Be Excellent To Each Other

Just a quickie. Was in a garage yesterday and a man on a large bike put his kickstand down, but the kickstand failed and the bike crashed to the ground.

I went to his aid, but it took three of us to lift the bike upright again.

I'd never imagined a bike could be so heavy. Doesn't this throw up all sorts of problems? If you fall off a bike you could be crushed, but also what happens when you are in traffic and have to come to a stop? Surely you can't just balance like on a bike?

Answers please!

Thank you.

Motorbikes are usually quite short to saddle height, so you can balance on one leg at lights, etc. They are very heavy but they're also usually designed so that the centre of gravity is as low to the ground as possible for most of them - obv., there are exceptions. This doesn't help very much if you drop them though - they're still bloody heavy to pick up initially. I think even modest bikes come in around the 100kg mark and a lot are significantly heavier.

If you tip a Harley over in the middle of nowhere, for instance, you're walking home.

Not really. Even a little 125cc bike is heavier than you expect, my 500cc weighs 170kg. But you get used to handling it when you're not riding on it, it's part of the basic training course that you are able to walk it around without dropping it.

A colleague had a 125 chopper, and when she knocked it over (which was often) it would take her in excess of 20 minutes to get it upright again.



Really? Your leg might be, though having bars around your engine might protect you a bit. You're more likely to be injured from the hitting of the road when you fall off, I think.



Well, you put your foot down, same as on a bicycle. Trust me, keeping a stationary motorcycle upright while sitting on it is extremely easy. Or, you can balance... I've come essentially to a stop and then resumed moving without having to put my feet down.

But yes, as my esteemed colleague DBSnappa says, they have a low centre of gravity to make it a bit easier. This is part of the reason why there's a weight limit for topboxes... you don't want to raise the centre of gravity too much or you'll lose stability.

This was some huge retro type thing. I was just admiring the chrome at the point it keeled over.

I didn't dare look to see at what the damage might be. The noise it made as it dropped was horrible enough.

I can imagine. The chap riding it appeared quite shell shocked when it dropped. He only got around to thanking us for helping him pick up his pride and joy as we were driving off.

For 10 minutes yesterday, I watched a biker at Morrisons try to reach down to unlock his front wheel only to be chased away by the pitbull terrier that had been tied up to a post a short distance away from it.

I suppose. I did watch both those journeys the two film stars made on bikes (one around the world and one from London to South Africa) and they fell off loads of times, but often it was on sand and stuff. Must still bloody hurt though and they had huge bags.

Did she ever help you uprighting your chopper?

One film star and some random tosser called Charlie Boorman, I think you'll find.

Oh yes, it will hurt... there's a knack to handling the bike when you're not on it, and you soon get a respect for just how damned heavy it is and how you need to use great care moving it around.

I keep it slightly tilted towards me, so that my whole body can help keep it upright... but if it starts to tip away from you, you will have a struggle both catching hold and then preventing it falling over and snapping iff your mirrors or (if you have a faired bike) some expensive fairing.

But honestly... stopping at the lights is nothing more than leaning slightly to the left and sticking your foot out so you come to rest on it.

Those kind of bikes weigh 100s of kilos, but yes, as Meaty says, I suspect the average weight of most proper bikes (i.e. above 250cc) is probably above 150kg, and that's probably the dry weight.

As for Harleys, most of them have massive foot boards making it quite difficult to actually tip them over completely, I would have thought, but yes, some of these bikes have bigger than 1500cc engines. Heck, Triumph make a bike that has a 2300cc engine. You could probably tow a caravan with that thing and you'd need a crane to pick the bloody thing up as it weighs a frankly preposterous 320kg, DRY!
two wheeled car

Haha, awesome.

My dad has a collection of old Nortons, each of which seems to weigh as much as a mini cooper.

The Honda Goldwing (those enormous touring bikes that have giant built-in storage boxes) has a reverse gear, as you've no real hope of propelling it backwards with just your legs.

I will confess to being surprised how heavy they were when I started learning. Ironically, the added weight of a bigger bike makes it a bit less twitchy than a smaller one which will wobble if a fly farts 20 yards away.

Why the fuck have the BBC paid for that twat to go on holiday and then, to make matters worse, inflicted on everyone a shitty fucking television programme of his boring holiday videos?

Nice. Every year I think about doing my direct access course and keep putting it off. If I leave it much longer I WILL be in the zone for accusations of a midlife crisis, but what stops me more than anything is that I'm just shy of 6'4" so would need to buy a big traily to look anything other than silly on a bike.

My erstwhile brother in law is into bikes - I think he's close to walking away from the silly exocet missiles of supersports, but his very good friend Chas has a collection of Tritons, which are awesome.

I need to get round to getting a bike licence, and Mrs Chris has even okayed it, so it's just a case of getting on with it now.

It's actually there more to get them on the hard stand, as that would be impossible without one. I think moving them backward or forwards with just your legs would be pretty tricky, but not impossible.


Same here, but I only did CBT to allow me to ride a 'ped I was loaned for a couple of months a few years back, but I did it on a proper bike not a scooter. Scooters are fun, but they never feel entirely stable to me with their wonky weight distribution.

You'll need a license before I have my midlife crisis.

Bikes are surprisingly heavy at first—even the little 125s—but they're not too bad once you get the knack of keeping them balanced at low speeds. So, basically, keep them upright. Travel fast enough to make counter-steering your method of turning (anything above 10mph or so) and the weight becomes a non-issue.

Stopping at the lights, if you're not blatantly too short for your bike, it's only a case of sticking your left leg out and applying marginal pressure to keep it stable and just shy of 90° to the left (or right if you put your leg that way, but it's good practice to keep your right foot on the rear break at a standstill).

I've dropped my bike twice so far. Once when I'd just got it, and couldn't pick it up without help; once when I was knocked off by a coach pulling out on me, where I managed to pick it up alone—all 190KG dry weight of it—but it's amazing the effect adrenaline has on you.

Bikes are ace.

I've pulled a CB900 and a GSXR1100 off my ex (not at the same time obv). Muppet.

I slipped off my bike on a frosty day once, (at a stand still, at a junction, tires went from under me sideways) and made the mistake of catching it as it was falling. Man, that hurt my back.

Ugh. Hope it was nothing serious.

Or we hope it was, depending on your feelings for him now.
I dropped my brother's Honda CBR 600 in a petrol station - I didn't have the stand down properly. I picked it up fairly easily as it's not that heavy, but I'd bent the clutch lever

No, the CB900 he was doing something to in the back garden and he suddenly started yelling me, I laughed until he started screaming at me to help him. He put a centre stand on it after that.

The GSXR we were bumping down the road because he had a flat battery, he slipped though and his luckily I caught it before it fell completely only scuffing a bit of the front fairing (it was quite new). Made my arms ache for a couple of days though.

/Hulk

When I did my CBT I, too was shocked at quite how heavy the 125 was. But once you do get that respect for it and are able to be more confident with it, it's not a massive problem. It's more about the technique than brute strength to pick it up and/or move it.

And as that was the first time I'd ever ridden a motorbike I did have to pick it up a few times. Cruising through summer country lanes on that bike was the nicest "test environment" I've ever had.

I'm a short-arse too, and if I can handle a bike, most people can. Although I do have the advantage of having worked in a warehouse moving stupidly heavy crap all day to build up some strength.

Me too, I used to work in a diary repack plant (where all the milk from the farms gets put into plastic bottles - millions of litres a day) and I pulled cages of milk about. The fucking muscle on me was incredible - I was a big fat guy with defined pecs, massive arms and a huge neck. Now I'm just a big fat guy, damnit.

Is that where they bundle all the unsold ones ready to recycle?

It think it's called repack because they've already packaged it up to get it from the farm to the factory. They've packaged it in a lorry, mind.

Anyone?

Grim... - He was taking the piss as you'd misspelled it as "diary".

Oh yeah. I always did that.

Was there a very puzzled Diary Factory owner in the area wondering why this random man kept turning up trying to pack milk?

Whereabouts had they bought them to?

Yeah, yeah. I've fixed that one now. Interestingly, my brother always says "brought" when he means "bought" - maybe it's a regional / school / family thing. Whatever - I ARE CURED LIKE HAM!

At 6'2" I am ever so slightly too big for mine. This could make buying the GSXR I want a bit tricky if it's going to make me look a total berk... but what can I do? I don't especially want a Pan European.

I'd be inclined to go for a KTM super adventure. You do live on the other side of a mountain! But if you want a deathtrap I think my brother in law might be selling his R1

Do it fucking sharpish before they make it harder, mate.

<pokes fate> I've not dropped the 500 yet, but I dropped the 125, and that was a fucker to get upright again, mostly as I'd forgotten that snow turns to ice overnight on roads.....

But, yeah, bikes are ehavy, but quite well balanced. I like to play the 'get home without putting your feet down' game, or 'don't use the brakes' game.

At present, I can't afford a new bike but I think, as a toy, I'll get one likie my father's. A single cylinder 650cc VStrom, as the short blat around the block on it I had did make me think "Crikey, MaliA, this is awesome".

My dad once rode down a roughly 1:6 lane with half a dozen sharp corners and two full-on hairpins on a Triumph Trident without touching the handlebars.

Yup, it's worth noting the new, harder bike test has been pushed back to 30 March 2009.

http://www.dsa.gov.uk/Category.asp?cat=405

The R1 is a lovely looking bike... most BMW bikes are ugly as hell these days (including those... things... that McGregor and Boringman rode around the world. The KTM at least looks nicer) but they're group what, 12, 15? Mine's 9, that's quite a step up.

One of the main reasons I did direct access is so that I would have something capable of getting up and over the mountain with ease. All too often I see people on wheezy little scooters that sound like a queen bee using a vibrator inside a dot matrix printer, struggling up the Thornhill side at about 11mph.

One thing that's very annoying in Caerphilly is that the road leading to the mountain goes through a residential area at 30mph, and you're halfway up the first slope before it goes unrestricted. The cops love putting a camera bike at the bottom of the mountain to catch people accelerating too soon (going up) or not slowing down enough (coming down). Regardless, there's a lot of twats who ride right up your arse going through the 30mph bit, so it's quite pleasing to have both a car and bike that can accelerate effortlessly up the mountain once it's legal to do so, leaving these prats far behind.

You're having a laugh. The R1 is a spaceship, it can do 0-60 in less than three seconds with a light rider (with big balls). It's insurance group 17, which is still quite respectable for a Ferrari slayer.

And Mike's has been tweaked to produce even more horsepower and I'd be surprised if his can was strictly legal. Talking of Ferrari's I'm hoping to have my first experience of driving one soon If it's not pouring with rain, I will have the roof down and I am going looking for tunnels as well

It's my dad's 60th on Monday. My brother and I have got him a Ferrari driving day thing at Silverstone

Ferrari's what?

Ferrari's gay willy, obv.

Ah so that's what you meant by "going looking for tunnels".

Sussed

I'm almost certain I'd kill myself on an R1. That is all.