RE: Forged wheels - 3

Well it's a good subject. But to reiterate a little they use the cast wheel mainly for lower manufacture cost. Cast wheels have to be made thicker to make sure the wheel will handle the job because of the possibility of voids in the cast. Although they do have much improved techniques with AL say since the sixties, they still have to do this. But anytime you reduce rotating mass, and this rotating mass is also unsprung mass then you can have several improvements. But we are assuming that we don't reduce the strength of the wheel which introduces other problems that do relate to handling. Hence going to a more expensive forged or carbon processes to reduce weight but not strength.
But there is definitely an impedance created when the wheel structure rotates in air. I think this is more pronounced in a bicycle wheel but there is no reason to assume it doesn't exist in motorcycle wheels, especially considering the much greater speeds. It would be fun to walk thru the Motogp pits and look at the wheels and see if they have been arro-ed so to speak. Could be something they do on the carbon wheels and possibly forged wheels too, but isn't talked about much ...

I also thought the 1250RS was a bit heavy- steering, certainly after a couple off test drives with a 1250R.
I fixed this problem by swapping the non-adjustable OEM steering damper for an adjustable Ohlins steering damper SD049 (now SD051).
Direct swap, no changes needed, everything you need is included in the box.
The difference in handling-steering is amazing, the OEM damper is much too stiff. I've adjusted mine on 8 clicks (off 16). Recommended by Ohlins were 10 clicks.
When you put the bike on the centre-stand, and put some weight on the back so the front wheel comes off the floor, than you can feel how stiff that OEM thing is.