whats faster

[fj1100turbo]

whats faster a 85 fj1100 or a 94 kawasaki zx9r.....the horsepower on the zx9r is 14 more than the fj........ebe though they are 200 cc difference....im ust wondering

[Bill_Rockoff]

Are there corners?  If there are, it depends who's riding.

If there aren't, it still depends who's riding.

The Kawasaki is a decade newer and has liquid cooling, so if two know-nothings who just bou/ght their first motorcycles (and didn't buy 600s because "those aren't powerful enuf for our mad skilz" so they bought 15-25 year old bikes with less power instead) line 'em up, the Kawasaki will probably accelerate faster, except for any skill differences between "new to this whole thing" and "complete moron" where someone might crash their new bike trying to go fast.  Try not to do that.

In the course of normal road riding, it depends who is braver and stupider.

You may have to wait for Carey to respond, he's had a ZX9 and a couple FJs.  he's probably busy riding, probably on an FZ1.  When I get to Boone tonight, I'll ask him.  He'll probably tell you the faster bike is "a Ninja 250."  ;-)   Other FJ riders in Boone will probably tell you "Anything but an R1." 

[andyb]

I've got a 90 FJ1200 and a 95 ZX9R.

The ZX9 is faster in the corners (for my riding, at least), and quite a bit faster in a straight line.  In a roll from low rpm in high gear, the FJ would probably have it.

[Arnie]

I thought the FJ1200 would beat a ZX9 in a top gear roll-on too.
From 60Kmh (~40mph), the FJ jumped ahead by about a length.  By 80-85 we were even, and by 100kph he just kept widening the gap. :-(
Not only does the ZX9 have more ponies, but its about 100 lbs lighter than my '91 and also much sleeker.

The two performance comparo's the FJ12 "won" were in the fuel range/economy stakes and in comfort where the FJ shines compared to the torture rack called ZX9.

Arnie

[andyb]

Depends on the year of ZX9 as far as weight.  The B models (94-97) were quite comparable to a similarly modded FJ.  With full gear and enough gas to race but little else, the FJ was 740 at the track with me on it, the 9 was 730lbs.  (I'm ~200 without gear, for reference.)  My FJ has a 4-1 pipe, no luggage, crash bars, or any other crap bolted on that could make it heavier.

The C model ZX9 was a serious redesign, and vastly lighter.  About 70lbs was removed between 97 and 98.

My ZX9 as it sits will go about 162mph according to the calculators in top gear, indicating just past 180 before the limiter--it's lost a tooth from the front sprocket from stock.  The FJ, on stock gearing but with a 17" wheel sitting slightly shorter than stock (calculated to 17/41 for those with stock rear rubber, the gearset being 17/40 in actuality) is geared for 158mph per the calculators, and could put the needle to 165.  Indicated numbers are probably more a question of the speedo error than anything else.

Redline on the 9 is 12k, with a solid limiter at 12.2k.  Redline on the FJ is 9500, and I've never spun it to the point of finding a limiter (no point, waaaay past peak power, but 10k indicated seemed to be an honest 9500).  At 45mph, the FJ is at 2770rpm, and the 9 is at 3658rpm (5th gear on the FJ vs 6th on the 9).  

As for absolute peak power, going backwards from the dragstrip numbers, the Kawi is making about 131hp for me.  The FJ was around 108hp.  The FJ has a big wall of available power, basically there's two steps to it; over 3k you have enough for any day-to-day use, and over 6k you need to be holding on.  The ZX9 is a lot more linear, more revs is more go, but can leave you wanting at times if you're under the 6k mark... anything up past 8k requires your absolute attention, and there's a very mild kick at 10k.

The ZX9 has lower bars than the FJ, but they feel quite a bit closer to me.  The FJ's riding position is damned hard to beat for an all day compromise though the bars can feel far away sometimes (I'm 5'9" at best), the ZX's is comfortable for a comparable distance other than the stock seat (vs a corbin).  By no means would I call it a torture rack though!  If I think back to when the FJ had  stock seat, I'd call them both pretty close for buttcomfort.  Leg comfort I can't rate really, my legs aren't that long and I really prefer being folded up a bit with my feet back farther than some, makes it easier to pick my butt off the seat for big bumps and such.  The ZX shock is a very, very nice unit and quite a bit more adjustable than the FJ, but the FJ is better when you want things plush and comfortable.

The FJ was getting ~40mpg for me in mixed riding.  The ZX9 gets 44-46mpg in mixed riding, and was 51.9mpg the last time I checked it (running nicer gas from MO, admittedly!) after a 'spirited' ride in the ozarks.  I'd say that mileage is more a question of how you've got things tuned, and the fact that my 9 improved during hard use meant that I needed to shim the needles up a half-step.  Having doing so, I haven't had it for a hard blast to see what the mileage dropped to, but ~45 should be about in the ballpark.  The 9 is also jetted quite a bit rich on the mains for dragstrip/race fuel/nitrous use, but most spirited riding in the twisties is on the needle, not the main.  With a 200 main jet (keihin numbers, don't get excited), the 9 would nose over just past 11krpm.  On the 210 jets, it's decidedly rich (but perfect on U4.4, an oxygenated, leaded fuel) and will pull hard right to the redline.  If I had 205's handy, they'd probably be the right answer, but I couldn't find a set at the time.


The FJ is reportedly much nicer for pillions (per the wife) than the 9, due in large part I'm thinking to the corbin, she does complain about legroom on both.  The 9 has hugely better cornering clearance and doesn't scrape anything even when playing pretty hard... the FJ often scraped the header on right turns.  The FJ has a definite urgency that the 9 lacks in high gear rollon stuff at low revs, and has much more of a hotrod feel.  The 9 feels more electric and linear, and comparably a bit boring, because it's less work to hustle through twisty bits.

With both lowered, strapped, piped, clutch upgrades, jetted appropriately, and geared pretty ideally, the Kaw can comfortably run 10.50 @ 132mph down a dragstrip.  The FJ went 10.90 @ 125mph by comparison.  Both bikes run similar 60' times (best of 1.68 on both, 1.686 on the FJ to 1.689 on the ZX9).  That said, the FJ was WAY more forgiving to launch, making it a lot more consistent.  Get it wrong on the 9 and it points to the sky or bogs... 8k-10k when WOT at a dead stop.  The FJ didn't care so much, and felt like it had more flywheel effect on a launch, so anything from 5k-6500 worked fine.

Different hammers for different nails.