@Braindead: Why not use the FZ front forks? They are made of a thicker tube, IIRC 43mm as opposed to the 37mm of the 220. I guess they would be much better, Plus the FZ also has that bigger brake kit too.

aawww! you bad boy. BTW I like what you are doing. Just a thought. You reduced the rake, meaning, it reduced your wheelbase as well. shorter wheel base may be more flickable if thats what you are looking for. Anyway this could have been achieved through the swingarm. Any reason why the rake and not the swingarm?

Am also toying with the idea of playing a little bit with my ride.

Ok, let me clear your confusion. When two same bikes with a difff set up of say
1) Z wheel base and X-Y rake will be more Sharp than
2) Z wheel base and X rake angle.

This is the simplest form of explanation i can give.

fz forks may be fatter but they dont have a guide bush at the tip of the inner slider of the fork. the 220 has it and hence it is a technologically better.
i trail brake a lot and this tiny bush makes a world of difference for exactly that.

wheelbase does not affect flickability much. it dampens the pitching tendency and makes the bike sluggish. it gives the illusion (probably) of stability.

what reducing front wheel rake does is that it in turn reduces front wheel trail. reducing that trail reduces self-correcting tendency of the front wheel. that is, it makes the front wheel easier to turn at higher speeds. thus you need lesser effort to counter steer and lean into a corner. you also require less effort to change the line mid corner.

all this means changing rake reduces stability, sharpening the bike. annother less known effect is that lesser rake and trail improve cross wind stability and stability over uneven terrain.

even with a 2 deg lesser rake, i have observed the bike to have excellent straight line stability.
a dog hit my front wheel once and threw the front wheel out of line at 80 kph. the bike seemed to enter a tankslapper but regained stability in less than 2 seconds.

so the golden question is why dont manufacturers use much lesser rake?
the reason is economics. lesser the rake, more advanced your forks need to be to work at absorbing bumps under braking.
in my observation, the bikes with steepest rakes have the best forks.

cheers

mmm.. I figure that rake angle would change the characteristic and my question is in what way.
Lets say...
Bike A has wheel base 1500 with 25 degree rake.
Bike B has wheel base 1500 with 27 degree rake.

In what way does in effect the handling characteristic. The Numbers are just for illustration.

ah! man.. simply plonk the P220-S engine to Fz and start riding, you got the best handling Pulsar, heart is what matters.

lol!
someone put an rd engine in a fz and made it look really neat.

but this discussion is not about simply bolting together the best combination. the main thing is understanding the whole system.

only then can one decide on what to change.


new question:
what about the human factor?
can it be that people thing the 220 is really bad because people say it is?

"everyone says so" is not a valid explanation. the whole world can be wrong. they all thought the earth was flat...

^i was thinking on the same lines when u started this thread... It maybe slightly harder to 'feel good' cornering a 220, but MAYBE it only takes a more skillful & experienced rider to get the same cornering speeds etc on a 220 as he could on an R15..

Maybe or maybe not. I think psychologically its in everyones mind that 220 is a nervous handler around bends and they dont push too hard for the fear of losing control but then it can also be related to the fact that the bike doesnt provide that much confidence to push for more bending and leaning.

Still, the bike has to be muscled into tight corners, once in it maintains good line but i still wonder whether someone can make the 220 lean as much as a R15, the trackday photos show how hard the guys lean their R15 and go scratching their knee guards

i have seen a novice track rider scrape his knees on the 220 as well.
... not that i am saying the 220 is as good as a r15...


i agree with you coolboy. it takes a track to distill a bikes real handling from its myth. considering most people have not ridden on a track, its easy for a handling myth to gain strength.

Keith Code and a lot of good riders/trainers have made a relevant observation on nervous riders:
if you are not confident with the bike, the bodies' natural tendency is to tense up. once this happens, the bike feels hard to maneuver. and as you get more nervous faster you go, you become tenser and less smoother, making the bike feel even worse.

in my own observation, if i feel the bike is not responding well, the first thing i do is consciously relax my body and most of the time, the bike starts feeling better.

that also means the riding position will make a huge difference to the rider's confidence level. in this respect, i like the r15. it pretty much forces the rider to position himself properly.

there is a possibility this phenomenon is partially responsible for the 220's reputation.

cheers

Having owned & ridden karizma & p220 extensively these are my few cents.

The question is "why people consider 220 to be a bad handler?"

1. The suspension setup is pretty soft on p220 fi. This has created negative image in the minds of people. Letme tell u p220 dtsi is a MUCH better handler than p220 fi. It comes with better suspension units. The springs in the forks are stiffer & rear shocks are stiffer.
2. The scariest on a 220 is the flexing of the chassis while leaning. Daily on my way to college i almost scrape my knees at speeds over 120 kmph on my 220 fi. Although the bike's rear wobbles badly it isnt totally uncontrollable.I have mastered it.
3. The p220 attacks any corner aggressively but goes really wide while exiting at higher speeds. This is the major drawback.
4. p220 fi used to come with not so grippy tyres & wasnt so confident inspiring. p220 dtsi has MUCH better tyres now.
5. The saddle is much higher than any of the bikes. Higher COG.
6. The heavy duty parts used in the p220 make it quite heavy.
7. The ride position is not track friendly & is more focussed for high speed commuting & touring.
8. Weight is not properly distributed throughout the bike.

My solution for a better handling 220:

1. Get better & stickier tyres.
2. Iam running on 350ml of thicker grade oil (Motul) in each of my forks. The recommended being 330ml.
3. Run on stiffest rear suspension setting. Pretty stiff suspension leading to better handling. My next purchase would probably be p220 dtsi rear shocks or something better.

Iam not sure what 220 forks are made of or if they are a copy of ninja 250r. I never found karizma to be a better handler than 220. It is lighter than p220 & ride quality is better. Thats the only thing i noticed. Flexing prevails here as well probably more than the p220. But i guess its not that scary due to the bike being lighter.

I have seen people with pre-conceived notion that p220 handles really bad. It is not all that bad that a 100cc city commuter handles better.

Among the bikes available presently in the indian market i have found R15, FZ & RTR to handle better than p220 dtsi. I feel due to lack of experience in track racing Bajaj is not able to come with a good handling Pulsar.

its like asking an apple why it doesn't taste like a orange . Its simply because its not meant to . the Pulsar 220s are meant to be cheaper bikes that target max no of potential customers and if bajaj makes them too race oriented then it wont have that high no of sales nos .

i remember riding my friends 220, after riding my R15, and i was nearly sitting on the tank to keep the front together...

I think this discussion is done about the handling.. the factors have been listed...

- weight, momentum, cog, flex, suspension, tyres, brakes, response etc etc etc...

@OP - where are we headed from here.. to improve the handling of the 220 , or build a better front end for your bike??? lol!!! j/k

lol!
by bike already has a pretty good frontend. the 220 forks on my bike behave better than the 220 forks on the 220.

this is about the 220.
the 220 is a good platform for understanding why a package does or does not work.

rahul summed it up well.

will list the improvements the 220 needs imo later today.

hang on and
cheers

A very good initiative
you attacked the basics
understanding all the factors that affect handling and finding out a way to improve it...... really very good

Hoping to see something good coming for all 220 owners