Well today was a little chaotic, but went well; I was able to do three full sessions, each one drawing about 30-36% of the battery--I actually did four sessions, but the first one was sighting laps at low speed and only used 6% of the battery. The bike performed well, I was getting the warning light coming on occasionally, and feeling a loss of power at times, but it never cut out suddenly, and I didn't really have to change my throttle behavior--in other words, I rode like it would take whatever I could give it, and it pretty much did. This is really impressive because it was HOT--97 degrees during my 3pm session.
Because of an accident in the 10:40 A group, we missed the following session, and I did not do the last session, so I only did one session with my other bike--and switching bikes really killed my confidence on the 919... I was happy to jump on the zero at 3pm when it had a good 3+ hours of charging, back up to 53%. I put on my video camera and the quality is not great but I will post up a link when I get that uploaded.
Most of the actual riding was simply limited by my skill level. They ran A, B+ and B-, I was in B- and it was basically C group with a different name. I occasionally scrape the pegs on windy roads, but only had that happen a few times on the track today. My other worry was the grip limits with the tires (Michelin PR3 rear/PR4 front), these are long-wearing sport touring tires, not made for track. The heat really cooked them. At the pace I was running, the grip was fine. I never felt them getting greasy, but I was pretty conservative. I had put the suspension back to the original Catalyst reaction settings last night and it worked fine, very stable.
There were plenty of RV hookup outlets along the pit area wall, but they were almost all taken, I had to hunt around but found one, unfortunately in the full sun. I do think the charging was limited by the heat, as my first charge was over an hour and only increased the charge by 6%.
So to breakdown the discharge rate per 20 minute session:
Session 1 (sighting lap): 100% to 94%
Session 2: 94% to 64%
charged ~ 1 hour: 64% to 70%
Session 3: 70% to 36%
charged ~ 3 hours: 36% to 53%
Session 4: 53% to 23%
- Finished with 23% charge...
I got back to the motel and the logistics of simply finding an outlet was challenging. There were three outdoor outlets that I tried, and all were broken or disconnected. Finally, I removed the screen from my window and ran an extension cord from my room to the bike--luckily the parking space was just outside my window.
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Topic: My big trackday weekend : ) (Read 2142 times)