Just got knocked of the bike...
- Thread starter eddieo
- Start date
Eddie glad you are ok, I had three near misses today that left me wondering if I should cycle at certain times or just give up all together...first was a bus trying to push past me against a line of stationary traffic how he did not hit me was a mystery, second I was being careful down a country lane only just wide enough for a car and I met one coming waaaay too fast in the opposite direction....I stopped...in the nearside hedge and he ploughed on and had the gaul (?) to to wave 'thank you! Aaaaarrrgh! And the last was a woman pulling out of her parking spot on the opposite side of the road facing the on coming traffic and cutting across me....at least she was very very apologetic....luckily I saw what she was doing and avoided a collision.....all this in the very picturesque country side of the Chilterns!
Also works in this area. I have these fitted:I always ride wirh flashing front and rear lights, seems to work on the pheasants around here
http://www.freelights.co.uk/product.html
Always on and no batteries to worry about.
Also important is wearing a Hi-Vis vest.
Be Seen.
Colin
It's a matter of perception. After a long career as a professional photographer, I learned a bit about it.
Looking and seeing are very different things. The eyes don't see, the brain does. She did look at you, she didn't 'see' you
What she means is she attached no importance to your presence. If you had been on the same bike but wearing a police uniform, she would have both looked and seen (noticed) you. And not pulled out because her brain would inform her action - that there would be consequences of endangering a police officer.
It's why hi-viz, daytime lights etc have little effect. When everyone has lights on, no-one has lights on, ditto hi-viz.
When a person is encased in a protective envelope like a car they feel (and are) safe. When performing a complex manoeuvre, they cannot 'see' everything, there is too much stimulus, too fast. So they look and their brain filters out what it considers unimportant. This isn't a conscious action but a survival one. A bike is not threatening and is discounted - an HGV would be 'clocked'. Nevertheless, both bike and car were looked at and in the narrow sense, seen.
If the woman had herself been a cyclist she would perceive the bike differently, she could imagine being knocked off and she would not blithely pull out.
It's a matter of training in the end. My own view is that no-one should be allowed a car license until they have first proved themselves competent on a two wheeler.
Hey, eddio, only a Londoner could consider south Croydon the country
Couldn't have put it better myself, as a cyclist whenever I'm driving I always take when overtaking other cyclists, I rarely feel like the cars overtaking me are ever too close, mostly they give me plenty of room but it's the larger vehicles, busses/lorries that worry me most because of their sheer size and lack of manouverability plus side & back vision compared to a car, a few times I've almost been knocked off from 'blind' bus drivers on bends veering left.
That's a good idea, and a nice comeback to use with the all-cyclists-should-be-taxed-registered-insured-helmeted crowd.It's a matter of training in the end. My own view is that no-one should be allowed a car license until they have first proved themselves competent on a two wheeler.
As your last recommendation (the comfort saddle) is now installed on the bike and working wonders, I have appointed you my quartermaster for such things.
So, what sort of flashing lights do you use - I know you CAN pay quite large sums for the things, so hopefully you didn't!
Allen.
I've tried cheap flashing lights and whilst adequate they are fragile. I got a pair of Cateye lights reduced in Halfords (£20 normally I think), the quality and visibility are far better. If you do a lot of night riding then I recommend going 1 above the bargain basement.
No, scarcely any night riding. But fairly regularly out in the morning traffic of NW London, and the more things to wake up the dozey motorists that I'm there, the better!
Allen.
Couple of further ideas:
a) this looks bright...
Bicycle Front Light. 1200+ candlepower, super bright, wide angle: Amazon.co.uk: Sports & Leisure
b) there IS a fairly bright front light on the Wisper, of course. Would I be pushing my luck if I investigated wiring a flashing light in place of the Wisper light?
Allen.
a) this looks bright...
Bicycle Front Light. 1200+ candlepower, super bright, wide angle: Amazon.co.uk: Sports & Leisure
b) there IS a fairly bright front light on the Wisper, of course. Would I be pushing my luck if I investigated wiring a flashing light in place of the Wisper light?
Allen.
I'm quite tempted to see what 36V lamps I could fit there, the original one had a bit of an overheating issue so needs replacing.
I'm intersted in the Vision X Solstice Solo.
There's a few different models with different beams.
The problem is headlights are not yet allowed to be LED, Halogen takes much more power to run and could have a bad affect on my battery.
I've had various Cateye LED front lamps for some years now, both on my push bikes and e-bikes. I normally ensure I have at least one LED lamp marked as "UK legal" on the bike as well as other backups. This is going as far back as around late 2003/4.
I do remember some initial disagreement over the legality of LED front lamps but it was resolved around that time (this following CTC link claims LED lamps have been permitted since 2003 which ties up with when I first started seeing "UK legal" front LEDs)
Lighting Regulations
Sorry, I meant that they are illegal on a motor vehicle as the lights garrence mentioned are for motorbikes.
Ahhhh, that's why all the reviews just use them as supplementary lights on motorbikes.
I'm still thinking about getting one. At £80 for 900 lumens they're cheaper than the super-powerful lights on wiggle and operate at something like 12 to 50V. Perhaps I should use the light my bike came with a bit more though, it's reasonably bright, just not so rediculously bright as the Vision X one!
These are good, a number of users on the forum...very bright and good value IMHO....
DealExtreme: $77.04 HA-III SSC P7-C (SXO) 3-Mode 900-Lumen LED Bike Light Set
DealExtreme: $77.04 HA-III SSC P7-C (SXO) 3-Mode 900-Lumen LED Bike Light Set
I`ve got several of the cheap and cheerful Chinese front and rear flashing LED lights. Not for seeing where I`m going as I don`t ride at night but more so that people see me and from feed back I`ve had from motorists the front light really attracts the attention and that`s what I want (even the wood pigeons get the message) they don`t like a flashing light and they certainly don`t like it up Em
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