I have upshifting clutchless down to the point
where most of my upshifts are clutchless but
under some circumstance I still like to 'clutch'.

I'm doing a lot of downshifting now clutchless, too,
but could use some tips/hints on getting them better.

The way I'm doing it so far is getting the motor
and trans in a semi neutral attitude where there
isn't much pressure on the trans in either direction,
kind of tricky as I'm doing this while decelerating,
so to make that 'neutral' force possible while
I'm decelerating I then add just enough throttle
to bring the bike back to 'that' neutral or unloaded
state, then I very quickly decelerate and accelerate
and snap the shift lever into the next lower gear.
It's kind of like a reverse action blip that we
do on upshifting clutchless.
I saw a video where the rider was explaining and
showing that he'd pull on the front brake lever
and roll the throttle someway at the same time,
kind of stabbing at both at the same time,
I couldn't quite grasp how that was working.
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I'm sometimes just doing the engine brake until
I need the braking action , but other times
braking steady with front brake and reverse blipping
the throttle.
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Any hints/tips would be appreciated.

I accidentally clutchless downshifted on the Hayabusa once. It wasn't real high rpm and I believe I was on the throttle very gently. It was no problem. I confess, I don't know exactly what's going on between the engine and the gearbox but seems to me, it's not just a question of load, it's how fast the engine is turning compared to how fast the transmission should be turning for the gear you're shifting into at the given engine rpm. I have always just used the clutch and throttle to blip and clicked into the next lower gear. Gear speed, and engine speed aline and it's perfect. I've done this since learning to drive a truck as a teen. It's the safest fastest and smoothest way to downshift. Even quickshifters blip for a clutchless downshift. The clutchless method sounds interesting for highway cruising but I wouldn't try it on a new bike.

What happens when the clutchless downshift is done improperly?

* Last updated by: Rook on 12/13/2025 @ 6:48 PM *

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I run a loose chain so I don't mis-shifts as much. Hard to say what tricks there are short of 'being one with the bike.'

I shift all the time with every bike I've/I own and haven't blown out a trans yet.

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it's not just a question of load, it's how fast the engine is turning compared to how fast the transmission should be turning for the gear you're shifting into at the given engine rpm.

When the trans is under load neg or pos, the gears
are almost locked in, notice how you can put a few lbs
on the gear lever without the gears separating, now
remove the load by essentially rev matching that
interface, and
the gears now unloaded will separate with mere ounces
applied to the shift lever vs pounds applied to
the shift lever.
Hence 'load' or unloading 'that' interface releases
the gears from each other, the engagement,
then the blip bumps the rpm a couple to few hundred rpm
in order to rev match to the next lower gear.
Well that's my take so far, based on being pretty
green at downshifting clutchlesS.
It may be possible that out slipper clutch
(back-torque limiter) aids the clutchless downshifting
and Hub said he runs his chain 'loose', that might
be part of the equation too.
I would say the speed of the actual change is also a
crucial element in that process chain of events.
The Clutch of course is absolutely indispensable,
regardless of how much clutchless shifting we
might do..
Getting or finding a
quick shifter to give instantaneous, smooth, downshifts
for the ZX14R is or was not happening at least
with the one you'd tried 'back in the day', that may
have changed today though, with later designs.

I run a loose chain so I don't mis-shifts as much. Hard to say what tricks there are short of 'being one with the bike.'
I shift all the time with every bike I've/I own and haven't blown out a trans yet.

That is the video that inspired me to continue
exploring with Clutchless Downshifts, and given that
most riders at least think about what it would take
to be shifting clutchless, that video should have
a lot more views, especially since there is only
one other that I've seen where the rider does
just a little bit of downshifting clutchless.
Upshifts are almost a no brainer, the downshifts
take a much greater skill-set and repetition
to get right, I'm going to keep working with it.
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Shifting gears a second here though Hub,
do you know any other part numbers that should
be compatible with my 2013 ECU, there is a ca vs 49
other states issue where gen2 to gen2 aren't
interchangeable.

Mine is the 21175-0739

Here's my foot cam. It was a cool day so I wasn't pushing as hard as my first track day when I nearly crashed. You can see and hear there's lots of downshifts and I'm using the clutch on every one. There's a little blip before the downshift and sometimes I blip a bit before releasing the clutch lever to soften the back torque because some of these are fairly high rpm downshifts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXimNwU8PFc

I had my game down better back in those years. I'm out of practice now. Other things to worry about than riding a big bike fast. I'm glad I did it for all I was worth but it's not me now, it's just a part of me.

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I'll be back , out riding, that clip didn't link up,
says plugin not supported.

then the blip bumps the rpm a couple to few hundred rpm
in order to rev match to the next lower gear.

I don't understand how one blips if they don't use the clutch.

Getting or finding a
quick shifter to give instantaneous, smooth, downshifts
for the ZX14R is or was not happening at least
with the one you'd tried 'back in the day', that may
have changed today though, with later designs.

There was at least one HM quickshifter that was bidirectional. It was expensive. I used an HM Plus which was only upshifting and as I'm sure I've mentioned, it couldn't withstand a really short kill time between gears on the Gen1 ZX-14. It had not enough time to click to the next gear up unless you set it to about 90 milliseconds which is about as fast as I shift with the clutch and there's no jerk entering the next higher gear. The jerk was kind of cool but it was slower than I thought a $700 shifter should work on my bike and I had to wonder if it was putting undue wear on the transmission when I coud just use the clutch and get pretty much the same thing a lot more smoothly.

All I can say is if you miss a shift, clutch or not, don't try to shift back down and start afresh. Shift up and I'd suggest using the clutch. Been there done that and had the curved splinters of gear dogs come out in my oil changes. Better yet, pull the clutch lever, roll to a stop and roll the bike forward and back while shifting back down to first gear. You don't want curved splinters coming out in your oil no matter how embarrassing it might be to roll to the roadside.

There might be better quickshifters for the 14. I heard good reviews of the Healtech. What I really want is one with Autoblip for clutchless downshifts and HM does that. I recently looked and it appears there's nothing new in quickshifters from 15 years ago. Here's what I think, a quickshifter needs to have settings that apply to gear, rpm and load. You usually want to shift fast at high rpm but that's exactly the time that presents the most hazard to the gearbox. The clutch offers a huge amount of safety in these situations. I suspect an air shifter or electric is better for the 14 although I sure love the connection with the bike (as Hub mentioned) that a foot shifter offers. If you're going to use a really fast shifter under conditions where the bike is operating at peak performance, I think it has to make the mechanical movements as well as the electronic ones.

It will be interesting to experience the updated bidirectional quickshifter on the Hayabusa I have on order. The Gen2 Hayabusa had a slicker gearbox than the Gen1 ZX-14 so a quickshifter might be more applicable. For the 14, I think the shifters with the cylinder attached to the shift lever are going to be most reliable and actually most appropriate to the bike. It's fun to road race with hte 14 but it's really not a road race bike, it's a drag/LSR bike.

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I'll be back , out riding, that clip didn't link up,
says plugin not supported.

I sure wish I knew why nobody can see my videos I post using the youtube /youtube with the square brackets. It used to work fine. I see it. I thought you might not which is why I also included the url you can copy and paste. That's safer anyway. There was a virus problem on here years back and it was caused by a link that was clicked instead of copy and pasted. I've had zero viruses clicking links here since but it can happen. I use a Mac though which might help.

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