Heavy Steering?

Just picked up a 1999 on Friday. Today I put 200 miles on it and I noticed that it has heavy steering in comparison to my friends gen 4. Is this normal for the Gen 5? My buddy and I traded for a few miles and he thought my bike was hard to turn left. I had to hang off the bike to get it to hold a line through a corner. Wanting some feedback on this. (Recorded this today 10-28-2012) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLdnW7oBfso&feature=player_embedded

 

Worn tires?

My last set had the center worn down due to a long daily commute and a broke owner. It required lots of effort to get it to lean.

 

Front has about 50% and nicely rounded. Rear now has 230 miles on it. tire pressure was set at the beginning 32 front and 40 rear. Also if I try to ride without hands it goes ever so slightly to the right. Could my forks be twisted or bent?

 

slight run off to the right is normal do to crown of the road. I would check how easily the front end turns with the front end off the ground.

 

The obvious stuff to check first would be air pressure in the tires, and the steering head. Is the steering head tightened too tight? are the bearings any good?. A few other things will affect the steering, tire profile, ride height/spring sag and rake and trail. Do you know if the PO did any suspension modifications to the bike? Did they perhaps lower the forks into the triple clamps? (i.e. less fork showing above triple clamp) Flip/change the rear suspension triangle? i.e. lowering the rear without changing the front to match.

Rake and trail is one place that you can really change a bikes attitude without spending a dime. I would see if you can look up the specs on the ride height and verify that the bike is set at the stock settings. But first I would check the front end for any issues. Bent/crooked forks, steering head bearings, steering head tightness. One other thing to check, in regards to your pulling issue, is whether the front and rear tires are straight and aligned, not only withing the forks/swing arm but to one another as well. This can affect your bikes straight line tractability, but on a typical US road with a high center crown, it will pull to the right some.

 

You are slightly under inflated with the tires, manual wants F36/R42.
When I bought my bike it had an old worn out front tire, and while it jerked to the right as soon as you took your hands off it still turned left without too much trouble. I agree with OOTVS you may want search for some issue that might be negatively affecting the steering.

 

+1

I normally run F40/R42 on the street. Bumping up the pressure on the front tire is easy so it's worth a shot. I don't think you will get a radical change with just 8psi though.

 

If some PO changed the headset bearings from balls to tapered rollers the steering would be a bit heavier than OEM. i agree with anyone who suggested trying higher tire pressure.

Heavy steering ?? I used to ride a '92 ZX-7, and it had farily hard steering, but the trade-off was the most stable and unperturbable front end i ever experienced. Awsome ! No VFR is even close to that stability.

 

When I took my VFR800 for its first test ride I noticed it felt the same way. It was a pig at low speed. Very heavy feeling. I took it back to the shop and checked the tire pressure and found about 26F/34R. I jacked it up to 34F/40R and it felt great.

 

Thanks for all the advice, guys. Here is a shot from our ride on Sunday.

 

I loosened the triples and the axle, shook it around and my diving to the right is better. I also added air pressure and upped the rear compression. Headed in the right direction.

 

Sent from my SPH-D710 using Tapatalk 2

 

Check the steering headset bearings ! It's Obvious.....imho.....

 

Did anyone suggest steering head bearings yet?

 

No - my GEN 3 flicks like a stilleto, but now I am lucky if I get a pinky toe down in turns :sad:

Cheers :thumbsup:

side bar, tyre pressure on all my stuff - 34 front / 36 rear

 

recorded the problem. It is not as bad since I raised the preload in the rear and messed with the forks. I think that just hid the problem tho.

1999 VFR800Fi Steering problem - YouTube