Re: engine braking

I'm not here to participate in the discussion, cos with all the comments it became to complex.

But Kudos [MENTION=26077]abhimanyu31[/MENTION] I had to reply since you got the MotoGP link to support your statements.

But yes at the end, Engine can be used to brake, but that's not what it's made to do. We've got brakes for that. Heck you can use your feet on the road to brake, but it's not made for that..or is it

Re: Yamaha YZF-R15 version 2.0

Ok!! Am a noob,am out of this topic... Though I know this. Engine braking should only be used in panic situations to avoid locking. Using it daily is going to affect the engine as its not designed for that.

Actually I used a word engine braking to mean the decceleration and this started

Re: engine braking

Using the low gears under engine power to slow down the vehicle is engine braking .

I , like most other bikers beg to differ with Keith on this . Some poeple are opposed to using the engine in this fashion and their arguments are well known too . Most other's who do use engine braking all the time reports no problems and significant benefits to their riding skills from it .

I think you might be afraid of engine damage because when I say "brake" the disc or drum brakes ( that we can see ) comes to mind . The wheel brakes work on friction and wears . The engine brake doesn't work on friction , it works on partial-vaccum created inside the chamber . When you close the throttle at lower gears ( or any gear actually ) , compression backs up into the chamber and stops the vehicle . i.e No significant wear or damage to drivetrain or clutch etc . In fact if you use clutch-declutch during decelaration , that causes significant clutch & drivetrain wear ( other than the wheel brakes wear ) . The 4-stroke gasoline engine is an air-pump , that works effectively both ways . During steep descent , engine brake use is essential ( like that sign says ) - you keep on wheel brakes and they are toast .

Engine braking - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

There are few cons to it however , like everything . You can always cause a shift-lock ( wheel skids ) or break off your gear teeth if done incorrectly ( from high speeds , wrong gear ) . Carbureted engines doesn't know you are using the engine to decelerate , so it keeps weeping in fuel and thus wastes it . However fuel-injected engine's ECU is engine brake aware - it cuts fuel when it senses this deceleration and thus no fuel waste too ! It is important for every biker to learn and use engine braking correctly and effectively - and this not from the web but my own experience .

It's page 22 of my 2010 Splendor owner's manual where it says "For maximum deceleration/quick stopping, close throttle and apply the front and rear brakes simultaneously" and " When descending a long steep slope use engine braking by changing to lower gears ... "

Never mind , because you have raised an topic that is important to us all bikers . It's something we can learn and use safely in our day to day riding and it's important that we are not afraid to use this technique . It causes no known harm to the bike at all , even in frequent or continuous use like coming down a long descent from a hill . Else the bike's manuals would have forbidden it . It is particularly good to use this engine braking frequently during a new engine's break in period too .

Re: engine braking

well, i have to start my ride in about an hour and it has been raining at a moderate rate continuously for 6.5 hours or something

ride is a total bust now, won't be able to rip even moderately on the highway. (i am scared and inconfident of doing my usual "sport-riding" on the wet road in general and particularly since it's public roads).

the only good thing is that i love this kind of weather in general (not for riding 450 kms in a day though), so i am trying to bring my mind into the mood of enjoying riding in cool windy rainy weather. it's actually not so cool, it's quite cold now since these are not summer/monsoon rains but rains of monsoon retreating and bringing in the winter. so god knows how much i will even enjoy that. i was so in the right mood of ripping through NH-2 and attacking the sweeping corners

oh well, still gotta go.

[/rant over].

Re: engine braking

Worry not for what you lost! Put a bright smile for what you have!
I'm too moving out with my bike for morning rides like as usual!
Cheers! Have a happy and a safe ride! :thumbup:

Sent from my A210 using Tapatalk 2

Re: engine braking

LOL so much happening here

i agree with both Pinaki sir and @abhimanyu31

both are actually telling correct thing but neither agreeing on each others

yes there is something called engine braking but you cant really use it as a brake. end of story. however loads of info being shared keep it rolling.

someone said that he uses engine braking in panic braking. not really sure if he knows panic braking but seriously please done do that. learn effective use of brakes rather relying on engine.

Re: engine braking

Thats the only option I am left with to avoid fish tail and how much can front dics manage alone. I rarely use it like once in a while not very often as U too am aware that causes damage to engine.

Sent from my A210 using Tapatalk 2

Re: engine braking

Sorry to interrupt, but I would like to say, I haven't met anyone who is technically as strong as Abhimanyu31 and ever since I have started riding. His concepts are clear, and the way he puts it down, makes it quite easy for a noob like me to understand.

It would be unfair to take his explanation in a wrong way.

Regarding his understanding on Engine Braking, it is quite clear, engine is not meant for braking and prolonged use can harm the engine.

To add to that there are certain things we do day in and day out, and we think that's the right way of doing it. It settles down so deep into our system, that we find it hard to accept when someone tries to advice against it.

To add to that, Front Discs are very effective while panic braking. You should try using both the brakes, it is very effective and wont feel the need for Engine Braking. I guess cost of disc pads is way cheaper than having to work on an opened engine.

Unique Number

I have booked a moto gp edition R15. Got the unique number sms from Yamaha. How to use this unique number?

Re: engine braking

My bike's owner's manual specifically asks to use all 3 brakes for quick stopping . So why do you think we can't use that ? If you wish I can post the scanned copy of the page tonight .

Engine brake is the most reliable brake since engines are build much better than either brakes . It's action is the smoothest and causes the least instability and is the safest - compared to wheel brakes . You can use it bindass all the time .

Infact I am quite sure everyone here is using it daily and frequently too - it's just that they don't know it's called engine brake . Whenever you close the throttle to slow down the vehicle with applying a little or no brakes , it is the engine brake that comes into action and gradually slows you down . Now tell me who has never closed the throttle and slowed down without touching the clutch lever ?

I have not questioned his knowledge , I am just a student learning from him too . I am learning daily from arguing hard with all of you .

As I have explained , there is no harm done to engine at all . Clutch is not even used during engine braking . 4-stroke gasoline engine is very much designed to be used as brake . Do you have any specific harm that may come to the engine in your mind ? Why does my bike's owner's manual ( as well as many other I see ) advice effective and regular use of engine brake ? Have you fully checked the R15 manual for any pointers on this ?

If you have not read it already please read this wikipedia page on this - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engine_braking

Re: engine braking

yes i use engine braking along with brakes daily. whenever i see that i have to stop the bike i shift down till i reach desired speed and also use little brake till then and finally use front more than rear to stop. during sudden brake i use rear more first to control the rear wheel spinning and use front to balance the speed and putting more weight on the front to not to lose out on it. my point is "dont rely solely on engine brakes". please do not take it in any other way. as the throttle is closed the engine braking happens by itself but to get the bike to standstill sooner you will have to use the brakes effectively. so i was telling that guy to learn braking better rather then solely relying on Engine braking.

Re: engine braking

wooh, what an endurance testing ride...continuous 7 hours worth of rain before the start of my trip left me questioning was it even worth a little going to a place 210 kms away on my moto just for passport work in such wet and windy conditions, thus far more risky and treacherous for a 2-wheel rider, and not having had as much minimum sleep as i'd intended (but the gatorade sports drinks sure seems to work fine , insufficient sleep and barely any food before the ride didn't matter)...somehow didn't wuss out enough and finally decided to just go ahead, for life happens just once and at some point in life i'd to make a trip like that anyway just for fun and to test my endurance even though today i wasn't in such a mood..i had wished, and expected until yesterday, a dry road so that i could rip the R15 through NH-2...but thanks to unbelievable way-beyond-reasonable-expectation-of-mine grip of the tyres and stability of the bike against strong winds, slippery road and under braking on such slippery road, i had a massive 84 kmph average speed through the highway (outer allahabad to outer kanpur, while just 60 kmph city-to-city) in the first part of the ride despite totally treacherous conditions thanks to windy rains and therefore slippery road for the 70% of the road towards that side of the trip...while i knew from previous (much less) wet riding experience (in not such high speeds anyway) that the bike is exceptionally stable even in such conditions, this was the wettest ride i'd even undertaken so far under fully wet and very slippery conditions, so had begun riding it slowly (well, slow enough ) at first and started increasing the pace gradually to feel the limit of tyre grip and braking stability on slippery and some places even muddy roads, soon enough i was so confident in the bike's capabilities (and mine ) that even on the wet road i basically ended up ripping it all the way to speeds in excess of 130 kmph including sweeping corners at 80-110 kmph..less than one-third of the ride and i was so glad i didn't wuss out on the ride which turned out to be such an awesome endurance ride..return journey was 80% dry thankfully, so ripped the R15 the way ripping a sportbike is supposed to be done and also thanks to dry conditions, could negotiate sweeping corners at 110-130 kmph and ended up doing a phenomenal 105 kmph average speed on the allahabad bypass and overall another phenomenal figure of 97 kmph average speed on the highway (outer kanpur-to-outer allahabad, while a very good figure of 70 kmph city-to-city)...so glad i didn't wuss out on the ride today morning even though its reason was to carry out the mundane work for passport...what an awesome sportriding-endurance ride of total 446 kms that had every kind of road and weather conditions in plenty that one can think of..the R15 is covered in mud stains all over the place, and deserves an A+ for its performance and the limits of it...THE ride of my life so far, and the first of the "rides of my life", despite severe pains in the neck, arms, shoulders and wrists...besides, got a taste of cross-country rally championships (although those are completely off-road excursions, but i faced muddy and broken roads too)

Re: engine braking

Wow so much of discussion.. Awesome!!! Loving it
Dude btw you are saying both previous quote you said do not use engine as a brake and now you say you use it daily
And from what I have learned by hard way ( crashing: hurting myself and my bike ) Rear brake is the most dangerous during panic. Since you are in panic,you apply the rear brake with full pressure ( happend to me ) This locks up the rear wheel and bike goes fishtailing and bike still moves forward depending upon the speed.This another panic and we forget to hold the front brake and boom..

Am saying from what I experience. Not to prove you wrong. Just want to share the human nature when he/she panics. And I know you have more experience than me.

Re: engine braking

as for the present discussion on braking/engine-braking, well, i almost always use the front brake exclusively, and the rear one not so much...in hard/sudden braking, using both front and rear produces tremendous deceleration, but even then i dont use the rear (along with the front) on each and every case of sudden or hard braking because more often than not (so far) just the front has proved tremendous enough source of deceleration (at least R15's front brakes are that good, and i dont see any decrease in stability either unless the road is slippery by itself or you are quite a good deal leaned over or something)...however, when the road feels a bit too slippery, either due to mud coverings or otherwise, and if in such condition i need to brake a bit strongly, i typically use both the rear and front with more or less equal force on each (actually how much force one is applying to either comes more of an instinct produced by the feedback of the surface that i am getting from the tyres)..not too much on the front because in such conditions its chances of skidding and/or folding increases, and not too much rear either of course well it can skid too seeing as how anyway not a lot of weight in on the rear in sportbikes..sometimes in such conditions, i have even used more force on rear than front (60-40 or 70-30 something i guess, if i could somehow quantify it)..a little bit of rear skidding while the bike is upright is manageable, the front doing so is not so much manageable and is much more probable to lead to a fall..also, i never use the rear brake while trail braking (have thought of trying it out by slightly using the rear brake, but it just doesnt come naturally to me to be leaned a bit and still use the rear brake, plus it's anyway not something i'd like to try out while being on public roads)..whenever i trail brake, it's always the front, and i'd even say that's how it's supposed to be anyway in front-ended motorcycles such as sportbikes.

but, particularly in view of my today's ride, R15's front brakes are so awesome even in extremely slippery and/or muddy conditions that just using the front moderately (and no rear) not only proves sufficient more often than not (unless one is really sudden-braking or something in which case well good luck lol) if the braking anticipation had been made rightly and timely enough, but even keeps the bike's line stable enough..

as for engine braking, well of course everyone does that..it's just that people seem to have different notions of engine braking, and in that sense to an extent it seems to me this debate here arose from a matter of semantics and what people understood by it (but some nice technical points have come up in the debate so keep on)...engine braking is both closing off the throttle without pulling in the clutch lever (yes one actually can feel the engine "slowing" the bike down, due to that partial vacuum thing that pinaki mentioned), and it is also going to a lower gear while at a higher speed (throttle off of course, and "higher speed" defined as the speed at which being on that gear would require not-low levels of RPM)...when the latter is done, there is a mismatch between engine RPM and the speed of the bike (wheel RPM), wheel RPM being greater than engine RPM when done so and so as abhimanyu explained, the engine eventually wins in bringing the wheel RPM down to match the engine RPM (which is also decreased in the mean time primarily because the throttle is off during the whole ordeal)...

everyone of course has done the former, but most people it seems think of the latter when they hear the term "engine braking"...i have done the latter too a few times, but only a few times mostly just to check it out for its sake when i was very new to riding a bike (a couple of months ago)...firstly it doesn't come naturally to me to do so, secondly it destabilizes the bike and it leads to the rear skidding a bit many times if the RPM mismatch between the engine and wheel is huge, which can turn for the worse if luck/conditions are appropriately bad enough (and due to these two points i never do it when braking suddenly or in panic, maybe those to whom doing so comes naturally get helped by it when in a sudden or panic braking situation).

Re: engine braking

Yes i agree here , using all 3 brakes will ensure best braking . Use any one and it may lead to collision . Press hard front brake and wheel will go out of control. same applies to rear brake too , it is more dangerous too . Lets put it this way applying brake while keeping throttle open is plain madness , you are telling vehicle to go forward and stop at same time . So it generally depends on braking power and type of brake one`s vehicle has , ex splendor`s both brakes = R15`s front brake . So jist here is to learn capacity of one`s ride and brake accordingly.