how many members have installed the hi compression, and cam kits? is it a significant gain in power? does the member who posted the battery box modification make and sell these? how much?
And lastly, what carb is the best to upgrade to?

First, before any changes are made, run it against the clock, enough times to get a good idea how its accelerating to 40 & 60 & 1/8th mile & 1/4 mile,, play with it,, then lighten it. Ditch that chrome trash can muffler & put a Dyna on it,, jet it. There are other ways to lighten it up. Lancer is a well experienced guy. I think Serowbot has a pretty light one,, but not as lite as some,
YOu can go with a bigger piston, have the cylinder treated to make it slicker & last a waaay long time,.,& there are cam profiles available & a carb.
BUT, for all that $$$ & time, you can ride the one ya have, do a few easy & cheap things & have fun & buy yourself a bike that puts out more power & handles better.. I THINK thats true, but others may be in a better position to offer you a clue..

Well I have done a considerable amount of mods on my bike.  When I got it the bike ran well, with $ 100 spent on some carb jets and a DYNA muffler it ran much better.  (This is certainly the place to start in getting a good running Savage).

Then the next year I had a fluke engine crank bearing problem and while the engine was apart I put in a Wiseco, Stage I cam, Mikuni VM36 carb from Lancer, a big foam air filter, custom made megaphone muffler, and some port work.  It runs really nice for a Savage - but just about any 2 cylinder bike 500cc or bigger can pull away from me at speed, and a 300cc Ninja can probably take me once we get to 70mph.  I really like my modded bike - but the engine mods probably only took me from 30 hp to 40 hp and were expensive.  Carb kits are nearly $ 400 with shipping, the Cam and shipping nearly $ 300, I had my rockers hard  welded and that was $ 200, the piston kit/boring and shipping is nearly $ 600, gasket sets are about $ 100.......add a muffler and air filter and you are over $ 1,700.....a decent deposit on a 125 hp sport bike!

If you need a rebuild, or a new carb it doesn't hurt to upgrade in the process - but tearing apart a good running engine to hop it up is gonna be costly.  If you want speed.....get a sport bike.

I'm in the process of supercharging my Savage. I think it is the easiest way of making a Savage perform at it's best. That said, it's not there yet so I shouldn't really comment until I can prove my theory. Eitherway I don't think a Savage can be high speed bike - but it should be able to become a capable 0-100 acceleration bike. Or maybe it will just blow up who knows  

Previously I replaced the carb with a VM36 from Lancer, made a new 1.5 header pipe, ported the exhaust, added a drag pipe and lightened up the bike by removing half of it. This in itself was cheap, easy, fun and has made it significantly faster. Still not a fast bike in motorbike terms but I can rip away from the lights and it sounds like I'm going fast.  

axa wrote on 01/29/14 at 16:15:31:


I probably didn't spend quite as much as I listed.  I did get my Wiseco from an eBay seller, and Boretech is about a 30 minute drive from me, so I drove it over to drop it off and picked it up when it was done.  I saved some shipping costs but spent a couple hours driving.  I also sent my cam directly to Webcam - but when you send a single cam for grinding you can't get the same rate that Lancer does when he sends them multiple cams to grind at the same time.  I also probably didn't need to get my rockers hardwelded - but Webcam recommends it and I did not want to have any problems.

If you have plenty of time to shop around and find what you need, find where to order it, and you can take the time to ship out parts and wait for their return....you can do it for a bit less money.

The point is.....the Savage is not a bike that can make a lot of "free" horsepower and it will never be a fast bike.  Every horsepower you gain beyond the DYNA and carb jetting.....does not come very cheap.

but Dave, that was not the tone of your posting at all.
When i started all this, i also asked similar questions, and as often as not the answer i got might have been discouraging.
When in reality it has all turned out quite simple and cost effective.

hi comp piston - 148 delivered bore 65$ ship $13 each way
total $240
price you listed near $600

carb 98 jets set $35 cable $45
total 180
price you listed $400

gasket set total $45
price you listed $100

cam grind, (which i just decided to cancel) price i was quoted 165+ship
total ~200
price you list 600 (as you note hard-welding is entirely unnecessary unless worn or damaged, and i might argue a bad idea as id rather wear down the valve arm over time than my expensive performance cam)

so when reading $1700 you might well see it be deemed discouraging, as opposed to what it all really can be had for $665, a real bargain for all that.