SW Motech Crash Bars

[Gun]

I had a bit of an off today whilst climbing a mountain. Short story is, the bike fell fairly abruptly on its left hand side, whilst I fell halfway down the mountain.

Inspection of the bike revealed that the SW Motech crash bar protected the radiator and fan. Good news. However, in doing so, it got squashed. Squashed to the point where the bar is now resting on the panel that covers the radiator and fan...approx a 2" squashing from where it originally sat.

Closer inspection showed that it has bent near where the bars bolt in front of the engine. The actual plate steel bracket (looks like approx 6mm or 8mm).

Whilst I'm thankful for it protecting the radiator and fan, I'm disappointed that such a relatively small crash could bend the bar.

My questions are....

1) has anyone else had this happen?
2) are they designed to do this (like a crumple zone in a car)?
3) could I bend it back into place or is it now eternally weakened?
4) has anyone done any additional bracing on their SWM crash bars?
5) do I now buy a set of Altrider bars (which appear to be stronger)?


Cheers,
Glenn

 

[coastie]

Unless you bring it to a fabricator, I think your best bet is to just replace it. I have Altrider bars and I can tell you from experience they are tough! Been down a few times, all on the left side, and they have not budged!

 

[Bushyar15]

If I remember correctly from one of my metallurgical engineer buddies that the metal has a memory. So if you bend it back you have to do something like heat treat it to relieve the stress. Plus it may be compromised. Thats second hand info from a million years ago… so I might not have it exactly right… I'd replace it...

 

[Mikeybikey57]

It would seem that these bars may be best regarded as sacrificial. My left side Givi bar did exactly the same thing as your Motech's, after I had a collision based disagreement with a panel van a few weeks back. Ended up with the same sort of damage as you and, despite doing a fairly good job of straightening everything out, I decided to buy a new pair of bars and replaced the left one, it's bracket and the very distorted cross member too. My worry was that the repaired bar may have looked okay but might not have held up as well if hit again. Plus, I've got a spare for the right side of the bike, should I ever be unfortunate enough to need one in the future.

 

[Buzz Ricer]

I have had the same thing happen with the SW Motech bars. They are one time protection at best. They look great and match the lines of the bike quite well.. but offer the least amount of actual protection. Consensus seems to be with the AltRider bars being the strongest.

 

[Dirt_Dad]

I have had the same thing happen with the SW Motech bars.

::026::

Way too expensive to be such a one time use item. Very disappointed in almost every SW Motech item I've installed on the bike. The SW Motech skid plate has been adequate, but the SW Motech luggage rack broke once under warranty, and in a different spot the second time not under warranty. In my opinion, SW Motech is not gear to be trusted.

I replaced the SW Motech bars with Givi bars on both Teneres. Each has been tested once with no damage to bike or bars.

 

[Brick]

I've had Givi's on both my 2012 & my 2014 and while I've only had a slow parking lot tip over... there was no damage.
I like them...

 

[terrysig]

Similar happened to me as a result of a deer hit fall. The SW bars saved the panel but bent big time. Also bent the S10 mounting tabs. Switched to the Altrider bars. Similar crash (but faster) on a muddy road and no bar movement just scrapes. It looks to me like there is better distribution.

 

[Checkswrecks]

I believe the one we replaced was on my son's Vstrom and learned that while not advertised, if you call, you CAN buy an individual left or right crash bar. It was slightly more than half the price of a set. The down-side was that we needed to wait for the next shipment to get a single, as they didn't want to break up the sets. It took something like 6 weeks.

 

[bigbob]

So how about the OEM bars from Yamaha?

I went down on Saturday, easy on the right, and both the bike and bars are fine. My ankle will be fine in a couple of day. Forgot to turn traction control off and hit some mud on a steep hill!

 

[twistedthrottle]

The material used by SW-MOTECH is a mild steel. Which is a lot softer than stainless, less brittle, and will give when force is applied. It is their philosophy that the bar should give rather than transfer the energy to the frame.

Stronger is not better and can in fact potentially be more damaging than an unprotected bike. We would not recommend bending the bars back and as was stated in this thread, we do offer replacement bars.

Kevin

 

[snakebitten]

I kind of agree. Just makes sense from a physics standpoint.

I believe the Givi's are designed to do the same. Cheap and replaceable is the intent?

Fortunately, the frame on these Beasts seem to be strong enough to handle both philosophies, historically speaking.

 

[Checkswrecks]

Not going to get into the argument about which philosophy is better, but mild steel certainly can be straightened. The hard part is doing it without losing alignment on the bolt-up points. (It's not the best idea to just bend these back while mounted on the bike, lest you twist the bike frame.)


I'll add that when we needed SW-Motecbar for one side (on one of the VStroms?) we were not required to buy a set so the bill was something like $185 as I recall. It did require waiting for the next container from Germany, and that took most of a month.