Today I learned...

Today I learned that some parking garage gates operate on an inductive loop.

This was a pay booth gate and the attendant asked me to roll over the cut where the loop is. When that didn't work she went a few lanes over and got a metal box they have for just this purpose. The guy in the Mercedes behind me was not pleased.

And this particular garage had the pay booth on an incline. How convenient...

What did you learn today?

In my short, newbie riding experience I have been successful a couple of times in deploying my kickstand to rest over the loop, causing the gate to rise. I think it was a causal effect anyway; I could be mistaken.

I've only tried that once and it didn't work.

It's not worked every time for me. When the kickstand trick fails, the attendant brings over a metal box as you described, to the consternation of all behind me.

Kickstand should work, if you have it in the right spot for the coil to pick it up and if the tech who installed it has the sensitivity not turned way down.

So saying, some of us in the KLR world haven't disabled our kickstand safety switch and that adds another irritation to the equation.

I like the metal box idea. That's funny.

What is this 'loop' you folks are talking about. I bought a recently bought a patio home in a gated community and I have only one gate that will open for me when leaving on my Yamaha. Even the gate at the guard house won't open for me. Is there something I can see to ride over to trigger these things?

Thanks.

If you have a KLR just leave the kickstand up, get off and kick the bike over. The weight of it laying flat will trip the sensor.

I'm no loopamatician, but I just know some will, some won't. It depends on how they are calibrated or voodoo or something. Look for a rectangular cut in the pavement about the size of a car. The wire loop is embedded there. Roll your bike over the line for your best shot at triggering it. If that doesn't work, you have to sacrifice a virgin or something.

Anyhoo, today I learned my client didn't get a hotel room for me for both nights this weekend, so I'm going moto-camping for the first time!

The "loop" senses disturbance in the magnetic field. It does not work by pressure. The mass of steel in a vehicle provides enough disturbance to do the trick. The "kick stand down" next to the loop serves the same purpose.

I had the same problem with the Buell not tripping sensors. I epoxied a couple of magnets I reclaimed from old computer hard drives to the bottom fairing on the inside. Now it trips most sensors. If your bike is fairingless, you could epoxy them to the bottom of the crankcase.

If you have a KLR just leave the kickstand up, get off and kick the bike over. The weight of it laying flat will trip the sensor.

Abso-f'n-lutely Correct! And being a proud KLR owner, I'm embarrassed to say I didn't think of this.

Although I can't imagine the reaction of the Mazda or Toyota owner behind me.

Upon reflection, it would be well worth it to try sometime. (grin)

For the other poster, there's another thread on a similar issue. But here's basics. Some traffic control devices use a wire loop imbedded in the pavement to sense your vehicle. Usually you can tell by looking for square, triangular or parallelogram cuts. They do this by running a very low frequency radio transmission through it. If you drive over the loop with your car AM radio on, especially on the low end of the band, you can hear a heterodyne "whine" as you move through the signal.

Chunks of ferrous metal, i.e. cars, motorcycle kickstands, metal boxes, etc., interact with that loop, the inductance changes the frequency and the electronics on the other end sense that change and open the gate. Or change the color of the light. Or whatever.

That's assuming the loop isn't an electrical 'open', the transmitter is actually broadcasting a strong enough RF field for the vehicle, kickstand, or metal box to interact with it, or the tech who installed it didn't crank the sensitivity-to-change setting so far down so that only an armored Mercedes will trip it.

Anybody ever try rare earth magnets?

Haven't tried it myself, but I've heard if you superglue a few of them to the bottom of the bike, it'll trip induction loops better. (For those who don't know, induction loops are even used at traffic lights in some places).

Might be worth a shot if you have to drive through an induction-loop-triggered gate or light on a regular basis.

EDIT: A little bit of google research...

I learned that the owners of that parking garage haven't bothered to get their inductive loop's sensitivity adjusted so that it detects motorcycles. Unfortunately they can be set to be too sensitive; nobody wants the gate to be triggered by an empty pop can rolling by.

Poop stings when it gets in your eyes......

Good idea. Use real big ones so you pick up nails and shit as you ride along.

We're gonna need more details.

Or...

We're gonna not need more details.

So I assume this is the same method for triggering traffic lights, yes?

Have you people with magnets noticed any difference with those?

I read somewhere that the magnet thing was a myth, but who knows.

It took a few months but I got my community to raise the sensitivity on the sensors. I can ride by the barrier, but not with side cases. Used to have to go out, park in front of the building and then fetch the luggage. They can be adjusted, it just takes pressure on the building managers.

What do you mean, You People ??

Magnets work no different than a piece if ferrous metal.

I have an inductive loop right in front of my house. I've tossed a hundred different materials into it, at the edge of it, all over.

A starter motor worked pretty good. Anything small enough to attach to a bike didn't work at all.

I learned that some threads are more fun than others