Cycle News - Archive Issues - 2000's

Call it what you will, hut the new FJB|300 and its co mp ute r-c o ntro I I ed c I utch flat-out works Diego to the rnountain torm ofjulian. I rode tlle "not-arFauto.natic, not-a-speed-shifter" veEion of the FJR I 300 all the llray there, ger- t ng acquainted dle entire tirne with the YCC-S system. I wen made mpelf forget about the foot-shift option, and concentrated solely on the hand shifter. On the return trip, I rode dre standard FJRl3Cl0. Hopping from one to the other tntly showed how well the YCC-S system work. Tq/ as I might, I couldnt replicate the buttery smoothness of the YCC-S when ir came ro downshifting. Riding through the tight and twisty roads en roure tojulian, I found myself hammering dorr'nshifis on the entrance to dow comers withoot nary a worr),, the FJR|300AE work- ing much like a sportbike with a rlipper clutch. The YCC-S system matches ttte revs well - better than I ever could on the sEndard unit. One thinS you do have to get used to is the fact that the downshift button is too close to the horn. LeaVnS downtown San Diego with ei8ht of us on the new Ycc-S-equipped FlRs and four with the standard model, it musr have sounded like a Shriners parade, as the m4o.ity oI us on the n€w bke at one tirne or another found our thumbs hitting the hom on dowrEhifts. Fourth to third. 8eep. Third to second. 8e+... lt was annoying for a while, but we all got over it. Some even went to using only the trigger in a push-pull method instead of using the button for downshifo. Hey - whatever work- AlthouSh the YCC-S system performs extremely well in a standard sport-riding application, where you really notice iE effe(- tiveness is in stoP.and-go traflic and around- town riding, lt! cruisinS through the city behind buses and such that yo! really notice how much you'd be using a clutch if there was one to use. But the FJ R takes care of all of that. You shift and it Ekes care of dle resq leaving your left hand free o sfaiglrt-arm the rifid- It's actually pretty (ool to be able to pull up to a stoplight, push th€ shifter button down to first gear, ard iust sit there. No more fumbling around to fird that pedv neuu.al, lookirg for the green light to flash on the dash. And no more arm pump from holdirE in the dutd. And when ttle ltght tums g.e€'l, you sim- ply give h some stid( and off you go. Oh, by the way, dre FIR comes with a gear.indlaor light. so there's no guessing whd Sear ),ou're in. You can see it phjn as day on right side of the instrurnent panel. Since lawyers still roam the eardt in num- bers too many, the foot shifter on the YCC-S system is the defauk systerfi - so you actu ally have to push a butron to engage the hand shifter Otherwise, only the sran- dard gearshift will work. Once you engage the hand-shift system, how, evei both can be still be used - foot or hand. One last thing on the shifting, the YCC-S uses a five-up, fivedown shift pattern, which means that neutral is on the very bottom, unlike on the standard version where neutral resides between first and second gear: lf you think you'd have an isEue with finding false neutrals actually, I guess they wouldn't be false anymore. would they?''1 never did, and I never heard any complaints from the rest ofthe testing crew on our day ride. With a 28-percent market sharE in the sport-touring mar- ket, the FjRI3m ha5 already proven its worth as CYCLE NEWS . MAY 31, 2006 5I (l pl I I t )r- l Aa fr \ I I J, {,' ...., l I l. a wonderful motorq/cle - but dEt dilnt stop Yarrnha from wanting to improve the breed with its newest model. So the sandard- model FJRI 300 gets some changes to address problems that owners have complained about on previous models. Unlike your typical motorcycle redo that involves increasing horsepower (it's still the same l4l ho6eFowei 12 c wxer-cooled, inline four) or decreasing weight or both, Yamaha addressed real-wodd issles as hr d what its cunomer base is lookirE for. Thus, the changes are rDsdy in the comfort and convenience department, though that's not to sal there aren't other changes. And we'll get to those. For starters, the ranSe of windshield adiustabiliq/ has been increased. Now you can raise it electronically, via a bunon on the left handlebar an extra 25mm over previous models, while also bringing it clo6er to the rider by 49.7mm. And air ducts hrve also been added beneath the windscreen and behind the speedometer - pumping more fresh air to the rider. And that's a good thing, beczuse one of the major complaints about previous FJR|300s was that the rider often felt like he was sittinS on the face of the sun - while wearing a leather iacket. To funher reduce the amount of heat get- ting to rhe rider, Yamaha also changed its air- management g,/stem. Now designed to get N I

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