At lights

I have heard it said that when at lights its best to wait with your bike in
gear ready to take off in case a car fails to stop behind you, at least
until 1 or 2 cars have stopped behind you as a buffer.

I have always felt safer holding onto the handle bars (as I would be in the
situation above) however would give my brake light a flash or 2 then hold
the font brake on until at least one car behind has complete stop.

The reason given for the first suggestion (from different riding schools)
has been so you are able to take off and reduce the impact with
acceleration.

The reason I think it is important to be holding on to the handle bars is so
I go with the bike rather than have to get my gear rack surgically removed
however I don't want to enter an intersection suddenly and just take off
through it just after an accident.

I am interested on other peoples opinions and experiences as I find this a
less painful way of learning.

 

Over here in Ingerland...

There are two methods which are encouraged and one which the Driving
Standards Agency suggest but nobody does. One called "The Safety
"Position" which is taught to learners.

The Safety Position:

As you're coming to a halt always be in the correct gear for the speed
which you're travelling, you should stop in 1st gear. Use your front
and rear brakes as appropriate to halt the bike while pulling the
clutch in when appropriate. When you're stopped remove your hand from
the front brake and hold the bike on the rear brake. Leave the bike
in 1st gear, holding the clutch.

The Hendon Shuffle: (Google for it)

Stop with front and rear brakes as appropriate, when stationary your
right foot goes off the rear brake (hold bike on front) and on to the
road to hold you up, left foot changes gear into neutral, release
clutch, hold bike on front.

The Driving Standards Agency:

Stop bike and with clutch pulled in left foot to get into neutral,
release clutch, both footses on ground.

While the Driving Standards Agency prefer their own method to be
displayed I know of no riding schools that subscribe to their method,
preferring The Safety Position. The DSA examiner will not fail you or
think anything less of you for using your preferred position and not
theirs as they're interested in your riding style as a whole and not
which or your lallies you dangle on the road.

I suppose it's personal choice. I am a great fan of the rear brake
and drag it while riding and filtering and as appropriate for
stability and many other reasons so use a combination of The Safety
Position which my riding school taught me most of the time and the
Hendon Shuffle depending on my mood, surface camber and if I'm on a
hill or not.

If you are holding the bike on the rear brake and someone drives into
the back of you slowly it reduces the risk of losing control. If
you've filtered to the front of a queue of traffic at a crossing or
traffic lights then being ready to go on green will improve progress
slightly.

 

In aus.motorcycles on Sat, 09 Sep 2006 12:10:47 +0100

Heh.. the questions stay the same, but the answers change.

I have a book that suggests you use the rear brake, because the front
brake cable might snap and the rear brake is almost always rod
operated.


Zebee

 

Cable operated front brake? I trust this is for drum front brakes. I
thought just about every bike about these days had a disc brake at the
front at least?

 

In aus.motorcycles on Sat, 09 Sep 2006 16:18:42 +0100

It was an old book.

Not super old, written in the late 70s I think.

Zebee

 

A friends modern sports bike has both brakes operated by Rod.

Boxer

 

Nyuk nyuk nyuk.

 

If you accelerate into traffic moving through the intersection are you
going to be more or less injured than if the car behind just hit you?

Have you calculated what the forces would be if your bike was hit from
behind? Would you be able to hold onto the bars during sudden
acceleration? Would the forces cause damage your arms? If a uniformly
shaped object (say a huge brick) was hit by a car directly from behind
would it move forward? Is your bike uniformly shaped? Do you think the
presence of suspension and its construction from non-brick materials
would change the way the bike behaved when hit from behind? Do you
think the gear rack will cause you more damage than the car hitting you
or the moving traffic you are planning to enter?

Nev..
'04 CBR1100XX

 

In aus.motorcycles on Sat, 9 Sep 2006 20:10:20 +1000

At what speed is the car going that hits you?

I've been hit from behind at the lights. Bike moved about 4 feet and
fell over with me still on it.

I didn't have any brakes on at the time, and wasn't holding the bars.

Zebee

 

I was waiting at lights ( years ago) bloke rammed the rear wheel , drove
the bike out from under me about 6ft with me splashed across the bonnet
, 5k damage to the Pan and me in hospital for 2 days with crook back and
bruising whihc lasted ages
Now I have no idea what energy was involved but it hurt and he claimed
to be doing about 10k when he hit...

 

Unless you were riding a postie bike or equivalent, I find 10k to be
highly unlikely. I'm not an expert though. It seems far more likely
in my uninformed opinion that either his speedo was inaccurate or he
was trying to put the best face on his stuff up that he possibly could.

ymmv

 

I've been hit from behind twice.

The first time was a car cresting a hill at an estimated 100kph
(pedestrian estimate which may be wrong) when I had just arrived at
the back of an unusually long line of traffic waiting just over the
crest of a hill to get onto Epping Rd in Syderknee. The young
dickhead in daddy's (uninsured by 3 days) car locked up. I was already
feeling uncormfortable about the situation I was in and was looking
for somewhere to get out of there when I heard the lockup.

Thankfully I _didn't_ have time to move because it would have meant I
had managed to turn sideways to the impact and would have lost my legs
I reckon. As it was, the bike took most of the impact, shunted into
the station wagon in front of me. Bike was totally shagged, I got
thrown into the air and landed on the nature strip with just a sore
knee.

The second time was in Hobart a few years back. I had stopped at
pedestrian lights and was watching the car pull up behind me. Once I
was happy he was stopped, I took the bike out of gear and released the
clutch. From memory I think I also stood up to stretch legs a bit,
which removed the rear vision mirrors from any decent view behind. The
(yet again, uniinsured) dickhead behind me decided to reach over and
get a packet of siggies out of his glovebox, and in the process took
his foot off the brake a bit.

While the road is flat and level, he was in an auto which started to
move very slowly forward. When it hit me very softly I almost managed
to support the bike, but I was just that little off balance and it
went over on the right hand side. Damage was only very light scratch
and bent brake lever as I sort of lowered it the last bit down. Just
didn't have the leverage to stop it, even though the bump was only
slight. Dickhead driver claimed I had reversed into him. Yeah right.

Both circumstances are different and I don't think there is a golden
rule. I still prefer to slip into neutral once I am happy that traffic
behind me isn't going to nail me, but in that first Sydney prang, I
would have been very seriously injured if I had managed to move.

You're going to have to make up your mind in each situation I reckon.

Cheers

 

Okay...so you reduce the chance of injury from a rear collision by
increasing massively the chance of a much worse side impact with
traffic coming through the intersection instead. hmmm...tough call!


Personally, I'd rather stay where I was and let the bike take the
initial impact of a rear collision, than risk a side impact with a car
smashing into my leg/arm etc at 50kph+

Damien
GPX250 -> CBR600 -> F650/R1200GS (when the $$$ are there!).

 

The idea is that if you're not clear at the front of the queue, you can
split past the cars in front of you and let _them_ take the impact. If
you're at the lights alone and someone is coming up behind you who is
apparently not planning to stop, it gives you the choice of waiting for
a car to park in your arse or, if the intersection is clear, getting
the heck out of their way.

You still have the option of "letting the bike take the impact", but it
gives you one or two other options as well. IMO, options are good.

 

worst case scenario, put the bike on the stand and dive for cover

ck