Just how fast is your reaction time?.

Click this link for a test put up by the BBC where you can test your reaction times, but be warned, it’s addictive!!

These rails are intended to keep vehicle from running off the road or across into the other carriageway and are only tested for car and commercial vehicle impacts, motorcycle impacts are not considered.

A motorcycle impact with the standard issue is frequently fatal due to the rider impacting the support beams which can lead to dismemberment and/or decapitation.

FEMA, the Federation of European Motorcyclists’ Associations, has has been campaigning for a new standard which takes crash tests with motorcycles into account and have issued a Special Edition newsletter about this.

The newsletter can be viewed on line at http://www.fema-online.eu/ by clicking on this link.

If you do then you will risk missing seeing potential dangers.

An example is to be seen in this link (Click Here)

The effect appears whether you concentrate on the centre blinking dot or on one of the outer fixed dots so REMEMBER

Keep Your Eyes Moving!!

]]> http://www.xsmotorcycleschool.co.uk/blog/2012/01/motion-induced-blindness/feed/ 0 http://www.xsmotorcycleschool.co.uk/blog/2011/11/fema-news-autumn-2011/ http://www.xsmotorcycleschool.co.uk/blog/2011/11/fema-news-autumn-2011/#comments Mon, 07 Nov 2011 11:05:19 +0000 drew http://www.xsmotorcycleschool.co.uk/blog/?p=71 Continue reading →]]> The Autumn 2100 edition of FEMA, the road riding motorcyclist pressure group is now available on line HERE and on their main website at http://www.fema-online.eu/

There are articles on Type Approval legislation, the “Back Off EU” protest, the “Road Safety 2011-2120″ proposals, mandatory inspections, there’s a study which shows that motorcycling is beneficial for society and others.

It gives a view as to proposed legislation and to what is being done on the motorcyclists behalf.

Worth a read surely?

You can read it at http://tinyurl.com/3qusgkj and then go on to read the rest of the magazine as well if you wish.

Some interesting articles and links here.

First off they are changing the order in which the exercises, “Elements” in DSA speak, are to be done, the intention is that all of the “slow speed” exercises will now be done together, followed by the high speed ones, presumably if the examiner is not happy with your slow riding he will not carry on with the high speed part of the test and so reduce the accident toll.

This will mean that the “Slow Ride” and the “U-Turn” exercises will now be done following the “Slalom” and “Figure 8″ exercises.

The published intention is that on the completion of the “Figure 8″ you will be asked ride across the yard to the “U-Turn” area at a walking pace and this will be observed by the examiner rather than you having to keep pace with him as at present.

Next will be the “Controlled Stop”, for this you will need to ride round the “circuit bend” at the end of the yard, but this first time round it there will be no speed requirement so it’s a chance for you to get the feel of things, and then go straight through down to stop with your wheel in the “stop box” of 4 blue cones.

The entrance to and exit from the “circuit bend” have been “altered to allow the rider to choose their preferred riding line”

Now you need to get up to speed!, it’s time for the “Emergency Stop”.

So it’s round the “circuit bend” again, but this time you need to get round it at 30kph, accelerate up to 50kph and through the speed trap and stop when the examiner raises his hand.

The official release says that they are now going to allow a 5% tolerance on that speed so it will no longer be a fail if you only do 49kph but it is a “Minor Fault”.

All that’s left to do is the swerve,   Oops!, Sorry, that’s the “Avoidance” exercise.

Round the “circuit bend” for the third time, again at 30kph, through the speed trap at 50kph (5% tolerance) and swerve through the marker cones same as always.

You have already done the “Controlled Stop” exercise so you now just need to stop safely near the cones marking the back of the box (the 2 front cones are to be removed before you start the exercise) .

Diagrams of the “New” layout can be downloaded from the “info/Practical Test/Module 1″ section of the XS main site HERE where there are both the “Old Test Layout” and the “Current Layouts” available for download.

Here’s a quick test for you to try to see just how good your reactions actually are. “Click here” to try the test.

This has now been completed and in it Mike Penning, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport, states that he “wants to see the practical test delivered as a single on-road event in a way which will maintain riding standards, protect safety and increase accessibility of the test to all candidates”.

The review suggests that the test could now include the hazard avoidance manoeuvre as well as the other specified manoeuvres ‘on the road’ or suggests that the low-speed manoeuvres could possibly be examined at CBT training centres ahead of the main test.

This change would of course mean that there would no longer be the need to take the test at one of the inadequate number of specialist test centres, as is now necessary and so do away with the current, inherently unsafe, need for a test candidate to ride for 2 hours or more just to get to a test centre in order to take a test.(There are reports of some candidates having to ride for over 5 hours to reach their nearest test centre.)

The actual report is on-line at:- http://tinyurl.com/294qsfj

We’ll have to watch out though that this change is not used as an excuse to boost the cost of a test yet again.

When the “new” test was first proposed we were told that it would not be necessary to increase the test fee but they have subsequently boosted it by over 50%. (A motorcycle test is now over £90 in comparison to the £62 it is for a car.)

A major safety factor is keeping them at the correct pressure, the wrong pressure will adversely affect the handling and braking so you need to check them regularly.

Bridgestone tyres are currently running a safety campaign, admittedly aimed more at cars but, one aspect of which is that they are offering a FREE tyre pressure gauge.

If you go to the< http://tyresafety.eu/home>, after the intro video has finished playing you will see, beside the front of the car, a placard “Order a Free Tyre Gauge”.

Click on this and you get the order page for a free gauge.

There are also a set of car oriented safety videos that also hold true for bikes

Got to be worth the effort.

!!THIS OFFER IS NOW CLOSED!!