Just curious

[HunterTodd]

I was crook today and I lay in bed looking at Youtube videos of guys riding STs really hard in Europe including a suicidal Kraut who seems to work under the assumption that oncoming cars will always get out of the way and another guy who clocked 250kays plus averaged over five kays on the autobahn.  Judging buy the way the dash was jumping about I think that guy was on the verge of lifting off.

  Anyway I was thinking about the ST compared to other bikes and how the power and torque output is fairly lazy for the size of the engine which led me to thinking has anybody ever done and heard of anyone doing performance upgrades on ST1300s.

 I am just curious to see what you can crank out of them.

For example I looked at a Bonnieville recently and it is quite easy to crank another 20 horsepower out of them with a few relatively minor mods.  With more extensive mods you can almost double the horsepower.

[Biggles]

K&N air filters and some pipes claim to help.
There's probably a Power Commander for the job.

[Skip]

   Just one question. Why? Its a tourer and has plenty of get up and go for its intended design and purpose. Just sayin' 

[HunterTodd]

I wasn't planning on doing anything or even suggesting it was a worthwhile project. My ST when it is going has all the power I will ever need.

Watching all those guys going fast on St's made me  curious that's all. 

Having said that the Triumph Trophy which is also a sports tourer manages to extract quite a bit more power out of a smaller engine.

[HunterTodd]

K&N air filters and some pipes claim to help.
There's probably a Power Commander for the job.

The Power Commander is one of the upgrades which they use on the Bonnieville but that raises another question that has always made me curious.  Honda engineers know how to map an engine, why don't they do it from new.

[Biggles]

The Power Commander is one of the upgrades which they use on the Bonnieville but that raises another question that has always made me curious.  Honda engineers know how to map an engine, why don't they do it from new.

Could be the Honda engineers want the engines to do 250,000 km without needing anything but oil and filter changes and the occasional plug change.  They know you can put more stress on all the components for a lot less than 250,000 kays before you need pistons, valves and bearings.

[saaz]

The power commander does not work on ST1300s. The ECU learns and does its own thing.  AS with the ST1100, the basic design of the ST1300 is for flat torque curves, so the intake and exhaust systems  restrict what can be done to easily improve performance.  A K&N filter and exhaust changes are about it, and even then it is more about the sound rather than performance. The money thrown at improving performance (head work, porting, increased compression ration, modified ECU etc etc) would be better spent on getting another bike.

[Brock]

There have been folk in the US, that have tried every conceivable option to get more power. The conclusion?? spend lots of time and money for very minor gain. I.E, Honda got it right the first time.

The bike goes faster than most of us can ride, let alone do it legally, and most important is that the fuel consumption goes through the roof..

[STroppy]

I rember back in the late '90's when I was looking at upgrading from my great old Honda CX500 Sports bike, looking at ads for 2nd hand bikes and there were a lot of ads which stated "reconditioned motor fitted at 30,000 Km", I thought Wotha! my 500 had way more K's than that and was still running well.

It seemed that the main bikes that fitted my requirement were BMW and Honda ST1100 with the Honda slightly better . . Of course I bought a BMW K100 RS, nice bike and kept it for a couple of years but took an ST1100 for a test ride and bought an ex-police bike . . Lurv the colour . . Safety White . . Works well . .

I have kept the 1100 but bought a red ST1300 in mid 2013 . . . I like them both . . Plenty of power for the purpose and love the longevity of the bikes . .