Decided to go out for a ride round today. Got up in the morning, still hung over from last nights ten pints, and peeked out the window at the bike and more importantly the weather. Not that i mind riding in the rain you uinderstand, its just that when its wet i prefer to favour my back brake but unfortuneatly it hasnt worked for three months due to the pads falling out when rust took a hold. No probs there though as it was fine and dry.
I like it riding in the hot sunny weather, so much grip available, especially the front tyre having 1mm of tread over its entire tread area - really puts some rubber down ya know!. Talking of which i can recommend mixing tyres front to rear - i mean they do different jobs so doesnt it make sense to have different tyres? thats why i run a radial tyre on the front and a part worn crossply on the rear.
Anyhoo, finished the breakfast and headed out to the bike. As it was so hot i decided against any formal bikewear and opted for my favourite red shorts and bare top look ( like baywatch ), best pair of flip flops on my feet , no gloves and just my old crash helmet to keep the flies out of my hair although doing up the strap under my chin gets a little restrictive so i dont usually bother. My brother had come round by this point so i offered him pillion - slight inconvenience as we had to put six inch bolts through the footrest hangers as the footrests got snapped off that time at cadwell!) And he gladly donned his black visored lid and jumped on the back - I didnt have a black visor in my lid by the way coz the visor mechanism had broken and it had no visor at all. Stlill, i found some hologram goggles to wear so the sun wouldnt dazzle me.
So fire up the beast and check the lights and switches etc. All seemed present and correct with the exception of the rear light where one of the two brake light bulbs seemed to be out althopugh both worked as rear lights fine. The front brake light switch didnt work but the switch on the rear brake did ( although the rear brakes dont work at all) so i would simply operate the useless rear brake lever everytime i braked the front - no problem. The horn also didnt work but i had fitted a cycle bell to the handlebars and decided to just flick the little silver lever if necessary.
So set fare for a day of scraping pegs - and bolts - we were off.
Up to the end of the road, quick nip over the pavement to fit between the bollards and then onto the road proper. First overtake came up quickly. We were in a thirty limit near the house when we came on some old codger doing twenty five. I span upto fourty eight - to get passed quickly - and nipped by, cutting back in sharpish to let him know what a tool he was, and then eased back to thirty , i dont agree with speeding in built up areas.
next overtake was on a sixty road with double white lines down the middle. Closed on the prey, down to third, bamng it to sixty and passed him like a shot. Then when the lines dotted again i cut accross to the opposite curb and rode on the other side of the road for about four hundred metres to get an early start out of the upcoming corner. Worked a treat as my knee went down good with plenty of sparks from my titanium knee slider, then blast by a bus stopped outside a school at about fourty eight as i powered back up to sixty.
Into town and filtering down between some cars waiting in the zig zags of a pedestrian crossing when my mobile started ringing. As we were doing no more than ten mph i whipped it out of my pocket, had a quick look at who was calling and then switched it off - better safe than sorry i say. The Cars started to move off and i shot out in between them and got away first - nice one.
At this point bro decided he needed a piss stop so i pulled over opposite this traffic island and waited while he took a piss behind a bush. I kept the engine running as she can be a bugger to warm start, and took off my lid rub the sweat from my hair. Bro back on and off we went again. Came up on a roundabout and pitched in, half way round then exit - no indicator as no-one was waiting in the exit junction wbut with my mirrors both being cracked i cant honestly say if anyone was on my left. Got a little wheelie on down the highstreet and then came upon a double line of queing traffic on the dual carriageway. No bother really as filtering between lines of cars at sixty five really eats up the jams and flashing my headlight on and off really gets em checking the mirrors eh?
finally we gat back home and leave the bike outside for a quick beer before dropping my bro back home.



Question is this, how many offences did i commit today?

You're a norty boy!!!

Driving whilst hungover
No back brakes/pads
insufficient tyre tread
mixed tyres
inadequate safety wear
no strap on helmet
no/faulty footrests
black visor (? i said it didn't matter but we're not sure)
no visor on your lid
hologram glasses
no rear light
faulty break switches
no horn
riding on pavement
riding between bollards
40 mph in 30 zone
cutting up traffic
overtaking with double solid white lines
driving on wrong side of road approaching a bend
speeding outside a school
filtering/overtaking in pedestrian crossing/ zig zag zone
using mobile phone whilst in motion
jumping traffic at lights
stopping opposite traffic island
no indication on roundabout
cracked mirrors
wheelie in built up area
flashing lights to annoy other road users
drinking and driving.


So I don't get a banana then??

just a quick question eh? you should have made this a comp it's a beauty!!
Right Offences, i've got
driving while drunk
defective brakes
defective tyre 1mils a no no
mixed tyres
unfastened helmet
holographic goggles?
no horn
footpegs
defective brake light
riding on the pavement
5 counts of due care and attention these being excessive speed while overtaking, crossing to opposite side of carriageway, overtaking outside a school,wheelie,filtering at excessive speed
2 ilegal overtakes double white lines, zigzags
using a mobile telephone while riding
taking off helmet while bike still running
waiting opposite a pedestrian refuge
defective mirrors

thats all i could see but then there's muppet points too
shorts and flip flops?
and finally titanium sliders with shorts whaddya do velcro em to yer hairy leg??

ok here goes, i make it around 25, but i could be wrong, what say you ???

Suki.
good go but no banana! TC and Devilpaint will see through this for sure I reckon - and i dont mean they'll spot the offences. Some are subjective but some are dead cert offences. Some however are not. To get you going think about the overtaking in a double whtie centre line zone, is that an offence? And what about driving on the 'wrong' side of the road?

Rick, like wise you are banana less at the mo! I was going to do something like this as a competition but it would cause too much trouble due to the subjective nature of some offences.

Naughty me! this drink driving offence - how dya know I was over the limit?
Overtaking outside a school? Half of that one Ill give ya!

Pussycat - I must confess i havent actually counted! This is a thinly veiled chance for us all to argue - er debate - wether or not certain things are offences or not. Hopefully Ill end up learning something!

Rick, i feel mean but i cant give you anything for the opvertaking a bus outside a school - there is an offence there but its not passing the bus!

speaking purely from a car drivers perspective of course (I'm not a biker yet!!)




Now do I get a banana??

No!

the double white centre line simply cannot be crossed over so if you fit your car passed another vehicle safely without crossing the lines youd be ok!

ten pints the night before and still hungover you would have to be over the limit, i've known guys get a ban from the next afternoon all you would have to do is get a tug which considering the other "offences" is very likely, slight whiff of beer and it's good night vienna.

the overtake outside the school has to be due care and attention.
you're passing a large vehicle at high speed.

same with riding in the opposite carriageway remember your ambulance do last week.

The bus had stopped.

Ill give you the drink driving - if i had had ten pints for real i wouldnt be fit to walk let alone drive for about a week!

but surely to pass a car saftely you'd have to?? :tounge:

Hungover - possibly over the limit
Faulty rear brake
Radial front, crossply rear
Unfastened helmet
Pillion footrests - hmmm? Bolts would probably do
Hologram goggles - dunno about those, probably ok as they aren't part of the helmet
Faulty brake light
Faulty front brake light switch
Illegal warning device
Riding on the pavement
48 in a 30
Double white lines - ok if you didn't cross them
48 past a school - got to be at most a 30 limit
'blast' past stopped school bus - you should slow
overtaking in zig-zags
checking mobile
stopping on a traffic island
helmet off while on bike with engine running
failing to indicate at island
broken mirrors
wheelie
filtering at 65
flashing headlamp
drink driving - again



At certain 'other' places any 5 of the above would elevate you to 'Riding God' and member of the inner clique

Feck, zombie has been written my autobiography..

There's a couple of things there which sound dodgy by aren't illegal. The tread depth limit on bike tyre is 1mm but you can't mix them. There's also nothing to stop you going out just with shorts and flip flops, except common sense. Not sure about the visor though, I think it'll probably be okay to ride without one. I think you may even be able to ride without able eye protection at all but TC will probably put us right on that one.

The 6" bolts are probably okay as well. I can't see there being a law to say what your footpegs should be like, so anything might be acceptable, unless there is a limit on how far they can stick out.

Riding on the opposite would probably okay. After all, off siding is an advanced riding technique. 400 metres is kicking the erse out of it though.

Don't know about the mobile though. Is it still an offence, if you don't answer it?

There's a couple of ones that have got me thinking.

If the bike is under 50cc you can get away with less than 1mm tread depth as long as the tread pattern is visible across the whole tyre.

As far as safety wear goes it may surprise one or two that as long as danglies are covered from the gaze of bashfull pedestrians the only legal requirement is to wear a properly fastened helmet conforming to the standards of the day.
The footrests should actually be alright as long as they are securely fixed to the bike and are suitable for resting feet on.


What if my brother decided he couldnt take the stress of facing forward and (after stopping of course) decided to sit with his feet on the footrest bolts but facing backwards so he could admire where weve been as we hurtle past the scenery?

so it would seem not as many offences have been commited as i first thought,
When you look at some of the things that are mentioned you think NO WAY! so you make it an offence in your mind.

The overtake on the bus must be exceeding 30 in a built up area.
although i still go for riding without due care and attention.

surprisingly enough there's probably, i reckon only about 10 clear cut offences
commited.

The rest seem to come down to common sense and common courtesy.

course i'm probably a mile off

there are a lot of offences here but as i said earlier the subjective nature - in that i mean it would in a coppers opinion rather than clear cut - of some of the offenceshas been put in on purpose to make us all think about how something we do routinely'could' be construed as an offence depending on how we were doing it!


as for the bus - it's perfectly legal to overtake or pass a vehicle that has stopped outside a school - but not to 'flash ' past at fourty eight as its very likely to be a thirty limit there and maybe even a twenty.

i wish id made the post longer now as there are loads more things i thought of to put in I just thought people would get bored reading it and not respond.

Appropo the bus /school one again - i wouldnt be surprised to get a dangerous or even reckless charge if that bus were alighting kids at the time and a copper spotted me passing it in the fashion described.

you could always do a ptII i'd be interested for sure.

Speaking of coppers discretion I saw a good one on m&m the other day.

A young lad on L plates got a pull for speeding 40mph in a 30 limit 50cc bike.
The officer who pulled him was gonna let him off with a caution but on inspecting the bike changed his mind and did him 3 points and 60 quid.

Any idea what he found on the bike that changed his mind?

My guess would be a de-restricted exhaust . Cos I did it to my scoot. Cheers MAlly

I know someone who put a H100 engine in a MB50. They slot right in there. It wouldn't surprise me if it was something similar.

spot on mally, a racing pipe it was.
The lad was gonna get off with a caution till the copper twigged you can't be doing 40 on a restricted bike.

he gave the rider a fixed penalty for the speeder and told him to get rid of the pipe the next day.

which was nice, he could have had it impounded, cos if the rider was only 16 he'd be riding a motorcycle as it was derestricted, not a moped.

I'm keeping quiet as far as the riding errors are concerned-interesting that some of our temporarily without bike memers dont know the legal tread depth of a motorcycle tyre.

Didn't know that either we live and learn

TC, so at what point does driving without due care and attention become dangerous driving.

Is there a divide so to speak or are they two seperate offences entirely?

It would seem the law has got it's act together on this one.
By changing the reckless driving law we may be getting the more dangerous "nutters" off the road.

i didnt read any unlawfull or reckless driving at all in that statement!!!




































however, when ya return from your holidays in inda, i wouldnt recomend driving like that over here

So that'll be zombie banned then, several times over..


I suppose there's a couple of those that would only be used, if the officer was being a right git. Like needing a helemt to sit on a bike that isn't running but it just goes to show, what you can get done with.

Cheers for that TC - I was going to do a round up tonite but you beat me to it!

the overtaking /white lines bit was meant to bring in the not crossing them if you can pass safely to make people realise that they do not mean no overtaking but you explained it better than i could !

the footrest 'bolts' would actually be fine so long as they were long enough to get your feet on safely and they were fixed securely to the bike - for what it's worth hte footrests ( passenger) on my old dt250 were 6 inch bolts fastened to the footrest hangers as the originals got snapped during a learn to wheely and slide episode in a field! ( neither of which were intentional btw!)


So tell me, did anyone enjoy that? Is it worth doing another one thats a bit longer with a bit more in it?

Aye, go for it..

yeah do another one

did you know... you can get done for pushing a bike with no engine in, if you aint wearing a helmet, for some reason i pushed a 400/4 from our house to the mother in laws and got stopped! got told off and had to take my docs to the cop shop, maybe he wanted to get me for something better(he lived in the next street from me and he never managed to catch me being norty ) or because he got called away, but he left it as a warning, phewwwwwww!



to PC Hogg(yes thats his name!)

watch knowing my luck he'll be a member of the forum

Go for it zomb, I enjoyed that one, it was nice to get a lively debate going and a little education never hurt anyone.

Thread reborn courtesy of woodz. Who can write one withmore offences in it? For a laugh obviously.