Total Motorcycle Community Forums

Wow I just went to the Kenda Tire site and found nothing about increasing torque on a bike.

Johnj wrote:Wow I just went to the Kenda Tire site and found nothing about increasing torque on a bike.

Differences in rolling resistance is not discussed anywhere that I have found and that is surprising. I wrote to dunlop about it, described what I'm doing with the bike and what I found with the tires and asked for a recommendation.

There are a few differences between the Dunlop knobbies and the Kenda duals. The knobbies don't throw much mud. The kendas throw a lot of mud. The knobbies were solid as a rock on pavement and in the parking lot. The kenda tread is softer, squishy, and it's easy to feel, front and rear, in the parking lot. Even so the steering is more accurate with the kendas but not as grippy. The kenda front tire seems to be wearing as fast as the dunlop. The thing that is not so different between them is off-road traction. The way I ride they are pretty close. The Kendas are more likely to slip on grass, I demonstrated that twice, but that seems to be the worst of it.

beginner wrote:I'd like to see what's in the booklet. That's where the priorities are set.[/quote[

Then go buy them. Both are available at barnes and noble, borders and amazon.com

I read somewhere there are 17 maneuvers in your beginner course. It would be a service to your students to put up some youtube videos showing them performed to perfection by a highly skilled rider who has practiced them a lot.

Each exercise is demoed to perfection by a highly skilled rider who practices them very little during the course. I don't see how this would be helpful. Where's your proof? I want to see a video. Your opinion isn't evidence

beginner wrote:
I'm surprised nobody has quibbled with my countersteering description.

Nobody tried for the same reason Dr. Van Helsing never tried to talk Renfield out of eating bugs...

Those of you interested in Countersteering, check out my "Leaning" video at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGY-kLYKqSY in it you can see how countersteering starts to become a serious and important skill at speeds above 15mph!

storysunfolding wrote:

beginner wrote:I read somewhere there are 17 maneuvers in your beginner course. It would be a service to your students to put up some youtube videos showing them performed to perfection by a highly skilled rider who has practiced them a lot.

I don't see how this would be helpful.

I mentioned this because it's worthwhile to encourage everybody to practice and I think official demonstrations, freely available on youtube, would help. There could even be scenes showing progression. Here's what the brand new rider looks like, then, after a couple of months, and some more months, and then to a highly polished rider after years of practice, all showing how the beginner maneuvers look at different stages.

Then go buy them. Both are available at barnes and noble, borders and amazon.com

I haven't spent money on a book yet because they all seem focused on surviving on public roads. I'm looking for a book focused on slow speed skills. I would by a gymkhana book in English.

I just found this. The Air Force Times reports, "The Secretaries of the Army, Navy and Air Force met with four major motorcycle makers Jan. 15." http://www.airforcetimes.com/news/2009/ ... s_011809w/ The only word for this is stunning. All that's left is for the President to mention motorcycle safety in a State of the Union address.

beginner wrote:It was in practice I learned that countersteering doesn't turn the bike, it leans the bike. I can also lean the bike by counter balancing. No matter what technique I use to lean the bike there still has to be a steering input, the front wheel has to be turned in, tracking in, the direction of the turn.

I truly, sincerely hope you do not try this at speed, dude. Please have an ambulance standing by if you do.

jstark47 wrote:I truly, sincerely hope you do not try this at speed, dude. Please have an ambulance standing by if you do.

If you are trying to be helpful please be more specific.

For those interested in Countersteering, here is a wonderful resource: http://www.superbikeschool.com/machiner ... achine.php

Very quick clean explaination at: http://www.datacraftsystems.co.uk/techn ... urning.htm

More indepth magazine article: http://www.motorcyclecruiser.com/street ... index.html

And if your ADD (like me): http://motorcycles.about.com/od/motorcy ... rsteer.htm

Counter-balancing is great for keeping the bike upright at slow speeds. At any decent speed, it's going to do very little to the bike itself as the forward momentum is going to want to keep the bike going in the direction it is moving. It takes a much stronger input, such as counter-steering, to turn (lean) the bike at faster speeds. People don't employ counter-steering for the heck of it..it's needed to turn the bike, period.

Can you turn the bike without using counter-steering at higher speeds? Possibly - but I would not recommend it The biggest problem folks seem to have with counter-steering is just wrapping their head around it. For most folks, if they shut off the mental argument about how counter-steering works and listen to the way the bike feels and look where you want to go, counter-steering comes much more naturally.

beginner, I think it's great that you want to talk about practicing and different techniques that can help you learn to be more proficient on the bike. However, I think you're butting heads with folks because your posts come off as emphasizing practice over riding when that's certainly not necessary. In addition to that, it is quite apparent that you don't have a lot of real-world application for some of the stuff you're talking about (counter balancing to turn as a great example). That's nothing to be ashamed of - however you do need to acknowledge that. I realize you've got a bee in your bonnet about the MSF course - but you seem to be taking that to the next level and are presenting some of your arguments as though you know better than the MSF coaches. If that's not your intention than you might want to reconsider some of the things you've said/the way you're saying them.

How much practical riding experience do you have? How many miles riding roads/trails, etc? You mentioned you're 30 miles from traffic - have you ever ridden in traffic or on the street? What would you ultimately like to be doing with your motorcycle? If your big aim in riding is to ride around your farm and have fun learning all kinds of slow speed skills - by all means it sounds like you're accomplishing that. However if you have the desire to do more than that, it sounds like the only thing holding you back is you/your fear/whatever is causing you to think that you must move at a snails pace through practicing.

Edited to add: While swear-laden, Dave's video on counter-steering is still the easiest demo of it I've seen: Click The demo comes about 2 mins in I believe.

Nalian wrote:
Edited to add: While swear-laden, Dave's video on counter-steering is still the easiest demo of it I've seen: Click The demo comes about 2 mins in I believe.

I like that one too! Part of it's beauty is that it's easy to replicate while keeping your hands ON the bars!