Ram air on the road

[superlite]

Also if it was no good on the road then why has it become the norm on virtually all road bikes now

Because they come with it from the factory and (now) are fuel injected.

We all know how hard it is to tune V4s with HRC's own parts, let alone fitting aftermarket or home made ram air. Go the RLR root (I mean route!) though and I'm sure it would be sorted (for the track).

Might look good on paper, but as with most carb mods, you have to give up something to gain more power in the real world - and I wouldn't consider a dyno reading proof when it comes to ram air.

I'm referring to real ram air, i.e. pressurised air box, not the chav equivelent we see listed on ebay or the HRC carb tray (which many think is ram air and is almost as hard to set-up!).

[Cammo]

Also if it was no good on the road then why has it become the norm on virtually all road bikes now,

All of them are efi sportsbikes that are aiming at peak hp numbers....

[Cammo]

and If you talk to Simon Ed he's just fitted it to his racer and said its given him something like 7-10bhp in the mid range, thats got to be good on the road

Pretty sure those figures would be from a WOT dyno run, not exactly how you ride a bike on the road....


EDIT: It might be a good idea to ask peeps that run ram air on their race bike how they think they would ride on the road.

My race bike with the full hrc open carb setup (not ram air) is definitely not road rideable!

[CMSMJ1]

I raced the BMC RVF wth ram air earlier this year and it was bloody good..

Didn't do much part throttle work with it but my recollection is that it was well set up and tractable. I reckon it could be made to work on the road...but probably not in town

I think Ram air for the track is a good call...but not for general riding. It may be good for backroads scratching too..depends how much, as a real percentile, of your riding you do at WOT and commited.

I ride like a softlad on the roads these days...

[Lope]

Some of you keep mentioning that high speed is required with no mention of the size of the scoop. It must be relative. If you're going bonkers or making a race bike, you could make a massive scoop. I'm not saying it would look pretty, but I reckon its possible to get massive gains with a big scoop. But for the road on a carb bike, I wouldn't go near it :)

[Spike16]

not virtually ever sports bike for the last 10 years has been fuel injection and most have had ram air

and most of my road riding is at WOT lol,

open road + national limit = head on tank and WOT

spose thats what you get for mostly riding with 1000's and with some shit hot roads on my door step

[Smev]

what is WOT?!!!

[Spike16]

wide open throttle

[CMSMJ1]

/whispers to Smev

Wide Open Throttle

/whisper off


@ Spike - I hear you..but you need to about sometimes and a bike that doesn't fuel well at small openings would be a ballache. You need to come and ride up north...I was down your end of the world last week and it was busy busy busy. Some neat roads though

[Spike16]

up narth lol

true, but busy building a racer at the moment so no money or time to spend on an adventure, I really wana go to the TT next year tho so might swing by "The North" as the road signs say on the way their/back

I hear you about small throttle movements but by road to people mean a sunday morning wednesday evening wepon or a commuter? their 2 very different styles of riding, my bikes more of the sunday variety with pritty high rearsets and feck all steering lock thanks to damper, no fan etc etc so ram air to me sounds like a fun idea