goddamnedtwisto posted:

You're missing the "of Italy" part of that phrase though, these things are relative.

Aprilia are the 90s Kawasaki of Italy, IMO. Throw loads of mad stuff at the wall, occasionally come up with utter gems, get completely ignored in favour of the others.


Pro-er tip - as a man you surely have daily experience of something that retains a small amount of liquid after you've finished using it, and should know how to deal with it. Don't worry, more than three shakes won't actually make the Baby Jesus cry.

Slavvy posted:

I have no problem with ABS but linked brakes put me off. I've never ridden a bike that has them, but the idea of the front brake coming on when I push on the foot lever makes me squirm uncomfortably.

Sagebrush posted:

Really? I thought the whole idea of linked brakes was to ensure that the front brake gets actuated when stopping even if midlife crisis biker wannabe refuses to touch the Layer Dan Lever (tm) and prefers to ride like he's on a beach cruiser bicycle with a coaster brake.

Slavvy posted:

Google indicates that they also apply part of the front brakes when you apply the rear brake. At least on the VFR800.

Bugdrvr posted:

I have the opposite problem. I ride a lot but it's only back and forth to work. During the weekend I just walk to the bar or the market or the liquor store or the bar or whatever. I put that FZR together so I could maybe go on fun rides or track days but I just don't feel like going anywhere on the weekends.

slidebite posted:

Getting off of chat

That is a pet peeve of mine. I'm not sure of the actual legality of it, but someone trying to be "nice" and wave you through a 4 way stop annoys me for this very reason. Just follow the rules of the road. You're not helping anyone and actually slowing down traffic.

Same thing with pedestrians waiting to cross but instead crossing when you stop for them, they wave you on. I know a guy that got ticketed for that. When he said he was waived through cop said "Yeah, too bad, you still have to yield and let them cross."

apatite posted:

Almost all of our bridges used to be steel-deck, but they are getting replaced by concrete decks, there are only a few steel ones left on lower traffic roads.


For rant-based content, I went on a memorial ride this weekend with a bunch of harleys and gixxerbros, it was fuckin awful. I had people sharing the lane with me unexpectedly, passing me in the lane and then going wide and parking it as we went into corners causing me to have to pass them on the inside of the lane after they had just passed me, my earplugs didn't help with the sound of freedom and lives being saved and they all acted like they were going to die when there was some gravel or a pothole in the road. The itinerary was riding from bar to bar getting smashed.

They rode 120 miles, I rode 150 and most of it was not with them. The food was good at the end though and it was for a good cause...

goddamnedtwisto posted:

They're paragons of sense and sanity compared to a quad though.

(I still sort of like the concept of those things though - I rode one around a carpark at a bike show once and it didn't seem any worse, dynamically, than any other scooter, and I'm a little surprised they weren't more successful)

Skreemer posted:

It's a bit of a heritage thing here in the US. Most shops either raced or sponsored someone that raced with some of the store folks acting as pit crew. Sunday was for racing and Monday was for the sales guy to get over the crash he had on the track. At least out in the midwest if you find a shop that's open both Sundays and Mondays you're pretty lucky.

Jim Silly-Balls posted:

I also never got this. My local Honda place is open Saturday 9-12 and closed on Sunday, but open on Monday 8-7. Completely backwards. Who is going to the bike shop at 8AM on a Monday?

n8r posted:

Hanging out in the left lane when you aren't passing is great for:
Getting tickets.
Having a pissed off driver who is going faster than you make an unsafe on the right pass.
Having a pissed off driver who is going faster than you when traffic suddenly slows pancake you into the car in front of you.

goddamnedtwisto posted:

Well the government avoids being in the middle lane in any form of transport, you're supposed to move to the inside lane as soon as it's clear. Obviously on most motorways that involves hanging around in the middle lane most of the time because the left lane is full of HGVs doing 56 (who the loving gently caress though that was a good idea anyway?).

I don't understand why people think being merged into unannounced is such a huge problem in the middle lane, you're supposed to be watching out for these dickheads regardless of what lane you're in.

Sagebrush posted:

^^^ I was going to post that video just to demonstrate how little they care -- hanging out in the left and going 40 miles an hour doesn't even warrant them getting out of their car.

They certainly don't seem to give a poo poo here -- Bay Area traffic is dense enough that all the lanes are full of vehicles most of the time, left included. Passing on the right / staying on the left I think is something that cops mostly care about in Europe (and I guess Washington, since two people from there have commented on it now). I also never heard of anyone getting ticketed for it when I lived in Ontario, Quebec, Rhode Island, Vermont or Arizona.

Getting piled into by someone travelling fast behind you when the traffic suddenly slows is a risk in every lane, and the sort of thing you should be looking out for at all times regardless.

I feel that getting undertaken by aggressive drivers is preferable to having said aggressive drivers suddenly cutting you off or merging into you when they realize they're about to miss their exit.

Snowdens Secret posted:

You got too LF, our military is barely 20% even including vets benefits. Englishmen aren't really in any position to lecture us on domestic matters.

Hell I think Triumphs are cheaper here, to boot.

HotCanadianChick posted:

Speaking of which, I just discovered this past weekend that I can remove my fizzer's half-fairing and leave the headlights and mirrors still attached to the bike normally. I just need to get a pair of fork-mount front blinkers and I can make my bike fully naked and still have two good headlights, and not spend $600 on an FZ1N conversion kit.

nsaP posted:

Don't get upset. You have, by yourself, seemed to equaled the number of incidents with cars(or people) that the rest of us have had over our whole riding careers. Artistic license is the nice way to say it. "Bullshit" is a better description.

Speaking of bullshit, I got a bullshit parking ticket last night on a side street at a halloween party, in my car, not my bike. "Parking facing the wrong direction" on a 1.5 lane, unstriped street. You know, where you have one sided parking and a wide enough road that 2 cars could squeeze by each other but usually one of the pulls to the side and waits? Looking up the laws I did break the letter, but what a pointless law here... I'd assume it was meant to stop people from diving across double yellows to park on the opposite side of the street, but it applies to me anyway with how it was written. I park the same way on the same kind of street where I live and never had a problem, though if I looked it up I'm sure I could have been ticketed every day. All of the cars on google maps seem to show that the cops have been a pain about that before.




Despite that I break all laws constantly while riding, it still pisses me off to suck it up and pay for such a trivial infraction.

hot sauce posted:

lol if your bike has never played a part in you getting laid at least once

Lexorin posted:

The only thing my bike attracts is middle aged business men.

MoraleHazard posted:

Do you have fat, hairy, Harley riders in the UK?

Slavvy posted:

It was 100% the 'correct' part. It's difficult to gently caress up because the 900 hornet only ever came with one radiator and no other model uses that radiator. The radiator is entirely correct and fits the bike perfectly, with all brackets etc lining up. The problem is that the upper outlet is supposed to come out around 1.5 inches, then elbow toward the motor. Instead it just elbows immediately, so the outlet is pointing directly at the frame spar and fitting a hose on is completely impossible.

Contacting the seller just got me a bunch of really concerned broken English and a promise to talk to the manufacturer so I've given up on that avenue. It can't be that difficult to just cut and lengthen an alloy tube surely.

Manifest Dynasty posted:

It seems like I keep hearing "My bike was overheating" more and more as an excuse for why people break traffic laws, and my brain is starting to automatically replace it with "gently caress it, I didn't want to wait."

HotCanadianChick posted:

Are they really trying to be friendly when they come up to you and ask you when you're going to get a real bike?

Because that happened to me at work the other day as I was putting my luggage on to my literbike to head home.

Jim Silly-Balls posted:

The reason I never go to the dealer though is because they never have what I want in stock. "We can order it for you" they say, but I can order it too, faster than the dealer, right to my house and dont have to drive back to the dealer. The reason I'm there is because I want whatever thing NOW and I dont want to wait for shipping.

I seriously think there may be a case in going in the reverse direction of what youre talking about, just stock a ton of poo poo and make it worth peoples while to come in instead of ordering online.

goddamnedtwisto posted:

So I said something in the pics thread that has sort of crystalised something else in my mind...


I realised those words would be Martian to whoever made that thing. This is what really pisses me off about not just hipster bikes, it's everywhere - software design, "maker" culture, and of course almost every loving thing published on the internet. It's the complete neglect of craft - not a conscious rejection as you'd get with, say, modern art or a rat bike, but the idea that the craft is completely and totally subservient to The Idea, and that if the result is poo poo it doesn't matter because "I'm creative!".

This could probably turn into an anti-millenial rant but I'll stop here. And you can't criticise me for it because I'm creative!

clutchpuck posted:

That's not what this thread is?

HotCanadianChick posted:

Ian Hespeldt, is that you?
http://sfist.com/2015/09/08/39-year-old_cyclist_arrested_in_cri.php

builds character posted:

Renaissance Robot posted:

I'm so used to people spelling "bear" wrong that for a second I had trouble parsing your post

Z3n posted:

I'd rather my bike be gone and there be a full insurance payout for me than come back to a hosed up bike with a screwdriver broken off in the lock. Especially considering that typically when they break the steering lock, they just thrash on it until it destroys the locking pin and the frame.

It's not actually about stopping the theft, they're going to get it if they want it even a little bit. It's about minimizing the damage they do to the bike so you either get the bike stolen and can go buy a new one or you don't walk out to a non-functional bike that you're going to pay a deductible on any repairs/towing/etc on.

No insurance company in the US I've heard of has ever tried to weasel out of a claim by saying it wasn't secured. I'm sure there's some examples, but that's why I pay a bit more for State Farm, they've been great through the handful of claims I've had over the years.