The trend for two wheelers specially higher capacity motorcycle has grown tremendously in our country over the year. Just like our interest, the motorcycles have also changed a lot over these years. They are now more powerful than before and are also equipped with various safety features like CBS or ABS. Motorcycles now are equipped with technologies that we had barely heard in the past. One such feature is quickshifter. We have all heard of it but, what is it actually? Here we have a video that explains the working of quickshifter in a motorcycle.
The video has been uploaded by Ayush Verma on his youtube channel. The video shows starts by mentioning that quickshifter is a very common technology found in litre class motorcycles. Generally the procedure of shifting a gear on a motorcycles requires a couple of steps. In a regular bike, the rider will have leave the throttle, pull the clutch lever and only then he can seamlessly shift into the next gear. During this process, rider loses the revs and few seconds.
The quickshifter on the other hand does not ask to pull the clutch lever before shifting a gear. It is a sensor that is attached to the gear lever. This quickshifter senses whenever rider is about to shift the gear and sends signal to the ECU. The ECU then sends signal to cut off power to engine. As soon as the power from the engine is cut off, the bikes upshift and the engine power is restored. The whole process happens so fast that one would hardly notice it.
high-end motorcycles these days come with bi-directional quickshifters. This is the same technology but in bi-directional quickshifter the rider won’t have to use the clutch while upshifting as well as downshifting. The quickshifters are only useful when the riders are in a race as it saves few seconds as we known that in a race every millisecond matters.
Riders can also do clutch-less upshifts and downshifts on regular motorcycle by matching the rev and the speed of the motorcycle but it is not as smooth as a quickshifter. There is also a possibility that clutch-less upshifts and downshifts if not done properly will damage the engine. Currently the KTM 390 Duke BS6 and the KTM 390 Adventure are the cheapest motorcycles in the market that offer bi-directional quickshifters. The Powertronics aftermarket piggyback ECU from RaceDynamics also offers a quick up-shifter.