How many teeth ya got?

[sv-wolf]

Opinions please.

I needed a new chain on my SV thou. It had done 12,000 miles and it was getting very weak. I was having to adjust it weekly. So I booked the bike in with my local dealer to replace chain and sprocket. On the morning I was booked I rode the bike over to be told, 'oh by the way, we couldn't get an official Suzuki sprocket, all we've got is one with 42 teeth instead of 40'. I was annoyed. I'd taken the morning off work and the chain was going fast so I sort of had to agree, even though I was a bit unsure about it.

Still, I thought it will give me a bit of extra low down torque. It might knock a few mph of the top speed, but how often am I going to need that.

But I decided not to go back to this dealer again. He's p1ssed me off more than once over the last year. I've found this other guy through Drumwrecker. He works for himself. He's an ex-Ducati race team mechanic, which can't be bad and Drumwrecker says good things about him. But he thinks that having the 42 teeth sprocket is dangerous. I've never heard that before, but...

Don't know what to think. Any thoughts, anyone?

[poppygene]

Can't imagine what he meant by "dangerous." Your bike should more easily loft the front wheel... maybe that's what he was thinking. You may find that corner exits are somewhat more... aaah... exciting.
The fact that you'll probably lose a bit of fuel economy is the only downside that comes to mind. If it doesn't bother you that the cruising RPMs will be slightly higher, then I'd say let it be.
I hope it's a steel sprocket. Aluminum won't last very long, especially on a torque monster like the SV thou.

[Telesque]

You'll get a little drop and fuel economy, and if you're used to full-on acceleration, you'll want to back off just a bit until you get used to the extra acceleration provided by two extra teeth. That's the only real danger I can think of.

My bike (you asked, right?) has a 16-tooth in the front, and a 44-tooth rear. Final gears (sprockets) don't have an incredible significance between bikes unless you know what gear(s) the transmissions are running, and what kind of engine RPMs the bike will do.

As far as changing it for a single bike.. if you don't like it, have them change it back.

Edit: For more info on how gears work, check this out-> http://science.howstuffworks.com/gear-ratio.htm

[barmy_carmy]

If the bike is lightweight with having 2 extra teeth that when pulling away, will prone to do a wheelie, and like you said you will lose top end. We used to have 43cog, but now we have a 39 cog which gives us a lot more Top end.

[sv-wolf]

Hi everyone

Thanks for the advice.

I was puzzled why someone, who might obviously be assumed to know a thing or two about bikes should think that introducing a larger sprocket onto a SV thou might be 'dangerous'. The SV is not prone to unplanned wheelies, so I couldn't work out what other problem there might be.

Anyway, I'm taking the bike over to him on Saturday so he can have a listen to it. I can ask him then.

Cheers

Richard