Chewing Tarmac with 16 teeth

in simplest terms think of it in the same way as riding a pushbike. You change down a gear and you pedal quicker to get the same sort of speed.

The main difference that with a 16T instead of a 17T everything is a bit quicker (apart from top end) The bike will feel like it's spinning up quicker, and will accellerate a bit quicker. The top end will not be as high, but you often find with bikes they are geared to get to the top end pretty slowly (relativly speaking) So you end up with about the same top end speed because you can actually rev to the red line easier in all gears.

There are down sides, you use more fuel. Your speedo will be wrong (not the SD though as the speedo runs off the front wheel) and it's a litlle more 'flighty' with the front end being a bit lighter.

People say it also solves a few fuelling glitches on the SD, however i've not seen the issues they talk about TBH.

For the money and the difference it makes its a no brainer.......




Wonder why ktm themselves changed the gearig to the same ratio on the 07 bikes? they listened to what the 05/06 owners were doing to improve the bike

After reading what you like from bikes, I would suggest that it is YOU more then many who would benefit from this cheap/easy mod! I only did it out of curiosity and it was amazing! It doesn't cure fuelling issues (obviously) but it can make that snappy throttle respone easier to control for those who find it tricky. Personally I have never had that much trouble with the sharp throttle response.

My advice is, stop trying to analyse it and do it. Then post your findings!

Some who did this loved it so much they then went on the change the rear sprocket to a 40T. Prolly not for me though as I do a lot of mileage.

Even KTM did it themselves on the 07 model!