rchase
-
Posts
1,117 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
12
Posts posted by rchase
-
-
So... Another not so funny at the time but funny now story...
One of my bikes is an MV Agusta F4 in a rare one year only color of Diamante Silver. I bought it from the previous owner who bought it new and there's was not a single scratch blemish or other abnormality on it. The guy was so protective of the bike I did not even get to ride it until the paperwork was done and he had a big stack of cash.
I kept it safe for many years until one day I was out riding and managed to start in the wrong gear. Normally this is never an issue as the F4 has tons of torque and can start in pretty much any gear. That's of course if you are not turning. The engine stalled and down she started to go. I was going slow enough so I was able to mostly catch the bike but I was not strong enough to lift it beyond the point of no return and keep my balance. I softened the fall but I still managed to break a lever and scratch a side panel.
I started sourcing some parts to fix the damage and this was my downfall. Unknown to me my parts guy "dropped the dime" to the original owner and let him know that the guy that he sold his baby to managed to drop the darn thing. I got the parts, fixed the damage and nobody but me will ever know. Bruhah ha ha hahhhhh! Yeah right!
When I needed my S1000RR I called up the previous owner of my F4 who was working at the BMW dealership now. I asked him what he had in stock and he told me about the bike I ended up buying. I arranged a time to come and see a few and he did not mention a word to me about the dropped F4. Phewwww. I get to the showroom and literally the first words out of his mouth were "So I hear you dropped my old F4". He was nice about it but you could tell he was more interested in making sure that the F4 was ok than selling a new BMW. He was relieved when he saw the photos and off we went to business getting an S1000RR written up and delivered.
Now there's two bikes I have to swear my parts guy to secrecy on if I have an oopsie.
-
Ouch. Glad to hear you made it out of that one to still be here with us. Both from the crash with an unfastened helmet and the wrath of the owner of the bike.
-
LOL. The snake story is hilarious.
You have to watch out for those ramps. I'm religiously careful loading bikes on my trailer. Imagine my surprise when I accidentally did a burn out on the end of my ramp ripping the aluminum trim right off.
-
This is turning into a fun topic.
Ok. One of my "near misses".
Unloaded my brand new 600 mile BMW S1000RR from the trailer heading to tech inspection for Level 4 at Barber. A fellow BMW owner on a red and white S1000RR yells to me "hey there's something stuck in your brake rotor". I turn to look at him and grab a handful of brakes and almost dropped the bike. Somehow my super human strength kicked in and I managed to catch my balance and keep the bike off the pavement. It was one of the red shop towels I put under my tires to keep them from sticking from my chock.
-
Saw this on the S1000RR forums and thought it might be amusing. What's the most amusing excuse you have heard? I'm sure the coaches have a whole bunch of fun ones.
http://www.motorcycle.com/top10/top-10-excuses-crashing.html
-
I concur.It is like having a friend critique you.
With the notable exception that the electronics won't tell you how good you are when you aren't to make you feel better.
I find the information helpful though. Especially questions like "how fast was I going here" and "how much grip do I have left before the TC kicks in to save me". It makes the decision to go "faster" much easier with hard data.
-
Hey. Glad to see you got your account validated. Xpyrion helped me by sending me a PM with some guidelines from Dunlop when I asked about hot pressures. A really helpful guy.
Welcome to the forum. I have never seen another one like it. World class coaches and very helpful students that will provide you information and insight into some of the more fun stuff.
-
Hotfoot,
As usual very helpful.
The problem that I had with the pressure towards the end of some sessions the back of the bike felt "bouncy" especially on a section of the track that had some ripples. The bounce got so bad that I hot pitted and was convinced there was something physically wrong with the bike. I don't know for sure since I never checked the pressure (I went right back out) but I would "guess" that perhaps the tire was overinflated and the pressure had risen too much.
Out of need I adjusted some of the suspension on the FZR but only to solve specific problems and at that I cheated a bit. I probably should start playing with the suspension a bit and get to know it a bit better. I don't even know which adjusters are which beyond the preload on the BMW's suspension. The guys at Traxxion Dynamics set the bike up and I have yet to touch a thing. I should probably get to know that stuff a bit better.
-
Thanks! That's exactly what I was looking for is a hot pressure value. At least "somewhere" to start. As for understanding all this witchcraft that may take a bit more time.
-
Jeff.
Don't mind at all.
My goal is to have a full end to end understanding of the "why" behind tire pressure adjustment. That's what's been missing in the past for me to be able to intelligently make adjustments. Ultimately it's about tire temp rather than pressure. Pressure is the method of the adjustment but the temp is really the important aspect that relates to having the tire function as designed.
-
This is a huge mystery for me. Mostly because of all the different schools of thought involved. Does anybody have a workable "formula" of how to adjust hot pressure?
Normally I "set it and forget it" and that's worked well for me. I run Dunlop Q3's on an S1000RR and do 31/30 cold. I recently did a 101 degree track day and realized this is probably not the best approach when the temp goes from 80 in the morning to 101 in the afternoon.
HELP!
-
So I know the cold pressure but what's the hot pressure need to be on these? I recently did a 101 degree track day and it was painfully obvious I needed to adjust the pressure but I had no frame of reference for a hot pressure. Any ideas?
-
Ain't that the truth.
-
Hmmm. I always seem to screw up the minor details. It sounds like I have that reversed. You would loose acceleration but gain the ability to reach the bikes top speed. Of course all dependent on the way the bike was geared.
-
Yellowduck. Thanks for taking the time to explain that a bit more. Not "Captain Obvious" at all.
Some extremely helpful information there that made me think about some of the other "wrinkles" of gearing. One of the reasons we do the "pick up" for our drive is not only is to get us better traction but also better gearing for acceleration on the straight. I never really thought of that before now.
-
Hotfoot. Hate to put you on the spot but could you elaborate a little on the RPM variation that you get leaned over? I read in one of Keith's books the finer points of gearing for a WOT turn at a specific track. I understood the concept but it still seemed like some kind of dark magic he was explaining.
I have run into this "gearing change" myself due to some visual issues I had with corner entry. I solved the visual issues but experienced that "wait a minute why the heck am I going so darn slow" because of that gearing change due to the lean. Understanding this a bit better would be quite helpful.
External links are MORE than acceptable if you have them.
-
WOT means wide open throttle, not redline. So yes you might well have revs left depending on how close to redline you were entering the corner.
Appreciate the helpful explanation. I was actually asking the original poster how many revs they had left. I guess I could have worded my question a bit better to prevent confusion.
Mostly just curious. As well what kind of bike is this? What works on a 250 would probably not work well on a big 1L monster.
-
So. A question. When you are WOT heading into a corner do you have revs left to make it through the corner?
-
I don't have anything useful to add but this is a good topic. Owning a rather underpowered bike myself I'm looking forward to the answer here.
-
I have the BMW 2d datalogger on my S1000RR. Dataloggers can be used for performance calibration but they also can give a rider input into their riding. The BMW logger gives a LOT of useful data to me on trackdays. I use mine mostly as a learning tool to see corner speeds, lean angles and even available traction.
RAM also has a steering stem mount for cameras which is quite useful. You can get a view of the tach and the track in front of the bike. It's really useful for "seeing" what you are doing.
-
Are your rear sets adjustable? I had similar problems myself and found that shifting was easier with the rear sets lowered.
-
A wise man once wrote about the $10 of attention we have while we ride. Do you think there are things you may be spending more attention than is needed on?
-
Great video Yellowduck. It will be a while longer on my diet before I ever have the bravery to mount a butt-cam on my bike! That bike sounds awesome btw. Between you and Jeff I might end up adding a Ducati to my collection one of these days.
The other night in my trailer with my bike still in the wheel chocks for transport I practiced a bit and managed to identify a few other minor issues which were all working in tandem to make things way harder than they needed to be. It never ceases to amaze me how little things matter in such a major way and how they affect more than one thing.
-
That's true too.
That's one of the things I really love about riding. No matter what your skill level there's always improvements that can be made.
Top 10 Excuses For Crashing
in Cornering and Techniques
Posted
That sucks! What's worse is that horrible surreal feeling that you get after years of being SUPER careful like you KNEW it would eventually happen!
In retrospect I'm perfectly ok with what happened. The huge thing it did for me is make it so I don't worry as much. I used to be SERIOUSLY uptight about that bike. Sometimes you make mistakes. It just sucks a LOT more when you have been super careful.