SW Motech Crash Bars - mixed results

[Dirt_Dad]

My wife had a tip over in some mud this past weekend. Nothing dramatic, she did not think the bike hit very hard. She's pretty experienced with bikes some would consider too big for her falling over. I didn't notice any damage on the trail and still haven't found any damage on the bike. Even cleaning off the bikes nothing jumped out at me. Tonight I did notice that it would be impossible to remove the electrical cover. The crash bar has bent in to nearly touch the cover.

I'll give the bars credit, they did protect the bike. But having picked up a good number of dropped bikes I'm shocked at how much they were damaged in this one slow speed, slow drop incident. In fact, I've never seen bars bend in any other drop I've experienced. It really never crossed my mind to see if the bars had bent in this one.

Obviously I'm going to replace these. I don't trust them to take another tip over. I don't trust them to attempt to bend them back into position considering how they bent this time. I understand that bars exist to sacrifice themselves for the bike, but this seems pretty extreme to me. These are not cheap bars and if I have to replace them every time there is a drop it could get expensive. I'll admit I'm pretty disappointed.

 

[EricV]

Wow, that sucks. One of the things I like about the Rumbux is the upper and lower bars, plus the full hoop connecting the upper cage. A lot more support across the side.

 

[tucanfast]

I have I put the same defenses and upset that when one has to clean the air filter has to dismantle the defenses time and time again, is annoying and view the photos are not very reliable defenses, thank you very much, greetings

 

[terrysig]

DirtDad. own them myself and was wondering how well they will do in a dirt drop? Are you going to classify these as one hit?

 

[Dirt_Dad]

DirtDad. own them myself and was wondering how well they will do in a dirt drop? Are you going to classify these as one hit?

Yes, one hit in dirt/mud is all it appears to protect. Have to wonder if it would have been cheaper to not have them and just replace the plastic cover. I'm not going to experiment with that theory. I've seen good results people have had with the Givi bars on a hit. I've put those on my Raven Tenere, thinking I may need to put them on my wife's bike. What ever is next, I'm not keeping these.

 

[TierHawg]

I think the bars that connect both sides are going to be more supportive than the independent hoop style like the SW-Motech. I didn't think they'd be a one-hitter though.

 

[markjenn]

I judge your experience to be more/less par for the course. Like 5-mph bumpers, I think you have to consider crash bars on a huge bike as sacrificial. And I agree with you that what you save in one area you might spend in the next. This is one reason I'm not installing crash bars - I'll just repair/replace the plastic if the worst happens. (Another reason is to save 25-lbs of weight on an already too-heavy bike.)

When a 600-lb motorcycle goes over, even a well-protected one, something has to absorb the forces and a big bike like this just puts a ton of stress on everything. I think people get the mistaken impression that you can armor up an adventure bike to make it as crash-worthy as a lighter bike and it doesn't work that way.

I'd bet you could take the bars off and re-bend them back to be about as new. Might have to get creative with jigs, vises, etc.

- Mark

 

[jajpko]

I dropped my bike doing a slow turn on blacktop with the Givi bars and they moved in a little. I had to loosen the 13mm nut where they connected to the center brace and pull them back out. No damage, just scratched the bars.

I also had the ALTrider bars and in my opinion they are the best, other than the ones Eric sells. I also had a drop from a standstill(yea I know, bike just likes to take a nap) with them and only put scratches on them. They are solid but $$$$

 

[terrysig]

Gotta wonder if something in the style of the oem crash items but slighty bigger and beefier might be better?

 

[avc8130]

I can honestly say I am not surprised to read this about the SW-Motech bars. The first time I saw a picture of them I thought to myself "wow, look at all of that un-supported bar...if the bike goes down that will be a serious bending moment on them". Sure enough, reality meets engineering.

The Givi are more "centralized". Maybe they will prove more durable. Only problem: you need to go drop the bike in the exact same spot/matter.
ac

 

[EricV]

Gotta wonder if something in the style of the oem crash items but slighty bigger and beefier might be better?

That pretty much describes the Rumbux bars. Skid plate is only bolted to the bars, not the engine. Upper and lower protection. FWIW, Rumbux also offers an add on to the stock Yamaha bars that gives more protection. No skid plate, but some upper protection to add to the Yamaha lower protection and hoop. I can sell those for $300 shipped to the lower 48. I will be posting details in the vendor section later this week for the farious Rumbux offerings.

 

[hojo in sc]

So it sounds like some may view crash bars as 'disposable' (all be it, not cheap), or go with out and replace the side panels when dropped. However, what happens if dropped on the left side without crash bars, so much that it damages the fan and possibly the radiator, are you then forced to push the bike?

 

[rem]

Interesting thread. Some good comments for sure. I guess I always figured crash bars were supposed to give a little and absorb some of the shock. Otherwise you could sustain possible structural damage elsewhere on the bike, but then I ain't the crispiest cookie in the jar when it comes to that stuff. So I guess it all depends on your outlook as to whether you want bars that WILL give or WON'T give. But regarding whether to have them at all, I know for a fact that I would have done a lot more serious damage to my right leg a couple years ago had I not had them on. I'm convinced they kept the full force of the bike off of me. However, I guess the idea is NOT to lay over at 40 mph. Anyway, I hope none of you have to find out if yours are doing the job or not. Let's be careful out there. R. ::020::

 

[Venture]

The Givi are more "centralized". Maybe they will prove more durable. Only problem: you need to go drop the bike in the exact same spot/matter.
ac

We need a volunteer! For the good of the community, and science, of course.

 

[Venture]

That pretty much describes the Rumbux bars. Skid plate is only bolted to the bars, not the engine. Upper and lower protection. FWIW, Rumbux also offers an add on to the stock Yamaha bars that gives more protection. No skid plate, but some upper protection to add to the Yamaha lower protection and hoop. I can sell those for $300 shipped to the lower 48. I will be posting details in the vendor section later this week for the farious Rumbux offerings.

Interesting. Definitely let us know what's available. I put frame sliders on the Tiger instead of crash bars purposely. Both sliders and crashbars have their pros and cons, but in the case of the S10 I think it's been more or less proven the stock piece offers up extremely good protection, so just beefing that up might be a great compromise over a traditional heavier, more expensive set of bars.

 

[Dirt_Dad]

I guess I always figured crash bars were supposed to give a little and absorb some of the shock. Otherwise you could sustain possible structural damage elsewhere on the bike,

I do agree with that line of thinking, but I expect it to be on a more significant hit. My wife went through a period where she struggled with the too tall, too top heavy DL650. For a while I was picking up that bike on a pretty frequent basis. Those Givi bars never moved on those simple drops. Had it been a more significant impact I hope the bars will sacrafice themselves for the good of the bike. But if I need to consider bars to be a one time use item regardless of severity, that really argues for buying the cheapest bars available that will do the job. Fortunately she is finding the low COG of the S10 to be far easier to handle and control than the DL650. This impact only happened becuase I stuck her in a mud pit on her second dirt ride on the bike. My bad...

 

[markjenn]

So it sounds like some may view crash bars as 'disposable' (all be it, not cheap), or go with out and replace the side panels when dropped. However, what happens if dropped on the left side without crash bars, so much that it damages the fan and possibly the radiator, are you then forced to push the bike?

Like all crashes, you patch it together as best you can and carry on. AFAIK, the only common problem we've seen with the radiator on the left after crashes is a jamming of the fan blades which if you're aware of it, you can probably make repairs to avoid the problem or disconnect the fan to avoid burning out the motor. A bum radiator fan is not a disabling failure anyway. Radiators will typically take a lot of tweaking before they start leaking.

- Mark

 

[EricV]

Interesting. Definitely let us know what's available. I put frame sliders on the Tiger instead of crash bars purposely. Both sliders and crashbars have their pros and cons, but in the case of the S10 I think it's been more or less proven the stock piece offers up extremely good protection, so just beefing that up might be a great compromise over a traditional heavier, more expensive set of bars.

Rumbux already offers this, but I haven't seen one in person. I'm working on getting some better pictures of this add on bar set. I'll post what I get.

 

[EricV]

Got some pictures to share of the Rumbux add on bars for the Yamaha crash bar. It's a beefier upper hoop that replaces the Yamaha hoop, adding upper side protection and bolting to the Yamaha hoop points and a third/forth point each side.

Yamaha bars for a refresher:

Now with Rumbux upper installed:

My take on crash bars is that they should distribute the impact forces as well as being somewhat sacrificial in harder impacts/crashes.

 

[terrysig]

Alot of good comments here. Just spent some time looking over my SW-Motech crash bars with a little pushing and pulling. They are attached at the front of the engine high on both sides so that kind equals a cross-over (kinda). The real movement is in the upper back corner towards the rider. That's where i can see the bars really getting pushed in.

Having said that I can't believe that any other bars would far better in that regard?

But what I read here and agree is buy the least expensive bars that are reasonably made for reasonably protection (paraphrase). I was all set to buy the Givi because I liked the way they looked for the S10 until I started to notice how the bars and bolts/washers deteriorated with time on buddies bikes. WTF? Don't care how cheap they are zinc plating and some quality powder coating is a must.

Quality, fit and finish of the SW "looks" much better and the protection similar.

Truthfully from what i've learned here I hope someone builds a version that replicates the little u-shaped OEM version and adds some size to it. I'd buy that!