Hard locking the rear with a botched downshift is scary stuff, and a high side in the making. The C14 has saved my butt on overly aggressive clutch dumps. A little chirp is nothing if it prevents the rear wheel from sliding.
If you ride a bike with a slipper like a bike that does not have a slipper, you won't notice it.
If I may? Which oil are you using? I aint no high falutin Rossi mech, but oils do play heavy in the clutch area.
Kawasaki engineers went one
step further and fitted the shaft drive
system with a back torque limiting
(slipper) clutch, something normally
found only on race and sport machines.
Then why have one?
Slipper clutches were designed for the race track. Guys who race change gear mid-turn and failing to match engine and wheel speed in a high speed turn while leaned way over is a recipe for disaster. The slipper, when properly adjusted, allows for some "wiggle room" in throttle position without causing rear wheel lock and the often resulting high-side when the RPM's sync and the rear wheel starts turning again. The slipper is not designed to slip when you downshift three gears and dump the clutch--though it is certainly possible to adjust it to do that I'm not sure what the trade off would be and if it would be worth it. You'd certainly lose a lot of engine braking back-torque and I personally wouldn't want that.
One of the reasons I asked the original question is that magazine articles that I read about bikes with slippers make it sound like you don't have to bother with rev matching at all while downshifting. Not having ridden a bike with a slipper and not noticing a difference with my C14 made me wonder if this a feature that breaks in with time. It doesn't sound like it.
Thanks for the replies.
My supermoto has a very good quality slipper. If you pussy foot around on the bike, you won't know it has a slipper.
Barry
We are all adult men here, we don't pussy foot on the bike or anything for that matter!
....ok honey, I will get off the computer and do the garbage now!
Barry, do you look at a slipper as a piece that gets used daily, or is it just for an emergency bail out?
I run the bike pretty hard and have grown to rely on the slipper.Please remember that when you next test ride a bike that does NOT have a slipper clutch.
I never felt the slipper clutch work until i started running Penzoil motorcycle oil. Tranny shifted much better also. I dont know whats in it but it works. I run the bike pretty hard and have grown to rely on the slipper.