My first TCat

Hi guys,my name is Roberto from London, just bought my T cat 1998 week ago,I'm very happy,nice to have found this forum to know more about my bike.
I'm having some difficulties on slow traffic speed,some said need to do slow traffic on 2nd gear but if I do so my Tcat requires 1st gear.Also witch is the best revs to change from 1st to 2nd gear..I'd just passed my DAS, tks.

Welcome to the forum Roberto

City riding is an art form on any bike. And which gear you need to be in is a judgement call that comes with experience.
The same is true of when to, and how many revs to have happening shifting from first to second . . . It's going to be clunky most times anyhow.

Hope you enjoy the forum.

Cheers
Tel

Thanks mate...You said everything. ..need more experience. ..but I'm enjoying my old school bike as the forum. ..

Welcome Roberto.

At very low speeds you'll probably need 1st gear. The Cat doesn't like it when the revs drop much below idle speed which is about 1200-1500 RPM.

Try using different gears and get a feel for how the bike 'feels'. When the revs drop too low the engine begins to struggle and if they drop any lower it may stall so that's your guideline. The mistake I made when I started was listening for an engine note like my car, which happened to be a diesel. So I tended to keep the revs too low. The Cat just isn't happy when the revs are too low. You can use 2nd but may have to give some more revs and feather the clutch. You'll tend to develop a feel for which approach suits which situation.

Have fun experimenting though and ride safe!

Thanks alot mate...spot on ... it was all what I need to know.
You answer my all my questions with your post.
Thanks again for your time.

Hi Roberto, welcome. Think you have your answer, I found I was in first a lot of the time in London traffic. One thing you will notice is the temp can get high pretty quickly - not so much this time of year though.

I notice 3 days ago,I was stuck for more than 5 min stand still on traffic light.
But once I moved it goes back to normal.
I mean normal is below 80 isn't???
Thanks Steve.

Depends on time of year, how you ride and how much airflow (not much when stopped in a hot summer).

The fan on the radiator only comes on when it gets above about 100 degrees though so 80 is certainly nothing to worry about.

80 sounds about right. It'll climb over 100 quite quickly in traffic, especially in the summer and the fan cuts in around 105 which has caused a few panicked messages on here, but they all seem to do it.