New Owner with a few Questions

[Patrick78]

Ok so I picked up and drove home my 2003 V-Max yesterday afternoon. It was about an hour and a half ride and it was great. Took me a little while to relax and feel comfortable as I'm coming off an 04 R6 and getting on the V-Max.

So now that I've spent some time on it I have a few general questions.

1. Does anyone make adjustable clutch and brake levers for this bike? The brake one is fine, but the range of travel on the clutch is too long for my hand size. The clutch fully releases at the very end of the motion so its basically slipping out of my fingers to get it in gear. So either an adjustable lever or an adjustment to the clutch itself to have it engage earlier in the stroke.

2. This bike is equipt with an oil pressure gauge mounted on the handle bars. The pressure read fine when I left his house, but by the time I got home the pressure was really low. After cooling off and restarting the pressure was back up to normal. Is this normal for long rides or do you think it might need to be topped off with oil?

3. The V-Boost is awesome and I've been doing quite a bit of reading on this site, but I don't fully understand the modifications that can be done to this. It is possible to have this engage earlier in the rpms, correct? How do I do that?

4. My bike has Kerker slipon's and a stage 1 jet kit. I read that Sean recommends having a full exhaust system for his kit as the stock header is very restricting. What about the stage 7 kit? Does that require an aftermarket header as well?

I think thats it for now. I would like to get some aftermarket turn signals to remove the ones that look like they belong on a school bus. And I'll probably lower the bike about 1" just because I'm a little on the shorter side.

But so far I love the bike. and Thanks to all for any feed back you offer.

 

[tugla]

congrats on your new bike man, and welcomeunk:

for sure you should fine your answers here on the forum, great bunch of guys to help you out.

your turn signals you can pretty much put what you like, lots of ebay stuff out there, chromed or satin finishes that are a lot smaller in size. also lowering it also is easy, if you need to rebuild the front forks anyways, can get progressive springs or race tech and end up lowering it at the same time. real straight forward forks nothing complicated.

for sure a full exhaust system is way better, and seans kits would be better off and more econimical then the stage 7. contact him and he can give you the best advise on what you need to do to the bikes set-up, dont think anyone can complain about his knoglede and assistance in those matter.

there are a few ways to either lock open the vboost so the valves are stuck open , but you wont get that vboost feel and the carb setup will be a little off. there are things like T-boost you can add and that you can choose via a switch to turn off the vboost for fuel milage if your always above 6200 in crusie, switch it to activate at 3k or stock at 6k thats kinda neet feature. but pending on how your gonna drive and which carb/exhaust set up should talk to sean to help ya out. stage 7 usually get ride or opens up vboost all the time, not sure about seans kit, others on the forum can tell you more about his carb kits.

and as for the oil pressure, mmm i can only think that the oil was warm and pressure dropped, what was it when it dropped?? does the dummy light still work? did it ever come on. i'd say chg the oil with Rotella T (seems to be consistanly favorite oil here) or which ever you like and then see what the pressure does when warm.

anyways hope this helps you out a little, im sure you'll get lots of help from verteran guys here.

oh ya this aint worth much if ya dont post pics of your new ride manunk:

 

[gamorg02]

to add to what tugla said. there are a few options for clutch levers but they are VERY pricey:

http://shop.mek.biz/product_info.php?info=p422_Brake--or-Clutchgrip-adjustable-sixtimes.html
or
http://shop.mek.biz/product_info.ph...utchgrip-adjustable-sixtimes-NEW-Version.html

something else, which you could probably mod to work, would be one of those clamp/master cylinder/lever combo's that would fit into the vmax banjo bolt. i think places like dennis kirk sell 'em. you can get 'em with adjustable levers

and as tugla said you'll want to upgrade to a full system to use seans or a stage 7.

tboost is fun and allows u to switch on the fly to 3 options: stock, turn vboost on at 3k or turn it off (for rain and whatnot) remember also vboost starts to open @ ~6k and is fully open @ ~8k. so tboost starts @ 3k and is fully @ 4k.

what exactly did your numbers show? normal at idle is very low when warm. 1-5 psi. when warm it should show 10 psi per 1k rpms roughly. were u way off from that?

 

[Patrick78]

I don't recall the numbeing on the oil pressure gauge, but either way when I got home the bike was idling at 0. When I blipped the throttle it would raise up slightly, but nothing like where it was when the bike was originally started. And as I mentioned earlier, once the bike cooled off, the oil pressure was back up.

I'm adding some pictures I took of the bike this morning:

 

[Buster Hymen]

1. Does anyone make adjustable clutch and brake levers for this bike? The brake one is fine, but the range of travel on the clutch is too long for my hand size. The clutch fully releases at the very end of the motion so its basically slipping out of my fingers to get it in gear. So either an adjustable lever or an adjustment to the clutch itself to have it engage earlier in the stroke.

There is after market for this, you can find them under the VMF Links button. Also you can use the master/lever combo off of a FJR.

2. This bike is equipt with an oil pressure gauge mounted on the handle bars. The pressure read fine when I left his house, but by the time I got home the pressure was really low. After cooling off and restarting the pressure was back up to normal. Is this normal for long rides or do you think it might need to be topped off with oil?

The VMax is rather notorious for low oil pressure when it is hot and at idle. If the pressure is decent when it is cold, then you are OK.

3. The V-Boost is awesome and I've been doing quite a bit of reading on this site, but I don't fully understand the modifications that can be done to this. It is possible to have this engage earlier in the rpms, correct? How do I do that?

There are a few options. There is a T-Boost switch which opens it at 3k or there is a Sasy switch where you can program it to open at any rpm. Honestly , stock is the best set up. Opening it earlier makes it really rich although some say it feels like it pulls harder. There has been dyno tests that show it makes less power opening it earlier.

4. My bike has Kerker slipon's and a stage 1 jet kit. I read that Sean recommends having a full exhaust system for his kit as the stock header is very restricting. What about the stage 7 kit? Does that require an aftermarket header as well?

Your bike is probably running rich with this set up. With slip ons, it's recommended that you use a smaller jet. Any after market full exhaust with Sean's jet kit runs well and makes good numbers.

 

[tugla]

I don't recall the numbeing on the oil pressure gauge, but either way when I got home the bike was idling at 0. When I blipped the throttle it would raise up slightly, but nothing like where it was when the bike was originally started. And as I mentioned earlier, once the bike cooled off, the oil pressure was back up.

I'm adding some pictures I took of the bike this morning:

nice bike dude, looks like you scored a beauty. unk: how do you like the sound of the Kerker's???

 

[Patrick78]

I love the sound of the bike in general. I've never heard a stock V-Max before so I'm not sure how much an increase there is with an aftermarket exhaust. But I love the sound of it and I love how it sounds at cruising speed on the highway as well.

 

[dannymax]

Ok so I picked up and drove home my 2003 V-Max yesterday afternoon. It was about an hour and a half ride and it was great. Took me a little while to relax and feel comfortable as I'm coming off an 04 R6 and getting on the V-Max.

So now that I've spent some time on it I have a few general questions.

1. Does anyone make adjustable clutch and brake levers for this bike? The brake one is fine, but the range of travel on the clutch is too long for my hand size. The clutch fully releases at the very end of the motion so its basically slipping out of my fingers to get it in gear. So either an adjustable lever or an adjustment to the clutch itself to have it engage earlier in the stroke.

2. This bike is equipt with an oil pressure gauge mounted on the handle bars. The pressure read fine when I left his house, but by the time I got home the pressure was really low. After cooling off and restarting the pressure was back up to normal. Is this normal for long rides or do you think it might need to be topped off with oil?

3. The V-Boost is awesome and I've been doing quite a bit of reading on this site, but I don't fully understand the modifications that can be done to this. It is possible to have this engage earlier in the rpms, correct? How do I do that?

4. My bike has Kerker slipon's and a stage 1 jet kit. I read that Sean recommends having a full exhaust system for his kit as the stock header is very restricting. What about the stage 7 kit? Does that require an aftermarket header as well?

I think thats it for now. I would like to get some aftermarket turn signals to remove the ones that look like they belong on a school bus. And I'll probably lower the bike about 1" just because I'm a little on the shorter side.

But so far I love the bike. and Thanks to all for any feed back you offer.

1. These problems could be caused by water/air in the fluid or possibly a poor line. Flush/change all the fluid, including removal/cleaning the slave cylinder and rebuild if necessary. Wouldn't hurt to go to s/s braided lines.

2. Oil pressure by-pass valve is set at 65 lbs. and normal operating pressure, after warm-up, is about 10 lbs/1K rpm (4,500 rpm =45 lbs. O/P-approx). If the gauge is showing your system is operating per these standards you'll be alright.

danny