The Binary Circumstance

I took the Ninja out a couple of times today and ventured a little further than I did yesterday.

When I first started the bike up yesterday and put it into first gear it stalled even though the clutch lever was pulled all the way into the handle bars and the kickstand was up. (There’s a switch in the kickstand to prevent you from putting it into gear with the kickstand down and the engine running.)

It stalled several times. That happened again this afternoon before I took it out for a ride.

I figured from my experience with stick-shift vehicles that somehow it thought the clutch was engaged or the kickstand switch was bad. It finally went into gear without stalling but it makes a pronounced sound when it does go into first gear, even slightly lurching forward.

On my first ride today I made couple of turns and got out onto a slightly busier street. By busier I mean a car comes along very minute or so. I wasn’t so good on the turns and felt that I was not completely in control. I was getting good at shifting on straight sections of road, both up and down, but I’m still having trouble knowing which gear I’m in.

The thing about turning on a motorcycle is that it’s not done like a car or bike. It’s done by leaning. When you lean the bike turns. The more you lean, the more you turn. This does not feel comfortable to me. You also should downshift the gears before turning to slow down going into the turn. As you turn, you should give it some gas to keep from going too slow. If you go too slow, your lean turns into a fall.

I was not very good at the turns and almost ran off the road a couple of times because I was going too wide. Fortunately, there was never any traffic around when that happened.

I felt more comfortable on the motorcycle this time than I did yesterday, especially with shifting gears.

I looked in the manual when I got home because I still wondered why the bike had stalled when when I put it into first after starting it. I also had noticed both yesterday and today that I had to let the clutch lever out almost all the way before it would engage. That seemed too loose.

The manual stated how much play should be in the clutch lever and my lever had about twice as much play as the manual stated. It explained a couple of easy steps to adjust it which I did. When I started the bike this evening and put it into first, it didn’t stall. It still made a pronounced click as it went into first gear but it didn’t lurch forward. So I think the clutch adjustment helped. I’ll call the place where I bought it tomorrow to see what they have to say about it.

It’s kind of cool how you can perform some of these adjustments yourself on the bike without too much difficulty.

This evening’s run took me up a portion of Madison Ave. N. where I was almost guaranteed to have other traffic and I did. I turned off into a school parking lot which allowed me to execute a turn again and also use the turn signals. Once again my turn was too wide. I also noticed, as I did on other turns that I instinctively put my leg out to catch myself. The instruction booklets that I’ve read make it clear that you should keep your knees up against the gas tank.

Of course, putting your leg out is only going to shift the weight and make it more likely that you’ll fall down while leaning. It’s going to take some practice getting used to leaning, speeding up if necessary while in the turn, and keeping the center of gravity close to the center of the bike rather than putting my leg out.

An irritating thing about the turn signals is that they don’t go off automatically. You have to manually turn them off, which so far I have always forgetten to do, and that’s if I remember to turn them on in the first place.

I stalled at a stop sign with cars behind me but was able to get up and running again without too much of a problem.

The fastest that I went the entire time was about 30 miles per hour and that felt really fast to me. I’m sure the cars behind me thought I was going really slow. Oh well, too bad.

I made another turn that was too wide (fortunately, there was nobody coming in the oncoming lane). I was probably also in too high a gear because the motor sputtered as I came out of the turn and gave it some gas. That’s what happens if you take a turn in too high a gear with a manual tranmission car. Once again, not knowing which gear I was in gave me problems.

In all, they were too pretty successful runs. I was definitely a lot better than I was my first time out. The bike now has seven miles on the odometer.

I’m really eager to take the MSF class next week to learn some of these skills from a professional instructor. I don’t think I’m going to feel confident enough to venture out into traffic or go up and down some of the steep hills around here until after I’ve been through the class. I also need to be careful not to develop bad habits on my own by driving too much before taking the class.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, September 7th, 2006 at 8:07 pm and is filed under Motorcycling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a reply.

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