Almost wiped out this morning!!!

So,I'm cruisin' in to work this morning and the VFR is running 1000% loving the cold dense morning air and makin' tons of power.
I roll on a hefty dose of throttle in 1st from a stop sign and the front end lofts up gracefully about a foot in the air.
Anyway.when the front wheel touches down she shakes like crazy and scares the poop out of me!!!
I had visions of youtube videos goin thru my head where the guy rides his head-shaking bike right into the weeds,or the wall,or the curb or whatwver.
The shake solved itself in a couple of seconds and I continued to work without incident.
I am wondering:
What causes this? It's the first time this has ever happened to me.
What if anything should a rider do to control or stop this?
Does this head shake usually end in a wipe-out or does it usually solve itself?
Please dont call me a squid...I wasn't really trying to pull a catwalk or huge wheelie,it just came up and I brought 'er down as gently as I could.

Any insight or advice is greatly appreciated!!!

 

Glad you pulled it out. That would make me shite as well. I got to feel the back end corner slide the other day. Stupid tar-in-road cracks kept grabbin the tire as I was rounding a 40mph curve at about 65. Good thing the VFR is yellow cuz I wet myself.

 

When you loft the front end, as you bring it back down, make sure you're slowly transitioning your weight forward. The bike naturally transfers the CG backward when you roll on the gas so you should transfer your weight forward to compensate. That's why you always see the racers on TV hunched down onto the tank.

KC-10 FE out...
lane: :usa2:

 

When you have a front end wobble DON'T roll off the throttle. The wobble harmonics eventually cancel out. When exiting slower corners under hard throttle bikes can sometimes gets into shaking the bars back and forth a bit. Worst response is to back out of the throttle; When you do, the wobble gets a lot worse in a hurry. Stay on it. It'll calm down. Track bikes wobble and slide around all the time. You might want to check the preload on your steering head bearings, and also the tire pressure up front, and the condition of your front tire.

 

I didn't have gas until after the pigskin burger at lunch (burger, thinly sliced ham, pepper-jack cheese), or was it the Coors light? or the tree pollen?

shakes suck, but you have some more confidence now that you've been through it that the VFR wants to keep going, not kill you.

I've had the front end wobble turning left at a cross-thru on a divided highway... the crown of the highway I cross can leave the front end light, if not off the ground during the turn and it is exciting when it settles back down. I have more confidence and stay smoother the more make that turn...

 

All good advice. Only thing I can add is make sure the wheel is straight as possible when you set down. Glad you made it through alright. I've never got the head to shake on the VFR but have had it happen on a friend's R1, pretty scary stuff.

Action

 

He is from Winnipeg....land of the 1/4 mile wide potholes in the spring. Glad you pulled out of it. You live in the neighbourhood of lots of big cemeteries don't you?

 

Do you think you may have been applying the front brake before the wheel came down?

I've only ever had my front end come up once (on accident), I was slowing down before going into a ditch (probably not the best description) on the other side of the intersection, the impact of the bump made me blip the throttle and then let go of the clutch too fast, that combined with the steep incline picked my front wheel off. I quickly applied the rear brake, which brought down the front end way too fast, all the while I had my hand on the front brake, which locked and slid out for a foot before I let go.

Lesson learned,

 

Front tire is not turning at the same speed as the increasing speed of the rear, kind of like a airplane landing. First reaction is to let off gas which transfers weight forward which makes it shake worse. You have to unnaturally get on gas and shift your weight rearward, at least this has been my experience.

 

Thanks for the feedback and encouragement,fellas!
To answer a few questoins that came up:
I do believe I landed 'er in a groove as this was an asphalt road and had quite the traffic groove.
Yes the wheel was slightly off center when I landed.
I landed her fairly gently (No balls smacked the tank this time)
Tire pressure was good and tire is a new Z6.
NO brakes were applied,no throttle was applied no inputs were applied by me at all.I just hung on loosely and let it do its thing.This is not due to my incredible riding experience but due to the fact that I didn't know what to do so I didn't do anything.

This just caught me by surprise because I have done some sloppy wheelies (slapping balls on tank,and landing with front wheel pretty far off center)in the past and the bike has always corrected my ham fisted mistakes.This was a pretty tame little flight and I was quite surprised when she almost threw me off!!!

Oh yeah,RANDY,
Yes,there are BIG cemetaries:rip: on Main st. just north of town,and I'm a couple of miles north of those.

P.S.
Finally enjoying great weather here in the prairies!!!:biggrin:

 

Sometimes doing nothing is the right thing to do. Glad you were able to hang on. Ride'm cowboy!!!

 

It snowed here today dammit:smow: :frown: And threatening to in the morning. Have to take the Battle Ship HMCS GMC Sierra to work in the morning.:rant: