Total Motorcycle Community Forums

Zagnut wrote:

UMMMMM dont ever "grab" your front brake on or off road

Quit splitting hairs... you know what I mean...I think that kind of goes without saying doesnt it?...

..although with a long bike like my Vstar... you'd be hard pressed to flip that bike by "grabbing" the front brake.. even with the two front disks.

uhhh you have ANY momentum and you grab that front brake yes even a vstar can flip.

ofblong wrote:

Zagnut wrote:

UMMMMM dont ever "grab" your front brake on or off road

Quit splitting hairs... you know what I mean...I think that kind of goes without saying doesnt it?...

..although with a long bike like my Vstar... you'd be hard pressed to flip that bike by "grabbing" the front brake.. even with the two front disks.

uhhh you have ANY momentum and you grab that front brake yes even a vstar can flip.

But can and will is a big difference... I've personally seen a cruiser lock up the front tire on dry, smooth, warm pavement, with good tires and traction. The chances that it will even lift the rear wheel without you leaning over the front tire and trying to make it flip are insanely small...

EDIT:
Fixed... haha

Wrider wrote:

ofblong wrote:

Zagnut wrote:

UMMMMM dont ever "grab" your front brake on or off road

Quit splitting hairs... you know what I mean...I think that kind of goes without saying doesnt it?...

..although with a long bike like my Vstar... you'd be hard pressed to flip that bike by "grabbing" the front brake.. even with the two front disks.

uhhh you have ANY momentum and you grab that front brake yes even a vstar can flip.

But can and will is a big difference... I've personally seen a cruiser lock up the front tire on dry, smooth, warm pavement, with good tires and traction. The chances that it will even lift the front wheel without you leaning over the front tire and trying to make it flip...

actually it would lift the rear wheel if you grab the front brake .

uhhh you have ANY momentum and you grab that front brake yes even a vstar can flip

uhhh... Bullsh*t!.. I can tell from your posts that you are the leading authority on all makes and models of bikes.. but I'm calling BS on this li'l nugget of wisdom.

"ANY momentum?"... lessay 30 or 40 mph... typical city speeds....
it would take an act of God to flip a Vstar... end of story.
.

Zagnut wrote:

uhhh you have ANY momentum and you grab that front brake yes even a vstar can flip

uhhh... Bullsh*t!.. I can tell from your posts that you are the leading authority on all makes and models of bikes.. but I'm calling BS on this li'l nugget of wisdom.

"ANY momentum?"... lessay 30 or 40 mph... typical city speeds....
it would take an act of God to flip a Vstar... end of story.
.

actually it would not. All depends on the situation. You hit the brake hard enough and your going down even on dry pavement. So unless you have some hard evidence to prove me wrong (which you dont) then you need to just move along.

You hit the brake hard enough and your going down even on dry pavement.

going down?... quite possibly.

flip the bike?... nope..

(ok.. maybe if you were going down a 70 degree downhill grade while chomping the disks with your calipers or something...lol... but I don't believe I've ever seen a road that steep in my 40 plus years of driving all over the US including the Rockies... but that's not to say a road like that doesn't exist somewhere and I haven't driven every single road in the world... so I will concede that it is possible.. if a road like that exists somewhere... to speed down that steep hill and lock the front brake up causing the bike to flip... I should never have doubted you...)
.

wait a minute... I just thought of another scenerio where I could flip my Vstar. Let's say I wanted to purge my tires to get rid of the stale air in them and put in some fresh air.... I mistakenly refill them from a tank of helium that just happens to be sitting next to the tank of air. Then, as I'm out riding I decide to "grab" my front brake.
But at that very moment...overhead there is one of those huge South American condors who has blown way off course and is flying over me. He sees a flash of sunlight off my chrome luggage rack on my rear fender and thinks its a fish with shiny scales... he swoops down to pounce and latches on to my luggage rack with his powerful talons and furiously flaps his wings to ascend to the heavens...while simultaneously there is a massive earth quake and the ground cracks just behind my front tire... the shifting of the earth's tectonic plates causes the ground underneath my rear helium filled tire to suddenly and quite violenty thrust upward giving the gigantic raptor that extra little bit of lift he needs to get my rear tire off the ground and my Vstar flips like an olympic gymnist!... wow!...who knew?...You can get a Vstar to flip.

Now you said " Any " momentum... which I could split hairs like you are and say technically "any momentum" could mean 10mph on flat dry concrete and you either need to prove to me that you can flip a Vstar in these conditions or you just need to move along!

...but I think dreaming up these ridiculous scenerios even though you know what I really meant with my earlier statement might be more fun...don't you?... Are you a lawyer by any chance?

ErnCol wrote:I'd go to the dirt bike forum, but I'd rather have you experienced street bike riders tell me how you get out of those situations in the loose dirt/gravel/mud, etc that you should never have gotten into in the first place.
So far, when I've traveled down that nasty dirt road that I shouldn't have on a street bike with street tires, I've managed to just power out and occasionally put my feet down for balance/stability.
You know those tempting roads that are all nice hard packed dirt until you round that corner up the hill and have to turn around?
Any tips that dirt bike riders use that can be used for heavier bikes...video references on UTube for instance? No dirt bike experience here.
Yeah, I know somebody is going to say..."stay on the pavement"...but what if you are run off the road and have to get out of the soft stuff?
Be nice.

I don't like it and stay off it as much as possible but as you say some times its just unavoidable. Its a catch as catch can scenario. Its a little bit of everything to stay uprite and always an on the spot judgement call. Being alert and focused ready to make the immediate adjustments when and as necessary. Speed depends on condition. The wetter the slower. And hard pack wet is an accident waiting to happen. Heading into Bar Harbor, Maine a couple years ago they had stripped the tar off the 25+mile road into Bar Harbor and it was raining, traffic (HWY trucks) on my arse, and no break down lane because thats where they piled the tar scrapped off the road surface. My nerves were fried once I succesfully and slowly made my way to the end of it. I know folks behind me wanted me to go faster but doing so I would have fell and perhaps got ran over.

my father grabbed the front brake an his 1100 shadow locked up the front wheel fell of and as the bike was skidding down the concrete it flipped so yes it can happen

Zagnut wrote: Let's say I wanted to purge my tires to get rid of the stale air in them and put in some fresh air

Do you mean fresh spring air to replace the stale fall air in the tire?