marauder@fluke.UUCP (Bill Landsborough) (02/29/84)
Date: Tue, 28 Feb 84 16:28:15 pst From: marauder (Bill Landsborough) Subject: Re: rain grooves; not so groovy... References: <1034@proper.UUCP> Welcome to the world of discrimination against motorcycles! It seems when ever laws are enacted regarding vehicles, bikes get the shaft. (No pun intended) Rain grooves will not do any real damage on a straight road but I would be cautious if you encounter rain grooves in a HARD turn. You don't want the point of tire contact moving side to side while cornering. Changing tire pressure (lower)will help reduce the wiggle but is not recommended since you will now affect other things with too low of tire pressure. A tires profile will alter the effects of rain grooves. A " V " shaped tire looking from the front or the rear of the motorcycle is more prone to wiggle than a " U " shaped tire. And a worn out " U " shaped tire will wiggle even less. Your Ascot 500 is more susceptible to rain grooves than my GPZ 1100 which is more susceptible than a Harley Electra-Glide. In closing I recommend doing what millions have learned to do, ignore it and go with the flow. Hang on to the handlebars more firm than normal but avoid the "white knuckle death grip" or you'll have nothing left in a mile or so. Have fun with the Ascot. They look like fun. Bill Landsborough
tiberio@seismo.UUCP (Mike Tiberio) (03/01/84)
What, you mean you haven't learned to deal with the dreaded rain grooves. Here is the straight poop. As mentioned in previous submissions, tires with straight tread and no bias can cause nasty wobbles on grooves (and steel grate bridges for that matter). Now everone knows that riding across the grooves at a bias will abate the wobbles. So what I do while I'm riding over the grooves is to simply steer back and forth within my lane, introducing a bias (except at each apex of my sine wave path). This will cure the wobbles even with Continental Tires (by far the worst I have ever used). By the way Pirelli Phantoms are very good on grooves. ty