp a B-King. I will figure out how. That's my modus operandi. I have said this site was a little guilty pleasure for me and it's starting to be too much of my life. I really enjoy trying to figure out a puzzle, but I may be getting consumed. It's more than just the bike, it's my ego. I have a lot of tools and training under my belt but I have gone too far. I mean, I have actually bought my own personal dyno. I could be mowing the yard with a much nicer lawn mower! Better yet, I could pay someone to mow the yard and I could be riding the bike that is lying in parts. My wife would say two words, mid life. So, I made a little peace with myself. I need to finish my current obligations and back off for a little while. I am getting too wrapped up in this process. I have other work to do and I am spending too much time pretending to be a big shot. I will let someone else lead and get torn apart. Doing so will give me a chance to formulate a two line educated opinion of 10 hours of work. I parked my mower, humbled, as I should be. I sat down at my computer. I didn't look at the groups. I didn't want to know. I checked my e-mail. Four new guys wanting to be added to my e-mail list. Dave is sending me some very nice machined titanium bolts that fit the mirror bosses and Chris tells me his bike is headed his way. I remember that feeling. He has never seen a new VMax in person. Tells me he has gotten ideas for a direction to customize his bike when it gets here. He has been living vicariously through the videos. I realized the reason I should do what I do. I remembered, if you have nothing, anything is something.

I have had time to comb over the results and I posted a few. See below. I am not done with the page yet. I have to go to work now. More tonight if need be. E-mail me any questions or suggestions.

I had to do some re-work of the videos from last night before I do the dyno sheets. Someone brought up a good point. I failed to mention not to use a dirty filter for the air box mod. Everyone must realize I do these videos as they happen. They may contain flubs, errors or things I fail to mention. I can't think of everything when I get excited. I have some people that really are hypercritical of everything I do, but it is constructive if it avoids a mistake or misunderstanding that could cause damage. Besides, I really don't consider something "done" until I send out an e-mail to the folks on my list. For testing this, I used a new, well I say new, less than 300 miles on it, filter that I blew clean with compressed air. I am running the prototype UFO air filter for now. Shortly after posting this video last night, I was e-mailed by Ken Zeller of evoluzion.net, inc wherein he states this modification is part of a new kit he is offering. I was oblivious to this being a part of his kit. I had not heard a peep of this mod from anyone, anywhere prior to my discovering it yesterday. Rack it up to two people thinking alike. I will say that Ken had e-mailed me prior to this about possibly testing a new race flow system. As for this mod, I strongly suggest you acquire a performance filter. If Ken has this to offer, then he is ahead of the game. The dyno charts I am about to post will still show the stock air filter is still very restrictive. If you guys promise to not go banana's, I will let you see the charts as I make them today. For now, this is the only working link to that page. Please don't quote anything until I iron out the details. I will make a Blog entry when I have finished and you folks can run with the charts.

3/11/09 I will work on the dyno sheets in the morning. Lets just say, it makes more horsepower. I don't want to confuse the results and I should review the data and make notes in the morning. Here is a trick for removing the YCC-I. I am tired, so this is it for tonight.

I have uploaded the video to here. I will take some time to put the dyno sheets together for this one.

I Have a new mod you are going to love!! I think it's my best yet. Best of all, it's almost free. I am working on the video and pages now. Cat Sass will have to wait for a bit.

Today I am working on a web page of the Cat Sass system testing results. I think you may be impressed.

3/10/09 Today I hope to get everything put away from the dyno competition and start wacking the Drag Star pipe again.

3/9/09 Today is a work day for me so not a lot to post where the V-Max is concerned. Every now and then I will go off topic when I see something that impresses me. It's my web site, so forgive me if I take liberties with it. As you can tell from the router art I posted here, I enjoy the process and I am a fan of artistically talented people. I really love some of the air brushing I have seen on some bikes. The Mad Max faux tank at Bike week was one of my favorites.

3/9/09 This next video came in my e-mail and I am very impressed, so I found it on YouTube and thought I would post it. Besides, we all could use a little good news today. The artist is Ilana Yahav. It's rare I am so impressed. Since I have nothing new to post today, spend a little time watching this gift. I hope you are impressed too: I moved the video to here.

3/8/09 I finished unloading the dyno and trailer today. I had a chance to look at my bike and see why it was not running right. I had relocated the Max Tuner from being velcro'ed to the ECU to under the seat for easy adjustment. I inadvertently broke the ground wire when I re-installed the seat. So some times it would touch ground and run, others it would die and not start. I hope to do more testing on the Drag Star Tuesday if work allows.

I finished posting the VMOA Bikeweek Dyno Shootout numbers here. Now to unload everything.

3/7/09 What a day! I was able to dyno some nice bikes today. Greg Craft, a fellow 09 owner and winner of the Dyno Shootout in the 09 stock class, won the raffle artwork. I was glad to see him win it. Thanks for the trick intake scoop filters! For results, Manuel Silveria's won the Gen 1 Modified Class with 123.6. A 1429cc nitrous Gen 1 Bike owned by John Simpson made 162.4 to win the Gen 1 Unlimited Class. Esten Spears had the UFO Max Tuner and UFO Cat Sass system with Afterburners on his bike and made a 180.4 to win the Modified Gen 2 class. There was not a unlimited Gen 2 at the event. Yesterday I was shipped the UFO Drag Star pipe back for additional tuning. I got the pipes on at 9:30pm and did not have any time to tune it. I am pushing the dyno thing with my neighbors as it is. It was not running right but still pulled a 184.3 at the event. My learning curve is coming around with the Max Tuner so I expect to lay down some good numbers soon. I was surprised to see the turnout given the current economic situation. It was good to see some old friends like the original VMaxGuru in my book, Eric Harnish, back in the mix. I've missed you buddy. Also, I was glad to see my new friend, Scott Erhardt, on the bike I love. Chromax. A beautiful and tasteful work of industrial art. I wish I had more time to talk with a few others like Walt and Jerry but I was glad to be a little busy. I want to thank the VMOA for having me at this event. Walter Bishop is doing a great job running the show. I will be working on the dyno results and I will post a link on the index page when I have them completed. I'm a little tired so I hope you guys understand if I catch this up in the morning. Again, thanks to all the new people I met today. It was the most fun I have had in a while.

3/6/09 I really am a creature of habit. Everyday I am updating this Blog about a bike. I think I am crazy! And you are here reading it so I must have good company. I don't do chat rooms or MySpace. I think we all have other things we should be doing, but this bike is my one "semi" guilty pleasure. This is the most fun I have had in a while. Today I hope to finish loading up and do a few test runs to see how this will work. I will be busy most of the day with this task. I am getting really excited about the Dyno competition tomorrow! I hope the VMOA has a good turnout. Hope to see you there!

3/5/09 I spent most of the day preparing for Bikeweek, getting the truck and dyno ready and working on the awards. Long day.

On the cruise issue. There may be a very cheap and crude way of doing this. The ECU looks at the Accelerator Position Sensor (APS) and it moves the butterflies to the correct position using the Throttle Position Sensor (TPS) as a feed back loop to resolve its position. These sensors are identical. Under normal conditions, the signals created by them mirror each other. If a relay has installed to send the TPS signal to both the APS and TPS inputs to the ECU, it may cause it to "Lock On" to the current throttle position and hold it there. Just a thought and a place to start experimenting. Most people could just buy a throttle lock and be done with it.

I set the raffle artwork up on an easel in my living room and I almost hate to let it go. The pictures below do not do it justice. Not that I am boasting about it, but it really is something to see in person. Even though I made this thing, my wife and I found ourselves staring at it quite often last night. It is almost an illusion how it is cut into the wood. The winner should be very proud. I guess this woodwork stuff must be a little boring as the e-mail has really rolled off. Page counts are still up so people are still stopping in. The woodworking may be of little interest to those looking to make horsepower but this is what I have to get done in the VMax world until Saturday. Maybe Sunday I can post the results of the VMOA Dyno competition. I received a few things from UFO to test. I plan to show them at Bikeweek on my bike, but I don't think I will have time to tune much by then. I start packing it up today. Hope to see you there.

Electronic Cruise control should be pretty simple! Something in the distant future.

One down! Four to go. Here is the cut of the raffle art. This turned out as good as any I have made. You can see the holes in the brake rotors.

I had an e-mail from the land down under last night. Yesterday I noticed the dyno's weather station was not reading the right % of humidity, so that is now on order from Dynojet. I keep a temp and humidity sensor next to the dyno and I have a weather station in my house. This new weather module did not last too long. I found out an O2 sensor from them is $2,500 bucks. Not in the budget right now. I will be side tracked today, the wife is not feeling too good and she needs my attention.

3/3/09 I played around with the bike this morning and made some headway. It appears the LM-2 problem was noise related. It's wiring came in proximity to the ignition and fuel injectors and seems to be the problem. I added some shielding to some of the wiring. I will work on more shielding as time allows. I had to switch gears and get busy on the awards. Here are the proofs for each including one we intend to raffle at the BBQ. They will look much better in person rather than a rendering. The raffle art is rather large, so we will offer to ship it to the winner. As a rule, I only make "One of a Kind" art pieces so this will be the only of this type and/or size. Here is a preview rendering:

It's cold this morning for Florida in March. 28 degrees. Finally some good news coming from the living room (I had a feeling yesterdays market would be bad). The weather report this morning places the high at 80 degrees on this Saturday. I'm thinking we are going to have some great weather for the next 7 days. Might as well load up and come to Daytona! I am running late with cutting the Dyno awards. I will be working on that today and tomorrow as well as getting the truck, trailer, bike and dyno ready for Bikeweek. My phone calls got me to nowhere yesterday. I went to bed thinking about it and woke up in the middle of the night with another idea. I am thinking there is electrical noise or vibration on the bike causing the bad readings. I will probe it with a Oscope and see if this puts me in the right direction. If not, I may have to take the plunge and buy the O2 sensor from Dynojet. Till then, I will have to give up on the O2 readings and I will have to tune using strictly the dyno results. I don't see me getting much done as far as tuning before Bikeweek anyway, I have got a lot to get ready. I am going to sneak a few pulls this morning in this cold dry air but without the right fuel, I don't expect much.

3/2/09 Here are my ride maps off my old server for those of you attending Bikeweek. Once again, I will be performing the Dyno competition for the VMOA at the BBQ. It will be held at Boxenstopp's. The address is 1299 State Ave , Unit 1, Holly Hill 32117. Phone # is 386-226-2077. I hope to be there and set-up to dyno the first bike at 10:00am.

For fun, I took a look at the traffic on my site and tried to cross reference it to the weather to see if the weather made a difference in how many page hits I was getting. I did not work for my site. I think whenever I make a new video, the page count goes up. I was curious and it was fun to look. I am sure the traffic on many motorcycle sites has to increase when a front moves through like the current one laying snow down in Atlanta! I wonder how many people do the same thing I do. Early of the morning, I get a cup of coffee and sit down at the computer. I make the usual check to see if I have e-mail. I usually have something so I try to respond to it or just surf a few forums to see what's new while the bad news plays in the living room. As many of you know, I have a Whipple Supercharger I am itching to put on my bike, but the news emanating from my living room about economy does not sound good. I am worried. This keeps me at bay for now. I have set the following restriction for myself. When you see the Dow back above 9,000, then it will be game on for the blower unless there is a vendor that would like for me to evaluate a EFI and Timing system for them. I really don't see that happening (at all), so I'll have to wait. When it comes back around, I hope to take you through the whole process with me. Good thing about the bad economy, if there is such a thing, I will be working allot with the stock bike for the time being. This gives me a chance to comb over the bike and look at different mods, test different pipes and play with the electronics. Till then, I am happy with what I have, a beautiful and powerful motorcycle and the good health to ride it. When you count your blessings, don't forget the simple ones. Thank God, I get to work today. More tomorrow. Thank you for visiting.

Dave Soli, a fellow VMax owner, did a fine job of demonstrating how he installed a Fuzeblocks auxiliary power source on his 09 VMax. I added it to the Modification page and links to it on my Aux Relay pages. I also added more info on the 2005 model V-Max on the history page. Thanks Trevor.

3/1/09 I spent the day collecting data for Monday morning phone calls. I have found the problems, now I need answers. Hopefully Innovate can answer them. Tomorrow is a work day. Tuesday will be a test day if all goes well.

Ah, a new clean page to start another month. I did a little web site maintenance this morning. Fixed some broken links and reworked the Race ECU page so it has all of the related Blog entries on it. I will try to keep doing this, adding the Blog entries to the related pages. I think it will help people find the information better. I forgot to post the initial numbers from yesterday Cat Sass and Afterburners. Don't commit these numbers to memory as there was no fuel adjustment. SAE corrected 175rwhp and 115ftlbs. Oopps! 98 left. The 125ftlbs was wrong, 115 is correct. This is with a stock bike including the stock air filter, 4th gear and 93 octane fuel. These numbers will get better as it needs a fuel adjustment. I would like to mention that on average, a completely stock bike under the same conditions makes an SAE corrected 170rwhp and 111ftlbs on my dyno. You bone stock boys should look forward to this kind of number. Now for my favorite thing that happened this morning. My wife was cooking breakfast and ask me what I am going to do today. I tell here after church lets out, I will start dyno'ing again. She actually say's to me "well, if you are going to make horsepower, today and tomorrow will be the days to do it as this cold front moves through. Tomorrow will be better, it's supposed to be cold in the morning". That just warmed my heart!