False neutral at higher speed, what do you do?

[brico]

I do not hit false neutrals too often. Today as i came out of a long curve speeding up from 80 kmh in 4th gear to 5th gear and when I was about 110 kmh i wanted to shift to 6th gear when i hit the false neutral. when I figured out i was in neutral I pressed the clutch again and was able to coast and controllably stop at the side of the road. The reason I did this is I did not want to damage my transmission. Last time similar thing happened to me when i up-shifted from that false neutral, the whole bike shuddered like it was about to fall apart, so i did not want same thing to happen again. How common are these false neutrals? how to prevent them? Is it dangerous shifting up or down at high speed from those false neutrals? I found myself sometimes struggling to upshift, feels like I need more movement to upshift than downshift. Downshifting is always easy, smooth an just a small tap on the lever does the job. Upshifting feels like labouring. Am I doing something wrong? This is my third bike after Yamaha FZ6 and Apriia Shiver.

[Texas42]

Up shift, ride it.

[Jed]

A false neutral is just a failed / partial shift. I used to do this quite a lot when I first got my R1200R. I've since learned to shift more positively / authoritatively. When I do find myself in a false neutral, I pull in the clutch and rev the engine to match the road speed vs the gear selected. The transmission can then just slide right in with no drama.

BMW transmissions are well built but certainly not as tight and smooth as those from Japan. You just have to learn to shift more deliberately and be aware that a too-soft / too-short shift may fail to fully engage the gears. It won't to any harm to pull the clutch and coast to a stop but I don't have the patience for that so I just complete the shift and motor-on.

cheers,

Jed

[garr2]

I have a false neutral upshifting between 4th & 5th.
Reading this post made made me realise I hadn't hit it for quite a while.
I think ....

I've since learned to shift more positively / authoritatively.

Ian