Chalo Colina wrote:
Zebee Johnstone wrote:
Chalo wrote:
queried about how they did it, they would say things like "you gotta
get your weight back and go real easy on the handlebars", or some
variation thereof. Which, oddly enough, is almost exactly the same
advice I have heard from recumbent riders when they offer their wisdom
about keeping the rubber side down.
Ah, so when people tell you that a particular style of bike has
certain requirements due to geometry, you won't ride that way so it's
the bike's fault.

Funny really. When I've ridden an off road motorcycle I find that if
you ride it as it's supposed to be ridden it works a lot better than
riding it as though it's a roadracer.

Who'd have thought that the lack of an engine completely negates that.
Learn something every day.

So, what then is the correct approach for riding a Kawasaki H1
triple? I assume its reputation for treacherous handling must be the
result of folks riding it in a way it was not intended to be ridden.

How about a Triumph chopper with 24" over forks? Surely there must be
a way to tease the sweet handling qualities out of a bike like that.

I have built and ridden a lot of crazy machines, some of which handled
relatively well and others of which were challenging. I'll reiterate
for your benefit: Many bikes _can_ be ridden that are actually no
good at all for the task, at any speed, with any rider. Techniques
for coping with them are, well, coping. There is such a thing as
plain terrible handling and most, perhaps all, 'bents seem to have
it.

The only real technique needed for a decently designed recumbent that
fits the rider is relaxing and not over-controlling the bike. The BikeE
is one of the easiest designs to ride.

Even on my lowracers where the combined bike-rider center of mass has to
move through a much shorter arc for a given lean angle than that of a
more standard recumbent or an upright is easy to ride after a hilly
century on a hot day when I suffering from heat exhaustion and
functioning mentally at a much lower state than normal.

To keep beating a necessary point, I can not think of single stock
production recumbent that is designed for a rider of Chalo's height and
weight. It is simply not economical to build a regular production
bicycle to fit people in the 99.9999th percentile of size.

--
Tom Sherman - Holstein-Friesland Bovinia
“Mary had a little lamb / And when she saw it sicken /
She shipped it off to Packingtown / And now it’s labeled chicken.”