Tire slipping?

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MegaMatt5000

senallttam
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I was watching one of my GoPro videos, and at one part I was leaned over pretty far in a right hander, then I encountered a bunch of cracks in my path. I was scared that my tires would slip out from hitting cracks leaned over, so I stood the bike up and went into the opposite lane. If there was a car coming, I would've taken my chances and pushed the bike through the corner. What I was wondering is, how do different road conditions such as cracks and bumps affect traction while leaned over? Does the road have to be perfect in order to maintain traction while leaned over to the edge of the tire, and will any road imperfections cause your tires to slip?
 
I am no expert in this but the tire will loose some traction, how much depends on how good the suspension is set, what kind of surface irregularity, raised ridges, grooves, presence of loose debris, the depth of the pot hole, how far are you leaning, how fast are you going, all these things affect traction, it is good to cautiously test your bike in such road conditions to know its limits & yours, will the bike side step only or get washed off? how will the front tire react? how to recover in case of major upset.
 
I would say it is a hopefully live and learn experience encountering new road conditions. What I've come to learn is leaned over in a corner on a road with uncertain quality of repair conditions is dangerous. I crashed my Fz6 because I was leaned over and hit loose gravel/cinder and slid out the rear tire about a foot only to have the tire gain traction again and almost toss me high side. Luckily I wasn't hurt too bad, the bike ended up getting totaled and I learned about leaning the bike over on an unfamiliar road with sketchy conditions. I've put in a lot of miles since then and will say the following have been really helpful to me.

1. Take the Advanced Rider Course: I did this back in February and it was very helpful covering the topics of how to trail brake, change your line in a corner, obstacle avoidance and decreasing radius turns. It was well worth the money. Also they covered body position.

2. Practice body position and throttle control.
Keith Code's Twist of the Wrist II vidoe or "The Cornering Bible" is a great video to help with the general topic.

THE CORNERING BIBLE HQ 'La biblia de las curvas' Part1 HQ.avi - YouTube

THE CORNERING BIBLE HQ 'La biblia de las curvas' Part2 HQ.avi - YouTube

THE CORNERING BIBLE HQ 'La biblia de las curvas' Part3 HQ - YouTube

THE CORNERING BIBLE HQ 'La biblia de las curvas' Part4 HQ.avi - YouTube

3. Get your suspension set up correctly. There are help threads here on the forum and I personally found a local race shop that set it up for $30. It was well worth it for the confidence factor afterward.

4. Stay loose. I originally was really stiff on the bike pushing or plowing through corners, but the looser I've been able to convince myself to get I've been able to hit deteriorated road conditions at high speeds and still stay alive, letting the bike do its job to maintain traction or in some situations regain it. David323 can attest, he was following me one afternoon and I came around a turn at an intersection with a line that set me up over a man hole cover. I slid a good half foot before gaining traction again. Scared the crap out of me and him but with good throttle control, body position and staying loose it was fine.

Also just saw that this post was in the tire section. Tires do make a difference in maintaining traction in a corner at speed. I started on Pilot Road 2's and hated them. It required a lot more effort from me for body position and having really good throttle control. I am on some Pilot Power 3's right now and would say they are a lot easier to lean in, maintain lines, and get on acceleration sooner with confidence. However, I would say in all honesty the tire, unless it is worn badly, is a small factor in the equation of what you can go on the street

Have fun, Ride Safe
 
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senallttam said:
If there was a car coming, I would've taken my chances and pushed the bike through the corner.
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Also if you are at the point you are 'push(ing)' your limit on the street then it's time to back off a little. I say this because I've had several members here graciously encourage me to not push the limit over the few short months I've been riding. Best rule I've heard is never really go beyond 80% of your limit or the bikes limit (thank you Hail and Dustin, and everyone else who has echoed this sentiment, sometimes the thought of you is in the back of my head when I'm riding). In a short amount of your time 80% becomes 60% because you are alive long enough to keep riding enough to get better and better.
 
Ssky0078 said:
Also if you are at the point you are 'push(ing)' your limit on the street then it's time to back off a little. I say this because I've had several members here graciously encourage me to not push the limit over the few short months I've been riding. Best rule I've heard is never really go beyond 80% of your limit or the bikes limit (thank you Hail and Dustin, and everyone else who has echoed this sentiment, sometimes the thought of you is in the back of my head when I'm riding). In a short amount of your time 80% becomes 60% because you are alive long enough to keep riding enough to get better and better.
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Wow Sky.. I've not read your posts in a while and I must say you seem to really have grown up as a rider! Really like everything you've said here! Good man!
 
Erci said:
Wow Sky.. I've not read your posts in a while and I must say you seem to really have grown up as a rider! Really like everything you've said here! Good man!
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Actually thank you, I'm rarely on the Fz6 site now, but you were always a good inspiration as well.
 
When I am leaned over and come up on something slippery or unpleasant, I am mindful of a few things:

1) Avoid sudden reactions. Don't chop throttle off or apply brakes suddenly. Panic is never an option

2) If it's possible to reduce your speed BEFORE the obstacle, do it gently and maintain your line -- going wide and crossing the centre line is never a good idea

3) When leaned over on a slippery surface, maintain steady throttle and focus your eyes towards your safe destination. Don't stare at the hazard

4) Keep the bike as upright as possible without compromising your line. Hang your body off a bit more and lean a bit less.

5) Relax. :)
 
senallttam said:
I was watching one of my GoPro videos, and at one part I was leaned over pretty far in a right hander, then I encountered a bunch of cracks in my path. I was scared that my tires would slip out from hitting cracks leaned over, so I stood the bike up and went into the opposite lane. If there was a car coming, I would've taken my chances and pushed the bike through the corner. What I was wondering is, how do different road conditions such as cracks and bumps affect traction while leaned over? Does the road have to be perfect in order to maintain traction while leaned over to the edge of the tire, and will any road imperfections cause your tires to slip?
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Your tires are already slipping more than you think. I ride a ton on crappy pavement just a little south of you. Cracks by themselves are not a big worry. In combination with bumps, they can get a bit hairy if you are pushing things. My video example would be Del Puerto Canyon road. Lots of cracks and bumps.
 
It is difficult to make a general statement. A lot of factors go into the traction calculation. As a physicist I am prone to bore people with formulas so lets try it with words.

The traction depends on the friction coefficient of the tire and the street. This determines how much force can be put on the tire without loosing traction. Now there a several factors which determine the friction coefficients. For the tire the most important would be: temperature (of tire), surface, material.
For the street it's the same: surface, material, temperature.

The more you lean the bike the larger the force on the tire and hence more traction is required. The problem with street riding is that you do not know any of the parameters beside your speed and roughly lean angle. Of course you know roughly the temperature and surface of your tire and the temperature of the road. However the road friction can vary very fast and what was a "grippy" road in one corner could be very different in another corner. The same applies to all the other factors, you know them roughly but they change all the time. Usually you fell slight slips which show you that the limit is close. Nevertheless if you encounter something which changes one factor very fast (like water running over the street in a corner, gravel, sand ...) than it is difficult to asses the problem in short time. So options are continue, change line, brake ..... Well all of these will effect your suspension and thus change the force in a difficult to predict way (short but large variations on the force of the tire on the street) so it all will depend on small things.

That's why leaving a larger safety cushion is very advisable on the street because you really do not know the traction such precise. Often I evade gravel or larger rocks on the road by changing my line in the corner. However that requires usually to increase the lean angle to corner tighter because running over the center line is not a good idea in any circumstances. The increasing of lean angle is only possible if I am not at the limit. Whenever I feel slipping of the rear tire I reduce the speed because I enter a regime where I have no safety margin in case of even slightly changing conditions.

I ride about 20k miles a year and can tell you that cracks can be very different depending on orientation, width and depth. In case that the knee is already on the ground that can result in a slip. So better save such riding for the track where the conditions are predictable.
 
Dreamdemon said:
As a physicist I am prone to bore people with formulas so lets try it with words.

The traction depends on the friction coefficient of the tire and the street.
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My ears perked up when you said physicist. I love science and physics was my favorite of all the general sciences. Thanks for the write up, well done.
 
Thanks everyone for the good replies. I'm running the Pilot Power 3's and they really give me so much confidence. They give very good feedback which makes me really feel every crack and tar snake in the road, which is why they sketch me out. The part at 4:55 in the video is what I was talking about. Also at 4:17, bumpy surface changes like that make me feel like my tires might slip out. But ya, pretty much as you guys have said, I just keep the throttle steady and try hang off more and keep the bike upright. This ride is quicker than my usual pace because that Ducati guy went by me on the bridge over a minute before me and I like to play catch up.
GoPro Hero 3 @ 2.7k - Skaggs Springs Road July 19, 2013 on a 2007 FZ1 - YouTube
 
at the 4:55 situation it just looked like you had the wrong entry line set up, and then when you went to flick in you had to adjust, then let off the throttle and swung wide (not as bad as a couple of my early riding wides where I crossed to the opposite shoulder, so good job there). When you let off throttle the bike will stand up, the suspension unsettle and you'll go wide. I'm almost of the mind set now where I feel a little slip and I just let it go, and in some instances the moment I regain traction increase throttle a little bit to reset the bike in the sweet spot of the suspension.

Obviously this felt different than what the video can convey but it seems you were alright and the tires were probably alright as well. The PP3's are pretty awesome. How many miles do you have on them? At about 3,000 miles on mine I started to feel like they were getting a little slippery and they didn't want to hold lines as well. Also, the front started to scallop a little. Take a good look at them and make sure they are wearing correctly.
 
Ssky0078 said:
at the 4:55 situation it just looked like you had the wrong entry line set up, and then when you went to flick in you had to adjust, then let off the throttle and swung wide (not as bad as a couple of my early riding wides where I crossed to the opposite shoulder, so good job there). When you let off throttle the bike will stand up, the suspension unsettle and you'll go wide. I'm almost of the mind set now where I feel a little slip and I just let it go, and in some instances the moment I regain traction increase throttle a little bit to reset the bike in the sweet spot of the suspension.

Obviously this felt different than what the video can convey but it seems you were alright and the tires were probably alright as well. The PP3's are pretty awesome. How many miles do you have on them? At about 3,000 miles on mine I started to feel like they were getting a little slippery and they didn't want to hold lines as well. Also, the front started to scallop a little. Take a good look at them and make sure they are wearing correctly.
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Oh that all makes sense. I definitely cut in too soon and did let off the throttle when I got spooked which made it stand up. I'm in love with these tires but it's disappointing that I've also heard from a few others that the performance declines towards the end of it's life. I'm just above 2,200 on this set and they're still sticking like glue. Mine show very minor cupping, but not enough to feel and just seems like normal wear. That may have to do with suspension setup. I weigh 155-160 so I'm not far off from the weight the bike was set up for. I just stiffened up the rear preload one notch to 4 and loosened the front by half a line to 6 showing. Shock rebound is 5 clicks counterclockwise from all the way turned in clockwise, and fork rebound is 16 (2 tighter than stock) and compression 7 (2 faster than stock). This setup feels very good for aggressive riding. The bike handles very quickly, at least for my weight.
 
Sky the links are great, but tires are traction. The FZ1, unless you're a pussy foot, needs quality tires, any bike for that matter. For street riding the knee dragging stuff doesn't apply. It's all about throttle use, a bike in good condition and being smart.

So to say tires don't matter is really out of left field. Go ride some Cheng Shins and report back...
 
Hellgate said:
Sky the links are great, but tires are traction. The FZ1, unless you're a pussy foot, needs quality tires, any bike for that matter. For street riding the knee dragging stuff doesn't apply. It's all about throttle use, a bike in good condition and being smart.

So to say tires don't matter is really out of left field. Go ride some Cheng Shins and report back...
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I don't know if I said tires don't matter. They definitely matter. But with skills you can overcome some deficiencies in the tire. At least that is how I felt riding on the PR2's. The PP3's were so much easier to do what I wanted that it just made riding easier, and learning the skills from before made it more enjoyable
 
senallttam said:
Thanks everyone for the good replies. I'm running the Pilot Power 3's and they really give me so much confidence. They give very good feedback which makes me really feel every crack and tar snake in the road, which is why they sketch me out. The part at 4:55 in the video is what I was talking about. Also at 4:17, bumpy surface changes like that make me feel like my tires might slip out. But ya, pretty much as you guys have said, I just keep the throttle steady and try hang off more and keep the bike upright. This ride is quicker than my usual pace because that Ducati guy went by me on the bridge over a minute before me and I like to play catch up.
GoPro Hero 3 @ 2.7k - Skaggs Springs Road July 19, 2013 on a 2007 FZ1 - YouTube
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well from the video it would seem you're pretty fast at least bit faster than I would go on unknown roads so won't give any riding advies...


riding advies seems silly when you give it to faster ppl than yourself...Ssky :)


what I can tell you, is bike suspension doesn't work when you're leaned over (doesn't work for road bumps, it takes weight shifts and other stuff I don't know how to explain )but only the tires take care of the bumps !

So.. keeping that in mind I would play a bit with tire pressure, a softer wall tire will work like a softer damping suspension with a higher spring rate (cause you need more air pressure) and a harder walled tire the other way around.
 
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donoharm said:
riding advies seems silly when you give it to faster ppl than yourself...Ssky
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Thank you, I didn't realize I was giving advice, rather having a discussion about traction and how it relates to sketchy road conditions.

The only advice I did suggest was that at the speeds that anyone is considered pushing a bike through a corner that they are in the upper riding limits for the road most likely and exploring the limits of the rider as well. I don't know if you are aware of the way they set speed limits on roads, but typically the speed limit is set to what is generally considered safe for most drivers in varying weather conditions. I've talked to a couple of different civil engineers and they both have said that in general you can safely speed on a road up to about 20 mph over the posted speed limit without exceeding the limitations of the road. This in turn is why at greater than 20mph over a posted speed it becomes criminal speeding because at that point the driver/rider becomes an imminent danger to other motorist.

After reviewing the video I could say that I would most likely keep up and probably let go of keeping up at certain points because the thought of how mangled my body would be if I had an off at over 80-100mph on a country road typically slows me down. I do see chronic pain patients and have in the last few years had numerous patients that their pain is from motorcycle accidents, including a couple of amputations with phantom nerve pain, which if you've ever had the pleasure of meeting in your life will develop a certain level of understanding for the fragile nature of the human body.

So the only advice I would have is save that type of riding for the track, where if you have an off you slide on a relatively flat surface, likely some dirt and don't have many large hard objects to immediately halt your further progress. If that point when he crossed the double yellow going 65-70 mph and a car was coming in his direction, he would have been dead in under a second and likely impaled his bike through the car/truck/suv or whatever killing everyone inside.

Outside of the reality check: I loved the video, the rider is highly skilled, I'm totally jealous of him weighing only 160 for the suspension and the OP has balls for posting a vid to Youtube that shows his speed. There have been people in AZ that have been arrested for criminal speeding (felony) for posting vids like that.

To the OP I was not trying to give you advice at all, ride your ride, have fun and get home safe.
 
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