Hi Mike,
I regulary swap the front sprockets from 16 to 17 teeth.
That is matching the engine characteristic quite well.
The sprockets for Yamaha SR500 will fit and they are cheap 😉 Chain length can stay as it is.
A very comfortable cruising speed with that transmission ratio is 115 km/h (72 mph). Constantly more than 130 km/h (80 mph) causes the engine to sweat.
My uncle loves to have that 17 teeth front sprocket and in addition he uses a 36 teeth sprocket in the rear. He is happy with that (over 100.000km on that Twin!), but you will need a chain guide / swing arm protector to prevent the upper part of the chain to “grind” the top of the swing arm.
We use aluminium rear sprockets, that reduces the bad vibes during hard acceleration in 5th gear at around 50 to 60 mph (90 to 110 km/h) a little bit.
Cheers, Michael
