Safety imo, hand-signals are "better than nothing"

"thumb out" on a right turn works for me! i been using it all week...thanks professor :)

this concept is about "better than nothing"...mucho-kudos to guys like Simon who refuse to compromise...man i would so love to be able to just buy a universal harness so's to get signals & brakes & such, i can do simple +/- wiring but as soon as circuits intersect i'm lost like a puppy chasing a butterfly ;)

meantime, i'll just keep "waving" at everyone :rolleyes:
 
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Good safety tip....especially the *thumb Out* tip. I woukld have liked to have been around when SS's prosthetic caused such a furor though. Humor is a good thing. :giggle:
 
Good safety tip....especially the *thumb Out* tip. I woukld have liked to have been around when SS's prosthetic caused such a furor though. Humor is a good thing. :giggle:
It wasn't humorous while it was happening, but it actually has made me laugh often over the years when I told the story. The best laugh was at a seminar I was presenting in Quantico in 1999, to a group of rather senior major metropolitan police departments officers - as it turned out, one of them had been one of the responding officers at that little fiasco years before. He told me that the cop in the unmarked car who called in the threatened with a pistol call was never able to live the story down in the dept.
 
Agree to all re the defensive driving. I joke that, being a big guy, I'll do a lot more damage to the car than they want, but, like many of you, I also try to avoid the busiest streets when possible, andm I'm always trying to update my 'emergency bailout procedure' in my head as I ride, depending on the situation.

FYI - I also moved the "view from the other side" thread from the "Laws & Legislation" forum, to be a sticky thread here, as it seem more appropriate. (it's still linked there, though.) I can highly recommend reading the attached PDF file, "A Law Officer’s Guide to Bicycle Safety - Reference Guide" in that thread.
 
Loquin, I've told this story here before but if the people who have read it will forgive me I'll repeat it. It ties in with your thoughts but is first hand, I've been there.

Dec. 18 1965 I went with my brother and his buddy to pick up a 1959 Sprite that I had bought from my friend.
My brother wanted to try it out before he drove it home and off he went. I heard him coming back and since it was a quiet side street I looked both ways quickly and walked out onto the street. Just a little to quickly it seems.

What I didn't see was a kid in his Dads new '65 VW bettle. He hit me at about 40 miles an hour. My buddy yelled look out but the car was ten feet away. You just can't act fast enough.

I bent the bumper into a V.
Crushed the hood flat.
Tore the drivers fender off.
My head hit the drivers side windshield post and bent it back about 6 inches and the roof buckled down.
The drivers door was hanging off by the bottom hinge.
I went 15 feet throught the air and landed on the car my brother was driving the other way. Then I got up and walked down the street with 5 guys trying to get me on the ground.

Two hospitals{the first one was afraid I would die there so they sent me on to the major hospital} and I had a broken knee, 62 stiches in my head and the skull was fractured from side to side or ear to ear and from my right eye up to the of split on top of my head.
I walked out of the hospital 6 days later. The hospital was not happy but they couldn't stop me.

The police told my folks when they stopped to see the accident on thier way to the hospital that it was too bad I had died. When Dad said I was very much alive he was told there was no way I could have survived even if I was wearing a motorcycle helmut.
When he told them again that I was indeed alive one of them said"how do you know". Then Dad told them all who he was and they all tried to apologize at once. Dad said that they had to understand I had more lives than a cat. This was not my first mishap.
One cop said not anymore, I used them all up that night.

The best part of it all was the doctor that put every thing back together was a plastic surgeon and I have no scars.

In short it only works if you see them. You just won't see the one that gets you until it's too late.

Steve.
 
This makes it easier. Check out the pic
safetey_signals6932.jpg
 
hand signals- a good flyer for MB community

I use hand signals, and it seems people under 30 think I am either giving the Hitler salute (right turn sign with left arm, bent visibly and conspicuously) or waving them to pass me by on the left, instead of waiting for me to turn left (left arm extended, with all fingers extended).

People are willing to murder you if they have to wait more than 10 seconds to go back to meandering around. You are keeping them from their boring jobs and home lives and dismal fast food smorgasbords.


We should print Motoredbikes.com flyers with the common hand signals on them (left turn, right turn, stop, etc). Something in a friendly tone.
IF you are the only cyclist or MB rider they have ever talked to (besides people riding their garage rusting Huffies at the park 2x a year), you are the national spokesman for bicycling/MB to them.
 
Blaze orange on a bicycle is a dangerous thing. For the insect-drivers, blaze orange means a pedestrian or construction worker, even if you're moving 20-30mph. They will not wait behind you at all and will flat cut you off or run you off the road.

The Hi Viz Yellow at least gives them pause, becuase they have to see if you are a cop or not before they give you the bird and try to run over you.


re: hook prosthetic "gun". Here is what you need, driver! :)
vin-diesel-mega-man.jpg
 
Happy C, you come across as a very bitter man. I can really, truely understand that.
I just wish I had started earlier myself. Right on brother.

As they say, "you can't soar like an Eagle, when your surounded by turkeys".

Steve.
 
I'm not bitter, I'm disappointed!

I'm one of the nicest people. I am great company, always the humor at any party, always saving the ride with my multitools, and good for advice.

But the people around here (Dallas TX and suburbs) are idiot drivers. It feels like I live in a lesser country where people just zoom around oblivious to any traffic structure.

I do really believe change can happen overnight. We just need to get Jay Leno to ride a motor bicycle.
 
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