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What is a false neutral?

What is a false neutral?

  • Neutral light is lit, but bike is actually in gear

    Votes: 12 11.9%

  • Neutral light is not lit, but bike is actually in neutral

    Votes: 26 25.7%

  • Can describe both 1 and 2

    Votes: 6 5.9%

  • Something else entirely

    Votes: 57 56.4%
  • Total voters
    101
sckego

sckego

doesn't like crashing
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Kegan
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False Neutral.

I've always thought that meant when you're trying to find neutral between 1 and 2, think you've got it, the green N light on the dash comes on, you let off the clutch, and the bike lurches and stalls. Or even worse, bike is on the sidestand with the N light lit, hit the starter, and it bucks forward and falls over.

I've also heard it refer to the opposite scenario: You're trying to find the next gear up (or down), think you've got it, the green N light is not lit, but the engine revs freely. I'd think this would be something more like a "false gear."

Discuss.
 
False neutral is a "neutral" between any gear other than 1st and 2nd; a "neutral" where you don't expect to find one.
 
GAJ said:
False neutral is a "neutral" between any gear other than 1st and 2nd; a "neutral" where you don't expect to find one.
Click to expand...

like between 5th and 6th
 
I prefer my shifter lever to be farther down, so that upshifts do not require much movement and downshifts a bit more. If I ride a bike where the upshift requires significant travel, sometimes I will hit a false neutral because the cogs in the transmission have not engaged, and it is literally stuck in between 2 gears. When it gets back in gear, it usually lurches me forwarded and I feel foolish.

If your neutral light is not on and it is in neutral, it means your dash needs to be fixed, that is not "false neutral"
 
When your riding along trying to be all cool and you go to shift and the bike goes,"Ruummmm!" And you feel like a big dork.:twofinger
 
asthmodeus said:
i'll take 'things bmw's do' for a thousand, alex..
Click to expand...

Can't say it happened more often in the BMW's I've owned vs. the Hondas, Suzukis and Yamaha.

Happens very very rarely for me and generally on upshifts where I don't nudge the gear lever upwards hard enough.

Can't really recall it on downshifts to be honest.
 
What BMWs have you had? Happened pretty much every day on my 1150 but I chalk that up to 100k+ miles and hard use. More common up than down
 
Tharkûn said:
What BMWs have you had? Happened pretty much every day on my 1150 but I chalk that up to 100k+ miles and hard use. More common up than down
Click to expand...

I actually haven't owned a "real" BMW truth be told. :laughing

Only a K75S for 20 years and an F800ST since '07.

The only boxer I ever rode, (the godawful R1200C), did, indeed, have a crude gearbox.

Believe it or not of all the bikes I've owned the one with the sweetest gearbox has been my DRZ400SM.
 
GAJ said:
False neutral is a "neutral" between any gear other than 1st and 2nd; a "neutral" where you don't expect to find one.
Click to expand...
^^^^^^^^^^^ THIS ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

It can be ANYWHERE including 1st & 2nd. Some of us who've ridden older bikes w/tranny's that were absolute crap understand.
Lite lit or not, don't depend on it= thus may keep you from flopping over.

Some of us are in the habit of hitting shift lever twice cuz we just not sure if it engaged or not. Yeah I know, looks :squid 'ly but finding yourself 2 gears down from the gear you had intended to downshift to can be...uh...exciting! *Ok, I';m babbling again...sorry. Older stuff is probably not relevant. (* leaving horror story out.) So...

Stopping at a stoplight, even if the light's lit, I'll let the clutch out a tad to be sure it's not engaged someplace where I don't know. When I FEEL IT'S FREE, only then will I let it out all the way to wait for the light...

Prevents (wherever you are) stopping embarrassments. :thumbup
 
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GAJ said:
False neutral is a "neutral" between any gear other than 1st and 2nd; a "neutral" where you don't expect to find one.
Click to expand...

:thumbup

Interesting that nearly half the poll responses are wrong. A false neutral has always (like since bikes have been around) a "neutral" or failure to obtain gear engagement between any two gears other than where neutral would normally be. That's the only definition.

If you are in neutral but your neutral light is not lit, you have a neutral/gear indicator light problem, not a "false neutral".

If your neutral light is lit, but you are really in gear, again you have a neutral/gear indicator light problem. Not a "false neutral".

Y'all young'uns are now educated.
 
Last edited:
Oh, and for some further edification, the most common causes of false neutrals (not in any particular order) are:

Lazy shifting

Worn engagement dogs

Bent shift fork

Defective shift indexing mechanism or linkage
 
ST Guy said:
:thumbup

Interesting that nearly half the poll responses are wrong. A false neutral has always (like since bikes have been around) a "neutral" or failure to obtain gear engagement between any two gears other than where neutral would normally be. That's the only definition.

If you are in neutral but your neutral light is not lit, you have a neutral/gear indicator light problem, not a "false neutral".

If your neutral light is lit, but you are really in gear, again you have a neutral/gear indicator light problem. Not a "false neutral".

Y'all young'uns are now educated.
Click to expand...

Yup. Not being in gear when shifting anywhere other than between 1st and 2nd as that would be 'in neutral' (just not what you intended to do).
 
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