It happened over a week ago now, but I thought i'd share an experience that I've now filed away in the "dumb shit" basket.
How I almost crashed - Or, why mass centralisation is a good thing
Lane and I had been given an old car, '89 Hyundai Excel, to get from A - B as her car had been written off after some dumbass decided not to stop at a red light. It had been off the road for the best part of a year, I got it running and it was clear it needed a new battery if it was going to want to start again after being left for more than a day.
Off to the Wairau road Repco I trundled on the Triumph, packrack attached, with bag of course. A battery was selected, purchased and placed in my pack.
Now, I'd heard/read somewhere when I purchased the packrack system that when you're by yourself on the bike, its best to point the bag forward to keep the weight between the wheels to assist with the bikes balance and handling, fair enough!
However, on the Speed Four, when the pack is pointing forward, it is sitting half on the pillion seat and half on the tailpiece of the bike. Not wanting to scratch the bike with a heavy battery on board, I faced the pack backwards, so the weight was entirely on the pack frame. This is the beginning of what was to become a pant-filling event.
In my typical early weekend morning stupor, I saw nothing wrong with what I was doing.
Geared up, onto the bike, head for the driveway.
Wait to turn left out of Repco, past the bus stop and up the road. Little did I realise the effect of that battery when I accelerated away, very quickly finding myself leaning left about 40 degrees, with the front wheel about two feet in the air. Maybe just a little too much throttle methinks! I had only just taken off, so my right foot hadn't even got onto the footpeg yet. The normal panic reaction occured, slamming the throttle shut bring the front crashing down slightly crossed up almost causing a wonderful highside infront of the people at the bus stop. Immediately upon landing, the toes of my right foot hit the ground, quickly followed by the footpeg slamming into the top of my calf muscle. Owned.
For the icing on the cake, and to cause further embarrassment, when the front slammed down, I also hit the horn, just incase people weren't looking at this dumbass wobbling his way down the road cursing like a madman.
Upon bringing the bike under control, I did what anyone would do in the situation, fucked off out of sight. Once round the corner, I faced pack fowards again, putting up with whatever was going to happen to the tailpiece!
For the last week my whole calf muscle has been a lovely purple colour. yay.
Hopefully someone will learn from this experience! I certainly have!
If you have to do something dumb like the above, make sure you're wearing your tinted visor, thank you HJC
/me hobbles off to get a coffee.
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Originally Posted by Devil
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