The Bells & Whistles
If you're accustomed to other motorcycles, Ural hack rig riding takes a little bit of getting used to. Some bells and whistles can help.
Despite what you may have heard, GPS is NOT just an affectation for sissies! Just a personal preference, but having an electronic kibbutzer when navigating unfamiliar areas can't hurt.
When you're new to a Ural and its low revving engine, a cheap, aftermarket tachometer is a good investment, at least until you develop the instinctive feel for finding shift points.
This isn't a modern rice burning Crotch Rocket; it's a copy of 1930s BMW technology. It DOESN'T rev to 6000 or 7000 RPM... if you DO manage to get it there, the Boxer engine will disassemble itself in a most unsatisfactory and disheartening manner.
Try shifting at maybe 2900 - 3100 RPM, and falling back to about 2000 RPM.
DON'T run a Ural at UNDER 2000 RPM for more than a few seconds; that's "lugging" the engine... sooner or later, the lack of oil pressure from lugging will surely be fatal.
Figure max RPM in 4th gear to be around 4100 - 4300 RPM. That'll give you about 63 - 67 MPH with the "low" version of the final drive gears that's standard on Urals that haul the weight of a sidecar.
Solo Urals have a different final drive ratio; figure another 5 - 10 MPH at the high end of 4th gear RPMs. It's STILL not a Crotch Rocket, but it'll get ya where yer goin'.
All of this is based on experience with the 650cc engine. I'd imagine the later 750cc engine is pretty much the same.
A few Dymo tape "cheat sheets" , like the one visible in this photo, can be useful. For calculating gas mileage; it's easier than trying to convert it from gas kilometerage!
A Ural speedometer used on export bikes will read directly in MPH by means of a second scale, but the main and trip odometers will always read in kilometers.
Also bear in mind that Ural speedometers aren't the most ACCURATE instruments around; at 50 MPH mine reads 3 MPH high (assuming properly inflated tires). That's another reason for the GPS; I'd rather trust the speed readings from the Bird than from the Bike... less tickets that way!
Also useful, but not shown in this picture, is another Dymo tape that gives tire inflation pressures in Pounds per Square Inch instead of the Russian standard of Kilopascals (KPa) per Cubic Centimeter.
Also... bear in mind that the front and hack tire pressures are DIFFERENT from the rear tire pressure. The pusher likes to be a couple of pounds firmer than the other two.
The Bells & Whistles
If you're accustomed to other motorcycles, Ural hack rig riding takes a little bit of getting used to. Some bells and whistles can help.
Despite what you may have heard, GPS is NOT just an affectation for sissies! Just a personal preference, but having an electronic kibbutzer when navigating unfamiliar areas can't hurt.
When you're new to a Ural and its low revving engine, a cheap, aftermarket tachometer is a good investment, at least until you develop the instinctive feel for finding shift points.
This isn't a modern rice burning Crotch Rocket; it's a copy of 1930s BMW technology. It DOESN'T rev to 6000 or 7000 RPM... if you DO manage to get it there, the Boxer engine will disassemble itself in a most unsatisfactory and disheartening manner.
Try shifting at maybe 2900 - 3100 RPM, and falling back to about 2000 RPM.
DON'T run a Ural at UNDER 2000 RPM for more than a few seconds; that's "lugging" the engine... sooner or later, the lack of oil pressure from lugging will surely be fatal.
Figure max RPM in 4th gear to be around 4100 - 4300 RPM. That'll give you about 63 - 67 MPH with the "low" version of the final drive gears that's standard on Urals that haul the weight of a sidecar.
Solo Urals have a different final drive ratio; figure another 5 - 10 MPH at the high end of 4th gear RPMs. It's STILL not a Crotch Rocket, but it'll get ya where yer goin'.
All of this is based on experience with the 650cc engine. I'd imagine the later 750cc engine is pretty much the same.
A few Dymo tape "cheat sheets" , like the one visible in this photo, can be useful. For calculating gas mileage; it's easier than trying to convert it from gas kilometerage!
A Ural speedometer used on export bikes will read directly in MPH by means of a second scale, but the main and trip odometers will always read in kilometers.
Also bear in mind that Ural speedometers aren't the most ACCURATE instruments around; at 50 MPH mine reads 3 MPH high (assuming properly inflated tires). That's another reason for the GPS; I'd rather trust the speed readings from the Bird than from the Bike... less tickets that way!
Also useful, but not shown in this picture, is another Dymo tape that gives tire inflation pressures in Pounds per Square Inch instead of the Russian standard of Kilopascals (KPa) per Cubic Centimeter.
Also... bear in mind that the front and hack tire pressures are DIFFERENT from the rear tire pressure. The pusher likes to be a couple of pounds firmer than the other two.