Help me!!!!! I've finally gotten my GS and now i can hardly ride it because the handlebars vibrate so bad that my hands go numb after about ten minutes. I'm really not sure what it is or could be, but it's making riding almost impossible. I'd like to get this fixed and be riding ASAP!!!
Possible culprits:
1. Early carpal tunnel syndrome?(I'm 21, is that possible?)
2. the bars ARE slightly bent, could that translate more vibe?
3. I've heard parallel twins just tend to vibe more. Am i just a wimp?

Does anyone else have this problem? Does anyone have any tips to curb the problem? I've ordered some new bars, weights, foam grips, and gel grips. I've also heard about special bars designed to minimize vibration. At this point, i'm really frustrated about the whole situation. I finally get the bike i want and i can hardly ride it at all. Any help would be great. I've put 200 miles on the thing in 2 days even with this problem, and i'm hooked on riding anyway!!! I just wanna get out there and go, know what i mean? Thanx :mrgreen:

check balancing of the front wheel. the GS does vibrate, but not this bad.

GS's vibrate some, but is generally not considered excessive.  In your case, it's better to determine the cause of excessive vibration first and eliminate its cause.  If everything's in good order, you can try other things to mitigate it.

Vibration has a variety of causes, including wheel balance.  These include, but are not limited to:
   
--Loose steering, swingarm, or wheel bearings
--tire type that telegraph road irregularities through the bike
--A fork that may be slightly damaged, causing excessive "stiction"
--wheel alignment is off
--worn drive chain and/or sprockets that have tight areas
--improperly adjusted drive chain
--excessive tire pressure (a GS'  recommended tire pressures are already a little on the high side)
--tight or improperly lubricated shock linkage
--slightly warped brake rotors
--improperly tourqued engine mounting bolts
--worn throttle control (right side naturally)

Of course, the most common cause of excessive vibration comes from the engine itself.  This might be caused by anything from the need for a good tuneup up to a complete rebuild.

Provided everything is in good order, there are things you can try:
--a different handlebar and weights.  A shorter bar won't generally vibrate as much.
--gel handgrips (I prefer gel over foam grips)
--installing a "throttle rocker", a device that slips over the throttle grip, and extends toward the palm of the right hand.  This enables you to loosen your grip and stretch your fingers, and still maintain throttle control with your palm (Recommended in any case).
--You could ride with bicycling gloves that have gel palm inserts.  Mountain bike gloves often have full fingered gloves, while roadie gloves have half fingers
--loosen up your grip a bit, and take your hands off frequently to stretch them and regain circulation.

It's critical for everyone to take measures to limit exposure to excessive vibration in their hands.  Numbness is not normal, and can lead to permanent nerve damage.  Some of the damage is cumulative.  Remember, we only have two hands, and that while modern medicine is amazing, it can't cure everything!

No, I'm not an orthopaedic hand specialist, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.  Actually, I've suffered some ulnar nerve damage in both hands from wearing cheap bicycle gloves on some 100 mile bicycle rides.  I've lost about 10% in sensation in both pinkies, and the event happened seven years ago.  Nothing serious, but it's made me more cautious.

One other solution for the numbness problem is to raise the handlebars a bit, which would take some pressure off your hands and wrists.  You have a couple of options if you want to keep the same handlebar you have, involving handlebar risers that are both included in this thread:
http://www.gstwins.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4981&highlight=genmar+risers
Here's hoping you find a permanent solution to your problem.  Let us know how you deal with it!

Quote from: chevelleHelp me!!!!! I've finally gotten my GS and now i can hardly ride it because the handlebars vibrate so bad that my hands go numb after about ten minutes. st wanna get out there and go, know what i mean? Thanx :mrgreen:I'm really not sure what it is or could be, but it's making riding almost impossible.

Parallel twins do vibrate a bit.  With the GS there are several probabilities:

carb sycronization can cause excess vibration - sync the carbs - there are some good threads on this do a search on carb sync.

Adding wieght to the ends of the handlebars can both dampen some vibrations and also changes the resonent frequency so that the vibrations are of a lower frequency which makes it more bearable - are your bar end wieghts in?  If not there are aftermarket ones available.

Longer bars tend to have a lower resonent frequency as well.

Installing some stuff called bar-snake reduces vibration.  A poor mans alternative is to fill the handlebars with sand, bb's or lead shot - one person I know made a mixture of shot and silicone caulk & filled the bars - claims that it dramatically reduced the vibration.

Some GS's that have been used for racing have had the counterbalancers removed - MAJOR vibration.

Getting your wieght off the bars will help a lot - higher and wider bars - like dirt bike bars will help.  

A throttle lock will help on the highway.

Death grip on the bars is the usual culprit.  A relaxed grip helped me out more than you could believe.

Grip the tank with your knees and flex your back to get more pressure off your hands. This also helps immensly when going downhill into turns.

You must have the factory suzuki weights on the end of the bars.  All of these aftermarket carbon fiber or aluminum so called bar weights do not have near enough weight to dampen the vibrations of the engine.  The factory weights are pretty heavy because they are lead filled.  Ive tried the aftermarket ones and they are no help.

Ok,

just a quick update to this thread to who ever is interested.

I tried the BBs solution. I've filled the handle bar with BBs completely, packed it, shook it, packed it again, and made sure that I didn't have any loose BBs when I inserted the stock bar end to seal the BBs. I did not use any adhesive yet, I don't really think it is necessary if the BBs are so tight you cannot hear any move around. (To who ever is planning on doing this, my stock handle bar took about 3000 BBs. NO I didn't count  , but I bought the 6000 BBs  jar from Walmart and it took about half the jar to fill it completely (no spills).)
It attenuated about 25-35% of the vibration, the rest is still there. The vibration is not horrible, and only occurs between 5K and 6K RPM range during acceleration and deceleration mostly. However, gloves with cushions or no gloves, after about 30min of riding, the hands will go numb.

I am working on getting rid of the death grip , but even when I force myself to relax with the hold, I still have hands go to sleep.

Two other solutions I am planning on using are:
1. Carburator Synchronization, which I believe is not going to help me much because the bike runs as smooth as butter when out of the 5-6K range.

2. Handle Bar Lower Holder Plate Rubber Cushion replacement - the actual cushions are shown in the "steering stem" diagram ( clymer manual or online parts search), but are used for the Handle Bar Lower Holder Plate. These I believe, by Suzuki design supposed to dampen additional engine vibration and work together with the weights on the end of the handle bars. If they are worn out or over tighten, by my opinion they may contribute to the excessive vibration. There are total of 4 rubber cushions, they go for about $15 a piece, I think thats a bit too pricey for some rubber bushings, so I may try to find home made alternatives.

I am determined to make my rides enjoyable. Will keep you posted. 

Ehh.. all GSs vibrate a good bit between 5 and 6K.. that's just what they do. Good luck though, let us know what works!

Things to check:
When was the last valve adjustment done?
Engine oil level

Counter-balancer?  Counter-balancer bearings?

Yeah, if those rubber cushions harden...

Otherwise, vibration is normal: http://gstwins.com/gsboard/index.php?topic=6177.msg50842#msg50842

When I first got my GS I found the same problem.  After riding for an hour or two my hands were numb or had that weird vibrate-ey feeling when you tap them on things.  I don't get that anymore even after much longer rides.  I am 99% sure that the feeling was the result of the death grip.  Now I take the time to sit up and stretch along the road or stop for breaks.  I also concentrate on keeping a relaxed grip on the bars.  It works miracles.

You are new and I dont doubt its death-grip syndrome. I had it with my first bike and that was a 50cc 2-stroke single... 30mph tops. Any of the other listed potential problems would cause /engine/handling/noise/braking/performance issues which you havent mentioned. There is no need to grip the bars as tight as you can, just loosen up and relax and let your hands particularly your thumbs fall naturally on the grips and levers, try leaning back a bit and take the weight off your wrists and put more body weight down through the pegs. The levers will adjust slightly relative to the bars, try moving them down and away from you slightly, this may help.You will find a comfortable riding position comes naturally with experience.

Guys,

I appreciate the feedback.

My engine is perfectly fine within any other ranges of RPMs.
I took the advice, relaxed, found a comfortable riding position and now hands a rarely go to sleep. 
How ever, just because I am new does not mean I am a complete retard.   
I can definitely recognize a harmonic oscillation frequency of the engine. If a significant vibration occurs between 5-6K, I don't care what any body says, but this vibration is not normal.
I believe there was some kind of thought process between those Suzuki engineers, they did not just slap this bike together from scap parts just to have a low end model available.
The stock handle bar weights are sufficient to supress all vibration the twin can produce under normal operation.
I have reworked the mounting of the handle bar weights with excellent results.
If you are familiar, the is a rubber bushing piece in each end that is  squeezed on the main bolt between to washes tightened by two nuts. These guys wear out as you ride. They may appear tight whey you tighten them, but they don't do the job.
I aquired new rubber pieces that are significantly longer than the originals. I removed the nuts on the outside, and basically squeeze the rubber piece between the bar weight and the inside nut/washer. This provides no space for the bar weight to move at all. when you completely tighten this up, the bar weights are totaly solid with the bar and you can not feel any shifting/movement or flex due to rubber bushing in them.
The vibration on the bars is gone to less than 5%. To me that is almost undetectable.

This is my experience and I am just sharing my solution with the community.
I hope my method works also for somebody else with the same issue.

Cheers.

i agree with everything written previously, and for me, the majority of it was "death grip" and wrong handlebar shape. i've since fixed both of those.

but something i noticed on my gs that also causes a buzz at 5-6 k---loose gauges. my gauges are ever so slightly loose from worn rubber cushions. causes a buzz when i get up to speed that i feel right in the handlebars. hands didn't stop buzzing for 1/2 an hour afterward!

Hey guys,

I just finished installing my Bike Master Super Bars. However, I am stumped on how to get the weights out of the stock handle bars to place them into the new bars. What tool is required? I never had any caps on the ends of the stock bars. The weights have a machined hole in them, so some kind of tool is required, I just don't know which one.

What are these bushings you keep talking about? Is it where the handlebars are attached to the bike with the 4 hexagonal nuts, or are they on the end of the bars?

Thanks

I'm having a similar vibe problem.  Bar-end weights are not really an option for me as I have CRG style bar end mirrors.  It seems to be far worse on the right hand side as it is my right hand that falls asleep.  Today I went out for a 50 mile ride and it was almost painful.

What should I do given that weights aren't really an option?

Chilly

Loosen your death grip. To me, the right hand going more numb = death grip on the throttle.

It's not related to death grip (that was my initial hypothesis too)--I've tried keeping a light/open hand on the throttle.  The right side genuinely vibrates far more than the left side. 

Chilly

bump--I've adjusted my chain, wheels are new--still, mega vibration.