The smell of burning rubber

I'd been dealing with many miles of traffic, and I'd at last come across a stretch of 70mph road that was empty. So I was riding to make up a bit of time while I had the opportunity.

Approached some lights that were green, but as I neared them, they changed to amber. My natural reaction would normally be to simply carry on, there was no traffic waiting to cross, I would almost certainly make it across before the red. However Tomtom had just given me a warning that these lights had a camera to catch red-light runners.

No time to think things through, I hit the anchors. Hard.

What I hadn't fully appreciated was that the road, although completely dry, had patches of dust, probably silt left from heavy rain a couple of days ago. Immediately, the ABS was being called upon over this surface that was sometimes gripping perfectly, sometimes not.

I've often experienced the ABS in operation on previous FJRs, but this was the first "real" episode on my 2018. I don't know if there has been any change in the ABS system, but for the first time I experienced the rear of the bike slithering a bit, so it felt a little unsteady, but the bike stopped ok (albeit a couple of feet over the line), with me having to work a bit to finally hold the bike upright.

Anyway, all was well, and, as I breathed a sigh of relief, I could smell burning rubber. Never known that before.

Probably a puff of methane gas.......

Impossible! Everyone knows the ABS is inferior to Mad Skillz!

These FJRs just keep getting better and better. On Pop's '07 I really felt that the ABS might be a little too intrusive, that it should have allowed a little more braking power. On our Gen3s the ABS seems to be less cautious.

BTW, I like your new avatar.

Hmmm, I don't think I ever got my tires to "burn" even when braking so hard the ABS kicked in. Though I have to admit, I never had to go to quite the extremes you went to. Are you able to stop the FJR reasonably quickly by just using the rear brake? Or is it like my Gen. 2, where I can stop the bike using just the rear brake pedal,but only if there is PLENTY of room to stop.

philter said:

Hmmm, I don't think I ever got my tires to "burn" even when braking so hard the ABS kicked in. Though I have to admit, I never had to go to quite the extremes you went to. Are you able to stop the FJR reasonably quickly by just using the rear brake? Or is it like my Gen. 2, where I can stop the bike using just the rear brake pedal,but only if there is PLENTY of room to stop.

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No bike can stop quickly with only the rear brake. The FJR appears to do better than many because of the rear-to-front linking.
I'm on my 4th FJR, from my experience (or what I can remember of my experience), the ABS has behaved very similarly on the '06 and the '10, seemed to operate at a more rapid rate with the '14, but still conservatively. With my '18, it seems, as Redfish Hunter suggests above, less intrusive. Maybe this is what led to sufficient slip angle of the tyre on the road to cause actual skidding, or maybe it was several rapid transitions from grippy to slippery and back that I've not experienced before (unlikely).

What I can say is that, without the ABS, and since I lack Redfish Hunter's Mad Skillz, I would have had a great deal of trouble stopping in the distance I did as well as keeping the bike upright.

Traction control may be the cause

Being new I'll be conservative with my comments: I purch'd my '06 FJR as a replacement (or better an adjunct) for my 81 XJ650. I still ride both often. Last year I started having (perceived) difficulty with the ABS. Keep this in mind the Mechleins on the bike were getting a little thin where the rubber meets the road. Hard braking in turns would kick the ABS light on. Anyway, this spring I put a new set of tires on the bike and did a brake job front and rear.

Lesson learned: After some maintenance checks, rotor thickness', fresh load of fluid in the lines and an ABS clean-out procedure per manual, I took the bike out yesterday for a 5 hour run to Massachusetts. I had a situation where I had to brake hard, real hard on an interstate here in the east. I've been riding for 50 years and this has always been true with all my Y's from my first DT250 in 1971 to today. If you change the tires, change the brakes and be prepared to hang on, you're gonna stop. ......just sayin'. My '95 Marc VIII and My F150 same-o, same-o.

So how picky are the online Constables about where you stop? Around here you will probably still get a ticket if you cross the Stop Line when the light is red.

Harald said:

So how picky are the online Constables about where you stop? Around here you will probably still get a ticket if you cross the Stop Line when the light is red.

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A real policeman might well issue a ticket, but the camera only takes a picture of you if you're moving across when the lights are red. I doubt it noticed me stationary with just my nose over.

Of course, having said that, I shall probably get an official letter through the post ...

At least you know the brakes work properly. Could be the smell of something else ( in your shorts) if they didn't. UK is tough doesn't sound like much fun with red light and speed cameras everywhere.

Dodahdude said:

Probably a puff of methane gas.......

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mech 1 twa said:

At least you know the brakes work properly. Could be the smell of something else ( in your shorts) if they didn't. UK is tough doesn't sound like much fun with red light and speed cameras everywhere.

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I've enough experience to know the difference between the gas types .

UK is tough, speed cameras all over the place, including long stretches with average speed cameras. They are talking about using isolated cameras to measure average speed over any route as well as along defined stretches of road.

[ Slightly political rant ] Many people believe the cameras are there to raise revenue, the authorities maintain they are purely for safety. Why they think it's safer to do 70 on a crowded motorway in the pouring rain, vehicles spaced by inches rather than yards, but dangerous to do 80 on a dry, clear day with no other traffic, is beyond me. Bring back police patrols like we used to have before cameras. Cameras pay for themselves many times over, and yes, police cost more and won't raise as much revenue, but do have some discretionary intelligence including looking for the idiot drivers who may well not be speeding. [ /Slightly political rant ]

And, yes, the brakes work .

I get burning rubber smell when I dump the clutch at @ 4000...should I be concerned ?

If the cameras are there as a deterrent or for "safety" reasons then perhaps they should be donating the revenue to a suitable charity rather than government coffers.

lnewlf said:

I get burning rubber smell when I dump the clutch at @ 4000...should I be concerned ?

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Don't know, my YCC-S precludes me from trying that (I did once manage an unintended wheelie when instigating an overtake, though).

RossKean said:

If the cameras are there as a deterrent or for "safety" reasons then perhaps they should be donating the revenue to a suitable charity rather than government coffers.

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We live in the real world, it's not going to happen.

And this just popped up in my FB feed.

Note that like many interweb headlines, this is a bit misleading. I'm guessing the guy got the 8 months for the laser jammer, not the finger.

When I T-Boned a big deer a couple of years ago I was in full mash everything front and back stop mode just before I hit it. I remember smelling burning rubber also when I stopped, thought my front tire was wrecked but all was good, just a broken nose cone.

You guys do realize that properly working ABS allows the tires to stop, but only for very short intervals? I used to determine vehicle speeds by skid marks left by cars with ABS, all the time. I even got into a huge pissing match with a civil attorney who tried to claim I was full of shit, because his clients car with full ABS wouldn't leave skids. It did, and they do. They look like a ladder: tons of faint black lines. Remember, until the tire locks up, the computer doesn't know how much traction there really is, so they lock, release, lock, release, repeat, until the vehicle stops or the brake pressure is reduced. Smelling rubber after a hard ABS induced stop is perfectly normal, as is soiled underwear in some cases!

New phones can track everywhere you've been and speeds. Google is watching. Mine even said I was motorcycling on one ride. HOW???

Won't be long till all that UK crap is here.

MONEY-MONEY-MONEY.

Laser jammer. yeah. Bad attitude added a little time.

OH somethings burning. Sorry.

HotRodZilla said:

You guys do realize that properly working ABS allows the tires to stop, but only for very short intervals? I used to determine vehicle speeds by skid marks left by cars with ABS, all the time. I even got into a huge pissing match with a civil attorney who tried to claim I was full of shit, because his clients car with full ABS wouldn't leave skids. It did, and they do. They look like a ladder: tons of faint black lines. Remember, until the tire locks up, the computer doesn't know how much traction there really is, so they lock, release, lock, release, repeat, until the vehicle stops or the brake pressure is reduced. Smelling rubber after a hard ABS induced stop is perfectly normal, as is soiled underwear in some cases!

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Not wishing into get into a p*ss*ng match, but I think you will find that modern ABS systems are a little more sophisticated than those you were dealing with, and don't wait for the wheel to stop before releasing the brake. They detect that one wheel is turning significantly slower than the other, or that a wheel is decelerating at a rate greater than is normally possible.

Operation and cycling rate are much faster and more subtle (though generally still obvious) than early systems.

A quick web search finds many sources, one such is https://auto.howstuffworks.com/auto-parts/brakes/brake-types/anti-lock-brake1.htm, I quote a couple of paragraphs (my emphasis):

The controller monitors the speed sensors at all times. It is looking for decelerations in the wheel that are out of the ordinary. Right before a wheel locks up, it will experience a rapid deceleration. If left unchecked, the wheel would stop much more quickly than any car could. It might take a car five seconds to stop from 60 mph (96.6 kph) under ideal conditions, but a wheel that locks up could stop spinning in less than a second.
The ABS controller knows that such a rapid deceleration is impossible, so it reduces the pressure to that brake until it sees an acceleration, then it increases the pressure until it sees the deceleration again. It can do this very quickly, before the tire can actually significantly change speed. The result is that the tire slows down at the same rate as the car, with the brakes keeping the tires very near the point at which they will start to lock up. This gives the system maximum braking power.

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I do, however, remember my first car with ABS. When that operated for the first time, I thought the car would shake itself to bits, more frightening than the bus that had cut across in front of me! I suspect that one did allow the wheels to stop.

(For anyone who still doubts the value of ABS, I'd suggest they read this ABS comparison test, done back in 1992.)