I trailered my bike from Ft. Lauderdale up to Colorado for the summer. When I got up here, the thing wouldn't crank. I end up having to get it re-jetted. After the thing is finally running I've noticed that I have significantly less power than I did at sea level. I've heard all types of possible causes from the boys but noone seems to know for sure. Does anybody know if the altitude will have a severe effect on a bike's power, etc.? Thanks.

 

Yes it will. There is less air.
To help, think of a turbo or supercharger...their job is to force air into the engine to gain horse power. Remember, lean is mean.

 

Definitely a difference. There are two 1/4 mile race tracks in the area where i live. One is in San Antonio and the other is in Piedras Negras. They are 3 ours away from each other. You'll run 1 second quicker at the track in Piedras Negras cuz it is closer to sea level.

 

"FHL quit bitching, we all know that altitude doesn't make a difference"

 

Is it possible to run an electric oxygen tank like my grandma has into your intake to increase the horsepower in high altitudes?

 

OK Colorado Newbie,
Yes, altitude doe make a big change more so with carburated machines than fuel injection but no matter what it makes a difference. The formula for altitude affecting horsepower is on www.nightrider.com, it's a mostly Harley site but the information is awesome. Now, here is the big advantage,,,,ready,,,huh,,,,are you,,,,well at 6000 ft. here in fun colorado if you can wheelie well here, you can be just frickin amazing at sea level. Me and a friend of mine were out on the cost, he is pretty good at wheelies here but on the same bike by the coast he was a stunt God. So, good practice.

My 954 runs the quarter here at about 10.9 to 11.5 depending on how lucky I am. so if anyone at sea level with a 954 wants to post thier times we might be able to see some differance. Oh, and the oxygen idea, yes it will work but it will be unpredictable and probably screw up the motor from constantly changing from lean to rich. Nitrous Oxide will do the trick without the hassle of constant jetting, after all that's what nitrous oxide was originally used for,,,altitude that is. Back in the days of propeller style fighter planes nitrous oxide was used to help the old air cooled gas motors work at high altitude because of the added oxygen, a lot of people think nitrous is a secondary fuel, not true in fact it's not even flamable what it actually does is make more air (well in a sense, don't wanna get too into that) Now, people use it for everything performance related, however Colorado is a great candidate for nitrous because if there is one thing you can never have enough of here is oxygen. incidentaly if anyof you guys have a deisel truck propane does the same thing for deisels.

Hey, don't worry Colorado is great exept for the fact everyone keeps moving here. Try your hand at some of the awesome mountain roads, you think you've seen twisties before,,,pfft,, your just getting started.

 

I heard that you'll lose about 7-10% HP every 1000 ft. So if that's true, my gixxer 6 with approx 100 hp stock will only produce 70-75 HP at 3,000 ft.

 

Its significant, when we went to dallas, it was amazing, power galore, I heard that at Denver altitude you lose about 30%...