2011 ZX 10R v BMW S1000RR feedback | Page 2 | GTAMotorcycle.com

2011 ZX 10R v BMW S1000RR feedback

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I know you are looking for street review, but I rode a new 2011 S1000RR for two days when I took the California Superbike School in New Jersey Motorsport Park (Thundebolt) last weekend. Truly an awesome bike...very comfortable riding position, brakes are superb (takes some getting use too initial bite), power delivery is very smooth, traction control kicks in at the appropriate time, and easy to toss into a corner. One confident inspiring feature I liked about the bike is that power delivery is calculated based on lean angles (i.e. - if bike is straight up, you get full power and if you are leaned over in a turn the computer compensates power delivery based on the degree you are leaned over).

FYI...the CSS is selling their 2010 BMW S1000RR's starting from 10,500USD up to around 14,000USD
 
Ok, as a BMW S1000rr owner I'm a bit biased to say the least. Here's my take. If you fit and have the money buy the RSV4 Factory. Preferably in APRC form. The motor is the most usable street engine in the world. If you don't fit comfortably on it, buy the BMW. All this talk of high strung peaky engines certainly applies to the Kawi but anyone that tells you the BMW lacks torque just hasn't ridden it. It's the best bike dollar for dollar in the world. I have no problem saying that. The Aprilia just reaks quality and is so well thought out. But if you want the best of all worlds, warranty and a great dealer network and access to it anywhere in North America there is only one choice.

BMW.
 
FYI you can get the ZX-10R ECU reflashed to be the same as the European model, which works out to +16hp if i recall correctly.
 
Sky_high said:
I know you are looking for street review, but I rode a new 2011 S1000RR for two days when I took the California Superbike School in New Jersey Motorsport Park (Thundebolt) last weekend. Truly an awesome bike...very comfortable riding position, brakes are superb (takes some getting use too initial bite), power delivery is very smooth, traction control kicks in at the appropriate time, and easy to toss into a corner. One confident inspiring feature I liked about the bike is that power delivery is calculated based on lean angles (i.e. - if bike is straight up, you get full power and if you are leaned over in a turn the computer compensates power delivery based on the degree you are leaned over).

FYI...the CSS is selling their 2010 BMW S1000RR's starting from 10,500USD up to around 14,000USD
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I got that same email on a Tues a few weeks ago, emailed them back weds and they had 27 bikes with 4 already sold. They emailed back on Thurs all sold in less than 3 days! Since the email went out to past students one can assume that all or most of the purchasers had ridden the BMW at their school. Must be a terrible bike:rolleyes:

I did the level one at the school 3 years ago on a Kawi ZX6...great bike.
Went back 2 years ago and did the level 2 on the BMW....incredible piece of machinery!
 
+1111 on the 2009 cbr 1000. Thats my next bike!! Not too many around and just a great machine!
 
ajaxguy said:
+1111 on the 2009 cbr 1000. Thats my next bike!! Not too many around and just a great machine!
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Yep. Power similar to the 2005/6 GSX-R 1000 but a little more of it, plus a frame lifted right out of a 600. IMHO a better street bike than the BMW or any other recent bike all day long.
 
Is there a dyno graph backing this up? I'm curious because I'm finding it hard to believe the Honduh is really that much more powerful in the midrange.

Cheers.
 
Dyno graphs are one thing. Gearing is another. Weight is another. The only way you're really going to tell anything about how the two feel from those sort of numbers is if you get a final power graph, showing the thrust in each gear. Dyno plots are for old-school "ricers." :)
 
Snobike Mike said:
Is there a dyno graph backing this up? I'm curious because I'm finding it hard to believe the Honduh is really that much more powerful in the midrange.

Cheers.
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146_1004_01+2010_literbikes_torque+.jpg


Pretty fat bit of difference!
 
The aprilia doesn't look like anything special in the above.
If the best powertrain is the one with the fatest midrange then the Ducati is the bike to have.......except when you look at the thrust curve and see the Kawasaki and BMW are better in the top 4 gears because of the gearing. the Ducati is a wheelie monster and you can't use all that midrange in first gear, and alot of second gear. A litre bike wheelies between 5-7 thousand rpm in first gear at which point you are doing 50-70 km/hr.........do you need more midrange?

http://www.sportrider.com/bikes/146..._kawasaki_zx_10r_vs_ducati_1198/photo_09.html

I saw another stat about top gear roll ons and the BMW did rather well in that metric of midrange.
 
murf said:
The aprilia doesn't look like anything special in the above
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But the Honda definitely does, and it's noticeable when riding.

Do I need more midrange? F' yes I do! I'd never say no to more power.
 
Gearing. Ride the Aprilia and you wouldn't care, BTW. It doesn't feel anything like slow. And it isn't, either, since my friend's has yet to be passed by either the ZX-10R or S1000RR that are in our group when we're on the gas. The BMW owner was outright shocked because he got schooled by the RSV4-R every time until speeds got truly ludicrous.

Dyno plots are only an indicator of what a bike *might* work like. Roll-on times are as much a product of gearing as they are of engine performance (or lack thereof) - when you have six gears there are a lot of choices for how hard to accelerate. The thrust curves on the other link are a whole different ball game, that tells you a lot. For instance, it tells you that the ZX-10R is nowhere near as quick as most of the bikes are and it shows that if you shift the RSV4 right, it may just beat the BMW to 200km/h (which is exactly what our group has observed). It also shows you part of why the ZX-10R isn't as quick - it's geared very conservatively, looks like you could hold it in first gear and do most of Shannonville without shifting. And in North America, it's pretty obvious that the bike is being artificially limited, since the European bikes are beating the BMW in many objective and subjective tests.

Here, if you buy a new R1 or ZX-10R, you have to spend as much as the BMW just to get them to work the way that the european bikes do. That's ridiculous but it's true.
 
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I'm trying to make sense of those thrust curves but they just don't correlate too well with the torque curves. I assume they get the thrust figures from the same runs as the torque and horsepower graphs, but it just doesn't compute to me for some reason.

The CBR for example has a torque dip compared to the BMW, starting at around 3500rpm up to 5000. So it's running behind for a range of only 1500rpm. Then it surpasses the BMW from 5000 all the way until 10,000 revs. That's a range of 5000rpm in which it makes significantly more torque (+10% for a while) but that translates only into a tiny blip on the thrust curve? It just doesn't add up. The gear is constant so the relationship between the torque and thrust curves for 2 different bikes should reasonably be the same throughout the gear. Maybe there's a mathematical reason for that... or it was an error in testing (Sportrider.com has fudged graphs before)

Thoughts?
 
That was my point, murf...

I'll tell my buddy about Guhl Motors because he is of the impression that he has to spend a whole lot more than that to get his bike working properly. I hope you're right, for his sake.
 
mmmnaked said:
I'm trying to make sense of those thrust curves but they just don't correlate too well with the torque curves. I assume they get the thrust figures from the same runs as the torque and horsepower graphs, but it just doesn't compute to me for some reason.

The CBR for example has a torque dip compared to the BMW, starting at around 3500rpm up to 5000. So it's running behind for a range of only 1500rpm. Then it surpasses the BMW from 5000 all the way until 10,000 revs. That's a range of 5000rpm in which it makes significantly more torque (+10% for a while) but that translates only into a tiny blip on the thrust curve? It just doesn't add up. The gear is constant so the relationship between the torque and thrust curves for 2 different bikes should reasonably be the same throughout the gear. Maybe there's a mathematical reason for that... or it was an error in testing (Sportrider.com has fudged graphs before)

Thoughts?
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the gearing is different so the curve gets shifted over. Not bad for a motor with the shortest stroke.
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