I've seen a guy put his bike on the centerstand without using any sort of grab-handle for the right arm...he put his foot on the tang, used his left hand on the handlebar to stand it straight up (yes, his wheel was all to one side, very disturbing) and popped it up. He was demonstrating that there need be no 'lifting' on the back of the bike.
Chris
hmmm... I don't see how that would be possible for me - at least not on my FJR.
(ugh, put me back on the injured list
)
If I stand straight up and put my full weight on the tang, the bike does rise up a little, but not nearly enough to be able to push back onto the stand.
So here's what's funny. When I first hurt my back, I was worried that I'd have to cancel the class I was teaching over the weekend - it was an MSF basic rider course with all scooters (yes, something like this does exist
). Ironically all of the scooters we use in training have center stands.
I was pretty happy friday when I was able to go to the gym, and work out without any pain or real restriction other than just taking it very easy to make sure I wasn't hurting myself on each excercise before I added any on significant weight. Saturday morning I was just a little stiff, so I didn't have to back out of the class.
I taught all day saturday, and the only time my back gave me any trouble was when I had to bend over to pick up cones. I was lucky I was teaching with my wife, and she did all the cone placement, and the rest of teaching didn't bother me - including taking the scooters off their center stands and putting them back. After class we have to move the bikes several times to get them put away, and with moving all the scooters, I easily must have done this 100 times between saturday and sunday. (granted, the FJR
should be harder to put on a center stand given its heavier weight - but the Goldwing (which I used to put on the center stand regularly) should also be harder than the FJR too.
I've been watching this video, plus the instructions in this and the referenced threads:
I've been carpooling earlier this week, but I did ride in this morning. I got to the same parking area, and when I put the sidestand down, I noticed it sunk into the soft ground, so I thought I'd try the centerstand. I tried to get the bike up by just stablizing it and using my weight, but it wouldn't move enough to get up on the stand. I thought it might be because of the soft ground, so I moved it over to pavement, and tried again (standing on the tang with my full weight @215 + gear - only using my hands to stablize), and again, it doesn't lift anywhere near enough to get the bike on the stand.
So then I thought I'd try the "lift up and press down" method. Right foot, and I tried the lower handle, and once again, I got a shooting pain in my back (although interestingly enough its in my left hip, which makes me think that this position is causing me to twist) - I think I may have actually used my right foot last week too - I just assumed that since the pain was in my left hip that I was using my left leg last time - that may not have been the case.
Its also likely that I wasn't fully healed up from last week. So I don't know. I think I need to stop trying to put it on the centerstand for a couple of months, and then when I'm sure I've healed, I'll try it again and take a video and post it and maybe somebody can point out what I'm doing wrong. Heh, if nothing else, "Rider hurting back putting fjr on centerstand" might get a lot of youtube hits for laughs...
At least I didn't mess it up as badly as I did last week. I was able to walk over to the gym at lunch, and again, a nice progressively challenging workout with lots of easy stretching seems to have alleviated most of the symptoms (gotta love endorphins).
It seems like the individual in the video is much shorter than I am, and he is able to reach the lower handle without bending over (much, if at all). For me, doing this is awkward, because I can't easily bend at the knee to reach the handle, because the bike is in the way. When I tried it this morning, I moved to a position where I could reach the handle, but I suspect I was lifting at least partly with my back. I was going very easy, and not using much force to lift up, and I still managed to pull something.
I'm just about certain that the GL1800 would have gone on the center stand without any lifting at all (I mean, duh - how could anybody lift a 900# bike while standing next to it).
Its also possible I suppose that I have some undiscovered problem with my back, that maybe doesn't cause me problems until I do this one particular activity. If that's the case, as long as this is my only limitation, I won't complain too much.