Weebl

You hear all sorts of horror stories when you look at doing a test, like 'they will fail you for blinking twice in a five second period' or 'they will fail you for not running over old ladies' If you stop in the middle of the road to wave old ladies across you will be obstructing the highway, so will probably fail, if you stop because they are halfway across or waiting at a zebra crossing then you are in compliance with the law and will pass. Personal, fairly recent experience tells me that they are pretty damn good, all they want, is to see you ride safely in a number of different situations. A 'slight' hesitation at a roundabout or while your brain processes which lane you should be in etc will not fail you. I know this because I did both on my test. It is natural for you to ride differently than you normally would while being tested, you are trying to show how safe and good you are and that makes you hesitate a bit or even sometimes make the wrong decision. They know this and won't leap on the first minor thing they see and use it as an excuse to fail you, from what I saw they certainly are not looking to fail people. Just remember, the last person who had your bike sat at home waiting for them to come back from MOD 2, passed (and I thought I had failed when I got off the bike, I had a massive list in my head of major f@£k ups I had made, 1 of them was written up as a minor, 2 others were mentioned but not worth putting on the paperwork, the rest were not even mentioned) Good luck

2500rpm idle way to high The bike would be a nightmare to trickle along in traffic burn't clutch def be on the cards. Dip beam has the wattage output as high beam both normally 55 watt just the angle of beam is change. Best to find a route where you give the bike some work if possible and get some charge back in, or stick an optimate charger onto the battery as and when. PS Most important, make sure you use a correct charger, a high powerd car type charger will cook your battery if left on for to long. Yes, 2500 RPM is stupidly high to have as idle when riding, but if you read the thread we are talking about leaving the bike idling to charge the battery, not permanently changing the idle to 2500 RPM, The idle as set is perfect for the bike to ride with, but not enough to leave idling and have the battery charge properly, I know this because I set the idle. I said to put the headlight on dip because if you are leaving it on for an hour on main beam you are likely to annoy people driving past much more than if you leave it on dip, not because I think it draws less current. I also did not suggest going for a longish ride which would be the easy option as he does not have a full licence.

Charging system was not podged the last time I used the bike. I had not ridden it any distance in the 2 weeks leading up to the couriers collecting but it was at 12.5 volts when it went on the wagon. I know you have had it turning over a fair bit and have probably given the battery bit of a shoeing and as said, a 5 mile bimble ride won't do a deep ish cycle recharge. The advice given about not leaving a bike idling for an hour is good, however in this particular instance, with that bike you can do it as the cooling system is excellent and it will be ok as long as it is a cool day, dusk would be my recommendation. As counter intuitive as it sounds put the headlight on dip as well. You can tweak the choke up a bit to bring the idle up (even better would be to reach under the tank to the carbs and tweak up the idle on the idle adjust screw to about 2.5k)

Mate, the couriers have broken something dropping it. Have you been in touch with them yet? I am really annoyed, I handed over a fully working, non fairing smashed and fully indicator attached bike and that is not what you have received.

10/40, halfords motorbike oil is fine. The stuff in it is exactly that and only about 800 miles old

It's definitely the later engine out of the mark 2 mate, and like I said, I can only apologise for the hassle you are having, she always started on the button for me. I also think you should name and shame the courier company, the more I think about our last conversation the more annoyed I am getting. I would push them for compensation. The pictures in the ad were very recent and she was in exactly that condition when he wheeled her into the van!

[if its been sat] Is fuel getting through to the spark plugs? Try and start it a few times, then take the spark plug out and see if there is a trace of fresh petrol in there Spark plug - is it firing? Black? - clean it/replace it, but i doubt its the plugs are the HT leads worn? Is the battery flat? - we will find out once you have charged it lol was it working ok before? As for it not changing gear, has the bike been sat for months? I know with my bike, it will only change gear once the engine is running, but it will go into neutral alright It's my old bike that Luke just bought. Fuel and sparks are good. It will be a sticky bendix. I have already suggested the rocking back and forth. She has not been ridden for about 3 weeks but was started the day before collection so she should not be too jammed up.

Thanks Weebl -is that not connecting it to the battery though or do I splice it into the brake/horn wire? Would prefer if it turned off when ignition off. You connect it to a power line. If you want it on the horn line find the power line going to that and connect it there. Don't inline it unless you have to, odds on that one of the power connections for something like the horn will be a terminal screwed on, screw it on there with the existing line. Don't stick it on anything like the lights, ancilliary stuff like the horn is OK but don't mess with a power draw that is fundamental to the bike. Realistically, you are best off getting a mate who knows wiggly amps to help you out, if you really are clueless with electrics, you should not mess with them, at least until he has shown you some basics.

Positive wire goes to a power line, earth goes to earth (random bolt on the frame should do) it does not really get any simpler? Red is power, black is earth, not a lot more to say really?

You haven't done something really silly like turning the petrol tap off to remove the tank for the work you have been doing and forgotten to switch it back on? Or knocked the kill switch to the off position while fiddling with the headlight? Easy done, I know, I have done both before

You can do it on your 24th Birthday. It would be unfair otherwise, a bloke with no experience is allowed to take a test for an unrestricted licence on his 24th, but you with a pass under your belt for a restricted licence and at least 18 months of experience having to wait.

Yep, CBT and Theory can be done in either order but both must be complete before Mod 1 and 2

It looks to me as though you are supposed to put the bolts through the slots with big washers behind them? Probably like that so you are not dictated to on where the bolts go on your plate, but you can move them depending on plate size and letters.

I rode a bike when I was younger (16 to 18) then nothing apart from the odd spin on a moped which I had a grandfather rights license to. My eldest got a bike, I remembered what fun it used to be so went for my test. CBT is about 8 till about 3 (6 ish hours on a 125) Mod 1 training was same again (6 ish hours) Mod 1 test was miles away so the ride there and back was also Mod 2 training (another 3 hours) Mod 2 training 6 ish hours then the ride there at an hour or so. so 22 ish hours start to finish, but I have ridden before and have driven for 20+ years, my instructors said I took straight back to it like a duck to water. If you have not ridden before and don't even have a CBT I can't see how you will get it all in before Jan 19th. How old are you?

If you can ride and have good road awareness and can remember the few points that your instructor will tell you are very important to do on your test then they are easy, if you cannot then they are hard. Take an assessment lesson with your chosen instructor and ask him how much training he thinks you need, you will be going some to get them in in time though.

I agree with you, crossing the line is usually a good indication you have given enough room, it was your statement I disagreed with. I have enough issues with cyclists completely ignoring the fact we are sharing the road without planting the idea in anybodies mind I am breaking the law and doing anything wrong because I happen to go past them in a safe manner but I dared to have a wheel on the same side of the road as them. It is a shame that the favour is not returned in traffic when it seems acceptable to squeeze through any existing gap between the kerb and my car, and as the traffic moves off again and they are trying to wobble around my wing mirror, it again becomes my responsibility to ensure we have a safe clearance.

While I don't doubt your description of the place, and I can even agree that it may be tougher to pass there than elsewhere, 33% means nothing in the context of how few people are in the statistics. Some test centers had 100% pass rates with 1 or 2 people in a month taking the test, some had a 0% pass rate with the same numbers. With low numbers like those seen on that spreadsheet, a few donkeys constantly failing, or a few Pedrosa's passing with no issues in an area will wildly skew the results. If you want to use statistics to prove stuff like this, you need lots and lots more test subjects, and you would also need to split out the Mod 1 and Mod 2 results. For better accuracy and better conclusions, you would also have to look at who trained as well as who examined and if that made any difference.

Nowhere does the law state you must cross the white line to overtake anything. I don't need to if I decide I can safely overtake a car without crossing it, so I certainly don't need to if I can otherwise give a cyclist a safe amount of room. I am not tarring all cyclists with the same brush but there do seem to be a large proportion of them that act as though they are in a tank (well they certainly seem to ride as though they are invulnerable) as well as those that act as though all courtesy should be directed at them, while they are free to ride in the most obnoxious manner that they can. Sorry to say it mate but a gaggle of them in Lycra tend to be the worst offenders.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... fined.html Obstructing the Police in the course of their duties. The funny thing is, the official line on speed traps is that they are not there to catch and prosecute speeders, they are there to slow people down and make the roads safer, that's why they publicise where they will be and they have warning signs up all the way along roads where they might be. By flashing your lights, you are also slowing people down and so assisting in the stated aim of speed cameras. They can still nick you for it if they want though.

Completely depends on the situation, I have had 2 in the last few months and I warned in one and giggled in the other. 1, Driving along in a built up area which is a 30 for a good reason, tool driving towards me overtakes another car (the other car he overtook looked to be doing about the 30) and accelerates up to at least 50 as he crosses lazily back onto his side of the road and while he did not cause me to brake, I did have to come off the throttle and mutter some unkind words as well as realising that there is a fixed speed camera he is just about to go through way too fast. 2, 50 MPH limit road which used to be a 60, and has no logical reason to have been dropped to 50. Mostly bendy road with no overtake opportunities apart from one straight uphill bit where it is nice and wide and you can get past lorries doing 40 to make some progress. Mobile van often stops at the top of this hill and catches people accelerating to a safe overtake speed. If the van is there I always warn people coming up to the bottom of the hill.

I would let him calm down (yes, shouting at you is not good but hopefully it was a momentary lapse due to his bike being broken and a bill coming his way) His answer of 'We will see' tends to lead me to believe he had already started calming down. Don't go in demanding, just see what he says when you go to see him next time, apologise for crunching into gear (although to be fair, you should not really be able to snap a chain by being a bit violent with the clutch) and see what he says. If he then says 'you have to pay' then you have grounds to argue, odds on though he will just sort you out as long as you don't swagger in shouting the odds about your 'rights'

Have you had the battery disconnected recently? I have seen a similar issue on a moped which had had the battery disconnected and put back on with the ignition switched on. To try to fix it, turn the ignition on and look for the twitch, if you have one you then need to disconnect the negative terminal of the battery, ignition off. Then touch the negative lead to the negative terminal. Switch on the ignition and as the needle does its little twitch, when it is at the lowest point, whip the negative terminal off. Then ignition off and start again. You should be able to very slowly edge it back around to the right place. At no point connect the battery with the ignition already on!

You at Brize working shifts? That is cheap as well, I decided to take my test just after moving out of Cartoon Town and it was a lot more than that!

It's just Tarmac with a high friction coefficient. Not sure which method they use but if you are interested in high friction tarmac? then Google Shellgrip or Calcined Bauxite.

No, if you do mod 2 under the new rules and mod 1 under the old rules, you get a new rules licence.