Bar end weights, do we need them? Any alternatives?

Any one tried riding without them?

Chris they are there to stop vibration which will be more prevalent at different speeds and road conditions. If you remove them you can do a few things to stop any issues if you get any. There are things that are called bar snakes that go inside the bars or a trick that a lot of people use it to fill the bars with sand which will dampen any vibration and have the same result

I've not tried it without them, But, The bar end weights that come with the Kuryakyn Chinese copy's are only a token gesture and weigh next to nothing compared to the standard ones and I've not noticed any excess vibration with those fitted.

Most of the time bar end weights are there as a preventative medicine, just in case. But like said if you do get the vibration there are other ways to skin the cat

rode my VS without any no trouble from the bike alternative get bar end mirrors sum of the more pricey ones werk well dont vibrate much at speed and have wieght so act in same way as your bar end

I'll have to look into doing something to mine as my right mirror vibrates so much I can't see clearly what's behind me.

So that question must be did your mirror shake like a drug addict with no fix before you removed the stock grips and bar ends?

I fitted Oxford " Cruiser " heated grips over the winter and removed my bar ends and replaced them with the caps that came with the grips ( made from chrome finish plastic )
Absolutely no difference ! .... the mirrors have always vibrated and produce blurred images at anything above 60mph ( smoothing out at 85mph + ) and they still do the same now

Thanks for the info guys, I wont worry about them. I took the bars off and decided to wait untill my new ones came to save hassle, but the sun has come out, the wind died down and I'm getting antsy so I went to put them back on for now, and found I am missing one inner expander bit. I rigged them up with an old piece of rubber, but wondered. I'll take both off and bung the end up and ride until the others come.
Simbo, do the Chinese grips come with their own 'inner expander' or equivalent?

coffeescoffer wrote:

Simbo, do the Chinese grips come with their own 'inner expander' or equivalent?

No inner expander, The end caps or spikes are fixed on with 4 hex screws. (supplied with grips)

Thanks Simbo, I'll not worry about the missing one then.

A mate changed the bar ends on his Marauder 800 and said the handling changed. Dunno how true this is but that's what he found.

I think it was probably in his imagination, they are only there for vibration

Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm sure I remember from my sports bike days that the bar end weights act as a steering damper as well as damp vibration. It shouldn't make any difference on our bikes as the steering geometry is pretty stable but on quicker steering more marginal sports bikes I'm sure there is a risk of getting into tank slappers if the weights are removed.

Ian800 wrote:

Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm sure I remember from my sports bike days that the bar end weights act as a steering damper as well as damp vibration.

Bar end weights are just to reduce vibration at the ends of the bars, They won't prevent a tank slapper on any bike, Only a steering damper would do that.

i recon i'd be with sim on that one

No worries, I must have mis-remembered, its an age thing

I don't want anyone to think I am clever so let me say straight away, I copied this:

Bar end weights, how do they work?

Bar-end weight theory: As your motorcycle runs, the handlebars form a resonant mechanical system. That is, the bars tend to shake at certain frequencies, in certain ways. The lowest frequency, or fundamental, is a motion you could call, "flapping." This is where the center of the bars, between the clamps, is motionless, and the tips of the bars are vibrating most. This is typically the strongest mode of vibration, and the first one you should attack. If this frequency is any component of the characteristic frequency spectrum of your motorcycle, then the bars start to flap away, bothering your hands. There are three ways to solve the problem.

Stop the vibration. Many aspects of motorcycle design can come into play to check vibration at the factory. Details of crankshaft design, firing order and angle, mounting location, and counterbalancers can be used in concert to make for smooth running. If the engineers who designed your bike were skillful and careful about these factors, as they affect vibration, you can stop reading now- you don't need this product.
Dampen the vibration. From an engineering standpoint, dampening means eliminating the resonant frequency of the handlebars. The proper way to do this is with a precisely designed flexible attachment between the vibrating part and a solidly mounted part, in other words, a shock absorber. The flexible attachment must be tuned to exactly oppose the specific frequencies of resonance, so vibration put into the bars will not be allowed to build up in them and hurt your hands. Unfortunately, there is no proper way to dampen the handlebar motion, without a mechanical linkage from the outside of the bars to the frame of the bike, other than the bars. There are products out there which purport to dampen handlebar motion, but they can't technically "dampen" the fundamental frequency, since there is no linkage between the bar ends and the frame. That is not to say they don't "work." I haven't tried them, but I know many who are quite satisfied with them. Why, if they aren't dampening the bars from flapping? The higher-order harmonics of the resonant frequencies should be effectively reduced by, say, inserting a combination of weight and viscoelastic material into the bars. Due to the physics of the situation, the higher the vibrational frequency, the less weight is required to disrupt the motion, and the less solid the mounting point of the dampening system needs to be. So having a heavy elastomer all the way through the bars would be great for the higher harmonics, with the internal motion of the elastomer discouraging the formation of standing waves in the bars. But that lowest resonant frequency, the flapping motion, is typically the strongest. For that motion, all that elastomeric stuff in the bars is only as good as its mass. In other words, it operates just like plain weights- it lowers the resonant frequency, and discourages the tips of the bars from changing speed quickly. This brings us to the last means of vibration control.
You could change the resonant frequency. When operating in this mode, the closer the weight is to the tips of the bars, the more effective it is. Solutions that involve equal mass throughout the length of the bars, have only a fraction of their mass working for the cause. The rest is dead weight. As a rule of thumb, any mass between the first two curves of the bar from center, is dead weight, and any mass at the tips of the bars is fully effective. That's why our bar-ends are designed to maximize weight just outboard of the bars. They are weighted from and upwards of 12.5 oz. per side or more, and every ounce hits home.

So after reading all that! They still only stop bar end vibration?

Thanks Crash, just what I needed. A fukin read the size of a novel to tell us what we had already said.

Hey Simbo & Dave

Hi CC nice of you to have gone and looked for that info,cheers good find,there are some novice riders out there that are unsure of things like that,that is why the question was asked.I only mention it in case people think Dave or Simbo are getting at you.No malice intended.

A useful conversation either way. It laid one of my misconceptions to rest

captain crash wrote:

Hey Simbo & Dave

Crash knows we are playing.

captain crash wrote:

So that question must be did your mirror shake like a drug addict with no fix before you removed the stock grips and bar ends?

Don't think so...but the installation of Jardines has sent them into shshshshaking :)
That's the only time I noticed... changing grips didn't do a thing really.

MarcinG wrote:

Don't think so...but the installation of Jardines has sent them into shshshshaking

How strange, can't imagine why. Oh well, stranger things have happened at sea

Thanks to all for responding, I have learn't a lot.