| Author |
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Xbolt12
| | Posted on Thursday, February 17, 2005 - 11:48 pm: | 
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So I get back to the office yesterday after doing a little lunch ride. Coming away from a light accelerating hard, banged 2nd (with the clutch) and she pulls a nice crossed-up wheelie, blipped it 5 or 6 times (100+ feet and 50 + mph?) but I too chickened out on the 3rd gear shift, so I dropped it just before redline and pull into work and my phones ringing. I answer and it's my wife. Seems I'm busted because she was coming down the hill on the other side of the street-oooops!
xbolt12 |
Dilysi73
| | Posted on Thursday, February 17, 2005 - 11:58 pm: |
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What advise would you give a new bueller and a fairly unex. rider on how to learn wheelies? I love my bike (as I'm sure we all do) so I'm a bit nervous about trying stunts.
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Kccyclone
| | Posted on Friday, February 18, 2005 - 12:38 am: |
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Dil, the best advise is don't do it, but we all know thats not realistic. If your skill level isn't there, I would recommend buying a cheap POS, or a fiddy to practice on. Look at any stunters bike and you'll see they all go down. |
Vikingdave
| | Posted on Friday, February 18, 2005 - 07:43 am: |
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Spatten1, I weigh 2 hunnd have a xb9s and the bike pulls first gear roll on wheelies. My technique is to roll er up to about 5 thou, chop throttle closed, wait for forks to begin rebound and WACK IT! (keep foot over rear brake to prevent unwanted mess in pants. LOL) As far as clutch use goes one should be able to wheelie anything using the clutch. My friend pulls awesome clutch wheelies on his H-D garbage wagon FL bagger. The citizens really go wild for the unexpected bagger wheelies!!! |
Reepicheep
| | Posted on Friday, February 18, 2005 - 09:06 am: |
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Don't do it is completely realistic advice. Lots of people don't.
The reality is that if you spend a lot of time doing this kind of stuff, you are running a pretty good chance that you will watch the bike go tumbling down the road in front of you at some point.
I'm talking about the gratitous "ride a wheelie" thing. The "front wheel comes about 9 inches off the ground on a hard accleration in second" is probably a lot lower risk.
I could do them pretty consistently on a borrowed Honda XR250 on the dirt. You can get a used KLR-650 for under $2000, and have a great wheelie machine for practice and a great dual sport as well. Buy it, ride it for a year and get good at wheelies (preferably on the dirt, it won't hurt as much) and sell it for about what you paid for it.
It's hard to imagine looping an XB and doing less then $1000 worth of damage. |
Wheelsleaning
| | Posted on Friday, February 18, 2005 - 11:00 am: |
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In my opinion, the XB is the easiest bike to learn wheelies on (and the most fun). It is extreemly confidence inspiring. I never need to touch the rear brake in a wheelie because the engine has such resistance when you let off throttle. Just take it one step at a time. Each time just get the tire up a little higher until you are comfortable with the one wheel experience. You have a higher risk if you're nervous. Oh, and don't play with second gear until you are comfy with the unicycle ride. The higher speeds are a bit more complicated. |
Spatten1
| | Posted on Friday, February 18, 2005 - 11:30 am: |
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Viking, I can wheelie 1st easy, I'm just struggling to pull it up in second gear. 1st revs out pretty quickly, and I just want to carry it longer, problem is, I've never been comfortable shifting with the front high.
My personal mission this summer will be to get to the balance point in second. |
Spike
| | Posted on Friday, February 18, 2005 - 01:25 pm: |
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My XB12R and my M2 would both power up in 1st and occasionally would power up in 2nd if the conditions are right, but I find that clutching it up in 2nd gear is more predictable and controllable. The reason being is that it takes a lot more power to get the bike up to the balance point than it does to keep the bike at the balance point. Using the clutch to take advantage of the flywheel weight gives you a "burst" of power that gets the bike up to the balance point. Once you're up there you don't need much throttle to keep it there, so you really want to be as possible with the throttle. You'll really have to practice getting a feel for the balance point and how much throttle you need to keep it up.
I started out doing them when shifting to 2nd on my M2. At first I would just let the front end come up a little bit and hold the throttle until the front end came down, but I gradually started letting the front end get higher and riding them out a bit farther. Eventually I started letting them get high enough that I had to roll off the throttle to get them to come back down. Once you get to that point you start getting a feel for the balance point. At that point you can also start adding a lot of distance because you're not accelerating at wide open throttle. From there it's mostly practice. You've got to calibrate your internal "bank angle sensor" to your throttle hand. On the M2 I was getting pretty good at it. I could pick it up on a 1-2 shift and walk it all the way through 2nd and set it down just after shifting into 3rd gear. I was just getting to the point that I could keep it at the balance point in 3rd when I sold the M2. I have to admit, it's scary setting the front end down at well over 80mph. I haven't been as brave with the XB, probably because it was twice the price. 
One more thing- buy a 50! 
Mike L.
'04 XB12R
'99 Z50R |
Vikingdave
| | Posted on Friday, February 18, 2005 - 02:59 pm: |
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Spatten1, I have same problem transfering up to 2nd, always seem to run out of road, and/or my coconuts become peanuts. Practice makes perfect they say...I'll let you know how I progress. |
M1combat
| | Posted on Friday, February 18, 2005 - 04:13 pm: |
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Practice makes permanent... Don't practice wrong . |
Oneway
| | Posted on Friday, February 18, 2005 - 09:20 pm: |
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am i doin this right? |
Navygunner
| | Posted on Friday, February 18, 2005 - 09:36 pm: |
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No. The picture is fuzzy. |
Duff24
| | Posted on Saturday, February 19, 2005 - 12:26 pm: |
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...and your eyes are closed!! get on the right side of the road!  |
Oneway
| | Posted on Saturday, February 19, 2005 - 04:56 pm: |
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twice the rush on the wrong side blind curve eyes closed |
Dilysi73
| | Posted on Tuesday, February 22, 2005 - 02:58 am: |
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Well I finally got the nerve to try a roll on wheelie, I did like Vikingdave said, had the rpms around 4500-5000 blipped it waited for the forks to rebound and rolled the throttle all the way back. She pulled the front tire up a bit(2 1/2- 3 feet) tried it a couple more times and got a great one up. it helped alot with my confidence about trying it and trusting the bike.
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