Embarrasing newbie faux pas

[hellkat]

Hm, well, you're not alone in this There are so many times I've made a right prat of myself, usually in front of someone (bloke) I'm trying desperately to be "cool" in front of *sigh*.
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Not nearly as interesting in real life.

[Trunecka]

I'm not that tall and have ridden a trailbike for a while.

Most common one is parking up quickly, switching the engine off and leaning it to the left...
... to find I haven't put the stand down, and promptly lowering 110kg of top-heavy, widebarred trailbike onto the floor.

I don't normally drop it down hard enough to do any damage, it's just that when the bike starts falling over, there's nothing I can do but try to slow its fall.


Also the 'incident' when I was out trailriding on my own. Went one way along a trail, down a hill with a field on my left, but wasn't happy with the rut which I rode in on the way down, so I chose the central, bushier rut on the way back up.

Just as I noticed that there were two people laying in the field on the hill, one asleep and one was watching me, the front wheel fell down a huge hole (obscured by the greenery) and the bike toppled onto my ankle.

My boots saved my ankle (there's a chunk of rubber missing that the footpeg removed) and after I'd pulled myself&the bike back upright I waved to The People On The Hill to let them know I was alright; by this time both of them were sitting bolt upright and looking quite entertained.
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"I'm gonna get free, Ride into the sun..."
-The Vines

[baldy]

[hellkat]

[stinkwheel]

Another classic is stopping at a junction then finding you have your shoelace/trouser cuff caught on the footpeg. The look on the face of the person sat behind you is a picture because all they see is you stop then topple over without putting your foot down.
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“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[hellkat]

[Born2bVile]

My other classic moment of complete stupidity took place over several days.

All of a sudden my bike decided it was just going to run on one cylinder.

Bit of a bugger when it happens on the way to work. Even more of a bugger when you happen to be going straight from work to a rally.

So I tinkered about with the bike in my luch hour. Nothing seemed to be wrong, so off I set from City Centre Manchester down the East Lancs. It started ok and ran well for a few miles. Then it cut back to one cylinder again.

So I completed my run to the rally at 30mph. Put the tent up got pissed. Won the rat bike trophy.

Several people had a look at the bike over the weekend and pronounced it to be running fine.

Left on the Sunday. Couple of miles down the road, one cylinder time again. Limped home at 30mph.

Back at the pub (I was living there at the time), we started trying to analyse the problem. Had the bike half-stripped when some clever dick comes up and says 'Is the petrol tap on?'.

I had fitted a new tap to one side about a week before and had gone onto reserve shortly before the rally. This new tap had different positions to the other (and what I was used to). I'd just turned both taps to the 6 o'clock postion out of habit.



Cheers,

Byrnie.
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NABD Treasurer
National Association for Bikers with a Disability
Reg Charity No. 1040907

[dodsi]

and i thought i would look silly on a scoot at 6' 3"

ah well few more weeks and a better bike is destined

[stinkwheel]

Re, BTBVs post (above)

I feel I should explain for the benefit of the younger people on the forum, that British twin-cylinder motorbikes with a carb per cylinder were often fitted with a fuel tap on either side of the tank. One for each carb, not as today where there is one tap with two spouts coming off it.
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“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[Born2bVile]

[Tarmacsurfer]

Heh, I liked the old XSs. Had the 250 for a while as a winter hack. Ran an 1100 for a brief period as well.

As far as embarrassing goes, it would have to be falling over at a set of lights. It was a rather cold night, I was on my way back from the Gurt Gallybagger rally on the IoW and had decided to go on to Oxford to see a friend. Met said friend in Reading and headed on up, stopped at a set of traffic lights in Henley and according to Cam just didn't put my feet down. Now me sitting on the bike was utterly positive I'd kicked it into neutral and put my left foot down, as normal. So positive I didn't even worry until the *crunch* of me plus bike hit the floor. Luckily the thing had crash bars as I was supposed to be delivering it to it's owner in Swansea the following weekend. The three people in the car behind me could be heard laughing from 20 feet away
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I'm immortal. Well, so far.

[Kickstart]

Hi

Many years ago I was riding past the house of a guy I knew and he was out fiddling with his bike. I pulled up and jumped off the bike to chat to him.

It would have helped if I had put the side stand down.

Gave him a good laugh anyway.

All the best

Keith
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Traxpics, track day and racing photographs - Bimota Forum - Bike performance / thrust graphs for choosing gearing

[stinkwheel]

My jawa is responsible for my comedy stalling at the lights on other bikes. It has a semi-auto clutch that works off the gear lever, if you hold the gear lever down with your foot, it holds the clutch in.

This means you can stop at the lights/a junction and hold the lever down whilst fiddling with your visor/messing with the bike/scratching your arse then ride away using the foot clutch. After a while riding it, you get used to this and try it on other bikes resulting in a juddering halt with legs flailing.
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“Rule one: Always stick around for one more drink. That's when things happen. That's when you find out everything you want to know.”
I did the 2010 Round Britain Rally on my 350 Bullet. 89 landmarks, 3 months, 9,500 miles.

[fuzz]

Having drilled a hole in my carb mount when fitting the Scottoiler, I was shitting it when the bike wouldn't start. It was the first time I'd stripped the carb off so it was a bit of a learning curve too.

My g/f noticed the pipe from the spigot in the hole we drilled had come out, so I recut a longer pipe to give some more slack and fitted it once more. Again the bike wouldn't start, but the pipe had remained attached.

Panic starts to take over, with lots of "I've f***ed my bike", until I remember I turned off the engine start for safety! I felt a little foolish, but proud aswell as I managed to fit that bloody thing properly after all!
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https://www.bikepics.com/members/fuzzbcf/
Bikes: '99 NSR125R, '00 SV650S, K1 GSX-R600, '97 CB500, K3 SV1000S, '16 VFR800

[Gazdaman]

A good one on a 900 diversion is the brakes occasionally stick, so you slip it into first and rock it back and forth to un-stick the brakes.

then you go to start the bugger, turn the key, and *nothing* happens, no lights, no nothing.

that's because it won't start in gear. Same thing if the side stand's down you automagically think the worst and expect the electrics to be dead or something.

I used to have an old Italjett 100cc field bike, that was given to me. It was slightly dubious, (all numbers filed off) the kick start thing had been rounded off so it had to be bump started. My dad would stick it into second, run then jump onto the seat with both legs to the left off the bike.

that looks like such an unstable position, he never fell off, but I'm sure many people have, and you end up on your back, on top of the bike.

Gaz

[Craggles]

Well the first comes before my CBT - I had got my dad to take me down the local industrial estate for a bit of practice with the gears, and so the first time I had ever rode a bike would not be the morning of the CBT (I'm very glad I did that!).

He'd set up some cones for me to ride in and out of, as I came to turn round the last cone, I lost control of the bike. I reached to pull in the front brake, but slipped and opened the throttle, so I pulled in the clutch which sent the revs sky high, so I let go - sending the bike jumping forward. Somehow I managed to brake/stall just before I hit the brick wall.

Second incident comes on my regular ride to college - been riding for about two weeks at this point, and had just got over the "I only stalled once on my way into college today!" thing. I was approaching traffic lights, ready to do a left hand turn. Every time I'd passed those traffic lights in the past, there was a green light to turn left - So I assumed it was always green. WRONG! While concentrating on a dodgy overtaking manovre from a white van man, I look up just before entering the junction to be faced with a red light. I slam on the brakes and find myself stalled, in third gear in the middle of the junction. I quickly look round, wack down into first and pull off into my turn. Thank god no cars were coming!

Thats about it... aside from stalling at a roundabout at my CBT, restarting, panicing and pulling out without looking. Into the path of a bus. Oops!
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If this signature is blue, you're riding too fast