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getting out of a tight parking spot

crank1000 said:
This may be a dumb question, but how are you guys parking that you need to lift your bike off the ground to turn it? I am just having trouble imagining that situation. Sorry if that sounds daft.
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parking lots, garages, tight spaces when parking
 
GhostRider510 said:
parking lots, garages, tight spaces when parking
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I gathered that. I'm just saying I've been in several garages and tiny parking spaces and never felt the need to levitate the vehicle to exit. Are we talking parallel parking? Just a standard parking garage? Do your parking garages have like 3ft wide roads?
 
I've done it on most japanese bikes.

But the one on my 03 r6 looks so weak and puny that I'm wondering when it will break.

Hasn't yet. So I'll keep going. If the bike tries to fall, I'll try my best to stop it.

haha.
 
I've seen mechanics and salespeople do this many times in different shops. I do it myself once and a while. Another trick is to dead lift the rear end of your bike or yank on the rear end and move it over. It's too hard to lift a bike by the front end because the forks will flop over. If you have a little scooter or 250 ninja, just pick that sucker right up. :p
 
Probably not a good idea. The kick stand is designed to support some small part of the weight of the bike. And not to be twisted while it's doing so. Putting most of the bike's weight on the stand and then twisting and torquing the stand is abuse in my book. Do it at your own risk. If the stand itself breaks you risk bike damage, damage to you, and a new stand. If the mount on the frame get's broken or tweaked, that gets even more expensive.

Look at it this way. Yes it can be cool to do. But like removing bottle caps with your teeth, it's not a smart thing to do.
 
How many people would actually admit that they damaged their bike because they tried this and the kickstand broke. :laughing

With all of the efforts to reduce weight, I would not at all be surprised if they have lightened up the kickstand quite a bit over the last 5 or so years. This could very well mean that the kickstand is no longer as over-engineered as it was in the past. There is a huge weight difference between the weight from a leaning bike and the majority of the weight of the bike on the kickstand. In addition, it would be designed as a compression member so if you're putting the kickstand at an angle you could be putting several magnitudes of shear stress on the kickstand than the engineers designed it for.

So, the real question here is whether or not you can afford to pay for the damage easily if a part that isn't designed for such a maneuver breaks while you're doing it. ;)

Just my :2cents
 
Its part of my normal garage parking technique at home with my DRZ do to space constraints. Must have done it 100 times by now, still no issue with it.
 
reynolds_brad said:
Its part of my normal garage parking technique at home with my DRZ do to space constraints. Must have done it 100 times by now, still no issue with it.
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Should be no prob to do it with such a light bike. But with a heavier bigger bike
your taking a big chance.
 
LIKE MENTIONED PRIOR DO NOT DO THIS ON ANY DUCATI . Except for the Engine and the suspension (bolted to the frame), EVERYTHING IS BOLTED to the MOTOR.

My old bike had a micro crack develop next to the kickstand from the stress load of the kickstand. Probably a factory defect that got amplified with this design.

I see people sit on their bikes with the kickstand down and spin them around. Neither is recommended on a DUCATI! Learn your lesson from my bad luck or regret it later..
 
Okie dokie... won't be doing it anymore. Maybe I'll look into the tail swinger timsar4 pointed out.

edit... Damn, looks like they don't sell tail swingers anymore :(
 
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Why don't you just back the bike in or back it out? :wtf
 
i do this only when necessary, it just doesnt feel right
 
Traq said:
Why don't you just back the bike in or back it out? :wtf
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I've got a (barely) 2-car garage that holds my car, my girlfriend's car, and two bikes. I kinda have to shoe-horn those things in there to make it all fit. The garage is just wide enough to accommodate both cars, so the only wiggle room I have is front to back. The Duc goes up against the back wall as close as possible with my car in front of it. The girlfriend's car gets pulled in as far as it can go and my SV sits between her back bumper and the garage door (easy access because I commute on it). Ya know what... here's a crummy MS Paint drawing of what I've got to work with.

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So... since it's pretty well established that pivoting on the kickstand isn't such a great idea, does anybody have any suggestions? Or should I just get some swivel castors and some plywood to make a little cart to shuttle the bike around?
 
:thumbup

I do this all the time - sometimes when parking on the street - it can save the hassle of backing in.

As others have said some stands are flimsy - the one on my R1 is OK :teeth
 
jhawksteele said:
I've got a (barely) 2-car garage that holds my car, my girlfriend's car, and two bikes. I kinda have to shoe-horn those things in there to make it all fit. The garage is just wide enough to accommodate both cars, so the only wiggle room I have is front to back. The Duc goes up against the back wall as close as possible with my car in front of it. The girlfriend's car gets pulled in as far as it can go and my SV sits between her back bumper and the garage door (easy access because I commute on it). Ya know what... here's a crummy MS Paint drawing of what I've got to work with.

untitled.jpg


So... since it's pretty well established that pivoting on the kickstand isn't such a great idea, does anybody have any suggestions? Or should I just get some swivel castors and some plywood to make a little cart to shuttle the bike around?
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Why don't you just park next to your car on the passenger side? That's how I had my R1 in my two car garage. I still maintain that I've never been in a situation that I felt I needed to do some crazy acrobatics to park or un-park my bike.
 
Have we had enough warnings yet that Ducatis bolt their sidestands directly to the aluminum engine cases and you can crack that if you try it? I know of several cracked engine cases from trying to pivot on the sidestand.

With that out of the way, last Saturday I had a reason to pivot my Ducati in a parking space. I was at the Ace Motorsports demo ride and big party on Saturday and we were parked two deep and two across in the car spaces. I started out behind someone, but left the ignition unlocked so that my bike could be moved if they needed to get out when I was on a test ride. After the third ride, my bike was pulled all the way in, which was fine with me. But later I needed to get out and would have had to roll forward and back about six times each to get the bike aimed properly to get through the gap. Since my bike has a centerstand, I lifted it onto it then tilted the bike slightly to one side and rotated around the left "foot" of the centerstand. No chance of damaging anything with that move, and I was now aimed for an easy exit.
 
Remember, if you bugger up the mount on the frame, you're looking at some welding. That will fuck up any paint that might be on there. And it will also be difficult to properly temper that area of the frame again. Park intelligently and carefully and you should never need to pivot the bike on the stand.
 
jhawksteele said:
A couple years back, I saw a guy at Sears Point get his bike out of a tight parking spot by dropping the kickstand, pulling the bike back up onto it, and pivoting around the stand. Ever since then, that's what I've been doing if there's not enough room to turn around. The thought occurs to me, however, that if the kickstand were to bend or break, I'd suddenly have 400 lbs crashing down on me. Is this an irrational fear? Does anybody know of a kickstand failing because of putting the entire weight of a bike on it?
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Happens quite often....but it depends on how cool you are. If you are uber cool, have all the blingyest bling on the bike, all your gear is color coordinated and brand new, and you spend more time at *$'s or the wall posing than you do riding the damn thing, then it is sure to never break. Doing that kickstand spin is teh coolness. :|
 
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