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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. If you want to start road racing motorcycles I would recommend first doing quite a number of track days. Become very comfortable on the race track. One of the advantages that we have nowadays is track days are plentiful and very affordable. There is no reason not to do a lot of them and to be very comfortable on the track before you think you are going to start racing. From there you need to figure out who your local race organization is. You do this by asking at local track day or asking at local tracks. Find out who they are. Some examples might be AFM, CCS, ARMA, AMA. So ask around and find out who your local organizations is. And then from there you need to figure out how to get licensed by that organization. Some of them will have their own racer schools where you sign up and attend their classroom time and then go through a test and some on track experience with an instructor to make sure that your certified. Others will have you go to a track day where the same thing will happen but you will do it in a track day environment with instructors of that particular track day organizer. Once you have done that you need to make sure that your gear and bike adhere to all of the race regulations. A lot of times this means safety wiring your motorcycle, replacing your coolant with water or water wire. Making sure that you have race tires. Proper oil and that everything setup has race body work and numbers on your motorcycle. So once you have got all that. All of your equipment and everything you can go an get certified. Go and get licensed and head out to the next race meet. Going there I would advise going on the forums and talking to some of the other racers. Asking all the questions about what to expect. Which races you should run when just getting started. Really any advice that your local racer can give you. Most of them are perfectly willing to talk to you and can offer you a lot more information than you can get online reading forums. And sometimes they will help you out on your first race weekend out. And then set your goals. Your first goal should be to just finish a race.

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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. I’m going to talk about some of the pros and cons of electric motorcycles. Electric motorcycles, some of their advantages are 1) that they’re quiet. More and more, the sound is becoming an issue with gas motorcycles limiting where and when people can ride. So electric motorcycles make very little noise not no noise, but very little noise. Electric bikes are also zero emissions, so they, themselves are very good for the environment. And they get their power from just the electricity you have in your home, which is a very efficient way of making electricity and there is a very low cost as well. One of the other advantages are, is I think that they’re a really good bike for beginners. They don’t have a clutch or gears. They’re a direct drive. So there’s less for you to think about as a new rider. All you have to do is think about the throttle and the front and the rear brake to control your motorcycle. They’re also very light weight which allows a newer rider to be more comfortable with them. Some of the down sides to electric motorcycle is that they are and emerging technology and that the range is still not up to where a gas bike might be. So between charges you can’t go nearly as far. One of the other down sides is performance and it’s not that they can’t perform like a gas bike, but you have to strike a balance between range and performance. So currently the performance of the bikes isn’t quite where a gas bike might be. And thirdly, a lot of it comes down to the technology in the batteries. The batteries are still very expensive. So gas, electric bike might start out at about the same price as a gas bike but that’s where your compromise comes in and you sacrifice a bit of range and a bit of performance for that same cost point. Conversely if you buy a very expensive electric motorcycle, it might have closer performance and range but will cost quite a bit more than a comparable gas bike.

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“My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles.
Riding a motorcycle in a group can be a very fun thing. There’s a few, you know, very simple rules to make it more enjoyable and to make sure everybody is safe. When riding in a group you should make sure that you know the route; you’re not surprised by people turning off in one place or another, so always ask before you leave which direction you’re going. The next thing is, when you do ride in a group, you should ride in an offset pattern. So not side by side but staggered a little bit so if one rider is to the left, you should be to the right of the lane and back just a little bit. And then the next rider, again, on the other side and back just a little bit from you. When you go into corners, though, you should spread out and go single file through the corners. Always make sure you ride smoothly and predictably so nobody is surprised by your actions. One key element is to always maintain your vision up ahead of the other riders. So don’t just look at the rider ahead of you, look at the group ahead, just like you would look through a corner when you’re riding normally and make sure that you can react to what the rest of the group is doing, not just what the rider in front of you is doing. And finally, you should ride your own ride. Don’t be pressured by the group to go faster than you’re comfortable going. Everybody needs to ride at their own speed and the group will adjust to that so it’s a fun, relaxed ride, not a, not an all out ride. And finally you should just enjoy being in the group for riding in the group. It’s a little different than riding by yourself but it can be a lot of fun and really enjoyable and more of a social aspect of riding. “

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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. Motorcycle suspension is in some ways for basics but to many people its black art so I am gonna go over few of the primers of what most of the motorcycles suspension is and to risk of your basic knowledge where there is an who it works. Setting up through your suspension is a key you can really change the whole at feel and really you would like a motorcycle cause its gonna feel much better when you properly adjust your suspension.The first thing you always want to do with motorcycle suspension is that your sag thats your starting point.Thats the biggest key factor and it changes from person to person because we all weigh of different amount so the persons right away is gonna affect the sag in the motorcycle which is why i have adjusters on it. So when i start by setting the sag on the front on the front the first application should be 45mm of sag. On the race track or track sudden it should be 35mm of sag. These are ballpark numbers gonna bay depending on the level. Then again you are gonna set the sag on the rear suspension and for the street you are gonna able 35mm of sag and for the track you are gonna be about 25mm of sag. Once you set the sag for your body weight you are gonna go ahead and adjust the what we call clicker which is the compression, damping and rebound damping. On the front you are gonna find you’r rebound damping its gonna be used screw adjusters and compression is gonna be found at the bottom of the flak and again screw adjusters. On the rear suspension you see the same. You are gonna find your compression damping at the top wherever is your reservoir is located and is case give you back your reserve but you might have a lesser reservoir some shocks you don’t have you lesser reservoir though might adjust the speed and adjust the top of the shock.Your motorcycle may not have this adjustments you may only have side adjustments or damping adjustments in some cases. Alright then you also want to adjust the rebound at the bottom here.

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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. I’m the director of electrical engineering here at Zero Motorcycles and I’ve been racing motorcycles for about 13years. I’ve held my professional license for 11 of those years. I’ve raced 750cc, 1000cc, 450cc and I currently race a GSXR600. For the past two years, I’ve been a the forefront of electric motorcycle racing. If you want to find out more information about me or Zero motorcycles, you can look at my website at KSquaredRacing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles, go to ZeroMotorcycles.com. And now, I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles.

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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. Adjusting your motorcycle chain is a very simple operation, but can lead many people to be confused.First I want to check and make sure how tight or loose it is to begin with, above an inch of play from bottom to top of the movement is what you would like to get on the chain. So you need to adjust it. What you should do. From time to time, it is gonna stretch and get loose. You are gonna losen yor main axle bolt here.But not completely remove it.Just loosen it enough that your axle can move freely back and forth.Go ahead and.. I will take a wrench. Go ahead and loosen the nut. Once that is loose and you have free movement,then you gonna need two wrenches, It might change from bike to bike, In my case, I need a 10 mm wrench and a 12 mm wrench. And you go ahead an loose the lock bolt, which is the one up against the frame and once that is loose, you have the free movement of the ten and that is also you gonna need to have the lock to pull it down together.From there, I gonna go ahead and check both sides to make sure that they are evenly aligned.So I do that by checking the number of notches behind the plate here and count on both sides to make sure that they are equal appear in between two marks that they are equally between the two marks from tis side to the other side.The key to that the wheel is aligned straight with the bike. Once they are aligned,you have them completely equal on both sides, I will go ahead and stick a screw driver in the spark head and roll the chain back and what that does is it sucks the wheel up against the adjusters, so that you have a firm adjustment on both sides. And then at about a half to a quarter turnaround of time, I will dial this out and this is assuming your chain is a little bit loose. It is very unlikely that chain is tight, but if it is, we would go the opposite direction. And you do a quarter turn on this side and a quarter turn on that side.And then release it. Check it again.Go back in continue adjustments until I get that one inch of free play top to bottom.Once that is done, I am gonna put the screw driver in one more time, make sure it is tight and then you are going to have tighten the bolt down and it is very important once you have done that you have tighten the bolt down check it one more time because sometimes with the play and the swing on that took tolerances in the motorcycles, you could get a little bit more tightening and or loosening, when you are tightening the axle down because of the movement of the wheels. So it is important you do that final check and make sure that the adjustment you made is still the adjustment it has.

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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. Track days are now widely available, and very easy to get into, and very affordable. It’s a very good way to improve your riding skills on the street by attending a motorcycle track day. So first of all you should identify a track in your area that you want to go to. And then go check out their website. A lot of times they’ll have a calendar, they’ll have what organizations are going to be holding track days at the track, and many times they’ll have links directly to their site. Once you’ve located an organization, read through their information and make sure you know what gear they’re going to require, what they require of your motorcycle as far as preparation, and what you need to expect once you get there. If it’s your first day then you should definitely sign up for generally what they call the C group. And generally the C group also comes with some instruction and some classroom time. Take advantage of that classroom time. Once you do that, make sure you have the right equipment. You should start by at least making sure you have a good helmet, leather boots, gloves, and back protector that are all in good condition and that meet all the requirements of the track day organization that you’re going to attend. Some of them will allow two-piece suits with a zip-together in the middle and others won’t. So check with your track day organization. As far as your bike, make sure it’s clean, that your tires are in good condition, there’s no oil leaking, everything is tightened down, all your bolts are tight and prepped, and your bike is in generally good condition. It’s really for your safety as much as everybody else’s safety there at the track. Once you’re there, make sure you come prepared with food and water so you don’t get dehydrated throughout the day. You’re going to be out on the track quite a bit and it’s very physical exercise. Go out and enjoy yourself. The track day organization is going to tell you what you need to know, there are going to be instructors there to guide you, and don’t be afraid to ask for help, and most importantly: ride within your limits once you’re there. You’re going to keep it upright and enjoy yourself a lot more if you go and just have a good time.

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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. Comparing the brands: Yamaha, Suzuki, Honda, Kawasaki. These days they all build a full line of motorcycles. The margin between them is very narrow, everybody has really come up and adopted all of the new technology, so they’re all really good motorcycles. The Suzuki’s, in my opinion, are really the most race ready motorcycle off the showroom floor for the sports bikes and just a generally fast bike all around. Honda builds a motorcycle that is really well made and very well engineered, so any Honda you get is going to run forever and probably give you very few problems. Yahama’s are also very fast right out of the showroom. They make a lot of power and are easy to ride very quickly, right away. Kawasaki does a lot of things well. Follows a lot of technology from the other guys, and really picks and chooses and gives just an overall good package, but I wouldn’t say anything stands out.

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“My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles.

Passing your motorcycle test is really a two part process; the first part is getting your learner’s permit, which is done by passing a written part of your test. Just like any other test in school, or talking your driver’s license test, just get the booklet, study the material, know it and go in and take the written part of the test. Once you’ve done that you’ve got your learners permit, then you can set yourself up for the riding portion of the test. One way to go is to enroll in a CHP course which will both teach you the skills you need to ride a motorcycle through a interactive learning thing where they provide the motorcycles and you can ride them and you automatically pass the test at the end assuming you pass the course. If you decide to just go the, go and do the riding part of the test at the DMV, they set up where you have to weave through some cones and then complete a circle in both directions, in which case you can go to the DMV and practice in the parking lot when they’re closed. So I would advise going and doing that, going in and putting in some practice time and making sure you it, and then you should select a motorcycle that’s small if you can borrow one from your friend. On a small motorcycle it’ll be easier, their circle is pretty tight. So, you know, borrow a motorcycle, become comfortable with it and then go there knowing that you’ve practiced it and that you can do it. “

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“Motorcycles 101: How to Ride a Motorcycle on Gravel

My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. If you find yourself having to ride on gravel uh, either because you’ve gotten to a dirt road that you have to cross or for some reason you have to exit the road to avoid something or another car and you’re on gravel, first of all don’t tense up. Just like riding in the rain, riding in gravel is all about being smooth. Be smooth on and off the brakes. Be smooth on the throttle. And when you turn make much wider arcs and when you do use the brakes, use your rear brake and not your front brake. You’ll have a lot less traction and the front is going to want to tuck out from underneath you if you grab your front brake. So, rear brake only. On gravel the bike is going to move around underneath you a little bit. Go ahead and let it move around. Be deliberate with your actions. Steer it just like you normally would but smoothly, wide lines, easy on easy off the brakes, easy on and easy off the throttle. If you have opportunity go ride a dirt bike to get a little experience on grave. It will help immensely when you go back to the street. If you are riding through gravel go ahead and turn and brake and slow yourself down as much as possible and then ease back on the pavement as soon as you can and then you can continue on riding. But be aware that you might have a little bit of dirt and debris on your tires so take it easy when you get back on the pavement.”

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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. Doing a motorcycle burnout is a fairly straight forward and easy stunt to start with. First you should make sure there isn’t anybody or anything behind your motorcycle that is going to be hurt by flying debris or hot rubber. From there you should try it on a motorcycle that you feel comfortable on both weight wise and height wise so you can get your feet flat one the ground. Having your balance is going to be essential for this. And then you’re going to go ahead and apply your front break firmly so that the front wheel can’t move and is locked. And the shift your weight forward on the motorcycles to get it off the rear wheel which is going to help allow it to spin and break loose. With the clutch in wind up the RPM’s of the motorcycle and then you’re going to release the clutch, applying power abruptly to the rear wheel to get it to break loose. At this point the rear wheel should start spinning and make sure you maintain pressure. If you have any problem quickly pull the clutch in and always maintain pressure on that front break. Don’t let it move. Once your rear wheel is spinning you can go ahead and allow it to keep spinning. It’ll just freely spin and you can smoke the rear wheel to your hearts content.

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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. Maintaining your motorcycle battery is easy if you ride your motorcycle all the time, but if you are going to store you motorcycle for any length of time, especially more than a month, you should think about how to maintain your motorcycle battery cuz it will go dead over time. And the longer you let it sit the worse off it gets and the shorter the life is going to be. So if you’re going store your motorcycle battery you should do one of a few things. You can start a charging regime where you either come out and start up the bike and run it and ride it around a little bit. For some period of time. Just starting it up and idling it is not sufficient. At idle the motorcycle draw almost more current than it’s putting into the battery and your not going to get much of charge into it. If you’re going to charge it. Just use a normal battery charger. You can often times remove the seat and some cases the motorcycles have the battery at the front here, but most of the time they’re under the seat. You can just lift the rubber boot and put your charger right across the two terminals. You can leave it connected if you want. It won’t hurt the motorcycle at all. If you’re going to remove your battery to charge it or to just bring it in your garage and make sure you leave it on charger remove these two bolts. Just pull it straight out. If you do store it do not store it on the cement ground. Put in on a shelf or on some wood up off the ground. That’ll help it and keep it from discharging. And one other thing you can do is a battery tender, which is available at most auto stores, is a really good device. It watch and monitor your battery and top it off from time to time. Most modern batteries are sealed so you should not remove the plugs to add any water. Once you seal them up initially or if they come sealed from the factory that’s the way they should stay for the life of the battery. Other than that the best thing for your battery is to ride it often.

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“My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. You can’t always avoid a crash, but there are certain things that you can really do to set yourself up to have the best chances of avoiding a crash. One of the first steps of doing that is to always have an out, always know how you’re going to get out of a situation.

When you’re riding know which lane you can move over into if you need to. Know where you can accelerate at. Know where you can move over to the shoulder if you need to if a car is coming at you. Just always know where you’re able to go next, where you’re able to change your line if there’s something in your corner.

Part of that is riding within your ability. Make sure that you’re always riding within your ability and that you’ve left some margin there so that if you need to change your line, you need to brake a little, you need to do something different, you’re not riding at the limit where you don’t have the ability to do anything of that.

It you’re riding at 80% you can use that extra 20% to do these extra actions that pop up all of a sudden that require your attention to do something differently than what you had planned to do. In dirt always use your rear brake. If you are pushed off don’t feel bad about going off into the shoulder and going into the dirt. Just make sure you remember the rules of riding once you get there and then get back into traffic as you can.

Finally, when riding in traffic, assume that nobody sees you. Assume that the cars don’t know that you’re there. Use you power to accelerate out of situations if you have to. Your bike is a lot lighter and generally has a lot more power to weight ratio than a car does, so if you need to, accelerate ahead of dangerous situations and get out of there. “

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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. How to choose a motorcycle: Picking a motorcycle can be kind of a confusing thing and somewhat overwhelming for people at first. So here’s a couple of quick guidelines for how you should go about picking your motorcycle. At first, you should pick one that is appropriately sized for you and for your size, which is physically not too heavy as well as not too powerful for your riding ability. You should pick something that you can easily handle, you’re gonna have fun and learn on. There’s a lot of good bikes out there For beginner bikes from 250 four strokes. They are really good for smaller people. They are ton of great 600s out there that are really rider friendly. So, decide about the size you are gonna get both power wise and physically. And then decide what style is best for you whether you like sport bike or super motor bike. Just a standard upright bike or like a trooper or cruiser style of motorcycle. Cosmetically you should pick something that doesn’t look the greatest right away. Chances are that, in a parking lot, you are going to drop it or rub it up against something in the first few months that you are riding. So don’t be afraid to get something that doesn’t look great but rides well. Also, don’t be afraid to get something that’s not too expensive. If you are jsut choosing your motorcycle that’s your first motorcycle and I think your needs are going to change after you’ve been riding for 6 months to a year. So you might not want the same type of bike you picked originally. So don’t pick something too expensive, something that you can trade in and move to something that’s more desirable after you gain some experience after some time on the bike.

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“My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. Riding a motorcycle in the rain the biggest, overwhelming thing is being smooth. You must be smooth when riding in the rain. You can do anything you want, as long as you do it with some caution, and ease I and out of it, smoothly. So, when you’re accelerating, ease onto the throttle slower than you would normally in the dry. When braking, ease onto the brakes and don’t grab them quickly. The other critical thing is to remember that surfaces that you might normally roll over, some of them may not have as much traction. Staying away from metal brakes is critical. Even paint on the line, the lines that are painted on the road, on the sides of the road. That paint is gonna become more slick in the rain. Another critical thing to remember is that cars don’t have traction just like you don’t have traction in the rain. And you’re a lot lighter than they are so, even despite the less traction, you can still probably stop more quickly than they can. So, don’t get on your brakes too hard and force the car behind you into a slide. And then you should be, always be loose on the bars and controls. Don’t clench them. Allow the bike to do what it needs to do as it moves across the pavement surface and over slick and non-slick items. Don’t react to things. Allow the bike to move. And, again, just be smooth.

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My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. So, the best way to clean a motorcycle helmet is first to prepare a solution. Probably there are a number of different things that you can look up to people already use but I like using just a mixture of water and rubbing alcohol. And I’ll take just, you know, like a window cleaner spray bottle here and mix about 50% water and 50% of alcohol that will help it to evaporate. From there, take the helmet. Most helmets at the very least have removable cheek pads. They remove in a number of different ways so you should look at how your manufacturer advises you to remove them. They also often have some kind of a release tab inside here and then you can go ahead and pull them up and out. This snap together; these can even be hand washed and then inserted back in the helmet. Once you remove those, some helmets may also have a removable lining on the inside. If yours does, you should look up how your manufacturer recommends removing it. You can pull it out, again hand wash it. You can use a detergent if you like, I’m doing that. And then just go ahead and take your spray bottle and spray out the inside of your helmet lightly and wipe clean. And leave it in a warm place with it up so that the fumes can the helmet and make sure your visor is open and it dries completely before you go riding. So I recommend keeping it inside somewhere in open, we want the environment to allow it to dry completely. On the external, you can use just a simple glass cleaner. Spray around all the vents and clean all the bugs off. Removing your visor, again I would recommend here how your manufacturer recommends doing it. Usually the user manual will show you. They often have some kind of a release tab that you can push down and it pops right open. Don’t force it, allow to pop up and it should pop off easily. And again when it goes back together, it should just pop back into place very easily. You could remove this, what I like doing as it allows getting at all the back holes. You really get a good clean in there and you can also clean your visor separately. Just put some soap and water and it will come cleaner, be smoke free.

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“Motorcycles 101: How to Set Motorcycle Suspension Sag

My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. So the way you set your sag on your motorcycle is, First the best thing to do is get two buddies to help you out. It will make things easier, you can do it with just two people but three is optimal. Then pick an end either the front or the back to start with. Today I’m going to start with the front. The next key step is to pick a point your going to measure from and two. So on the front I like measuring from the bottom of the fork, to the top of the dust seal. That’s going to be my measure point right there. Then what your going to do is lift the bike, and completely top it out. Which we call the topped out sag. And measure that distance between those two points, with the suspension completely topped out. Once you have done that you want to have a friend hold the bike in an upright position. Then you the rider get on, with your gear on preferably. And get into your riding position, so get into the position your most likely riding in. While your in that position have your friend that measured the first measurement measure the second measurement. This is going to be your sag measurement, once you subtract the first measurement from the second measurement.

Forks can often have stiction in them as well, so it helps to give it a little bounce then take that measurement one more time. And see what the difference is between the two. And the difference is going to be the stiction in your forks.

Once you’ve done the front your going to repeat the exact same thing on the rear. The rear might be a little bit more tricky to find a measurement point. I like to go from the axle to a fixed point on the tail section. And the key there is to make sure that fixed point isn’t going to move around. So when you top it out or lift it, always lift from the frame and not to the point that you’re measuring to. And that will give you a nice consistent measurement. And then again the same thing. You’re going to get on the bike and assume the riding position that your normally in. Have someone steadying the bike for you. And measure the top dot distance, and measure the riding sag. Subtract the two from each other and that’s your sag measurement.

Once you’ve done that you can adjust you sag by setting the two bolts at the top here. Dialing counter clockwise, is going to give you more sag. So it is going to lighten the spring load. And then on the rear the same thing, there is a counter down here, you can dial it out, to lessen the pressure on the spring, to give yourself more sag. Or dial it in to get less sag.

You want your sag to be about 45 to 50 millimeters on the front, and about 35 to 40 millimeters of sag on the rear for street applications. For race applications that will get tighter. To about 35 to 40 millimeters on the front and 25 to 30 millimeters in the rear of the bike.”

Transcript

My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. Choosing motorcycle gear is really about first establishing what conditions you are going to be riding in, are you a fair weather rider that just rides when it is sunny and nice out or are you going to be commuting to work and whether it is rain, shine, snow slede and that is really going to tamper the type equipment you buy and how much equipment you buy. You buy summer equipment and winter equipment to combat those two things, so the first thing is really establish where you are going to ride in and then what type of equipment you need to buy for that riding. From there you need to really buy equipment that is really going to protect you first and foremost and then second think about want, comfort, and then of course style. So, you know the real basics is you know a good helmet, make sure it is DOT or _ approved that will be marked on the back of the helmet. The next thing you really need is a good pair of gloves, make sure they are sturdy, have good protection if you are going to be riding in the summer, some great light weather gloves. If you are going to be riding in winter, make sure they are Gore-Tex lined, but still have some armor, they are going to protect you in the event of an accident. Then a jacket, jacket is very important. If you are going to be riding in the summer, leather jacket is great. They also make some _ jackets that have Gore-Tex lining or nylon protective on the outside and make sure they have some armor in it so that if you crash, the gear does its job. Again, picking some good boots, but again it will give you some ankle support, make sure that you do not get a twisted foot by leaning over on it or if the bike falls over, your boot is going to protect you, so that is very important. From there, buying equipment that is going to keep you warm is also important. If you cannot feel your body, if you are not comfortable you are not going to ride well, so at the times of winter I would buy a cheap rain suit that would replaceable if it gets ripped and just wear it over my leather’s another gear. People that commute a lot might buy some one piece suits that will do the job of both protection and warmth and that is _, but really the most important thing is with equipment you get what you put into it, so spending a little extra money in the long run is going to pay off both in comfort, in safety, and longevity of the gear that you buy.

Transcript

“My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles.

Riding a motor cycle for the first time is pretty straight forward. I think the key is to become comfortable with the motorcycle before you put yourself into a situation that could be potentially dangerous. So part of that is that if you are able a great way to start riding a motor cycle is on dirt. The consequences are pretty low when if you got the dirt bike chances are it’s already been dropped and you can just easily get up and brush yourself up and try again. The other way is whether you start on dirt or the street you should pick a motorcycle that you can easily flat foot that isn’t too heavy for you and one you are comfortable with. Then you should you should familiarize yourself with the controls of the motorcycle you are about to ride and you know you make sure someone is there who knows and can show you all the controls and how to operate them once you are comfortable with the controls I would advise pushing the motorcycle around a little bit making sure you can get it off kick stand and that you are comfortable with the weight moving around. Push it around in a circle push it forward push it backwards a little bit get a feel for how it is and then get on the bike push it around a little bit with your feet under and get a feel for how it is to push around. Once you are comfortable with that you can have somebody there instruct you to go ahead and start the bike pull the clutch in and put in gear let the brake and then you go ahead and engage the clutch just to the point where it starts to pull the motor cycle a little bit and then disengage it. Do that at least 20 times engaging and disengaging for the bike to go forward a little bit. Once you are at this point you move forward about 5 or 10 feet come to a stop. Repeat this baby steps that get you each step of the way.

So now you are comfortable with that go ahead and roam around if you are in a parking yard or a dirt yard and take a few laps and stop and take a couple more laps. You are building on the skills. Repetition is making you comfortable each next successive step. Once you are comfortable with that then you can start going up in gear so you are pulling the clutch and shift up shift back into the first. Practice going up and down. Once you have mastered all this basic abilities then you should be able to start adding just as you would to a car come to a stop and then make a turn on to the stop and from there you know you can just add to it. Each time you are building on what you started on and that foundation of just engaging starting and stopping and working the controls.

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Transcript

My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. So to change your motorcycle oil first you should get the right tools together before you start the job. Of course the motorcycle oil that you’re going to use up until about 3,000 miles I recommend that you use a petroleum-based oil after which you can switch to a synthetic. You’re gonna need a funnel to pour the oil into the motorcycle. You need you’re oil filter, an oil filter wrench, either one of these handy ones that goes on the end of a socket or just an old fashioned oil wrench. And then you’re gonna need a ratchet or a wrench with the right sized socket or at least sized appropriately for your size drain bolt. You may also need, if you have a bike with fairings, you may also need some tools to remove the fairings and get to the oil plug or if you don’t have fairing and it’s all available you can just go at it. I have these race fairings so I’m gonna go ahead and pop these off. Remove the fairing. From there you’re also gonna need a catch tank. Which you’re gonna go ahead and place underneath the drain. On your motorcycle it may vary a little bit but it’s gonna be somewhere under the oil pan at the bottom here. Take your wrench. Go ahead and loosen that and spin it out. Be aware that it’s gonna shoot a little bit at first and if it’s extremely cold when you’re doing it then I would recommend idling your motorcycle until the oil temperature comes up to about 80 degrees or so. So that it flows and you get all the oil out of your motor. Once that’s drained–you should leave it for about five minutes to let it drain–go ahead and put that plug back in. Tighten it down with the wrench. Don’t over tighten it. You don’t want to strip the threads. Then you’re going to remove the oil filter which is in up under the front here. So it’s gonna be somewhere in the front of the motorcycle generally. Go ahead and again remove that using your wrench. Loosen it and then spin it off. Put it in your catch tank. Take your new oil filter. Put a light coat of oil on the seal to make sure it’s lubricated and then spin it on and tighten it as tight as you can get hand tight and then take your wrench and tighten it 1/8 of a turn more tight from there. So hand tight plus 1/8 of a turn. Once you’ve done those two things and you’re all tightened by up and sealed back up you can add your oil. So now that you’re ready to fill the oil back into your motorcycle go ahead and remove your oil filler plug. Put your funnel in there. Start adding your oil through the funnel, watching the window here but make sure your bike is on a flat level surface and that both wheels are flatly on the ground. The bike being higher like in this case on a stand or on a slanted hill is gonna affect the level of the oil in that window and throw off your measurement. So make sure it’s flat. Fill it up to about half way between the empty and the full line. Then go ahead and put your cap back on. Run the motorcycle for a couple of minutes until you see some temperature rise in the oil and then let it sit for about five minutes and check that you’ll see that the oil level has gone done because the oil has been circulated through the new oil filter. Go ahead and refill it up to halfway between the empty and the full line. Put the cap back on. Wipe down everything to get any oil drips off of the bike that you might have dripped in the process and then you’re ready to go.

Transcript

My name is Kenyon Kluge. I’m from Santa Cruz, California. I’m a team owner and rider for K Squared Racing. I’m also the team manager and rider for Zero Motorcycle Racing. If you want to find out more information about me you can look at my website, ksquaredracing.com or for more information on Zero Motorcycles go to zeromotorcycles.com. And now I’m going to talk to you about motorcycles. Buying a motorcycle can be a big decision for anyone. So, finding a good motorcycle is critical and sometimes stressful for people. The way I usually go about it is first I ask friends especially motorcyclist friends if they or someone they know is selling a motorcycle. Somebody that you know that knows another one of your friends is gonna know the condition of the motorcycle a lot better than just some random bike. And a lot of your friends are you know, are selling or changing up motorcycles frequently. There’s a lot of motorcycles out there to ride. And so chances are they probably either have one for sale or know somebody that has a motorcycle for sale. The next source I go to is Craig’s List. It lists a lot of motorcycles in your area. You can often times not go to far and find a pretty wide selection of motorcycles. The third place I might try is Cycle Trader. They’re gonna a lot of times point you towards dealerships in your area, but a dealerships not a bad way to get a used motorcycle either. A lot of them keep some stock of used motorcycles. They’ve usually gone through them and their reputation is on the line, so, chances are that you might pay a little more for a motorcycle from a dealership even if it’s used, but you’re going to get I think the value out of it that you’re gonna pay for. And then the important thing is, is to make sure you set your expectations of what bike you want and what bike is right for you and you maintain those through all of these channels. Though if you do go to a dealership don’t let them talk you into the wrong motorcycle for you. Set your expectations before you go buy the bike. And then through all of those sources maintain what it is that you are looking for from the beginning.