Lowsided!!

[Grumpy Goat]

[Lee]

Video is private

[Duckbubbles]

Chip seal is the bane of bike riders everywhere. Looks to me like the road was recently re-topped. Sorry for your troubles. My very first experience low siding was pea gravel on concrete, great idea!

Frank

[runnerhiker]

Bummer! I hate gravel on asphalt! The last time I went down, it was also about 20 mph, on ice here in CO, amazing how body aches lasts after such a minor fall. Take care.

[Lee]

I can see the video now.
Sorry to hear about the mishap.
Sometimes it's hard to tell if the gravel is loose gravel on chip seal roads.
Iowa uses a lot of chip seal because it's the cheapest hard surface but our gradation is finer than what Texas uses.

[Grumpy Goat]

Chip seal is the bane of bike riders everywhere. Looks to me like the road was recently re-topped. Sorry for your troubles. My very first experience low siding was pea gravel on concrete, great idea!

This area was re-topped maybe 1-2 years ago, so the darker part that you see is not actually fresh. I have been on it closer to its resurfacing. I suspect that the junk I slid on was probably spillage from some truck using the roadway. The rest of both FM 149 and FM 3090 were essentially "clean".

Probably think twice about riding in this area again since I don't need the riprap / chipseal aggro and the curves are OK but bumpy. Not worth it.

[Grumpy Goat]

I can see the video now.
Sorry to hear about the mishap.
Sometimes it's hard to tell if the gravel is loose gravel on chip seal roads.
Iowa uses a lot of chip seal because it's the cheapest hard surface but our gradation is finer than what Texas uses.

Thanks. Texas indeed uses the coarse stuff. I remember my trip to Big Bend in 2016 when I encountered miles of the stuff ... probably took 50% of my tire off in that 4 day weekend.

[Grumpy Goat]

Bummer! I hate gravel on asphalt! The last time I went down, it was also about 20 mph, on ice here in CO, amazing how body aches lasts after such a minor fall. Take care.

Thanks Ron. Speaking of slipping on ice, once in university in Canada I jumped off a snowbank onto what I though was a damp patch of concrete walkway. It wasn't. My landing foot must have hit the surface at a less than perpendicular angle and I went down so fast I didn't have time to put out my hands and smacked my left cheekbone on the concrete. Just thinking about it is painful.

This slide yesterday was slower but not by much.

[Duccrazydave]

Sorry to hear about that GG. Glad you're OK. We have plenty of intersections like that, in my neighborhood and surrounding areas. Unless there is regular traffic to pad it down, the loose gravel remains for months and years in those same spots.
Seems the BRP has recently been active with the same surface conditioning. Hopped on (at Meadows of Dan) going South towards 21, on Friday, and encountered several miles of a coarse version of this.
How would you say your riding gear held up?

[BobAin'tStoppin']

Wow, Glad you're ok Wayne. Going down is no fun.

[Duckbubbles]

FM 149 and FM 3090

The only roads near Houston with a fun factor.
One of the reasons I moved to Austin almost 40(!!!) years ago.

Frank

[Grumpy Goat]

Sorry to hear about that GG. Glad you're OK. ....
How would you say your riding gear held up?

Thanks Dave. The riding gear held up very nicely, although the total slide was not very far. I looked at the front of my jacket and riding jeans and both show light dirt scuffing but no real damage. The area where my jacket abraded my forearm would be a good place to look for damage to the jacket but there seems to be hardly a scratch there. Weird.

Ticked at the scuff marks on my new scratch-free helmet though, but thankful that it did its job. Still don't know why the idiots on cruisers don't wear gear, especially helmets. My crash could happen to any one of them and probably does.

[Grumpy Goat]

FM 149 and FM 3090

The only roads near Houston with a fun factor.
One of the reasons I moved to Austin almost 40(!!!) years ago.

Frank

That about sums it up. Houston has a lot of good points, but nice motorcycling roads and scenery are not among those.

[Olgry1]

Sorry to hear about your low side but happy you are ok.

[Grumpy Goat]

Sorry to hear about your low side but happy you are ok.

Thanks John.

I already bent the gearshift back to pretty much normal orientation so the bike is easily rideable again. I will be replacing the gearshift lever, though, since the shift nub part is pried out a bit from the lever proper. I also removed the left side fairing for repair, and straightened out the left front indicator. It is amazing that the fairing only has localized damage so a repair may be cost effective (new one costs $280). I'll see what my body shop has to say tomorrow.

Looking at this bike and how its put together, it is almost as though it is designed to go down. Just have to have the right sliders in the right places and for minor crashes it will be just fine.

[RS_Lars]

Glad you are fine after your mishap.
Did the same in late 2017 with gravel in the road.
Luckily, my wife and myself walked away from it.
   

[Lee]

I wonder if you can still buy the LED turn signals?

[Lee]

Wayne if you plan to pay for the repairs out of pocket ask the county to reimburse you.
Never hurts to ask.

Show them your pictures of the road and mention there was no loose gravel warning sign.
Normally something like this works best if you can go in person but with the virus so bad in Houston I would email. At least with email you can send pictures.

[Grumpy Goat]

Glad you are fine after your mishap.
Did the same in late 2017 with gravel in the road.
Luckily, my wife and myself walked away from it.

Wow! And a grey RS too. Glad to hear that you walked away from it without serious injury. Did the bike have much damage?

[Grumpy Goat]

Wayne if you plan to pay for the repairs out of pocket ask the county to reimburse you.
Never hurts to ask.

Show them your pictures of the road and mention there was no loose gravel warning sign.
Normally something like this works best if you can go in person but with the virus so bad in Houston I would email. At least with email you can send pictures.

Lee - thanks for the suggestion. I was thinking about that. I agree it could not hurt to try.