Misting up vizer

[cozmoss11]

I am very new to "moped riding" I have a 50cc longjia moped black edition; I have been driving a car / vans for over 35 years. The whole point of taking to the moped was to save money however, I do feel very vunerable and aware of the increased danger when out riding my moped. I do enjoy it very very much but would ask for any advice form more regular bike riders with regard to safety and "Is a cbt course reccemended" Seems that every biker I talk to has come off there bike at some point. One friend spent £2,000 on a bike and had three accidents is as many weeks, he ended up in hospital. I do really love the extra feeling of freedom but I fear taking the moped out "even if the roads are just damp from a slight rain fall" I then take to my car.

Another question I would really love an answer to is, when riding with my vizer down, how come it mists up ? also I have been out and its rained and I wondered how bikers cope with that lack of vizabillity of the the rain on the vizer ?

I do feel biking is for me and my thoughts are to "eventually" upgrading to a 125cc. Taking all I have said here into account, what advice would a regular biker offer me, Thanks guys.

[Codemonkey]

Visors misting up can be a real pain and it will only get worse as the weather gets colder. There are however a few solutions:

1) Get a drop of washing up liquid or liquid soap, smear it onto the visor (on the inside), and rub it with a bit of soft cloth or kitchen towel so it leaves a very thin film across it. You'll have to re-do it every week or so but it does work.

2) See if you can get a "PinLock" visor and insert for your helmet. This is line a normal visor, but it has 2 little plastic pins on the inside at wither side. The insert is a mini visor that locates in these pins and creates a sort of double glazing effect in your lid. These work very well (its what I use).

As for getting a 125, you will have to do a CBT first since your car license won't cover you for riding one since a 125 is not classed as a moped.
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Test Passed 10/05/2011 Current bike: XJ6-N

[Paulington]

Hey there Cozmoss.

I can honestly tell you with a LOT of certainty that you would feel a LOT less vulnerable and much more like you are in a car if you just went all in, passed your DAS and bought a 600cc motorcycle or a bigger tourer type thing. Even when it rains due to the extra weight of a bigger motorcycle they have MUCH higher stability and therefore feel much better under you so you have no worries.

Mopeds are by nature tiny and very very hard to spot by other drivers which is why you feel vulnerable, not to mention the size difference compared to other vehicles on the road. They are awful things. For this reason I would highly suggest you taking your DAS test and getting a bigger capacity (and bigger in size) motorcycle, doing so you will feel a lot safer and as you have learnt through your friend, do NOT spend a lot of money on your first big bike as you will only end up dropping it!

Secondly, your visor mists up due to the condensation of your breath. The breath coming out of your lungs is EXTREMELY warm in comparison to your visor, as soon as it hits your visor it condenses and boom, you have a load of fog on the inside of your visor.

To prevent this, you can purchase a few different things, recommended are:

An in-helmet mask that directs the air out through the bottom of your helmet and prevents the visor fogging.

or,

Rain X Anti-Fog treatment, you wipe it on the inside of your visor every few days and it prevents your breath condensing which stops your visor misting.

As for the rain on your visor reducing visability, you will notice that when you have a big motorcycle that goes faster, the rain will just run off your visor due to the wind hitting it which clears it pretty good. Until such a time you can do simple things such as treating the outside of your visor with Rain X which helps the water run off a lot easier OR just wipe off your visor periodically, they even sell attachments that slip over your gloved index finger that work as a window wiper or you can just get waterproof gloves and wipe it off occasionally.

To add, just because your friend crashed three times in as many weeks doesn't mean you will, chances are judging by that he's not the best rider and would benefit from some more training as almost all accidents are avoidable if you are riding correctly.

I hope that's helped Cozmoss, welcome to the forum and if you have any more questions don't be afraid to ask! !
____________________
"Four wheels move the body, two wheels move the soul."
Current Vehicles: '89 Kawasaki KDX200, '99 Yamaha XV535, '00 Honda ST1100 Pan-European, '08 Suzuki GSX-R1000, '08 Mitsubishi Lancer GS4 2.0 TDCi, '15 BMW 1 Series 116d Sport Turbo.
CBT: 27/08/08. Theory: 04/09/09. Module 1: 16/09/09. Module 2: 01/10/09.

[Andy_Pagin]

[Rogerborg]

Crikey, yes, do a CBT and get on a 125 ASAP. Running costs will be similar to the 50, but it'll be much more capable.

Regarding rain, there are loads of rituals that we perform. I spray furniture polish on my visor to make the water bead and run off of it faster, and also use a glove wiper - a teeny wiper blade that slips over a finger. It sounds daft, but it works a treat. eBay can provide many examples, or you can look for gloves with a built in version.
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Biking is 1/20th as dangerous as horse riding.
GONE: HN125-8, LF-250B, GPz 305, GPZ 500S, Burgman 400 // RIDING: F650GS (800 twin), Royal Enfield Bullet Electra 500 AVL, Ninja 250R because racebike

[Germ]

A bigger bike just feels so much more secure for lots of reasons....the sheer weight and bulk gives you confidence,they tend to be less "twitchy" and you'll find they suffer less from buffeting when you get overtaken by an HGV (or overtake one in strong wind).

I've just got back to bikes after a 20 odd year break and I didn't realise you could get these finger wiper-blades,back in my day we just had gloves with the index finger made of suede so you could wipe off the rain ....it didn't work great but was better than nothing.

[Nope.]

Everything said above and a big does of Man the fuck up will help a lot.

Riding in the rain isn't hard, it just requires a tiny bit of extra planning with breaking and so on. Just go out and do it! Coming off in a slide doesn't tend to hurt much (Especially when its just a moped on top of you!), just scrapes up the fairings a bit.
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Former: Derbi GP1 50, Sachs XTC 125, Suzuki GSXR 400 GK73A, Kawasaki ZX7R, Suzuki DR250, Yamaha RD350
Current: 2011 Yamaha XT660Z Ténéré, 2003 Yamaha YZR-R1 5PW (In Build), 2009 Kawasaki ZZR1400

[Teflon-Mike]

Hello Cosmos; first of all scooter style moped wont be doing you many favors.

They weigh about as much as a half eaten packet of crisps, so aren't particularly well 'planted' on the road.

They have wheels smaller than a toddlers pavement toy, so little 'stability' created from them spinning like a gyroscope, and being little they drop into every tiny dent in the road and have to climb out of them.

They are governed to less than 35mph, so struggle to keep up with traffic

What weight they have is all at the back, and they have bog all between your knes to give them balence, structural stiffness or anything to grip hold of with your legs!

And THAT is all before the more perverse aspects of engineering you get in some of them, like Vespas, that don't even have the wheels on the same centre line!

So YES a 125 or 'propper' motorbike would feel a LOT more confidence inspiring.

As for the visor problem......

I wont gain brownie points for the suggestion, but have you tried an open face helmet?

Full face hats steam up. END OF!

I have been using Shoei since 1987; these are top of the market hats that probably cost more than your bike did. They are great hats, and when I got the first one, they were about the only things on the market with decent venting, and were 'more' fog resistant, but NOT fog free.

More modern helmets have much better venting than in days of yore, and low and middle range hats these days can be pretty 'OK', BUT.... I dont think that they have EVER found a completely fog free helmet yet.

Old wives tricks abound, and there are hundreds of proprietry solutions you can smear on your visor, Fog-X being one of the more heavily marketed ones, old 'Bob-Heath' visor prep being an old favourite, after a smear of washing up liquid.

Most work to a greater or lesser degree, whether they are VFM or not is another matter.

For 'gadgets', people make a lot of 'pin lock' inserts, which are a bit of thin perspex pegged inside the visor, so it acts a bit like double glazing....

I have never tried one; in the early days they were always a bit, hit and miss.

I used a 'fog city shield' which is a similar thing, only film is spaced from inside of visor by thin rim of double sided tape.

I put one on a BRAND NEW visor for my Shoei, when I was given one by the makers for product evaluation, before they went to market....... worked BRILLIANTLY, and stayed in that hat for five years, BUT I kept that visor for damp and rainy days, and kept it clean, and you could STILL, even in top line, well vented hat get it steaming up....

The FIRST thing you should do when starting to steam is 'open' the visor a crack.

This lets the helmet vent, and clears the visor, and as said, the recourse when even top brand, top vented, inserted and preperation laggered hats steam up!

Which is where many better helmets start to score, becouse the visor will open a 'crack' and stay there.....

visor mech on many lower market hats simply isn't that good, and they are all or nothing affairs..... but then so many people treat them that way, knowing no better!

Which is WHY I say, have you tried an open face helmet?

On a scooter or 125, and for town riding, where speeds dont often get that high, they CAN be a boon.

Unfasionable these days, and not 'politically correct' to suggest them, every one spouting the party line that full face give 'better protection'.

Yes..... WHEN YOU CRASH

Trick to riding bikes is to NOT crash.......

PRIME tool to help you NOT CRASH.. is seeing where you are going!

Open face hat, no visor, cant steam up! SIMPLES!

They are also lighter, and with out visor mech on the side or chin piece, the field of view you get from one is GREAT... so double whammy... better field of unobstructed view to let you see whats going on around you; PLUS nothing in front of your face to steam up and stop you seeing what little you might!

Now, I wear both full and open lids, and yes, you DO feel more exposed, and yes, at speed they can get a bit buffety... BUT... I do regularly ride on the road in one, and at speeds up to about 70, and feel quite comfortable doing so, and really DO appreciate the field of view, and lack of being 'closed in'.... many people who refute open face hats, have OFTEN never ridden in them.....

Safety is always a compromise; how much you are comfortable with, and can afford, vs comfort and practicality.

Open face hats don't offer 'as much' crash protection as a full face... though the chin piece of a full face hat is not offering any significant impact protection... there is no padding in there... stop a bang breaking your nose, but anything much harder will smash the shell anyway.... so its mainly for abrasion protection.

So small plus for crash protection, you may want in the eventuality of an off, against gain of visability, ALL the time!

Blindly letting the emotive 'fear' of having chin grazed in an off, drive the decision over what hat to buy, rather than common sense, is a BAD thing..... you are letting your judgement be ruled by FEAR not LOGIC, and is a bad start to risk management, which is big chunk of what biking is!

ANYWAY:

1. Yes bikker bike will be more confidence inspiring
2. Open visor a crack when misting
3. Try smear of washing up liquid on iside of visor, or other preparation.
3. Consider Fog City Shield / Pinlock insert (But on brand new visor)
4. Consider new lid, MAYBE an open face, IF you have thought about all the pro's and cons.
5. NO, absolutely no reason you MUST have an accident.
Risk is always there, and odds are not great, especially for newer riders, but its not mandatory. While fears of an accident are often skewed. Most falls hurt, and cause a bit of damage, not THAT many actually put people in hospital, let alone kill them.
Risk is there, but look at stats; mostly newbies grazing themselves locking a wheel practicing e-stop too enthusiastically, or not looking out for hazards well enough, or nutters, going quick regardless taking chances regardless, often on bigger, higher performance bikes, they cant 'really' handlke, especially if they are a wun-week-DAS-wunder, clambering onto latest plastic crotch rocket.

Use your common sense, keep your wits, no need for it to be you.

BUT, and another plus for an open face lid in my book, ALL starts with simply looking where you are going!

As an instructor, told students, you can get away with loads of 'silly faults'; you can eff up your road possitioning; you can cock up indicating, you can get road speed wrong, off balence or anything else.....

ONE thing you CANNOT afford to fuck up is your observations.

And if you can't see out your hat to begin with...... your onto a looser before you even begin!

Open face hat, in these circumstances can make a lot of sense. Back to Basics, where higher technology sends you chasing ever more technical and ever more expensive answers to something that need never have been a problem in the first place!

BUT you have to weigh up pro's and cons for yourself and go with what you are most comfy with.
____________________
My Webby'Tef's-tQ, loads of stuff about my bikes, my Land-Rovers, and the stuff I do with them!
Current Bikes:'Honda VF1000F' ;'CB750F2N' ;'CB125TD ( 6 3 of em!)'; 'Montesa Cota 248'. Learner FAQ's:= 'U want to Ride a Motorbike! Where Do U start?'

[angryjonny]

I've used visor inserts for years - pinlock on my current Arai but stick-on ones before then. By far the best solution I've found to visor misting - even on a cold damp day, you might fog up a bit at the bottom but your vision should still remain clear.

Also - when you're stopped at traffic lights or wherever, just angle your mouth so you breathe out downwards out of the helmet rather than into the visor space.

[philoldsmobil...]

if you cant get a pinlock for your helmet, try the Bob Heath anti fog spray, it works very well, but it does need regular re application (about once a week)

[Biker Alex]

Has no one else ever hidden in the girls locker room and mastered the art of breathing lightly?

When im going 15mph+ my visor does not fog up, when I get to a traffic light I either tone down my breath and breathe slowly if its a short stop or open the visor a cm or two. More recently with my new helmet I have just opened the vent which is just above the chin and I can breathe as heavily as I want.

Could never be bothered to try and 'fix' it.

[RussBLS]

I would discourage people from using open face helmets. If by some chance you do come off and the lower part of the visor or your chin hits the floor, I'm pretty sure you'd be saying goodbye to your jaw.
Full face helmet with the visor open slightly is the only way to go I believe.

[Teflon-Mike]

[RussBLS]

[RussBLS]

[ThatsTheBadge...]

Pinlock, Pinlock, Pinlock!

I'd absolutely suggest a lid with the ability to take a pinlock insert, they're fantastic.

Yes, you will pay a bit more for a lid/visor that can take a pinlock but they're excellent for stopping you from fogging up. I've had one since I started riding and would never buy a lid that couldn't have one after using one.

They have their down points but the only major floor in them is that if it absolutely chucks it down you can get some water between the visor and the pinlock insert, all you need to is pop it off, and dry it out for an hour maybe, you'd be drying your kit off anyway if you got that wet.

That's my two cents worth anyway, I have a flip face Duchini lid for commuting and a Nitro lid for when it's colder the flip face lid tends to be colder in winter and I hate being cold especially on my face.

[Pete.]

At this time of year if your visor is misting up all you need to do is crack the visor open a little. WHen you are moving the visor will clear very quickly, but when you are sitting at lights it will mist up quickly too, just open it up then pull it closed when on the move.

In town I ride with my visor open and wear a pair of cheapo dark-tinted safety glasses. Not because they are safety glasses but because they have flat thin arms and are comfortable to slide in through the visor and weigh almost nothing. I can also pull them out and tuck them in my tank cover by the arm if it gets dark when riding.

Inserts are great, Bob Heath spray is great too. Neither are necessary in the UK right now.
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a.k.a 'Geri'

132.9mph off and walked away. Gear is good, gear is good, gear is very very good

[LordShaftesbu...]