Speedometer accuracy question

[Mjbell72]

I dug around the forum a bit but couldn't find an answer. I took my "new to me" 1990 Voyager for a run today. I had my cruise set at 60 MPH and was getting passed by other cars like I was going way under the limit of 55 MPH. The last one who passed my hit one of those "Tattle tale" roadside radars and showed 67 so I know he was speeding. I saw 58 as I approached but then it dropped suddenly to 55 even though I had not slowed. Not sure if it caught the car behind me or what. In any case, at what was indicated to be 60 MPH I was at about 2500 to 2600 RPM. In other people's experience does that sound right? I am also assuming it does have the proper size tires on it.

Thanks
Myron Bell

[scottolds]

In my experience, the Voyager speedometer is not very accurate. I use the speed indicator on my GPS for accurate speed.

With the stock speedometer drive gearing, the speed tends to read faster than you are actually going by about 10%. Which is why it is more noticeable as you go faster. However, the odometer is pretty much spot on to how far you travel.

There is a different speedometer drive gear that will get the speedometer to show accurate at the cost of underreporting you distance traveled on the odometer. There are forum posts about this change.

I have tried both setups. Because I pretty much always have the GPS running, I switched back to the original gearing because knowing the distance for fuel economy purposes was of greater value to me since I track every fuel up via Fuelly.

There is a thread where someone calibrated their speedometer with a drill and got it to read accurate with the stock speedometer drive gear, but that is really tearing into things.

Hope you enjoy your new Voyager. I love my 94 so much I just picked up a 1990 this weekend as a "spare". Will be getting to know that one as soon as I get it back home and registered.

[Mjbell72]

In my experience, the Voyager speedometer is not very accurate. I use the speed indicator on my GPS for accurate speed.

With the stock speedometer drive gearing, the speed tends to read faster than you are actually going by about 10%. Which is why it is more noticeable as you go faster. However, the odometer is pretty much spot on to how far you travel.

There is a different speedometer drive gear that will get the speedometer to show accurate at the cost of underreporting you distance traveled on the odometer. There are forum posts about this change.

I have tried both setups. Because I pretty much always have the GPS running, I switched back to the original gearing because knowing the distance for fuel economy purposes was of greater value to me since I track every fuel up via Fuelly.

There is a thread where someone calibrated their speedometer with a drill and got it to read accurate with the stock speedometer drive gear, but that is really tearing into things.

Hope you enjoy your new Voyager. I love my 94 so much I just picked up a 1990 this weekend as a "spare". Will be getting to know that one as soon as I get it back home and registered.

Thanks for that information. Seems as nice as these bikes are they do have their little nuances. Kind of a PITA bur I'll have to check my speed with a GPS speedometer to see just how far its off then I can adjust accordingly.

Thanks again!
Myron

[Me Again]

I have always just figured 10%.
Not gonna back up traffic but not getting a speeding ticket either.
Adjust to your own style of driving.
It does feel strange to set at 85 (approx 77 actual) in a 70mph speed limit and still getting passed constantly.

[Nails]

For my part, I made the cog change because I want to monitor my speed more carefully than my gas mileage. I do the 10% calculation on gas mileage at my convenience in my head, when the ride is getting boring -- don't really need to know the gas mileage anyway.

But when I see a cop on the median, I just look at my speedometer.

[cushman eagle]

I took 100 mile ride today,and watched my GPS,which showing 70 MPH,my speedo was showing 73MPH,which is 4%
That seemed a pretty consistent ratio during my ride.
I was hoping to find a safe place to get the GPS to 80,but decided not to take the risk