Shifting Gears Episode 9

Dave

So Ken, this week on winging it I want to talk about rider comfort… how many kilometers do you have on this bike?

Ken

Over a hundred and sixty thousand on this one.

Dave

How much did you have on your last one?

Ken

Like two seventy, two eighty.

Dave

Okay so you’ve learned a few things over the years in terms of comfort for yourself, right?

Ken

Yeah.

Dave

What are some of the things you’ve done to this particular wing to make things a little more comfortable on the open road?

Ken

Well the first thing might not seem comfort but it is for me if it involves safety.  The convex mirrors that I ended up putting on there was just an awareness thing.  When you’re surrounded by traffic, especially when you get in town, you don’t always get a chance to do a shoulder check , but those little convex mirrors let you know that somebody’s there that the regular mirror wouldn’t do.  So I put those on on all my vehicles.

Dave

Right.

Ken

Again, another air deflector is found immediately below that’s more about what the driver needs.  I can direct that in right at me and not influence the co-rider at all.

Dave

Right.

Ken

Moving farther down, when you’re on the open road and you want to change your feet position, highway boards, highway pegs, whatever you want to call them, are out there, just to give you a change in your ergonomic style.

Dave

Right and those will fold up should you decide to do some hotter turning in some corners.

Ken

Yeah and if you want to go play with the skids in the corners you fold them up and it gives you a lot more cornering clearance then they do in their present position.

Dave

How about you, just your standard foot peg.

Ken

The standard ones aren’t that much bigger but they are larger than OEM and it’s sort of like, on a long ride, if your foot is on a narrow point pivoting, that can become tiresome on the arch of your foot.  If you broaden it just a bit, it makes it that much more comfortable – then you can move a little more without your foot falling off the surface all together.

Dave

Moving up even further, I see you’ve got your outlets there for your heated vest etc.

Ken

Yeah, there’s a number of reasons for people to do this.  I use them for both a vest, it’s also my plug in point for my battery charging in the off season or any other appliance that I want to quick connect at twelve volts.

Dave

And then finally I see that you’ve added after market grips.

Ken

You know, they’re always trying to make the bikes comfortable for everybody and then you put in your own personal touch.  I liked a bigger grip and these are much more rubber cushioned then OEM grips and that vibration, that texture of the road, can be annoying if you’re out there for a long time.  So this really cushioned it and these two can be retrofitted to be heated at the same time.

Dave

Very nice.  So all in all, what I see here is a lot of flexibility.  You’ve added things that give you flexibility so you can move your body around, you’re not getting stiff, you’re not getting cramped and then you’re doing more things to isolate yourself from vibration.  All these things that tire you out when you’re out on the road for a full day.

Ken

That’s right and some will apply to some people and some will use a derivative of it. But anyone who’s out there long term typically does a little tweaking on their own.

Dave

Very nice, great job Ken.

Ken

Thank-you.