too cold for the fz1

Lonney

Lonney

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I took the yammi out for a ride yesterday when i left it was 51 degrees and sunny beatiful! when i left my friends house in jersey it was dark and 40 degrees wow what a difference i was freezing i had plenty of clothing but i was not prepared for the wind i was badly missing the windshield and fairing protection from my st1300 i wonder what the windchill is at 40 degrees doing 70 in the dark too cold there isnt many downfalls to this bike but cold weather seems to be one of them!


thawing out

Lonney
 
Lonney said:
I took the yammi out for a ride yesterday when i left it was 51 degrees and sunny beatiful! when i left my friends house in jersey it was dark and 40 degrees wow what a difference i was freezing i had plenty of clothing but i was not prepared for the wind i was badly missing the windshield and fairing protection from my st1300 i wonder what the windchill is at 40 degrees doing 70 in the dark too cold there isnt many downfalls to this bike but cold weather seems to be one of them!


thawing out

Lonney
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It's FREEZING!!!!!!!!
My moto is my every day driver so I stock up on QUALITY thermal gear during the off season. Your hands are what takes the worst beating. They are in direct impact with the wind. It can be brutal. You also freeze out on weird places like your neck. Most protective gear does not cover places like your neck.
Riding in the cold is definitely not as much fun. I know some hard core guys that brag about riding in cold weather and say that it's the same as any other riding. HAHAHA!!!! What a crock!!! :doh2:
 
Today is only going to get to the mid 40's for a high, but tomorrow will be in low 50's. It seems silly that 5-8 degrees can make that much difference, but I truly think it does. I'm on the fence about a ride today, but I fully intend to take one tomorrow regardless of whether I take a ride today or not.

I have some decent gloves that work down to about 40-50, so maybe that's why I set my limit there. I'll be putting the larger V-Stream windscreen on too. That really helps. :wilynily:
 
I just bought some glove liners to help out this winter. I also wear a neck warmer thing that I bought for snowboarding a few years ago, that helps a ton.

On the coldest days it is in the upper 40's for the ride to work, but normally back up near 60 by the time I head home.
 
well what gear are you wearing? proper gear keeps you from having this issue. my textiles are rated for below freezing but on top of that i have heated gear too because it's, well, soooo nice to be toasty n warm all the time haha
 
My FZ1 is my commuter. Unless there's ice or snow on the ground, I'll be riding it regardless of the temperature.

I built an extension for my factory windscreen by cutting up the lid of a big Sterline plastic tub. I painted it black and then used electrical tape to attach it. It looks pretty good, and is 17" tall. I did finally order an actual Givi Touring screen the other day, which has the same dimensions and won't look quite as Ghetto. But the difference is quite dramatic.

As for gear, heated gear is the answer. Do the wattage diet of HID headlights and LED signals and taillights and a headlight cut-off switch for one light. Then get the lower-wattage jacket (like FirstGear's 65W model) and add heated handgrips if you don't have them already. I'm going to order a pair of their heated gloves soon too (15W each) and use them in lieu of the handwarmers, or alternate between them as needed.

But between the heated liner and my heavy FirstGear Kilimanjaro jacket and liner and Tourmaster Caliber pants over top of jeans, I stay nice 'n toasty.

Rob
 
Lonney said:
I took the yammi out for a ride yesterday when i left it was 51 degrees and sunny beatiful! when i left my friends house in jersey it was dark and 40 degrees wow what a difference i was freezing i had plenty of clothing but i was not prepared for the wind i was badly missing the windshield and fairing protection from my st1300 i wonder what the windchill is at 40 degrees doing 70 in the dark too cold there isnt many downfalls to this bike but cold weather seems to be one of them!


thawing out

Lonney
Click to expand...

Always try to dress for the weather but over the years when I have been caught in the cold. I stop and buy a newspaper ! Slip that paper under your jacket across your chest and it makes a BIG difference. Keeping your chest/vital organs warm really helps.
 
I have managed to stay warm with gear and heated grips. The gear is all FirstGear with the Rainier jacket and cold weather pants. I have a neck gaiter and a balaclava. The boots are air-tight FirstGear and the gloves are the Rev-it H2O cold weather gloves. Adding the heated grips was what did it for me. My feet are always warm with those boots and if I can keep my hands warm, the rest of me stays comfortable.

It's not easy to stay warm on these bikes with so little wind protection and I've even gone to a worse situation by running with the CD medium screen.

I'm OK to about 35 degrees. Probably even lower but at 35, I'm more worried about the roads at night and black ice!!! So, if it will be much below 38 for the ride home, the bike stays in the garage that day.

I'm hoping to rectify this cold weather problem in the next year. ;)
 
RobG said:
As for gear, heated gear is the answer. Do the wattage diet of HID headlights and LED signals and taillights and a headlight cut-off switch for one light. Then get the lower-wattage jacket (like FirstGear's 65W model) and add heated handgrips if you don't have them already.
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Great suggestions! I'm running a Powerlet heated jacket liner and a set of Symtec heated grips. I haven't run a true meter on my wattage draw, but the liner is advertised at 105W and the grips are 36W (max). I was concerned about the power draw on my charging system, so I also installed a Heads Up Voltage monitor.

The bike handles the additional load just fine when both the grips and the jacket are on high. At idle, the monitor goes red (sometimes flashing if I'm sitting too long). At about 2500 RPMs or so, it goes solid green, indicating between 12.9 and 15.1 volts. Peak charging of the Gen II is documented at 565 Watts @ 5K RPM. All of that seems to indicate that I'm not going to run my battery down or overtax the system by staying comfortable.

I have to admit that I've been considering going with LEDs for the tail/brake and indicator lights. Removing the incandescent load would probably get me into the yellow at (or just above) idle.
 
It got close to 50 today, so I took a ride. I was too lazy to put the V-Stream windscreen on, I was sorry about 10 miles into the ride. :banghead: I only rode for about 40 minutes at a time. I love my Olympia gloves. They work well down to about 35-40. It is suspose to be warmer tomorrow, so I will be riding again. I hope to go a bit farther, and I will be changing windscreens.
 
I might consider heated grips and I really want to add a power outlet, but I'm afraid of screwing up the electrical system. I would like to get some 'bark busters' or some hand protectors just to block the wind from my hands. I think if I do just that in combination with my current gloves, my hands would be good to a much lower temp without heated grips or heated gear.
 
BDazzler said:
I might consider heated grips and I really want to add a power outlet, but I'm afraid of screwing up the electrical system. I would like to get some 'bark busters' or some hand protectors just to block the wind from my hands. I think if I do just that in combination with my current gloves, my hands would be good to a much lower temp without heated grips or heated gear.
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Powermadd makes hand guards for all kinds of toys I would be willing to bet you could bolt a set on the bike. Blocking the wind makes all the difference in the world. I could never keep my hands warm snowmobiling till I put powermadds on
 
BDazzler said:
It got close to 50 today, so I took a ride. I was too lazy to put the V-Stream windscreen on, I was sorry about 10 miles into the ride. :banghead: I only rode for about 40 minutes at a time. I love my Olympia gloves. They work well down to about 35-40. It is suspose to be warmer tomorrow, so I will be riding again. I hope to go a bit farther, and I will be changing windscreens.
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Hey Troy - what model Olympia Gloves do you use? I'm not running heated gear and I really don't want to mess with the electronics so I'm interested in the best gloves I can get for cold weather.
Right now I'm using a pair of gloves that I snagged at Academy Sports when I got caught in a cold front. They are ski gloves but they are really warm. However, I am looking to upgrade.
 
thepopularjock said:
Hey Troy - what model Olympia Gloves do you use? I'm not running heated gear and I really don't want to mess with the electronics so I'm interested in the best gloves I can get for cold weather.
Right now I'm using a pair of gloves that I snagged at Academy Sports when I got caught in a cold front. They are ski gloves but they are really warm. However, I am looking to upgrade.
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The tag says "style #4350/men's" (Olympia Sports 4350 All Season I Gloves) Mine are a Medium, but I have thick hands and short fingers. I usually need a Large to XXL to fit my hand and then the fingers are way too long. This pair just fit very well for me. They are labeled "windproof" which helps, but I think they are only a medium weight, so I still think 40 degrees (maybe 35 pushing it) is as low as I can be comfortable.

Edit: I just was looking at the Motorcycle Superstore and saw they have glove liners to be worn under your gloves. They are only $6-13 for most. That could be a cheap alternative or even help the winter gloves you have work for even colder weather.
 
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BDazzler said:
I might consider heated grips and I really want to add a power outlet, but I'm afraid of screwing up the electrical system.
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Completely understand. I spent the money on a Fuze Block and am very happy with it. I connected it to the battery via an SAE connector, so I can easily pull it off and put my trickle charger on. The only other wire is to control the built-in relay, so it's pretty low-risk to the electrical system. Each "outlet" can be independently set to switched (with ignition) or unswitched.

Could I have built something like this? Probably. Would it look as nice? Definitely not. Twisted Throttle partnered with Curt from Fuzeblocks.com and they're selling a full kit under the name of Powerhub
 
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BDazzler said:
The tag says "style #4350/men's" (Olympia Sports 4350 All Season I Gloves) Mine are a Medium, but I have thick hands and short fingers. I usually need a Large to XXL to fit my hand and then the fingers are way too long. This pair just fit very well for me. They are labeled "windproof" which helps, but I think they are only a medium weight, so I still think 40 degrees (maybe 35 pushing it) is as low as I can be comfortable.

Edit: I just was looking at the Motorcycle Superstore and saw they have glove liners to be worn under your gloves. They are only $6-13 for most. That could be a cheap alternative or even help the winter gloves you have work for even colder weather.
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Thanks for the info Bud......I believe I have a pair. Do they look like this?


20121116_060429.jpg



This is a good solution for weather (wind chill) in the 30 degrees and up. Once you get bellow that - not so much.

Just late night ramblings.........I was wondering if there is a term for the wind blowing right on motorcycle drivers hands? I suppose it's like wind chill but different because it's increased by our velocity on the moto. HHHMM Late night ramblings :doh2:
Motorcycle Wind Chill? IDK - I give up. Whatever term someone comes up with is a valid point because the wind mercilessly blows on the motorcycle riders hands. It can be flat out brutal. Anyway I just thought that it would be useful to have something like that because we all know that it is a different temperature when you get out on the hiway. LOL It's late - I'm rambling - Good night :stirpot:
 
Here is a quick tip... carry a pair of latex or vinyl gloves (think surgical) with you. These, under riding gloves, will trap heat and stop all wind from touching your skin. :D
 
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