“Serious Threat to Life” - Honda Pan European Review

First of all, the issue discussed is about the ST1300 NOT the ST1100.
Unless you looked and listened closely it would be easy to assume the issue was with the ST1100 since most of the video footage is of ST1100s.
The ST1300 was designed by Honda of Japan not Honda of Germany like the ST1100.
They are two different motorcycles - to drag the ST1100 into the 'pan weave/Scottish policeman' deal of the ST1300 is very poor journalism!
It's like he was looking for 'filler' to have a proper length video. ;)
The ST1100 was never mentioned as such by the BBC.
FWIW, Mr. Google says -

In 2007, a British coroner, Dr. James Adeley, announced he would warn all Chief Constables in England and Wales of the "serious threat" posed by the police version of the ST1300 due to a high-speed "weave" or wobble instability. This followed an inquest into the death of a police motorcyclist who was riding the single-seat model.
The BBC reported on this, stating that:
  • Following the coroner's recommendation that the bike should not be used in excess of 80mph, Honda and the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) working group jointly agreed the bike should be immediately withdrawn from service pending further investigation.
  • Some police forces, such as Central Scotland Police, took their bikes off the road, while others, like Lothian and Borders, modified their existing bikes to limit their top speed.
The old motto I have about journalism still rings true -

"Don't let the truth get in the way of a good story!" ;)
 
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Must be slack season for Ryan F9. ie come up with something, anything, regardless of accuracy. He usually does a better job. I wonder what is going on? Setting the foundation for another video which shows where the first one is wrong?
 
Journalists are lazy and ignorant.

Yesterday the local TV news station had a special feature on problems with UPS in particular they kept mentioning UPS (United Parcel Service) statistics policies, but more than half of the videos and photos they used yesterday showed US post office workers and vehicles!
 
gunsmoker said:
Journalists are lazy and ignorant.

Yesterday the local TV news station had a special feature on problems with UPS in particular they kept mentioning UPS (United Parcel Service) statistics policies, but more than half of the videos and photos they used yesterday showed US post office workers and vehicles!
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Ah, it's probably that AI stuff again ... or LI (Lack of Intelligence) ;)
 
Why is anyone even bothering writing about an old subject regarding a long-discontinued bike? Click bait. Dust off something off with shock value and rehash it for a new audience. Wouldn't be surprised if a good amount of it was plagiarized.
 
I would have to say I have ridden the ST 1300 at speed (maybe not at 100+ miles per hour) with a top case on it out in Colorado and it feels as stable and planted as my 1100s. I actually feel that this was probably just a couple of bike accidents that doomed the whole lot of the police bikes, even though it really didn’t need to. There are so many variables involved with something like this, including type of tire, tire pressure, set up of the suspension, etc. and it would appear that none of these have been thought about or accounted for. So if these bikes are set up properly, I really see zero problems with them. Yes, the wheelbase on the 1300 is a little shorter than the 1100 but to me it runs and handles just fine as we all know. I have seen this on car forums in the past as well. A few cars have an issue, and therefore, they all do which is obviously not the case. Anyway, it is a well kept secret by us, so yes, if they stay on the cheaper side of life, it’s a benefit for us if we want to get them in the future. Not so much for selling ones that we currently have. I guess technically if you’re buying one from a dealership, you can bring up the video and show it to the dealer to see if you can get a better price! The dealer will think they unloaded a bad bike and you’ll be walking away, smiling the whole way.
 
Owned a 2003 ST1300 for 12 years and 130k + miles and never a problem. It did dance in the truck bow wave on the freeways and sometimes in a certain cross wind but just lower the shield and crouch down a bit and slow down some and all was good. I think I read somewhere that it was found that the blue police light stalk had a harmonic weave at speed which un settled the suspension if it was set too soft. The 2003 US models were held in the warehouses and all the motor mounts were checked and retorqued by Honda before the bike was released to the US dealers.
 
As I have said many times, I have experienced the ST1300 'Pan weave' on the Autobahn in Germany.
The key is I had to reach 120+ mph sustained not just run up for a little while and back down.

http://www.unclephil.us/Alps2008Day04.htm

And there are very few places in the USA where you can do that - maybe out in Nevada (or so I've been told. ;))
Loading, top trunks, tire inflation, etc. all affected it.
But I don't believe the officer that died testing the ST1300 was a 'rookie' rider by any means.

Mr. Google again -

  • Tests confirmed that the "Pan Weave" instability could be reproduced in civilian models at high speeds under certain conditions, with some civilian owners reporting experiencing it as well.
 
Josh_ST said:
Thanks Fort Nine! Drive the prices down so I can get a post 2008 model dirt cheap! 😁
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Get out of the age of dinosaurs, this pan weave first reported in 2007 possibly due to weight distribution of equipment on police bikes. Honda continued to build these bikes till about 2012. So it's not driving down prices, motorcycle ownership is. :thumb: Go to youtube and see how many different bikes with tank slappers there are.
 
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The Pan Weave is a real thing. It wasn’t a wobble or tank slapper but a damped oscillation around the longitudinal axis that occurs above some particular speed around or north of 115 mph. Not all S1300s exhibit the behavior- there are lots of variables and it had to be ridden faster than many riders were willing to go but it cannot be dismissed as fancy. The British magazine Ride did instrumented blind testing at a racetrack and documented the weave in a published article in 2007. That said, ST1300s have covered millions of miles without killing too many riders. I chipped in my fair share of miles on the 1300 and I rode in the weave more than a few times and I also rode that bike to its top speed of 143 more times than I’m willing to admit in a court of law without it going into the weave but sometimes it would weave as low as 115 miles an hour.
 
dduelin said:
The Pan Weave is a real thing. It wasn’t a wobble or tank slapper but a damped oscillation around the longitudinal axis that occurs above some particular speed around or north of 115 mph. Not all S1300s exhibit the behavior- there are lots of variables and it had to be ridden faster than many riders were willing to go but it cannot be dismissed as fancy. The British magazine Ride did instrumented blind testing at a racetrack and documented the weave in a published article in 2007. That said, ST1300s have covered millions of miles without killing too many riders. I chipped in my fair share of miles on the 1300 and I rode in the weave more than a few times and I also rode that bike to its top speed of 143 more times than I’m willing to admit in a court of law without it going into the weave but sometimes it would weave as low as 115 miles an hour.
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I've always felt that it had something to do with the position of the windshield and creating aerodynamic lift.
To me it felt like trying to drive an old pickup truck with too much weight in the back and the front got 'light'.
When I dropped the windshield all the way down I did not encounter the problem regardless of top speed.
The nice thing about that section of the Autobahn I was on I could triple digit as long as I liked without fear of a ticket!
And I would still often be passed .... ;)
 
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