Bike vs bike crashes - why so many?

[jrandom]

... a naked Italian thing which, I understand, does throttle wheelies in first gear merely by rolling the throttle off and on at 7,000rpm.

Sounds quite dangerous. I'm not surprised me poor old mum was so dead set against these motorcycle things.

[Dean]

Yea his bike was the first bike i pillioned on, and i was amazed how there would be a car way infront merging into one lane and all of a sudden we are infront of the car and im struggling to hold on every time he blimps the throttle.I think wheelies are nice when done on bikes that arent made to wheelie or arent suited to, seeing someone wheelie on a typical zx10 or a gixxer one thou is boring to wacth but wacthing a tourer heavy naked bike 12 oclocking is fun to get on camera!!!!

[Ocean1]

The cage moved left, and as I was about to pull out to pass a twat on a bike came the other way

Yup, had just such an invite from a camper van in the Buller gorge last week, I'm alive because I declined it. Never trust some other bastard's opinion on whether you should cross the border.

Dunno where you get all that from. My reading suggests GP riders turn in under brakes to get a sharper turn.

carbonhed, I think, is talking about being neutral/cracked-on into a corner, road-riding styles, and then grabbing front brake, which does tend to stand the bike up.

Mine sure as hell does, even if I'm sluggish easing off the front picks it takes more effort to tip in. A firm squeeze after that requires steering compensation. A panic grab mid-left hander would put me across the centreline in a flash.

Still, the mental image of flying over the oncoming rider is amusing, which I think was the main point.

It's a valid tactic for cars, I've jumped over two and walked away. Don't believe it's a workable plan for an oncoming bike, though...

[jrandom]

I think wheelies are nice when done on bikes that arent made to wheelie or arent suited to

Some of us think the same thing about circuit racing.



Which, dangerous sport that it may be, offers the advantage of a distinct lack of oncoming traffic.

[Dean]

Some of us think the same thing about circuit racing.


Which, dangerous sport that it may be, offers the advantage of a distinct lack of oncoming traffic.

choice picture GSX1400 rule!!! is that you in the pic by any chance , its a nice kneedown
When i get my full licence im going to get one ( well hopefully )

[jrandom]

choice picture GSX1400 rule!!! is that you in the pic by any chance , its a nice kneedown

Yes, that's me. But, uh, there's a good couple of inches of air between my knee and the deck, sorry dude. I'll try harder next time eh? No balance or coordination, though, remember. I may well fall off or summat.

When i get my full licence im going to get one ( well hopefully )

Good man. I like you now.

[RT527]

Hey all I don't mean to be a pedantic Prick.....meh what the hell here goes anyways....this accident didn't occur today it was yesterday at 11 30 in the morning .....http://www.stuff.co.nz/4841438a11.html.......soz to be way off the track here...now what were we talking about, oh yeah head ons.....see them every day an so over them , I would have a near miss /head on about ooooo lets say on average 4 a week, its not that Im looking for them , I just see it happening and take the necessary action, so as to avoid a nasty reaction.


Oh shit thats right this is a bikers forum and Im talking about me driving trucks again , oh how horrid.

But it is in relation , in the fact that 50 % of the near misses involve 2 wheels!!!! but Since no one can say slow down a little and enjoy life with out having torrential abuse hurled at them ... Ill just say what the heck Im bigger than you so I should go over the top of you just nicely so next time someone comes at me ... don't expect me to move , cause I'm a rock and I'm steadfastly going about my business driving my truck ....ahhh what the hell Ill prolly still move out the way before you even realize that you are heading towards your impending doom which would look something like this

[Ixion]

All of which is very interesting I'm sure, but does not go to address the original question - why so many?

One would logically think that if bikers were going to head on something, the something would be roughly in proportion to the numbers of the various classes of vehicles on the road.

That is, one would expect far more headons with cars, than with bikes, just because there are so many more cars than bikes. More targets as it were.

Doesn't seem to work that way? Is it possible that the much maligned cager is in fact quite good about sticking to his own side of the road (Harry Huriup always excepted) ; whereas bikers have fallen into bad habits of overtaking without due consideration of what be oncoming. So that there is a greater liklihood of bike impacting bike, than bike impacting car. In which case, the solution lies within our own hands.

[Ocean1]

- why so many?

Is it a real anomaly, or a perceived one?

If real I wonder if there's an effect from the different lines bikes take to cars. It may be the opposing bike line is more... congruent to one's own bike line than yer average opposing car line.

Mebe.

[BMWST?]

I am strongly tempted to a bit of micheal extraction, but as this is a serious topic , I will, by a mighty and valiant effort, restrict myself simply to saying that you are seriously mistaken. Unless by 'drastic change of direction' you mean something like a handbrake turn.

ok we agree to disagree..i was in a honda prelude and we had to take evasive action to miss a motorbike who pulled out in front of us blindly following his mates....we were doing 100 km an hour and swerved around him...I have had 11 bikes and traveelled many thousands of km(in a previuos time) and loved throwing my bikes around(countersteer invioked wheelies mid s turn and i swear i could not replicate that manouvre

[mikeey01]

This really is very very important. The reason that bikes involved in head ons with each other don't take evasive action is often because of the "WTF - this can't happening" reaction.

When confronted with something that we believe just should not be, our minds tend to lock up. This can be prevented by pre-visualising.

Regularly, on corners and such, put the picture into your minds eye of a car/SUV/bike dead in front of you when you come into the corner. Don't actually do anything, just visualise the possibility. (I usually use the memorised image of the last vehicle that went by). And think of what possibilities there are. Then when the situation really does occur (and sooner or later, it will) , instead of freezing with a "WTF - no this isn't right" reaction, you will at least do SOMETHING.

That sir is some dam good advise, thank you!

[jrandom]

ok we agree to disagree..i was in a honda prelude and we had to take evasive action to miss a motorbike who pulled out in front of us blindly following his mates...

You could well be right. I suspect some cars are capable of retaining traction while pulling more lateral G's than most motorcycles could.

In fact, that's not just a suspicion, it's reality. Look at any car vs bike shootout - the car always has superior corner speed.

So stating that a car can swerve more sharply than a bike in these circumstances is probably justified.

[RT527]

All of which is very interesting I'm sure, but does not go to address the original question - why so many?

Yeah I know it was just dribble....there is no real reason that this happens...people don't like being told how to ride /drive so until someone accepts that what they are doing is fundamentally wrong no actually that should read playing Russian roulette with all chambers bar one loaded , they will keep crashing after veering over the centre line.....OK I can own up to doing this myself even after James Duece My brother told me and actually stipulated "DO NOT CROSS THE CENTRE LINE UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCE" guess what about 20 mins later in a set of twisties, well sought of, Out back of nowhere between Masterton and Ekatahuna I think it was, I crossed the centre line, and I can honestly put that down to lack of concentration, there was no reason to do it, (I wasn't going warp 1.5 which for me would be nigh on impossible to ride at those speeds anyways ).

There is no real answer, we could try to be concerned and actually show consternation with the ones that actually like to ride dangerously ...let them know that it isn't acceptable to pull half baked stunts ....or ride beyond there limits...or we can just keep on going about our business and let natural selection form the basis of our existence....Human nature at its best is best described as the shell be right it wont happen to me norm of things that no one knows whats going to happen next should ever be using to decide what to do next....

[Mikkel]

I took the missus out to see some of gravel roads we ride around Banks Peninsula this weekend. We were going along a fairly narrow road - space enough for two cars if needs be, but only one set of wheel tracks if you know what I mean.
At one point we were about to enter a fairly obscured right-hand corner. I enter the corner at about 30 km/h and just at that moment a motorcycle came around the corner. Luckily there was time and space for me to, very quickly I might add, pull approximately a meter to left and luckily he didn't get shocked enough to target fixate on the car.
Being a dry day with plenty of dust I had kept an eye out for clouds that could have given me a warning - but he must have gone too slow to raise any significant amount of dust, or he would just have started off when we met him. I wasn't going fast, neither was he - sometimes the lay of the land just allows dangerous situations to occur even when exercising due care and attention...

As it were, it could have gone either way. If he hadn't already been in the right-hand tyre track it most likely would have gone awry. Thankfully he stayed upright and we didn't go over the edge - and no, I didn't check that there was enough space to move left before I did it, I just did it because my natural reaction was to try and avoid a collision.

[MarkH]

Too many riding beyond their capabilities. There is never a need to cross the centreline.

Crossing the centre line when you do it (and generally you shouldn't do it) should ALWAYS be done deliberately and with a lot of care - the road code says you should still have 100M visibility by the end of the manoeuvre. It makes no difference whether cornering or overtaking, if you don't have a shit load of clear view ahead then you need to stick within your own lane. If you unintentionally move into the opposite lane while cornering then change how you corner and don't do it again - one day you will cross the line and be killed. The rule should ALWAYS be to stay within your own lane, the exceptions should be VERY carefully managed and involve LOOKING & THINKING.

If you lack experience then a good exercise is to practise on every corner the skill of riding fully within your own lane throughout the entire manoeuvre. This works fine on all the corners, not just the blind ones and is a good habit to get into. In fact as Squiggles said: "There is never a need to cross the centreline".

If you find yourself drifting wide on left handers then try entering them slower - 'fast in, slow out' is not how it goes! (some use 'fast in, crap yourself when running wide, slow out') Next time try the proper 'slow in, fast out' method and you will find you have less skidmarks in your undies.