Kawasaki Sportsbike Riders Club - Australia - Online Forum

Benny wrote:My mates dad said I should try octane booster and gave me a bottle. I only ride a z750 and i dont know a terrible lot about my bike, should I give it a go? or is it not meant for my bike?

i use to bang it in my blade all the time.... i honestly never noticed a difference...

i ran 98ron BP ultimate (which is the only 98ron fuel in tas) in a 2006 Zx6R and i reckon it was crap. It had trouble starting and once it did start up and ran sluggish for about 10 seconds... you would even have to give he throttle a bit of a pump to get it to run properly.
Anyway went back to 95 and it starts up really well its very happy to wake up now!!!

apart from the start up i noticed no difference and i ran 98 for about 200km's

so 95 premo for me!!!

BladeBoy wrote:

blue12 wrote:

Cath wrote:I only use 98, and only from Mobil or Caltex.

I might just fill up with 95 next time and see if I can spot any difference...

Changing fuels can take a few tanks to take affect as the computer has to set itself right with the different octane. So if you want to check you might have to use a couple of tanks and see what happens. Same as when you go back to 98 you will have the same situation.

Would it take that long

There's a trick to speed it up.

Fill with the new fuel.
Take your bike home.
Disconnect your battery.
Squeeze the brake lever.
Connect the battery.
Take it for a ride over 30 - 40 km.
Be reasonably gentle at the start and thrash it at the end.

This drains the power so the computer is at its fresh from factory setting. It starts on a really conservative fuel map and timing. The idle will be crap and it will feel much lower on power initially.

But the computer plays go seek with the timing and fuel delivery very rapidly. The steps are much greater than if you just change the fuel and its settled into a particular mapping. This is why you should start gently, it gives the computer a bit of leeway to find a reasonable map before you start demanding big power.

Thrashing it toward the end of the ride will tell the computer just how much throttle there really is and how you really need it.

Now do a few timed quater miles and get your average terminal speed.

Rinse and repeat.

If theres a difference you should see it in the average terminal speeds. Adjusted for humidity, air pressure and temperature and all that.

If you cant find any appreciable difference and the airpressure, temp and humidity are about the same. Then there probably isnt one worth worrying about.

Oh, and it shouldnt hurt your bike. You will be able to feel the engine smoothing up so work with it. In fact there's a school of thought that states thats how you should treat any performance vehicle. Start smooth, get it hot, give it some, let it cool down while moving, park it.

Alternatively send it in to Mythbusters or Top Gear. Its the sort of thing they like doing.

blue12 wrote:Changing fuels can take a few tanks to take affect as the computer has to set itself right with the different octane. So if you want to check you might have to use a couple of tanks and see what happens. Same as when you go back to 98 you will have the same situation.

Not on your bike it wont. Just about all bikes are open loop and the mapping is set by men in white coats in the factory. The bike has no real idea of how much air it's taking in, type of fuel or exhaust flow. It's all pre-programmed and "trimmed" via a few sensors - TPS, coolant temp, air temp & pressure etc.

Even the ones fitted with oxgen sensors ignore it when accelerating and the ECU defaults to a "man in a white coat" map. The oxygen sensor is only used to trim the mixture when cruising.

falx wrote: There's a trick to speed it up.

Fill with the new fuel.
Take your bike home.
Disconnect your battery.
Squeeze the brake lever.
Connect the battery.
Take it for a ride over 30 - 40 km.
Be reasonably gentle at the start and thrash it at the end.

This drains the power so the computer is at its fresh from factory setting. It starts on a really conservative fuel map and timing. The idle will be crap and it will feel much lower on power initially.

But the computer plays go seek with the timing and fuel delivery very rapidly. The steps are much greater than if you just change the fuel and its settled into a particular mapping. This is why you should start gently, it gives the computer a bit of leeway to find a reasonable map before you start demanding big power.

Thrashing it toward the end of the ride will tell the computer just how much throttle there really is and how you really need it.

.......

......

Alternatively send it in to Mythbusters or Top Gear. Its the sort of thing they like doing.

I put Opticrap in my lawnmower once and it even stuffed it up !

BladeBoy wrote:I put Opticrap in my lawnmower once and it even stuffed it up !

yeh, I heard those Honda 4-stroke mowers are a piece of crap !!

Gosling1 wrote:

BladeBoy wrote:I put Opticrap in my lawnmower once and it even stuffed it up !

yeh, I heard those Honda 4-stroke mowers are a piece of crap !!

Never miss a chance do you Gos

Ok learnt something new about the computer on a bike when changing fuels, thanks guys. Also another thing with optimax is the big problem is with most injection sytems on bikes they are a small injector which is why the carbon build up. I know that even on the 12 they use a mitsubishi injection system which is not big enough to take the sulphur in the optimax causing carbon build up. Where as on the big bore machines, such as the Hyabusa they use a different injection system which you can use optimax so i am to believe. Sorry Gos, but i had this explained to me by a very respected man in the know..

BladeBoy wrote:.....Never miss a chance do you Gos

Never mate, I'm always on the lookout for an opportunity !! (My first bike was a Team Soichiro, ssshhhh don't tell anyone....).

blue12 wrote:....but i had this explained to me by a very respected man in the know.....

no worries mate, that does explain a lot about the varying opinions on Opticrap, or whatever it is called these days. The Mobil 8000 seems to be a good brew ??

I have been studying KTM SuperDukes and one of the tweeks is to let the bike idle for 20 minutes after changing anything,must be much the same deal,good to have an explanation of what happens as the computer remaps itself,now I can see what happens it all makes perfect sense.

I just ran a tank of the new 98 in my 02 Townace and got 280k instead of my usual 250k on the 95 and I was hitting it a lot more than usual.