The amount of negativity aimed at Honda’s latest E-Clutch technology, fueled by misinformation, is shocking. Surrounding it is the distinct energy from the “They took our jobs!” South Park episode, but instead of “jobs” it’s “clutch”.
I’ll be the first to admit, I think there's a global constitution for motorcyclists, and one of its amendments is that we’re entitled to a clutch lever in front of our left hand and we can use it however and whenever we damn please.
Thankfully, Honda’s E-Clutch lets you keep yours. In fact, I felt slightly freer using the E-Clutch system than I do on most modern bikes equipped with a quickshifter and auto-blipper. But for as long as there have been electronic aids, there’s been a reluctance from the motorcycle community to accept them—just think about when ABS and TC hit the scene.
Let's set the record straight, under no circumstances will the E-Clutch system shift gears for you. This system doesn’t turn the motorcycle into an automatic, which seems to be a somewhat common misconception. What you can do if you choose to, is shift up and down, come to a complete stop, and pull away all without touching the clutch lever. So, on the open road, you can essentially think of this as a quickshifter—except it’s a little bit better.
Riders just need to get familiar with E-Clutch to get the most out of it.
On The Road
Selecting a gear, regardless of where you are in the rev range, is smoother than most quickshifters, thanks to how the E-Clutch system uses the clutch to assist the engagement of each gear. More simply, anyone who’s used a quickshifter at a less-than-optimal point in the rev range or rate of acceleration will have felt the jerkiness of an unhappy machine.
But the E-Clutch system irons out these jerky movements by manipulating the clutch to keep everything buttery.
And so on the open road, I found myself shaking off the normal shift points that I know work well, and going with the flow, or more accurately, my flow.
Short-shifting from first to sixth and pootling along wasn’t a problem, nor was wringing the neck oh-so-rewardingly of Honda’s 649cc inline-four and slotting in the next gear as redline approached. But the stand-out was how well the E-Clutch handled shifting as you went high into the rev range, but climbed slowly—a situation where I’ll often get a jerky, unsettling response if I use a quickshifter.
I could feel the clutch working its magic for me to keep everything smooth, regardless of what way I chose to make forward progression. You could think of this system, in part, as the most agreeable quickshifter you’ve ever met, it’ll even allow you to shift down while accelerating and shift up while decelerating.
When it comes to smooth overtakes at relatively high speeds, it can’t be understated how much easier it is to crack the throttle, simultaneously downshift, and complete the maneuver without thinking twice. Then, lay off the gas while shifting up, and resume your cruising speed. But good roads must come to an end, and that’s when the E-Clutch plays its trump card.
Once it’s time to come to a halt, the E-Clutch will engage without any input from the rider, regardless of what gear you’re in. I’ll admit that it takes some unlearning of muscle memory, but my God did it make my life easier once I got used to it. By the time I was on the return journey and riding through small towns with stop/start traffic, I was physically and mentally running on empty.
At this point, it’s important to note that I could’ve used the clutch at any point. Pulling the lever disengages the E-Clutch system and gives the rider total control, like a conventional manual transmission (MT). But I chose not to and that speaks volumes to the usefulness of this system in my books.
On Track
I wouldn’t say that the E-Clutch system can’t handle track riding—far from it—but I will say it gave me the opportunity to find its limitations, albeit not very easily. Before I noticed anything that I wanted to speak to Honda’s engineers about, I found an unexpected perk—rewarding rev-matching.
Rev matching on downshifts is one of the simple pleasures of motorcycling that can bring a grin to a rider’s face almost unexpectedly. So satisfying, so smooth, and such a feeling of oneness with your machine. Unfortunately, with the introduction of bi-directional quickshifters and auto-blippers, manual rev matching is something I get to do less and less of.
Sure, on a track I will opt for the bike that has an auto-blipper so I can focus more on brake markers, body position, and all those things that make for better lap times. But once the track day is finished, and it’s time to ride home, I prefer the feeling of flow rather than go. But you can’t have your cake and eat it… unless you get a bike fitted with Honda’s E-Clutch.
While the system won’t blip the throttle on downshifts, it has no problem with you doing it, with or without the use of the clutch lever. And if you don’t manually blip the throttle while aggressively downshifting, the rear tire isn’t going to lock up and send you wayward, as the E-Clutch system uses the clutch on downshifts to smooth everything out. The CBR650R and CB650R already come with slipper clutches, but the way the slipper clutch works with the E-Clutch feels like a next-gen slipper, or as I was calling it, “A slipper clutch on steroids”.
The only time I caught it out was when I was being borderline unnecessarily rapid with my shifts.
I wasn’t trying to break any lap records, but I wanted to know how this system handled short shifting. So after a few attempts to essentially bypass third gear and go straight to fourth, I noticed the system couldn’t quite keep up, and it was a similar story if I was excessively quick with my downshifts. After having a chat with one of Honda’s engineers, he told me I needed to wait approximately 0.4 seconds between my shifts.
It’s pretty hard to count when you get down to tenths of seconds, so I just gave my shifts a hair's breadth longer, and that solved the issue.
So, is it as good on a track as the latest crop of bi-directional quickshifters? Probably not. Did I notice that when I stopped trying to purposefully give it a hard time? No.
You Set The Terms
It’s quite difficult to make an argument against the E-Clutch, as it doesn’t take anything away, it only gives you more. The CBR650R and CB650R cost exactly the same as they did last year, even with the E-Clutch, and the whole system only adds 4.2 pounds.
When you weigh what you get versus what you give up (nothing), it very quickly becomes a win-win situation. The only area I could really criticize the system is that it was a tad snatchy upon engaging first gear, but even this almost completely rectified itself once the engine and transmission heated up. And if you find this to be an issue on a cold winter’s morning, you can use the clutch manually.
The one time the system will override your riding is if it senses you’re going to stall the engine, and if you really want the autonomy to stall your own engine, you turn the system off. Although, I don’t see why anyone would want that.
The E-Clutch is yours to use as and when you please and should make the transmission feel even more personal to your taste, as you can set the pressure sensitivity you prefer for upshifts and downshifts.
Would I trade the bi-directional quickshifter on my motorcycle for this system? Potentially. The only issue is that the way I ride is on the more aggressive side, and you’re as likely to find me on a track as a mountain road. The riders who I imagine will see the most benefit from this system are those who commute on their bikes as much as or more than they hit the canyons, and this is represented perfectly by the motorcycles the E-Clutch launched on.
Like the rider aids mentioned throughout the intro of this piece, I believe the E-Clutch will go on to become mainstream and widely accepted by the community because a MT on a motorcycle adds to the sense of freedom while riding—you’re the governor. But, when you combine that MT with the E-Clutch system, you have more freedom, not less.
Thankfully, I’ve never had to live anywhere where lane splitting is illegal, but if I did, and sitting in stop-start traffic was a daily occurrence, you better believe I’d try out a bike with this system. If this sounds like you, maybe it’s time to give the E-Clutch a chance.
P.S. I can confirm that this is the easiest burnout you’ll ever do on a motorcycle with a clutch lever.
