I scraped the left footboard really hard Friday afternoon and it scared the hell outta me. I rode a Suzuki Bandit 1200 and had both pegs ground down so I don't need to prove anything more to myself. Besides.....th sound is horrific. It's like turbo charged fingernails on a chalk board! SUCKS.

 

Since 1956 I have had 36 bikes and 100's of thousands of miles riding. Never scraped a peg/footboard. Better yet never an accident with a bike. I wonder if there is a correlation?

 

That's good to hear. I take curves 15 over, most of the time. And I never scrape. How fast are guys that scrape going?

 

I know some people are going to leap on their soap boxes after I say this, but just remember, we all are into riding from different backgrounds and get enjoyment from it in different ways. I just want to put a word in on the side of those who like the thrill of riding a bit faster. I've ridden with guys who can ride their Harleys even faster than I do and still feel in control.

As many of you have, I'm sure, I've ridden a lot of bikes. Each one is different, of course, and some scrape so easily, that is at such low lean angles that I couldn't help but shoot sparks, the Yamaha V-Star comes to mind, as well as the Honda VTX. On the BMW's I've ridden my toes were touching pavement before any part of the bike.
Personally, I ride my Harleys as much like sport bikes as I can manage. It's just the way I have fun, so I've scraped through two sets of foot boards on the Ultra, and several sets of pegs, many muffler mounting bolts and a fair bit of the frame on the Springer. I've always felt that on my bikes the scraping is a warning that I shouldn't lean the bike over any further, but it doesn't scare me.
About a two years ago, a couple guys from our club went to a track day to see what they could learn about going even faster in the corners on our bikes. They passed on to me some practices that allow me to lean my body more and bike less and thus take the corners at good speed with a bigger safety margin. So now, when I scrape it reminds me that I'm not practicing good technique.
I'm 54 and I do feel it takes me longer to get loose on the road than it did when I was young and invincible. I can feel that day coming when I'll have to back off in order to feel as safe as I do currently when riding the twisties fast.

 

Since when is scraping pegs/boards such a bad thing? There's nothing wrong with pushing yourself or the bike. That's one of the ways we become better riders. And, I don't care about the cruiser, touring, sport bike labels. Bikes are built to be leaned over,and ridden hard if we choose regardless of what class they are labeled as.

With all due respect to the women on the board (most of whom probably ride better than the guys), where has everyone's testosterone gone?

Riding is supposed to be fun and a little exciting. Aside from the few who do it as their sole means of transportation, isn't that why most of us ride in the first place?

I'd write more but I'm running late for my manicure/pedicure appointment.

 

i used to scrape my exhaust when my bike was stock, but now i've moved some stuff around, never scrape.
In other words, my scraping was a limitation of the pieces on the bike - not the bike.
I imagine footboards are pretty easy to get into the bitumen

 

Yeah, this.

 

+1 Ditto! Anymore I stay within my limits but know both of my bikes limits. I have my hands full enough watchin out for the distracted cell phone users, the guy or gal in a race to the next red light, the person cutting me off so they can get a one or two second jump ahead of me or the older peeps whom I can't even see the tops of their heads sometimes. All IMHO

All that money peed out the window..

 

Not a floorboard scrape but my pipes scrapped my first ride on a Dyna WG took me a minuet to figure out what actually hit. I was going about 30 ish on an on ramp

 

Got nothing to do with speed. Just how much of a man you are.