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I'm lucky enough to live in quite a nice part of Britain. Worcestershire has a lot of twisty back lanes and undulating roads, and beautiful English countryside. It's perfect for testing a 250 2 stroke.

I'll and write down a few of the rides on my VJ23 because I've had so much fun on it over the years.... And not so much fun, when I have to push it home. :)

02/9/06

Went for my first legal ride on the bike. Having got tax and insurance on Friday. On the ride I caught up with an old F reg ZXR750 who was overtaking slow countryside traffic. I don't like countryside traffic as the heat of the engine starts to climb. The vj23 really needs a cooling fan on the radiator. The temperatures I see at slow speeds are usually no more than 65*C.

ZXR man got passed the slow traffic and I think he was gunning his engine full throttle when he could. My rgv could catch him up quite easily when the powerband kicked in, so there was a fair bit of stepping down gears. I managed to overtake ZXR man going through Cleobury Mortimer. A quiet tranquil place, not really fit for a full power VJ23 with race pipes.

When we got through the town and into the countryside I opened him out fully. Lots of braking at the last second, dropping down several gears to keep near the powerband, my chest on the tank to get a low centre of gravity and I found that within a few bends I'd lost the ZXR in the distance. :)

03/9/06

Went for my second legal blast on the bike.

I've noticed the mixture is way too rich on the big jets so I'll have to try the smaller original jets. The bike felt spluttery at part throttle and wouldn't clear its throat when opening up at full throttle. Even over 9000 revs!

I went over Clee hills keeping a close eye on the sheep roaming near the road. Then after a couple of miles a G reg VJ22 in Lucky Strike colours went passed on the other side of the road. So I turned round to chase him down and hopefully have a bit of a race. I drove a mile or two only for him to wizz passed me. The race was on.

The Shropshire country roads are quite windy and narrow with lots of double white lines, meaning you're not allowed to overtake, but there are plenty of straight bits of road to open the bike to full throttle. It's the perfect RGV territory.

Lucky Strike man and I managed to pass queues of slow moving traffic and really open our bikes out to their limits. I found my vj23 could catch up with his Lucky Strike no problem at all, although having the wrong jet size on the carb meant I'd sometimes get into my power band and the bike was still spluttering. As for handling, his seems to handle just as good as a vj23. Braking in the same places and taking sweeping bends uphill and down hill at about the same speeds. We got close to Bewdley and he turned left into the town. Maybe I'll meet up with the fella on the road again. Hope so!

Bewdley town

After arriving home I changed the carb jets from the 160 size down to 155. It took about 50 minutes to change them. I went back out and rode about 20 miles through Bewdley and into the counrtyside. It felt much better. Accelerating cleanly all the way to 11500 revs. It still felt a bit spluttery at part throttle at 5000 revs but that may be down to the race pipes and the bike having a very high geared rear sprocket.

10/9/06

I went for a late afternoon ride through the Worcestershire countryside and tried taking some photos.

This is the sort of countryside we have in Worcestershire. It has quite a lot of sweeping turns which are fun and it's ideal for a VJ23s lightweight. I tried taking a photo when I was moving and it looks a lot faster than my actual speed but holding a camera and riding in this countryside is quite dangerous. Thats why I only took one. I really need to sort out my jetting though as the big flat spot between 6000 and 8000 revs is annoying me now.

16/9/06

I decided to visit my brother before winter set in and as the rear tyre was on its last legs I thought I may as well wear it out ready for a new tyre. Something a little less sticky perhaps. The journey from Kidderminster to my brothers is 40miles, thats part of motor way and part green lanes, so it's a good test of the VJ23s all round ability. The motorway was a bit boring really. I was in the outside lane for most of the way cruising between 90-100mph and the engine temperature was about 55*C. When I met my brother we filled up on Super unleaded at 88pence per litre which is the cheapest I've seen it in months and then we headed out for a 50mile high speed bike ride through country lanes towns and motorway. We headed towards Knowle and my brother set a pretty fast pace on his Honda Transalp 650cc. The RGV doesn't have any problem keeping up with the Transalp, even with my half bonkers brother on board, but the Transalp seemed to gain a lot more ground in the very tight corners. I really had to thrash the engine to keep up too.

A lot of the corners on the countryside we went to had that stripe of gravel mud and debris in the middle of the lane which I did my best to avoid especially mid bend.We went through Warwick and Kenilworth.

WARWICK

They're quite nice towns but the RGV was getting quite hot (about 67*C) I'm not sure if 67*C is hot but the temperature climbs very quickly so I was glad to get through the traffic and out of the towns

Kenilworth

We got onto the motorway and my brother gave it full throttle on his Transalp, to which I nailed the RGV to the limit and quickky caught up and sailed passed his 110mph limit. I think I reached a top speed of about 120mph, which wasn't half as scary as trying to keep up with a Transalp in little used country lanes. I was also very glad it didn't seize. I kept my left hand over the clutch just in case. :)

In conclusion. A VJ23 won't beat a Transalp in a narrow country lane race and it's uncomfortable trying. My wrists and groin hurt just keeping up. I may be able to have more of a performance advantage next year against his bike though after I change the 5 clutch bolts (M6 x20mm) for Titanium ones, reducing the revolving mass and revving faster. Plus a porting job on the head and barrels by Stan Stevens and finally tuned on the Dyno on Reid Speed in Stourport. I'm sure the RGV is not running to full potential. It feels like the mixture is rich and the 43tooth rear Talon sprocket is way to highly geared.

The Sugaya pipes have also melted the bottom undertray plastic. I'll buy a new one and cut it back away from the pipe a bit.

I'll also change the rear sprocket over the winter and gear it down a bit. I miss the 2nd gear power wheelies. At present I have a 43 tooth Talon on the back wheel. I'll try a 45 tooth next.

**Update**

I changed the rear sprocket and geared the bike down by a couple of teeth. I didn't get my power wheelies though. I think it's down to the jetting. I need to make a concerted effort to get that sorted out. They're a bit of a pain to change but it needs doing.