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1 up 5 down!
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Just been asked by a colleague interested in motorcycle mechanics, why we
have a 1 down 5 up gear box arrangement on bikes these days and not the 1 up
5 down or even the N at the bottom of the stack!
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My FS1E had all 4 gears down with neutral at the top. When I bought my
RD250E it took me all of 5 minutes to get used to the box being
different, but there's no way I could ever get on with British style
right foot gearchanges.
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The last right foot change I rode was a Laverda Jota, in a 1 down 4 up
pattern. Once I figured out a technique of putting the ball of my
left foot on the peg and not even *thinking* about moving it, I got on
with it ok - for the five miles before that I kept trying to change
gear with the rear brake.
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A Laverda was the only bike I ever rode with a right-foot gear change. I
don't recall having any difficulty with it, except when the footpeg fell
off going through Bath.
I don't think I've ridden anything with a 1 up /n/ down pattern.
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AFAIAA it was mandated for all machines sold in the US from a certain
date, probably in the 1970s, and I guess it was easiest to standardise
on that.
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Is this just a safety thing, if so what is this reason, or is it just a
standard imposed up on us by the Japanese industry?
Love to get some answers, it's been on my mind for a while now with no
definitive response.
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Well, putting neutral somewhere next to 1st makes sense, because you're
in neutral only when you're stopped, and to start moving from a stop
you need to get into 1st gear. Putting 1st BELOW neutral also makes
sense, because then all it takes to get moving from neutral is a quick
push down on the shift lever (much easier than pushing up on the lever
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But that's not why they put it there; They put it there so that
neutral would be BETWEEN TWO GEARS. Why? Because neutral is not a
stop. If you always push the lever until it stops, then you'll
always end up in gear -- never in neutral. This is considered a
Good Thing, especially by those riders who NEVER shift into neutral
at stops.
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that would be required if neutral was all the way down on the bottom).
The rest of the pattern follows from this basis (1st right above
neutral).
I suppose another shift pattern that fits would be neutral on top, then
down to 1st, then down to all the other gears. But the current pattern
was probably chosen to make it intuitive: "push up to go up a gear".
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No idea, but at one time I had five bikes, mostly Brits, and had 4
different gear change patterns if you include left and right foot gear
shifts. Two had gears on the left, foot brake on the right, but one was
1 up and 2 down, and the other was 1 down and 2 up. The other two were
gears on the right, I wish I could remember the bikes, but time
intervenes. Previous ones had a hand change and a car like gearbox.
I can feel a bout of Alzeimers coming on just thinking about it.
What was the question?
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