hitting a blown radial...?

[twinlove04]

So, uh, what do you do when there is tire debris all over and you have to hit a (large) chunk of it?

The other day I had to swerve very hard to avoid many large pieces of a semi's radial.  It seems that here in the desert tires blow rather frequently, and thus pepper the highways with rubber.  Somehow my line managed to zig and zag betwixt and between many large tire sections.  What do you do when, given safety and surroundings, you have to hit one?  After nearly 10,000 miles on my GS, I have this sick feeling that my time is coming.  Has anyone ever rolled over a radial?

-Patrick

[TragicImage]

man up, go over it, unweight the rear wheel as you go over, and keep a flexible grip.... same as when you have to run over anything else.



I'm an Alamogordo NM escapee... I know all about the debris everywhere in the desert.  Some roads are so infrequently traveled that the debris can stay there for a week or so before a road crew comes to clean it up.

[makenzie71]

^ditto.  If there's no safe means of avoiding it, go over it.

[pantablo]

man up

is that like "cowboy up"?

[scratch]

Debris in the middle of the roadway is just like riding in the dirt.  Wheelie over it.  Get your butt out of the saddle, like a dirtbike (like you did when you had your ol' BMX bike and did jumps, or go up curbs, same thing).

Now, this begs a question: http://gstwins.com/gsboard/index.php?topic=29773.0

[trumpetguy]

I also live on I-40 but about three thousand feet lower in altitude.  Still hot, and a million semis.  Lots of debris on the road.

My advice is (Captain Obvious here) don't tailgate EVER.  It reduces the reaction time from when you see the tire or piece of tire until you are on top of it. 

Stay back and look ahead, even in traffic.  It's a lifesaver.

[twinlove04]

man up, go over it, unweight the rear wheel as you go over, and keep a flexible grip.... same as when you have to run over anything else.

I'm an Alamogordo NM escapee... I know all about the debris everywhere in the desert.  Some roads are so infrequently traveled that the debris can stay there for a week or so before a road crew comes to clean it up.

"Man up,"  I'll remember that when I'm about to wet my seat...

I also live on I-40 but about three thousand feet lower in altitude.  Still hot, and a million semis.  Lots of debris on the road.

My advice is (Captain Obvious here) don't tailgate EVER.  It reduces the reaction time from when you see the tire or piece of tire until you are on top of it. 

Stay back and look ahead, even in traffic.  It's a lifesaver.

I'm with you on the tailgating thing, but the speed limit out here is 75mph, so whether tailgating or not, debris can come upon you awfully quickly.

-Patrick 

[FearedGS500]

kind of keep an eye on traffic in front of you . when they weave be ready helped me many times

[LeChatNoir]

Here in the grandiosely styled "Inland Empire", the most entertaining part of the local morning traffic report is the sheer variety of debris in the roadways. I've heard about...
* mattresses
* ladders
* kitchen cabinetry
* live animals
* PVC pipe

and much more, spilled from trucks on major highways in the area. Fortunately, I commute by bicycle on surface streets, but you'd have to be pretty insane to risk all that stuff by motorbike on the highway around here. All the more because traffic is such that you *cannot* leave a decent following distance without some cellphone-bound moron in an SUV cutting in in front of you and taking your space cushon...

[edit] OH yeah, don't get me started about all the shredded, steel-twined, ex-truck tires blowing about the freeways hereabouts like so many tumbleweeds at the O.K. Corral.

[ducati_nolan]

Someone I used to work with was in critical condition and had to have brain surgurey after swerving to miss something that fell of the back of a truck (not sure what it was) he didn't hit it but he rolled his triumph convertable, seatbelt broke, and he was thrown from the car. Secure your loads mutherfuckers!

[natedawg120]

Secure your loads mutherf%$kers!

+1
i don't know if it like this in all college towns but around college start and college stop time people come down with load and loads of crap to go in to their new apt or dorm room.  Most of the time if it is a pickup it is loosly tied or not tied at all.  I have seen box fans take off, mattresses fly astray, boards for lofts slide right out the back of pickups, and been pelted with was appeared to be styrofoam and plastic beads from a beanbag that was unzipped in the back of a truck.  It can get interesting around move in and move out time in my parts