Missed shifts

[brian kirby]

What is the best thing to do when you miss a shift? I assume the best thing to do is shut the throttle, pull in the clutch and let everything spin down before you try for another gear? I dont miss very many shifts, but when I do I want to do whatever will cause the least damage.

Brian

'72 Six Day (on loan from Ernie P.)

[Ron]

Hi Brian,
I'm not sure of the answer your looking for but with mine, I pull in the clutch and shift up again (if I miss an upshift.) It usually finds the gear I wanted.
Most important always use the clutch, if you want to save the shift key.
RonW

[Doug Wilford]

Ron is right- shift up- Most gears missed envolve neutral, downshifting from 3rd to 2nd the selector key goes to far into
neutral so you want to upshift, if you downshift again you will be in 1st (Not good0 in most racing situations)   Becase of the spacing, or neutral between 1st and 2nd, if you miss going into second gear, it is usually becase everything inside is spinning fast and you did not hold your lever in the upshift position.   We have all done what you asked about, sometimes it just needs a logical explanation to understand how to make it work better.  
Have Fun
See you all at Barber NEXT week, already!

[tooclose racing]

Well..post-season.  Tank/carb are drained and I've coated the bike with enough WD-40 to, um...warrant me buying another can of WD-40!

So..I'm reflecting on my first year with a Penton and what an awful job I did at shifting in a couple of races - the Broome Tioga AHRMA national being one of my fondest memories.  And what I love about this site is I can search the word "shift" and I immediately learn something in this thread.  The "overshift" neutral from downshifting to second from third!  And every time I instinctively pushed down again (AFTER I started breathing and stopped revving)and would catch first gear - too low for the turn I was negotiating.

So... I will work on shifting up when I catch THAT neutral (which was probably 90% of my neutrals).  Now - a confession...my recent roadracing background and historical Japanese dirt bike background means that in the heat of battle I sometimes don't use the clutch.  Heck, maybe even a lot - it's a fairly subconscious behavior.  I always "blip" the throttle, BTW. Question: will this result in the premature death of my Sachs 6B tranny?  Is their some PM that I can do/should do at beginning of season that would go after the "weak link" (i.e. shift key replacement, or just adjustment check) that would allow me to continue this bad behavior? []

And finally - a nod to Mr. Tony Friedel - who built a beautiful 72 125 SD that I purchased last winter and had an absolute blast riding in my first vintage racing season.