Text 5937, 103 rader
Skriven 2010-03-15 19:55:42 av Roy Witt (1:387/22)
   Kommentar till text 5828 av Robert Bashe (2:2448/44)
Ärende: Motorcycles
===================
12 Mar 10 07:16, Robert Bashe wrote to Roy Witt:

 RB> Roy Witt wrote to Robert Bashe on Thursday March 11 2010 at 18:57:

 RW>> These days, if you want to buy cheaper insurance, you take a
 RW>> motorcycle safety course.

 RB> Nothing like that here, but in view of the German requirements for
 RB> getting a motorcycle licence to begin with, I suspect such "safety
 RB> courses" would be considered pretty tame here in Germany.

Tame or not, they might just teach you something you didn't know.

 RB> Getting
 RB> even an extension to your auto drivers' licence to legally ride a
 RB> motorcycle is like getting a university degree here - plenty of
 RB> theory, plenty of practical driving, then a stringent test.

You can just go to the driver's license bureau here and take the test.
Passing that, you can then take the road test while riding on your bike
with a Texas trooper driving his squad car behind you. :o) Taking the
course gives you a break on insurance and a heads up on current laws.

 RB> It cost
 RB> me upwards of EUR 1800 to get my licence extended to motorcycles, and
 RB> the training took around four months in all. Mind you, that was
 RB> _only_ to have my regular car license extended to motorcycles. But in
 RB> effect, I took the regular test for an auto license plus some extra
 RB> stuff (and the practical part) for motorcycles on top of it.

They issue you an M on your driver's license here, meaning you're licensed
to ride. Otherwise your class of license is just a C for cars/trucks.
Commercial licenses have an A on them and Bus drivers have a B.
Potentially, you can have a CMAB license.

 RB> In contrast, the two times I took a drivers' license (for cars) in
 RB> the States (once in Oklahoma, once in Texas) were a breeze - go
 RB> through the booklet with the regulations for a week, show up, take
 RB> the test and then go out with a police officer for a round around the
 RB> block. Based on that, I can understand why extra safety training
 RB> would be useful or even necessary in the States.

I've never done anything more than that. But these days it isn't that easy
for a non-licensed person. Again, a driver's education class (in high
school) will get your teenager's insurance premiums lowered.

 RB> On the other hand, the insurance for my Suzuki Bandit 600 only runs
 RB> around EUR 60 a year (I have a good deal insuring it together with
 RB> our two cars at the same company, and we have an accident-free
 RB> deiving rebate here on insurance), so that was never much of a
 RB> problem.

Mine costs about the same as my 56 Chevy, about $240/year.

 RW>> One of the things they teach you is to never cross railroad tracks
 RW>> at anything other than perpendicular to them. Even dry, they'll
 RW>> throw you off a bit. I've experienced railroad tracks many times and
 RW>> have always kept that in mind over the years, before I decided to
 RW>> take the safety course.

 RB> I got my German motorcycle licence many decades after the accident I
 RB> described. At the time, I was just a post-doc in Heidelberg and
 RB> didn't even know you needed a special licence for a motorcycle -
 RB> nobody ever asked me for one, so I stayed in ignorance.

I never had to have one in Illinois, Washington or California
(CA grandfathered an M to my license), but in Texas they give you
incentives to take a course and get one.

 RB> Anyway, the particular corner where the accident occurred was a real
 RB> bitch, with the road splitting off into a Y to the north (I was
 RB> coming from the south) and tram tracks going in _both_ directions. It
 RB> was effectively impossible to avoid them, but it had rained and I was
 RB> going too fast - I was just lucky nothing more serious happened. It
 RB> was one of those things that won't give you any problems 99 times out
 RB> of 100 - but when you slide on the tracks, you really slide.

Been there...

 RW>> I once rode my Triumph Tiger (1952, 650cc single carb) around the
 RW>> ledge of a lagoon on a dare...

 RB> Even the thought chills my blood.

Just think how it would have chilled mine to fall off that ledge. :o)

 RW>> The following summer I was riding in a group with some friends when
 RW>> one of them veered off the road and cut his head in half on the wire
 RW>> holding the last telephone pole in place. He didn't feel a thing, as
 RW>> he had already died from a heart attack before veering off the road.
 RW>> Matter of fact, he didn't even bleed much. I gave up riding for
 RW>> about ten years after that.

 RB> I can believe it. Something like that can really put you off.

I was dating one of his three sisters too. We split up soon afterwards
because she wouldn't ride double up.

                R\%/itt

    You can put lipstick on a pig, but the pig still stinks!
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