Ducati Monster Forum

Alright guys and gals, here is a loaded question for you.

Hot or cold, I wear leather Daines track trousers (the kind that zip into the jacket).  They have the velcro pads that take the pucks.  I have been riding without the pucks, but lately I have been thinking of putting them back on.  There are situations that come up during rides where I think I could use them.

What do you think?  Asinine?  Shucks, go ahead?  Dangerous?  Am I going to fast if I use pucks?  No place for them on the street?

So, feel free to voice your opinion and provide feedback/opinions/jabs/humor/insults.  I'm looking forward to the discussion this will bring.

Respectfully,

John

Personally, I don't have the skill level to need them or even to use them.

After reading about the Quebec sportbike ban, I do wonder if wearing pucks on the street is just asking to be identified as a public menace.

I never wear mine on the street.

if the pants come with pucks, mine as well leave them on. unless theres an actual reason to take them off like they interfere with something.

Its the one day that you will be leaning far over cause you took a corner too hot and your about to scrape your leg off youll wish youd left them on.  I dont know ive seen people actually use them on the street, i guess if your good at it why not

If your taking off your pucks just so that people wont think your a poser, doesnt that make you a poser cause you worry too much about what people think?  (this aint directed at johnny, but i guess at anyone including myself)  just an observation.  [drink] more beer i say more beer.

i just bought a pair today with pucks, my skills aint even close to be able to drag my knees on the ground.......yet, but i plan on it someday so im leaving them on.
The more i ride bikes the more i could give a flying F^*K what another rider thinks of my gear or my bike. Everyone thinks thier gear and bike is the best, if not they wouldnt be riding it or wearing it. harley riders think they are it, Gixers think they are it, and of course us ducati riders think we got it going on. If your wearing leather pants without pucks, youll get the evil eye from the puck wearing crowd, if you wear pants without pucks, well what a pussy you are.  [bang]

I have a 2 piece Dainese suit that I used to leave the pucks off. I put them on because they were too new... ;) I'll probably take them off again.

I have a one piece Vanson that I wear in summer (it's perforated). I always leave the pucks on.

I have a two piece Revit mesh/winter suit (just bought it) no pucks, no need.

If you think you're going to get your knee down, emergency or fun, put them on. If there's no chance of that then just leave them off. Having said that, I lowsided my previous bike and took some of the wear on my left puck so it served a purpose. :)

IMO if your riding hard enough on the street that you are using the pucks then you should take it to the track  :)

Personally, I don't feel like getting my knee down is a "requirement" when cornering hard....Sure it's fun, and can prove useful to sort of gauge how far over you are, but not necessary for most street riding...

It looks cool and feels good, but I can usually hang off + corner just as well while keeping my inside leg closer to the tank.....It can be tough, though, because once you've done it, your instict is to do it all the time!! 

Wear them if you want, they may save some wear on your gear in a crash.  If you feel you need them for riding on the street you're most certainly exceeding anything that could be called safe.  See "The Pace" above.  Besides, it's already hard enough to talk your way out of a ticket riding a Ducati in a full track suit ;)

Scott

+1
Wear the pucks if you want, but if you're dragging knee on the street, you may not be leaving enough leeway to deal with streetside variables.  Just attracts too much "ticket me now!" type of attention for my taste.

When I bought my Alpinestars leathers I specifically looked for some with no sliders.  I know that I will never be touching a knee down unless I'm crashing, and there is knee armor inside to protect me from that case.

I have pucks on my leathers because the only pair of pants that would fit me had them.  I've never come close to touching a knee down, and am not trying to do so.  However, they worked great once when I dropped my bike in a parking lot. [roll] [cheeky]

I would hazard a guess that if you asked the average person in the street to point out differences between someone on a bike with full leather and someone on a bike with full leather and pucks you'd get very few people that'd have any different reaction. Not wearing pucks because of the supposed image that it creates is as much of a fallacy as loud pipes saving lives IMO. If you're in full leather, you already look like you're a racer to most people. The little pieces of plastic (or Ti if you're lucky!) on your knees aren't going to markedly effect the image you're projecting to the general public.

if you dont own anything other than a sport bike (any type of cruiser) you probably dont know what they are either.  And cops dont know what they are.

I have to strongly disagree with you.

I don't believe that I come across as a racer to most people when I'm fully geared up for a ride:
(http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c67/scottrnelson/Ducati/srnH1-800.jpg)

And i'd have to respectfully disagree with you, Scott.

I was switching the pucks between a one piece & a pair of leather pants, and decided to leave them off the pants for street riding in just the tiniest tinge of vanity -- since I know a tiny fraction of motorcycle riders will look at them all shiny and new and think "poseur." Don't think it makes a bit of difference to the average observer, including law enforcement folks. Unless, of course, they happen to be into riding themselves.

I bet the average person takes a look at you stretched over the tank of a hot yellow, fully-faired bike that looks fast standing still, a full black leather suit with obscure logos on it & purpose built boots and thinks "motorcycle racer." No pucks? Hardcase bags on the bike? I'd wager only fellow aficionados spot those details. Just like the same person sees a Harley rider with a leather vest & pony tail and thinks "outlaw," not "graying tax attorney."

Personally, i think HOW you ride is more important to the cops out there than what you ride or what you wear.

Okay, now I'm going to have to get your opinion of this photo, taken on Saturday east of Fresno.  ;D

(http://i25.photobucket.com/albums/c67/scottrnelson/Fresno/Img_0455.jpg)

I agree, I don't think you look like a racer either but even though I said it, that wasn't my main point. The main point was that pucks don't make a discernible difference. I also think to the casual observer that there's very little difference between your suit & a 1 piece race suit. So, agreeing with triangleforge, I have to say that your suit being slightly less sporty doesn't really make any difference to the overall impression that you give. Another good point from triangleforge was that your bike looks like a sport bike to a lot of people & as such, you'd be tarred with the same brush.

That's a cool picture. :)

Were you looking for some other comment? ;D

Exact same riding outfit.  Different bike.

Could it be that the motorcycle makes a bigger difference than what we're wearing?  That's where the arguments seem to be going so far.

Although I think that now I'm convinced that only the presence or absence of knee pucks isn't going to make a big difference in the impression we give people.

I honestly think that the dark visor (I own two and one clear) does a lot more to give the racer impression than pucks or the style of suit. I definitely agree that what kind of bike will have a larger effect on the impression but I doubt it makes as much difference as to make the impression positive or negative. If it's naked it's a cruiser, if it's faired, it's a ninja and if it's a GS they're really confused. ;)

I'm with you on that one -- the bike makes a huge difference.

And yeah, that's a cool picture  [thumbsup] Can't ever see myself owning one, but would love to ride a nice custom like that one sometime!  And just for the record, knee pucks on a chopper -- well, that's just WRONG!!!

How to confuse Harley riders 101: wear full leather, full face & pucks on a sweet custom. ;)

Even better, if you can get far enough off to USE the pucks without dragging hard bits, my hat's off to you!  It'd look like you were racing in a sidecar, with no pilot!  ;D

[laugh]

In the same theme:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kFleFrJx7nw

NICE!  I half expected the sound of the exhaust note to change before the video was over, with all the new holes in the pipe.  :o

Guys (and gal)-

thanks for the really good discussion.  It's nice to sit back and read some intelligent exchanges.  I still don't know whether to keep the pucks in the closet on put them back on.  Going to think about it some more.   [thumbsup]

J

I keep my pucks on because if im committing to a turn and im leaving leeway on the street for something to happen i want to be able to lean far enough into it and not worry about my knee hitting.  If im not wearing the pucks i tend to bring my leg back in as i turn which changes my body position, which forces me to lean my bike over even more due to the weight change, so it leaves me with less room in an emergency.

 :o  Hey man, never thought of that.!  Pretty interesting way to look at.   [thumbsup]

I have to disagree with this.

It is possible to get your weight off the bike without dragging a knee.

I know several very fast track riders that never drag a knee and get way off the bike.

If you're dragging a knee on the street you're riding too fast IMO.

While I agree generally (do what I say, not what I do! ;)), I can drag a knee at like 20/30mph, you don't need to be going fast.

True...

you also don't have to drag to go fast.

I take my sliders off.

I don't think the ground up surface will get me many points with officer friendly.

Agreed.

Having said that, a polite, respectful attitude will do a lot more good than sliders would do bad IMO. Not that I'm telling you anything you don't already know. :)

Im not saying im dragging my knee though.  Im just stating that it gives me the maximum amount of ground clearance when i can hang completely off the bike without worry of hurting my knees from a lack of pucks.  And the more clearance you have the more maneuverability you have in an emergency to the inside of the turn.  Its not about going fast in my opinion just leaving lots of leeway for the unexpected, thats what i was taught in the total control class anyways and i agree with it.  And i have dragged my knee at 15mph easily.  But we all have our personal preferences.  Go with what you like just because i do it doesnt mean you have to.  The pucks just give me peace of mind knowing that if i need to i can go all the way over. My 2cents   ;)

I wear em around the office.  It makes for interesting conversation.

Seriously, I have two sets of lowers.  The race ones with sliders and I wear them on the street and the track.  The other pair are made to zip on over my pants and they don't have provisions for sliders.  I wear those when I commute to work.  If I am going on a weekend ride in the canyons, I wear the race leathers with sliders.  There is no way I am going to pry those things off just for appearance sake.

Having watched a video of John Mcguinness doing a 130 mph average lap of the Isle of Man TT and never getting his knee down makes you think that pucks are worthless for normal road riding [thumbsup]

And you consider a 130 mph lap of the Isle of Man "normal road riding"?

I have to be careful not to go riding after watching any Isle of Man videos.  It makes me want to ride at insane speeds.  [evil]

 [roll]

i worded that wrong, i meant if you have never owned a sportbike, you probably wont know what the pucs are for.

I was just reading an article on John in the July 08 UK Superbike rag. Pretty good read. He talks about rythym vs flat out speed. That is more of what I chase when I'm out for a ride: rythym and being in the moment.

That being said, I have a two piece suit. I do track days. I raced a YSR (kx60 powered) in TX MiniGP. If I wear my leather pants on the road, I don't take off the pucks. Too much effort. Most times, I wear textiles on the road. Another good thing about pucks is you can actually put some of your weight on your knee to sort of create a triangle with the front and rear contact patches.
FWIW.
Steve

No offense intended, seriously but why in the world would one care about how someone else looks at you? When I ride the twisties, I wear my race leathers, always. I don't think I have EVER looked at someone else's gear to see if they scrape their pucks or not...why would I care? I stop for lunch on my weekend rides (usually six hour rides), and go to sit down restaurants. I get all kinds of looks and I could care less.

Quick story...I was riding with my wife when we pulled into a gas station. We start chatting with a couple who were much older (our parents generation), who pulled in on Harleys. They ask us, "aren't you hot with all that gear on?"  What happened next was a very bizarre, surreal conversation where we end up lecturing our elders about not wearing gear. It was strange. But they wanted to fit an image and wearing protective gear was not part of that image. I did not intend to lecture because again...I don't care what you wear. It just came across that way. But they are so concerned with their image, that they won't wear gear ???  They are SQUIDS!

I'm not trying to sound like a jerk but who cares if you are wearing pucks on your knees or not? Ask yourself if you want to ride or worry about your image.
Guys, I'm really not trying to be harsh here. Emotion doesn't transfer well on the internets! [beer]

pucks sometimes out of laziness...no other reason.

All my leather suits have 'em.. I'm not going to take them off for a 2 hour sunday ride to get back home and put them on again.

It kinda looks weird dressing up in my leathers with worn pucks, race boots (very worn, held together with duct tape), helmet, gloves, b/p, etc.. on a GS1200Adventure.  [laugh]

Some of the roads i ride on, yeah I do use my pucks.. that doesn't mean I'm out racing. You CAN get your knee down at slow speeds also, not that I do (often) on the road.

It is not unknown for some folks to apply their pucks to a grinding wheel so that others will think they are getting their knee down.

It's funny how wrong perceptions can be.  Consider the worst case wheeling riding squid careening down the highway and the veteran track rider wearing full gear out for a weekend cruise.  Most people would look at those two and say they both have a death wish.  If you asked them who was likely the more aggressive rider, I bet they would pick the guy armored to the teeth.  If you asked them if he was wearing "pucks" they'd have no clue what you were talking about.

I think you should just wear what you need.  They general public already considers you to be a danger regardless of what you are wearing.

I leave them on the suits that have them just because I'm too lazy to take them off....or even to consider it.  (pretty lazy).


My personal experience with being pulled over seems to be the opposite of you guys.   Every single time the officer has commented that I should slow down, but it's obvious that I'm not a novice and am wearing the right gear...so no ticket today.    This was frequent in Florida when I commuted daily and has happened several times up here in MD too.

Of course in FL nobody else was ever wearing a full leather suit so maybe it was a heat pitty thing.

53-week bump...

wouldn't a puck act as extra armor and protect your proximal fibula knee from an impact? how could more protection ever be a bad thing?

I WISH I had been wearing pucks in the event of my 35mph low side. My left knee cap was used on the ground instead.

You know the feeling of your kneecap hanging out of your leg but inside your pants sure is an interesting feeling.

although my outer knees did not suffere damage form my recent excursion with roadside metal, i would have liked to have had the extra protection. i didn't have pucks on due to the thinking i would never get low enough on the street to have to use them.. i was wrong. in that emergency situation i could have used the extra safety sensor to know if i could have gone even lower in the turn.

I don't know that they provide any more protection to your knee.  They're not really absorbent, so they'd just translate the force to the knee armor. 

What I've found is that having pucks does protect your leathers from more damage in the event of a crash.  I've scraped the hell out of pucks (oops, had a funny misspelling there until I corrected it  ;D) during a crash, but had the knees of my leathers escape largely unhurt because the pucks took the brunt.  So I keep 'em on.  I don't really care about what they look like on the street or what officers think about them.  I've never put a knee down on the street, so don't need them for cornerning. 

That said, it's confidence-inspiring to know they're there if I want them.  If I'm cranked over and my rear slides out on gravel or whatever, it's nice to know I can try to put my knee down.  I've stuck my knee out on a coupla occasions like that, but haven't had it touch and haven't had to use it lever the bike back up.  Still, I go into turns knowing that I can do it if necessary (and ignoring that there's no way I'll actually save a crash that way ;D).  As a psychological thing, it helps.  Still, if I had gear without pucks, I'm not sure I'd pay the extra $ to purchase pucks and then sew velcro on.  Not worth it. 

Look, officer: no marks on these babies—I'm a responsible rider! ;)

In some situations, it depends simply on the person and their style of riding.....

My wife cannot physically slide off the seat to drag a knee, but if she could, she would. She knows she will never get her knee down, but she leaves the pucks on her suit, regardless. Sitting upright in the seat, she will drag her pegs and toe sliders, even on the R1, though....

I can ride as fast, or even faster than my wife, even when the ST2 (because I can gain more ground clearance from sliding off the seat). If I sit upright, I can drag hard parts far too easily, so I was forced to get off the seat. With sliding off the seat, I will often stick my knee out and drag, but it is not a requirement. Actually, when I'm going at the higher speeds through the twisties, I usually don't touch my knee down at all, but sometimes I get surprised when it touches and I don't think I'm leaned over that far. Now, there have been a few times when I was dragging knee and toe where I think it may have been a little mandatory.....this is when I had the knee on the deck and the rear end would do the little slide-catch-slide-catch-slide-catch thing (usually from not letting the tire warm up enough to stick well). I wouldn't doubt it if I would have lost the rear end had my knee not been on the ground...

Then, we have a buddy who drags his knee in just about every curve he comes across. I've seen him drag his knee on the Blue Ridge Parkway while turning into an overlook, and he's told us stories of being downtown and dragging his knee throguh intersections....

It's really funny to watch the three of us ride together, especially when my wife is leading. She'll be going through the curve while sitting upright in the seat, I'll be behind her occassionally dragging a knee and often not, and then our buddy is behind us dragging in every curve, but.....we are all pretty much going the exact same speed and taking the same line.

It just has a lot to do with riding styles as to whether you can drag a knee or need to drag a knee. In many situations, dragging a knee has nothing to do with excessive speeds nor being "on the edge". There are several curves on the roads around here where you "can" drag your knee in a curve while doing the posted speed limit. You may not "have" to drag a knee, but you can. I also love the folks who think that because you are dragging a knee, that you are committed to that line and are going to crash if anything unexpected happens....well, that may be true if you freak out (with or without a knee on the ground), but you can drag a knee and change your line or even hit your brakes...or both. I have no problems having my knee on the ground and being able to make changes. I think this paranoid dillusion of being "too committed" stems from people who have never gotten a knee down.

Anyway, I leave my pucks on and would never take them off unless to rotate them or replace them. Matter of fact, I try to make it a point to drag a knee and hit 100+ every time I take a bike out (there's one road I can do both at the same time). It may be a little, lazy, tight 20 mph curve on a deserted back road when I drag a knee or a huge, straight open road with no houses and only fields on either side when I opt to hit 100+, but I do try to accomplish each when I take a bike out.

Here is a 30 mph curve being taken around 30 mph. It is the first curve in an "S" with each curve being a decreasing radius. I am able to see through this curve before the set up and throughout the curve.....

(http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d32/Kramer_Krazy/Terry_178.jpg)
(I didn't know who this guy was on the side of the road when I came through and he took this picture. It took me nearly two months to find out who he was and to get this pic from him. The shot he took just before this one, I had my knee on the ground and was looking right at him while trying to figure out who he was and why he was there.)

and this is a poor abused knee puck....

(http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d32/Kramer_Krazy/Holey_Slider.jpg)
(This one is nothing compared to a set of my wife's old pucks.)

if you have the gear, why wouldent you use it?

just because you have pucks on doesnt mean you have to drag a knee.

i find it interesting people take the time to take the pucks off. Thats time you could spend riding  [moto]
when i read the topic i did not read how crazy do u ride on street, i read do you waste time taking the pucks off your leathers before you ride  ;D

Funny, I was thinking the same thing.  I typically don't wear my leathers (2 piece) every day.  Usually, I'll just go with the jacket and Kevlar jeans for my commute, out to the store, slabbing, or for an easy ride around the area.  If I plan on riding a technical road, a road that I'm not familiar with, or if I'm on a group ride with people I don't know, I'll wear as much gear as I can including pucks which I see no reason to take off.   

I got pulled over last year near Dahlonega (North Georgia mountains) and was in full leathers with pucks. The officer was quite congenial and commended me for wearing more gear than the average guy he pulled over. Cut me a break.

Call me naive and dumb, but I sorta feel like the cops would rather see you look like a racing lunatic than a pile of hamburger. Chalk one up to hope for humanity!

^^^ your not naive or dumb, just Wonked out of your head  ;D
play on words i love it.  :P

If you have the velcro and you feel you rather not wear pucks all the time, have your local upholstery shop make you a set of thick leather patches to wear instead.  Make them in color for a little added flair.  Scuff em up on a grinder for that "sierra hotel" look.

Feel free to contact me for any additional sartorial advice.

I'd guess you're right.  You can't give a ticket to a pile of hamburger  [leo]

Scott

I think whether or not you use pucks relates to your personal situation like others before me have said.  For instance, if you have just spent the weekend at the track, and you are used to putting a knee down, if your new found reflex catches you off guard, you can end up with a nasty raspberry on your inside knee.  If you have put a knee down in the past, I'd say leave them on just in case you find yourself in a position where instinct kicks in and you want to drag a knee.

A few months ago I went into a decreasing radius right hander much too hot on my M750 in jeans and a leather jacket.  I knew it was going to take some seriously lean to make it through and I ground the hell out of my inside knee without hesitating.  Now, I roll pucks all the time though I almost never use them intentionally on the street.

That situation is one of the reasons why i will always have my sliders on my leathers.