So I got this (Brand new <10 miles!) 09 Ninja 500 for my fiance, and she loves it! It has a 1" lowering kit, and it is the ONLY sporty bike we could find that she can fit on because she has such short legs. But long story short, she was supposed to bring it back to college last weekend, but weather and car issues means she took my car back and I'm breaking it in for her.

This bike scares the crap out of me, here is why, and please if anyone has any solutions to the qualms I have with it PLEASE tell me!

1. It feels like there is zero feedback from the tires: Going over train tracks while turning on the ZX6 I can feel each tire start to slip on the metal and catch on the pavement on the other side. But the suspension is so soft I don't even feel that there are tracks or bumps there on the 500!

2. It keeps turning: Get it into a turn, let go of the handlebars, the 6 pops back up again, the 5 doesn't. On the 6 if you push with X pounds on the bar you will stay at Y angle, a little harder, the angle decreases a little and you turn sharper. The 5 if you push with a constant force the angle keeps decreasing until you are sliding down the road. You push until you are at the angle you want and then you almost let go to keep it there.

3. It doesn't tell you how far you are from the sharp corner of the rubber: on the 6 when you get closer and closer to the edge of the usable tire it makes you push harder and harder, and eventually you get to the point where you just know you can't go any further, when you know you are using 100% of your available wheel, but on the 5 since you don't have to keep pushing, unless you are holding a protractor or keep your head perfectly level it is hard to tell what angle the bike is at and how much further the tire has to go. I have been riding it a little aggressively (it is just what I do) and all week I've been thinking I still had another 15-20 degrees to go before I was at the limit, and I looked at the tires yesterday and realized I was actually getting within 1/8" of the edge, and that realization that I was 1/8" away from pushing my fiance's new bike past it's limit and laying it down made me worry a lot more about giving it to her.

I've been riding very aggressively for 7 years, and I've gotten pretty good at pushing my 636 right up to the limit, I listen to it when it talks to me, and I feel like we are on the same frequency. We are, as cheesy as it sounds, one. But at no point in time did I get even a faint whisper from the 500 that I was about to tell it to do something it couldn't do. And if I can't hear any feedback from it on how close I am to the limit, how is my fiance who has been riding less than a year going to hear it? What happens when I forget she is behind me, and fly through a corner and she says 'I think I can push this bike just a little faster and almost keep up' when she can't?

Being a mechanical engineer I fully understand the complex dynamics and kinematics of the complex rotational systems that are motorcycles. I understand that the wheels are smaller, and therefore have less angular momentum allowing the 5 to 'flick' over much faster, and the rake angle is flatter giving the rider much more mechanical advantage and decreasing the force it takes to lean, the suspension is softer decreasing the amount of impact energy transferred to the rider and 'deadening' the road vibrations.

I know none of those things can be easily changed to allow the bike to 'talk' more, but I have to ask is there ANYTHING anyone has found that I can easily do increase feedback and road/tire/traction/angle awareness? Are there any tricks or other warning signs that I can look out for, and tell her to look out for, that we are trying to go too fast? Any help from the many experienced riders here would be appreciated!

Thanks everyone!

 

hmmmm,,,,stock tires suck. You know that by now. The EX is uber soft and underdamped, so even not knowing that you may weigh over 120lbs, the suspension was not set up for you. The undercarriage will grind itself flat in a few corners. I tracked the pirelli sport demons on my wifes 500 for half a day. Was a fun time, but unless you revamp the suspension, you will be still limited on the fun times. That little 500 is nowhere close to what you are used to, and you are aware of that, but once dialed in, it is a fun ride.