Had To Lay'er Down

A few years ago a neighbor's wife told me about a yard sale she was helping with, which was the aftermath of the death of a friend's husband on his motorcycle. She related to me, "He laid it down just like they tell you to but..." What could I say? She wasn't a rider, and neither was the widow. I think I just nodded my head sympathetically and expressed some sort of condolence, but inside I just wanted to go chew someone out for that.

greenwald said:

Head protection not necessary, when "loud pipes save lives!"

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You'd think, if lay'er down is the first and only line of defense, that they would be bigger on protection...

My .00005 cents worth... I agree with no bashing the HD brand, many good riders ride them too.

But not using the front brake(s), alcohol, no counter steering skills, and no understanding of skidding all contribute to the fatality rate.

At least laying er down is better than locking up the rear brake only to release it into a high side. Happened two summers ago during a charity ride as one hot head wanted to show off but was not looking ahead to see the stopped traffic. Sounds like rear brake only and then released it when the back end was not lined up to sling shot him off the bike. A rider EMT on scene but could not save him. I was not there but the EMT told the story while giving a first aid presentation for motorcyclists.

Even taking the MSF courses may not really teach you all of this unless you follow up with more study and training.

Just Now I am just wondering if the lay er down adage is from the idea once you lock the rear brake up and start sliding you should just keep it locked so you do not high side. Not the best way to stop obviously but IF it comes from the people advocating rear brake only the two kinda go together.

I have no idea what the answer is but this thread has made me think more about how people riding fast, powerful, and heavy bikes may react if they have not been trained properly. It also motivates me to get more training to learn more and to keep practicing the skills. Cheers!!

A simple explanation for those who refuse to use the front brake: There's a reason why there are two discs on the front and one on the back. Let them figure out the rest - whatever bike they ride.

(Yes, I know some bikes don't have dual front discs)

AKsuited said:

I was asked to do a group riding seminar at an ABATE meeting a few years back. When I mentioned counter-steering, a Harley guy stood up and pronounced with 100 percent certainty that due to gyroscopic precession, counter-steering could not possibly work. The truly sad thing was that in a group of perhaps 70 "riders" not one disagreed with the guy (except me). If it hadn't been February and about 10F, I could have proved him wrong in the parking lot.

It is scary how ignorance can take such hold of a group.

Harry

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That is scary. I thought EVERY rider, schooled or not, would know that that counter -steering is the basic way you make a motorcycle change direction. AND they are doing it on every ride even if they don't know it. (Leaning off, weighting foot pegs, etc. are all open to debate for us normal street riders. Counter-steering is just basic, and something we prove works on every ride we take.) How is that debatable?

Not much debate among most of us about the advisability of using the front brake except in slow maneuvers. You have to wonder how long the riders who fear the front brake and have no clue how they steer their bike will remain riders - or alive.

BCKRider said:

That is scary. I thought EVERY rider, schooled or not, would know that that counter -steering is the basic way you make a motorcycle change direction. AND they are doing it on every ride even if they don't know it. (Leaning off, weighting foot pegs, etc. are all open to debate for us normal street riders. Counter-steering is just basic, and something we prove works on every ride we take.) How is that debatable?

Not much debate among most of us about the advisability of using the front brake except in slow maneuvers. You have to wonder how long the riders who fear the front brake and have no clue how they steer their bike will remain riders - or alive.

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Agree with everything you say!

Probably the reason that 'counter-steering' still holds some mystique is that the attempts to define/explain it have, over the years, been 'murky' at best. Even some of the material provided to me as a motorcycle instructor is confusing (to me as well as my students).

Probably the best dissection of 'counter-steering' I've encountered is that it is a momentary steering of a single-tracked vehicle away from the direction you actually intend to go. This allows you to overcome inertia (the desire for an object in motion to resist a change in speed or direction) and get the motorcycle to turn (or steer) aggressively in the intended direction. I dip ever so slightly to my right for a nano-second to drop into a left-hand turn. We did this all the time as kids on our bicycles - just never had to teach and preach it. If you film a bike in slow motion with high-speed cameras, that's exactly what it looks like.

Discussions based on that explanation seem to resonate well with the novices I encounter in my MSF classes, as well as the advanced training I teach at Road America.

As for braking - yup, both brakes applied with equal and increasing pressure (70% of a motorcycle's ability to brake is up front, due to weight transfer), with some judicious use of rear brake only for specific maneuvers (trail riding, slow-speed maneuvers, parade antics, etc.).

For those who treat these concepts as fiction ....... Darwin will prevail.

Well, there are motorcyclists, and then there are motorcyclists.
If all you use your bike for is to ride down to the bar, maybe to another bar, and then home, you may well avoid these issues.
However, if you ride to Missouri, and Minnesota and Washington, and Utah, and other places, it is an issue.
dc

Oh, let me add, I said ride. Not "trailer".

David13 said:

Well, there are motorcyclists, and then there are motorcyclists.
If all you use your bike for is to ride down to the bar, maybe to another bar, and then home, you may well avoid these issues.
However, if you ride to Missouri, and Minnesota and Washington, and Utah, and other places, it is an issue.
dc

Oh, let me add, I said ride. Not "trailer".

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Maybe you should have said: "there are motorcyclists, and there are bikers".

But... there are motorcyclists who do trailer and there are bikers who ride.

Back in June of 2010 I was doing some work in the garage when I heard all manner of nasty screeching and impact sounds out in the road. By the time I looked out there was an EMT truck on scene and realizing I would just be in the way, stayed put until the helicopter landed next door. The road was closed off for over six hours with all manner of scene investigation going on. Later I approached and laying just off the road was a crashed HD FatBoy with a worthless novelty helmet beside it. Guy was dead at scene.

SUV was turning left(classic) in front of this guy, he panicked and stompted on that giant tractor rear brake pedal throwing the bike into a slide right under the SUV. I swear to God that skid mark could be seen for a year afterwards. What a waste...

There are long time riders out there that believe that they will get "thrown clear over the handlebars" if they grab a handful of front break. I do my best to not ride with those folks. Stay safe all.

Layin 'er down extends to the retail locations, as well. This one was in Pueblo last April..

The best comment on the V Twin Forum (http://www.v-twinforum.com/forums/v...ley-talk/306234-laid-er-down-yesterday-2.html) concerning this motorcyclist was "that's what insurance is for, probably needed new paint and chrome."

greenwald said:

Agree with everything you say!

Probably the reason that 'counter-steering' still holds some mystique is that the attempts to define/explain it have, over the years, been 'murky' at best. Even some of the material provided to me as a motorcycle instructor is confusing (to me as well as my students).

.

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I am surprised to hear that. "Countersteering" is based on the fact that the front tire is momentarily moved onto a patch off center on the side you want to turn to. The smaller diameter the tire is now riding on will cause the bike to turn into that direction. It is plain physics, nothing mysterious.

I have two words, and only two words, on counter steering: gyroscopic precession.

Mike: It is simple physics, but it's not THAT physics. What happens when the tire's edge radius approaches zero?

BC: what happens when the wheel's mass approaches zero?

AntonLargiader said:

Mike: It is simple physics, but it's not THAT physics. What happens when the tire's edge radius approaches zero?

BC: what happens when the wheel's mass approaches zero?

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Sorry, I only had two words on the subject.

But, recalling my high school physics, a wheel's mass will never be zero.

AntonLargiader said:

Mike: It is simple physics, but it's not THAT physics. What happens when the tire's edge radius approaches zero?

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Anton, I don't know what you mean with

the tire's edge radius approaches zero

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The fact that the bike turns the way it does when you apply countersteering, is because of the way I described it. Any track day instructor will confirm this. It is one of the reasons countersteering does not work with sidecar rigs, the CanAm Spyder or trikes.

Quiz at 10:00

http://www.tonyfoale.com/Articles/Balance/BALANCE.htm

Counter steering is counter-intuitive

Anyone told "turn left to go right" would certainly question it.

I remember the time I figured counter-steering out, by myself. They didn't tell us anything back then.
I remember telling an engineer about what I'd discovered and he didn't think it was right until he tried it.

Physics is only simple if you have a complete understanding of it.
Try explaining DynaBeads to somebody.
Then try explaining why they won't work on a dynamic wheel balancer.

EMSimon said:

The fact that the bike turns the way it does when you apply countersteering, is because of the way I described it. Any track day instructor will confirm this. It is one of the reasons countersteering does not work with sidecar rigs, the CanAm Spyder or trikes.

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Some of this probably comes down to how we each use the terms steering and turning. And handling in general is a pretty complex chain of events (that does involve the camber thrust that I think you are referring to and gyroscopic precession) and the actual changing of direction of travel is merely the last step.

That said, if you're going to teach this stuff, you have to get the causality right or else your students will rely on the wrong inputs, which will work under normal conditions but will fail in extremis. To put it differently, if a student thinks that B causes D, but really A causes B which leads to C which causes D, then when he forces B in a situation that doesn't allow C to happen, D will not happen. That's where the body-steering beginners crash.

The lean of the bike, isolated, will not cause turning. That's all I was saying. If you lock the steering straight while riding and then lean the bike, it will just fall over.

regrettably I heard these words--or ones very much like them when as a photographer I coveraged a traffic accident. The rider said he'd laid the bike down to avoid hitting apedestrian who'd walked into his path. The rider was a police officer.