I've never had any issue with my side stand on my stock FT. My lowered FT is another story. I had 1/2" sectioned out of the end of the side stand & then welded back together. Remove your side stand & take it to a
GOOD welding shop. (You want to make sure that the weld has good penetration & is solid so your bike doesn't fall over) The guy that did mine, took it to the wire wheel first & removed all the paint from the end. He then took a straight edge & a soap stone & drew a straight line down the length of the tubing. Then off to the chop saw & chopped a half inch out of it. He then took the ends to the bench grinder & ground a nice bevel around the freshly cut ends. After that, he realigned the soap stone reference line & welded it back together. After it cooled, he dressed up the weld lightly & I took it home to paint it. You can't even tell that it was sectioned & now the bike has a nice lean to it. If you check out my FT/CBR Hybrid post, I think there is a pic or two of it.
I always store my bikes that have center stands, on their center stands to keep them straight up & down. When I'm out & about riding the bike, I use the side stand. I've never noticed that my FT has any problem. I own an FJ1200 Yamaha that the side stand almost had the bike standing straight up & down. I placed it on its side stand once at a gas station & it high sided on me. Damn that pissed me off! Then when I picked it up, the side stand collapsed & it went over on the other side. When I got home I ordered a new side stand spring & examined the side stand issue. I ended up taking my small angle grinder to the forward kickstand stop boss & removed some material until the side stand angled farther forward a bit. Now the bike has some lean to it & the side stand is leaning forward instead of straight up & down.
There you have two possible solutions to your problem. Have you lowered your bike, or have lower profile tires on it?
Good luck
J.
PS. Here is a pic for you:
http://ascot500.com/index.php?topic=79.msg309#msg309
