front tire blowout
 

wat do u do? is there a way to stay in control or are you pretty much goin down?

DO NOT touch the front brake, stay loose on the bars, try to maintain a straight-ish line and pray? If you fight the bike, you're gonna go down. If you hit the front brake, you're going to go down hard and fast.

Full blowouts are pretty rare on modern tires. A complete and catastrophic loss of air pressure would likely mean a lack of observation and basic maintenance on your part (or a sniper from the Book Depository / Grassy Knoll :p). Might lose air pressure rapidly. But so long as you don't panic, you should retain some steering ability. Hopefully enough that you can bring the bike to a safe stop with careful rear + engine braking.

Just don't lock the rear

Way it worked for me once or twice .............years ago ...from memory

You actually try to ride in down , in other words keep slightly on the gas as you
decrease speed..... no brakes .............pick a spot with few obstructions out of
traffic and head for it. As the bike loses speed the centrifugal force is lessened
and the tire loses more shape and becomes more unstable ........so having yourself
pointed to an "open" area will help alot as the bike is most unstable as you approach
a low speed stopping point.

pop the clutch and wheelie to a stop

sounds like a winner. if it happens ill be sure to get that tire off the ground.

Kuroshio and Sproc, sounds like solid advice. i dont think it'll happen (or i pray it wont) but me and a friend were talking about what to do in this situation the other day. so basically, dont touch the front brake, use rear and engine, and pick a spot to crash lol

Well there's some disagreement between sprock and I on the rear brake. Maybe randyjoy or soot will see and offer up something. Being regular track riders im guessing they've encountered this situation more than the average rider

I'd like to mention that if you're going to engine brake you should do it with extreme care because too low of a gear is damn near the same as grabbing a handful of front brake

My friend blew his front tire the last ride we went on this year. He was riding an old cb550 with a tube, it also broke the bead. He was going between 60-70 kph. I didn't see it, all I saw was the pile in my rearview mirror and spun around to see wtf happened. He was really glad that he had his gear on. He was totally fine! His gear has some good scars though and his old bike needs some work(it's a cool cafe style bike). Now he wants something like what I have(02f4i) to keep up. I think 80mph is crazy on that bike...lol. We were just glad he was ok. I wonder what would happen if you had a blowout at 250kph!! yikes!

Just noticed this thread...IMHO, it is very hard in a blow out situation to apply just the right amount of rear brake. Definitely none on the front, and in this situation many people would slam down on the rear if they're used to using the rear at all - this one is hard to practice for since the bike won't steer like it should. If rear braking is used, just ever so slightly. Downshifting and rolling off that throttle will work wonders.

In a complete, true blowout (not just a fast flat), the damaged front will rapidly slow you down as it won't want to roll very well and rubber pieces will start causing trouble. Trying to maintain stability would be my first instinct, then ever so gently pointing somewhere that I can slow down (or won't hurt much when I do crash it!!). Just don't touch the front brake!

Like Kuroshio said, a full-on blow out, front or rear is extremely rare with today's tire technologies. Not something I really worry about anymore.

And an ounce of prevention: check tire pressures at the beginning of the day for every ride, and while you are doing that, inspect the tires. The single most important piece of motorcycle equipment is the interface between you and the roadway -- tires.