Travels of a Squid: Blair's beginning motorcyclist journal

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Travels of a Squid: Blair's beginning motorcyclist journal

#1 Unread post by blair »

A nod and a wave to everyone in TMW.

I'm Blair P. Houghton, I'm 41 years old, and I learned to ride a motorcycle just over a week ago.

I had ridden once before, for 5 minutes, about 25 years ago, but in the words of the person taking my reservation at the T.E.A.M. Arizona MSF school, "that don't count."

What I do from now on does count, though, and I'll be recounting much of it here.

So sit back, lean when I lean, and we'll both enjoy the ride.

--Blair

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#2 Unread post by scan »

Welcome Blair. Please keep us posted on how things are going. I just started a couple years ago myself and I'm a fanatic now!
* 2003 Kawasaki ZRX1200R *
"What good fortune for those of us in power that people do not think. " Hitler - think about that one for a minute.

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#3 Unread post by honda599 »

Welcome Blair. Would be happy to hear about any nice rides in your area.

Keep the rubber side down.

Cheers

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#4 Unread post by blair »

Backblog

Mid-April, 2005:

I wasn't working so I had a lot of free time. My girlfriend was really busy doing cool stuff for work so I was feeling a bit useless, too. She's into motorcycles. I'd always wanted to ride but I knew I needed to learn properly. I didn't have a bike, and I didn't have anyone to teach me. So I wondered if there were any motorcycle training schools here in Phoenix that would let me use one of their bikes.

One googlesecond later, I had the the MSF T.E.A.M. Arizona website up, and began to see from point A to point B. A few minutes and a short phonecall later, I had a spot in a three-day Basic Rider Course (BRC) (half-day Monday, full day Tuesday, half-day Wednesday). I just missed out on a weekend class but I didn't want to wait until the end of the week (why wait five days to save one day?)
'93 Honda VT600CD Shadow VLX Deluxe

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#5 Unread post by blair »

Yet Another MSF Class Blog:

Monday, 2005/04/18 - Wednesday, 2005/04/20

BRC is a blast. The instructor is a former motor-cop, and a nice guy besides. They're all really nice people. It's no boot-camp. They fully understand they're teaching frightened people to do something almost purely recreational. The first day is classroom, a mixture of short explanations, short videos, and classroom participation (each person gets to read a page of the manual and summarize it, then the instructor adds detail and experience; it's less efficient than just letting everyone read the 40-page booklet, but far less boring and more likely to help get the most information into the most people's heads).

Day 2 is a long morning of baby steps on the bike. First choosing one according to comfort (inseam height, mostly). Then finding the controls (there are 4-5 different kinds of bikes, and none has everything arranged exactly like the picture in the book). Then hefting the bike between your legs, leaning it back and forth to know that it's heavier than it looks. Then moving it a little. Rolling across the tarmac unpowered. Starting up (FINE-C) and shutting down (thumb, key, valve). Rocking back on your heels, then forward under power using the friction zone of the clutch. Using the friction zone to power-walk. Lifting your feet for a little ways and using the brakes to stop. Using the friction zone to control speed while riding. Turning at low speed. Perimeter turns (very tight turns). Stop-and-go's without putting your feet down. Shifting into second. Turning at slightly higher speed (slow, look, press, and roll). Weaving. Moving faster. Feeling the sensation of countersteer in curves. Moving even faster, upshifting to 3rd then downshifting to 2d to engine-brake. Panic-stopping.

You learn there's a speed-based tradeoff between stability and timing. You can go very slow and have a large window to start a move, or you can go a little faster and have a lot more stability, though you have to be predictive and decisive, which takes practice. As human beings, what isn't explained to us we will learn by trial and error. We will make every mistake that nobody tells us about beforehand, and many mistakes they that do tell us about. My class had only one laydown, though; and it was at essentially 0 mph. Absent traffic or high speed turns, motorcycles want to stay upright and on the line you choose. Which isn't to say they're perfectly safe at low speed. That bike landed on her foot, and started dripping gasoline on the ground. Still room for disaster.

After the first morning of riding, it's back into the classroom for the second half of the book and a 50-question multiple-choice test, which is part of your official score. The test is not that hard; everyone passes by a good margin, and I and a few others get 50 out of 50.

Day 3 starts with gauging speed in curves - slowing before the curve, looking to the end of the curve, then steadily and gradually rolling-on while turning through the curve, keeping in a 3- or 4-foot lane, for a 90-degree turn then a 135-degree turn (which is much harder because it requires you to understand that you need less haste in accelerating). Panic-stopping in curves. Countersteer swerving. Counterweighting for low-speed U-turns and S-turns. Lane changing (including keeping straight while turning your head to look behind you). More panic-stopping. Most of these are practice for the riding tests at the end of the morning.

The instructors turn from coaching mode to DMV Official mode to administer the tests, which includes the U-turns, swerve, and panic-stop in one test, then the 90- and 135-degree controlled curves in the other test.

There are some secrets to the scoring, but they aren't allowed to tell you beforehand, so I won't ruin it for anyone here. Suffice to say, I thought I'd gotten at least a point off on the 135-degree turn, but it turns out that the way the rules are worded what I did wasn't technically a deduction. So, officially, I got 100% on the riding test, to go with my 100% on the written test.

You can call me Ace.

But if you want to find Ace, he's out practicing his line in the curves every chance he gets, until he can hold the front tire on a painted stripe without a wobble (which is overkill; the test lane is more than a yard wide).

Very few people stayed in the box for the U-turns, which shook them. Even though the instructors warned them that failing a single skill can't fail them on the overall test, and while most did the swerve okay, almost none remembered to panic-stop after the swerve.

The only two who got 100% were the one who went first (me) and the one who went last. And I could tell the last guy was getting a lot of help in maneuvering from his choice of bike. He had selected one of the sportbikes, while I was on a small Nighthawk, which is a standard that's somehow labelled a sportbike by Motorcyclist magazine. People on the more cruiser-like Rebels had a very hard time (ironically the more timid folks selected bikes that looked smaller and less threatening).

N.B.: The biggest differences in the three types of bike are the height of the seat and the location of the footpegs and foot-controls. Sportbikes are tall and put your feet behind you; Cruisers have low seats and the pegs set forward. Standard bikes are in the middle for both seat height and foot position. The sportbikes turn quicker, but are slightly less stable at speed (a semester of control theory will teach you that controllability requires instability); the cruisers take a wide turning radius, but the lower fork angle gives the front wheel a lot of "trail", which makes them more stable in a straight line.

The sportbikes would have been harder to feel in-control of when first starting to lift your feet, but in the test, which is all about maneuvering, they ride more like bicycles.

I also don't recall seeing anyone but me using the counterweighting technique we were taught: repositioning your butt to the outside half of the seat so you can lean the bike farther to maintain balance at very low speed. They got into the box, tensed, and tried to just crank the wheel and coast through the turns straight up. All of them except the last guy rolled wide on the first U-turn or leaned the other way too soon for the second turn and put it almost entirely outside the box.

My biggest piece of advice would be to look carefully at how the instructor is doing any of the demonstration rides, and do exactly that. Trying to "be more careful" won't help, because they're doing it in the most careful way already, and any alterations to that procedure are automatically less careful. Match their speed, posture, and timing, and your bike will do what theirs does.

All that said, only two people got enough points off on the whole test to be asked to come back for a re-test - and one of them was an experienced rider! Which actually put some perspective into my "perfect" performance, and kept me from being a fool when going out to buy my bike and solo for the first time.


Celebration

On my way to the DMV, I stopped off for beer and wings (one beer followed by lots of water and time). Then I hung out in the DMV for a while (like I had a choice...it's the world's slowest vending machine), then I drove home and hit the Internet hard looking for a motorcycle.

My newest "birthday" is April 20, 2005.
'93 Honda VT600CD Shadow VLX Deluxe

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#6 Unread post by blair »

The hunt for a new machine

Thursday, 2005/04/21 - Tuesday, 2005/04/26

Well, new to me. After deciding I shouldn't go too big, or too new (in case I drop it I don't want to trash its resale value too hard, so I should buy a well-used bike, though perhaps not a crummy one), I got a copy of a month-old CycleTrader from one of my favorite bartenders, and a copy of the Motorcyclist Magazine Buyer's Guide from the grocery store (good timing; maybe they know something about Spring Fever), and because that Nighthawk was such a pig to shift and stalled a lot (stalling before the first curve in my test was what made me angry enough to almost blow the second curve) I decided I didn't want to go there again.

The books were good to familiarize me with the range of bikes available (there are very few standard bikes, and few cruisers between 250 and 750, which were the extreme limits of my desired range) and prices (they're about 50% higher than I was expecting, at every size and vintage). Tons of sportbikes, and plenty of oversized, overpriced custom bikes.

I also had a list of dealers given to us in the goodie-bag at the end of the BRC. These were dealerships that had donated bikes or other things to the program. So I took a day and went around kicking tires and schmoozing salesmen. It didn't take long to whittle the list to what, I later found out (from the TotalMotorcycle website's fair-use embellishment of the Motorcycling Magazing guide, in fact), are widely regarded as some of the best bikes for beginners: The Honda Shadow, the Yamaha Virago, and the Suzuki Savage.

If I were a small woman instead of a big guy, I would absolutely have kept to the 250s. But I felt underpowered on the Nighthawk 250, so I thought something in the 400-600 range would be right. You can't find the 400s that were the staple retail bikes when I was a kid. And very few 500s (though most 600s are actually in the 550-599 range).

Partly because the first bike I actually touched at a dealer was one, I focussed on the several Mid-90s era Honda Shadow 600 (actually 583) models available around town. I learned from the Kawasaki dealer that because of Arizona Bike Week earlier in the month, there was a major shortage of used bikes. Which helped, ironically, because if there'd been a larger selection it would have just taken me longer to choose one. Instead, I made a command decision and plunked my ducats on the bike I feature in my avatar (and here, and many other photos to come, I have no doubt).

I like the color, sort of a dark teal blue with black accents, although I liked the Diamondback Purple on one that was at a pawn shop on Scottsdale Road a lot better; but they wanted an extra $1k for a bike with 2.5 times the miles and major cosmetic damage including deep turn-scrapes on the pipes and what appeared to be stilleto heel marks on the pillion... probably owned by some skanky biker-chick who liked to show off by standing on her seat...

The only delay was for the helmet shop to get in the lid I ordered (an HFC AC-3 three-quarter hat with a face shield instead of a visor), but they weren't open Sunday or Monday, and by the time I got there I'd changed my mind and wanted black instead of pearl, because it'd go better with the bike. I bought a couple of spare face-shields as well; they're easy to clip in and out, and only about $18 each. That will save a day when one breaks or gets too scratched-up to salvage.

I paid $2400 ($2750 with tax, registration, etc.) for a '93 Honda VT600C Shadow VLX (review, specs) with 17K miles and only minor cosmetic flaws (a thumb-sized dent in the tank; a burned hollow on a hidden part of one sidepanel that had apparently come loose and lain on an exhaust pipe for quite a while on some ride; a scratched spot on the right-front corner of the fender, and scratching on the end of the same-side handbrake, both indicating that the bike had been dropped at least once; moderate longitudinal scratching on the lower exhaust pipe, clearly due to sharp cornering; and the obligatory scrapes on the ends of the footpegs...) Clearly it was garage-kept and maintained by someone who gave at least as much of a damn as I would have.

Admit it, you're envious. Hell, I'm envious right now because I'm keyboard guy instead of shiny cruiser guy, until they deliver it.
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#7 Unread post by blair »

The hunt for the soul of a new machine

Wednesday, 2005/04/27

After the usual round of snafus (their truck blew a hose; they couldn't find the temporary tag they'd printed for me, etc.) I got my bike delivered.

No, I didn't just ride it home from the dealer; BRC had got me up to maybe 25 mph a few times, never past 3rd gear, and nowhere near actual traffic. Dammit, Evel, I'm a squid, not a test-pilot.

And when it got to my house, twilight and rush-hour were in force, either of which could only increase the learning curve. So I just rode it to the end of the block to get it turned around so I could drive it up the driveway and into the garage. And spent the rest of the evening feeling like a new priest waiting for a bus in front of a strip joint...
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#8 Unread post by blair »

And now, we blog.

Thursday, 2005/04/28

First Day riding, about 2 hours, 68 miles.

Took my bike out for serious. Right turns, left turns, hills, long curves, riding in one-car traffic beside, behind, and in front of cars, changing lanes, passing, going faster on the straight portions.

Getting my bike up to 70 on a stretch of nearly-deserted highway was a lot more technical than matting it in a car. The wind starts to change the weighting on the wheels.

I keep thinking to fasten my seatbelt and check if my doors are locked. At one point, I actually got that feeling I get when I know I'm sitting in an open vehicle (like a jeep with no doors) with the wind and the pavement going by at full speed, and I had to bring myself back into motorcycle mode, where those things are the norm.

Lots of firsts today. Most notable: first bug splattered right in the middle of my face shield. It me say, out loud, "Yeah, I'm basically going to be wearing one of these for the rest of my life."
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#9 Unread post by blair »

Friday, 2005/04/29, about an hour, ~25 miles.

Ran an errand that required crossing I-10, and the safest route would be by riding onto the 202 freeway for a mile or so. Way too much traffic on the other roads, and that stretch of 202 is very lightly used. The ride was successful, although I probably should have worn a tighter or heavier shirt. I'll get used to the violent flapping at some point. Or not.

Still a bit of a squid starting out at lights with anyone waiting behind me or to turn after I go. That'll get better. Still an idiot about cancelling my turn signals. I think the BRC should teach turns as, "signal, slow, look, press, roll, and cancel," so I'll have that in my head every time.

And, of course, I was a total idiot when I drained my battery. What happened was, I got off my bike at a restaurant for lunch, looked back at the helmet lock and noticed it was open, and said "cool, I won't have to unlock that", and didn't. Which means I didn't turn off the ignition and remove the key to unlock the helmet lock. So I ate lunch with the lights on. Which ate my battery's lunch.

I spent an hour getting the AAA to send someone. And who arrives? A locksmith with jumper cables who, it turns out, discovers his toolbox has been boosted from his pickup truck. So we're there, trying to find the battery, thinking we need to take the seat off, but that takes an allen wrench, which, of course, is in his toolbox, which is in someone else's truck. After some fumbling I realize that the battery is buried in the chassis but its terminals are accessible from either side of the bike. So he jumps it, and I let it run for a bit, then I stop it and try to start it, and it's stone dead. No charging going on at all.

So I spent another hour waiting for the dealer to come and pick up the bike and give me a ride home then take the bike back to the shop to be checked out to see if the battery is bad. It probably isn't; motorcycle electrical systems are really weak at charging the battery, so a ten-minute idle isn't going to do a thing for them. I could have jumped it and ridden it home, but that would require trusting I wouldn't stall it, which I don't trust me not to do at this point.

The incident wasn't all that upsetting, for two reasons.

One, the bartender at that restaurant is my favorite bartender, and that was his last day there, so we got to hang out for a while, and I got a piece of the cake his coworkers got for him. It was good cake. And one of the managers is a Honda fanatic, so we got to talk bikes for a little bit.

Two, I had made a punch-list of things that I was going to have the dealer fix on the bike (5 or 6 items; the biggie was that the horn clicks instead of beeping) and this gave me a chance to get all of that done. AZ's Lemon Law mandates a 15-day warranty period for my way-past-manufacturer's-warranty bike, so I'll have about 10 of those days left to find anything else that might be wrong.

Lessons learned:

1. Adjust your mirrors so you can see what is directly behind you as well as what is to the sides.

2. Wear clothes that will be comfortable for cold and wind; it will be colder and far windier than you expect, even if you expect a lot.

3. Practice just starting and stopping, a lot, on various grades and with varying curves immediately following.

4. Practice turning off the turn signal compulsively. (I hit save compulsively when I'm editing a file on a computer; I need that same tic transferred to my signalling thumb.)

5. Tailgaters are incorrigible.
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#10 Unread post by blair »

Saturday, 2005/04/30

Noodling around the net looking at crash and fatality rates, I found Michigan's rather exceedingly detailed report on the subject.

2003 Michigan Traffic Crash Facts

Cooking the data a little, we can say roughly that there is one fatality per 8 million motorcycle miles, and one crash per 200 thousand motorcycle miles.

Michigan Motorcycle Crashes (pdf)

Other data in that report, and a diagram I saw elsewhere, show that most danger comes from the front and front-left.

I think I'll go knock my front wheel into a car bumper later this afternoon, just to clear up the next 15 years.

Crash rate per licensed driver (pdf)

Between the URL above and this one, we see that one in 9 motorists of all kinds will have some sort of crash in a given year. But one in 60 motorcyclists will. Am I figuring that right? Is motorcycling 7 times less likely to get you into an accident? That actually makes me feel safer, even though one in 400 automobile crashes is fatal, while one in 40 motorcycle crashes is fatal. Or maybe it's that not many motorcyclists use their bikes as much as their cars.

I went and picked up my bike in the afternoon. I couldn't get a ride there, so I just drove my car and left it there, along with a Battery Minder Junior they sold me.

I rode home in real traffic and did okay. One stall; and I ran out of gas making a turn. But there was nobody coming in any direction so I was okay. I pushed over into the bicycle lane, realized what was wrong, switched to reserve, hit the start button several times, and got it going. I stopped at the next gas station and did my first motorcycle fillup.

99.8 miles
1.810 gallons
$2.359/gallon
$4.27 total

Four bucks for a fill? Now that's funny. The tank on a Shadow is rather small. About 1.8 gallons in the "ON" position and a little more than half a gallon in reserve. It's a bike meant for in-town cruising rather than long freeway trips, clearly. But judging by this one fill, the mileage in mostly city use is well over 50 mpg, which is going to be very nice.
'93 Honda VT600CD Shadow VLX Deluxe

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