Handlebars vibration: Possibles fixes

[Guest]

I filled a set with shot on one bike... works well.

Shot? Sorry, english is a second language.

[Rob S.]

Buck shot, bird shot, shotgun ammo.

[rphillips]

Can talk about this forever... Just heavier, I don't think, is the answer, if it were, just pour the bars full of lead and go. The weights are cushioned from the bars. the vibration is absorbed in the cushion while trying to get the weight to vibrate same speed as the bars are but the cushion won't let the weight keep up with the bars. Look at the wgts. for the ST1100, they have rubber to cushion them on both ends. For your steel rod idea, use rod smaller than ID of handlebar, then find "O" rings that will snugly fill the space and cushion steel rod from bars.... The Honda wgts. may not help at all, but the Honda engineers have probably studied this way more than you ever could. If theirs don't help, yours would probably be pretty questionable as well... That said, I never got either of my GS1150's to be as smooth as my GS1000 and GS1100's... Good luck.

[Guest]

I think that is the best way to do it. Plus it wont cost me a lot to try it. If I can find steel rods 1/16'' smaller that the ID of the handlebar with O rings. If it doesn't work, then ill fill it up with silicone

[Grimly]

If you still have them, could you measure the diameter of the bars with the rubber inserts? Im looking to see if they would fit inside my current handlebars.

Sorry, I haven't seen them for years. They're still around, because I definitely didn't throw them out, but who knows where they are now.

[salty_monk]

https://www.barsnake.com/ - These do work but not as well as very heavy bar end weights in my experience.

I meant BB shot - it's easy to get here. You could also use round fishing weights. I filled the whole bar once but I also inserted a cork then silicon & then filled just the end 3-4 inches on another bike.

If I was going to try this again... I'd just buy some silicon or caulk & pump it into the bars till they were full and then let it go off for a week or so. The downside with that is you're probably never getting it out again if you don't like it!

[Who Dat?]

Rather than trying to absorb the vibration, how about killing it BEFORE it gets to the handlebars?

Have you adjusted your valves and done a vacuum sync on the carbs? Those go a LONG way to a smoother engine.

[Guest]

Valve adjustment is the first thing on my list when I get back home from uni next weekend. Basically My 3 main jobs for May and June are:
1-Valve adjustment.
2-Dynojet kit installation and tuning(including vacuum sync).
3-Handlebars vibration.
After that Its maybe a disk job and some cosmetic stuff.

[LAB3]

Just replaced the nasty old pitted windshield on my bike last week with an NOS one. The old windshield kinda fluttered around a bit at top at highway speeds and the NOS replacement doesn't. Believe it or not it made a huge difference in the vibration of my bars. Something to consider there, aerodynamics.

[Suzukian]

Get some Oakum from Home Depot, fill the handlebar ends around 2 inches so that when the Oakum is wet and swells, it will leave 2 inches deep of the inside of the bars ends empty. Stand the handlebar on end, and fill with molten lead. Do the same thing with the other side. The Oakum will stay inside the handlebar and affect nothing, and the lead you can get from fishing weights and melt down) will absorb the vibration. No one will know you have anything in there. Pack the Oakum tight, get it real wet, it will expand exponentially, then push it down the desired depth.

[Guest]

Get some Oakum from Home Depot, fill the handlebar ends around 2 inches so that when the Oakum is wet and swells, it will leave 2 inches deep of the inside of the bars ends empty. Stand the handlebar on end, and fill with molten lead. Do the same thing with the other side. The Oakum will stay inside the handlebar and affect nothing, and the lead you can get from fishing weights and melt down) will absorb the vibration. No one will know you have anything in there. Pack the Oakum tight, get it real wet, it will expand exponentially, then push it down the desired depth.

Have you actually done this? I'm curious about corrosion of the bars with trapping moisture inside of the bar with a fiber material.

[Suzukian]

That's not an issue because Oakum absorbs all the moisture. I learned from making tube safety bars, you spray the inside with a coat of mineral oil, that will take care of any moisture problems after you weld them tubes shut. I've used Oakum for years on plumbing problems, especially when you head to change diameters of cast iron pipes for modern toilets.. You could use Heavy Duty aluminum foil to make a pocket at each end. When it cools down, you pull out the plug, and hit the top sides with a punch so that you have to hammer the plug back in. Spray in the mineral oil, and you should be good to go. The first way, making a wad of Oakum, will give you the best fit though. Any other way might vibrate loose eventually. I'd just ended up getting in the bar end weights. I don't notice them, to be honest. Mine are black. .

[diptenkrom]

they do make hiddn bar end weights - "anti vibe inserts"

https://www.fasstco.com/products/anti-vibration-inserts

https://tacomoto.co/products/flexx-bars-universal-anti-vibration-inserts

[Suzukian]

If you take the bars off, fill then ends with fishing weight lead, fabricate a plug to block the lead (like a freeze out plug for the block of a car, which could be easily made with some thin sheet metal and a ball peen hammer), you cold just take a propane torch heat the handlebar ends and lead and melt the weights into the ends.

[Cipher]

I fitted a set of Honda ST1100 bars on mine and found the ends contained about 4" long steel inserts as anti-vibe weights.
I had to remove them to fit my internal bar heaters, though.

You see a lot of old suzukis that have the bar tip weights removed. I've always wondered if its a perverse aesthetic penchant a la no front fender or rear shock delete or just one fell out so the other got removed.

mine buzzes painfully at about 4-5k rpm. And to ride it would make a masochist think you mad.