120 MPH and no Ban

[vernon]

Enjoyment and thrill of speed is relative... what if all motorbikes and cars were speed limited to 80mph max? or 75? If you get in a road train of bunched up vehicles all together at least you can slow down a bit or speed up a bit to separate.

Then if some nuts still want to waste fuel accelerating to the limit as quickly as possible they still can ...but what's the point of any road vehicle in the UK being capable of going faster?

It isn't the acceleration that thrills it's the speed. Eighty miles per hour is quite pedestrian.

As for vehicles be capable of faster speeds - that's what track days are for.

As for being caught in a road train of similarly speed limited vehicles - I've been there when I got caught up in a convoy of Citroen 2CVs when I owned one. It was the most frustrating forty five miles that I've ever driven. It's a bit like Formula 1 where overtaking is all but impossible and only driver error allows progress through the ranks.

 

[Muddyfox]

Enjoyment and thrill of speed is relative... what if all motorbikes and cars were speed limited to 80mph max? or 75? If you get in a road train of bunched up vehicles all together at least you can slow down a bit or speed up a bit to separate.

Then if some nuts still want to waste fuel accelerating to the limit as quickly as possible they still can ...but what's the point of any road vehicle in the UK being capable of going faster?

You've never owned a sports bike have you Archie

i undestand where you are coming from but not having enough power to overtake is far more dangerous than having to much

@ Vernon .. high speed is the big thrill but i think that the acceleration plays a big part in the excitement .. most sports bikes will hit 60mph in under 3 seconds and 100mph in under 6 seconds and at 120mph your only just thinking about changing up to 3rd gear .. and then theres the noise

Simon

 

[atbman]

You've never owned a sports bike have you Archie [ATTACH=full]191222[/ATTACH] i undestand where you are coming from but not having enough power to overtake is far more dangerous than having to much

Not having enough power to overtake isn't the slightest bit dangerous. Unless you're stupid enough to overtake, of course.

The idiot in the decapitated, legectomy fatality video had power enough to overtake, until he killed himself. It wasn't lack of acceleration, but lack of brains that did for him

 

[vernon]

You've never owned a sports bike have you Archie

i undestand where you are coming from but not having enough power to overtake is far more dangerous than having to much

@ Vernon .. high speed is the big thrill but i think that the acceleration plays a big part in the excitement .. most sports bikes will hit 60mph in under 3 seconds and 100mph in under 6 seconds and at 120mph your only just thinking about changing up to 3rd gear .. and then theres the noise

Simon

I disagree with not being able to overtake being dangerous - it's a no brainer - don't try. The most difficult car for a 2CV owner to overtake on the open road is another 2CV. All other vehicles were either faster or slower the 2CVs were flat out and still within the speed limit overtaking had to be planned minutes in advance and finally executed hours later

Acceleration played some part in for me but when it's possible to break the speed limit and still have yet to leave first gear one has to question the need for the rest of the gearbox

I've been there and done it with fast sports bikes but my epiphany came when I calculated my speed in feet per second once when I was tooling up the A1 and then considered the consequences of a front wheel blow out. It put a brake (sic) on my insane activities.

 

[longers]

Crashing and severe injuries do not put them off as testified by one of the constable on TV and as evidenced by my mate "crasher Pete" -

I didn't see the program but did meet a biker a few years ago who was barely held together with nuts and bolts. The doctors told him that one more off would quite likely be terminal but he was going to carry on racing sidecars and just face the consequences. He was very relaxed about it and said it was a case of "when" not "if" he died doing what he loved. His choice and his family were ok about it too apparently.

Not for me but I'd quite like to get a powered two wheeler in the future and ride sensibly.

 

[Archie_tect]

i undestand where you are coming from but not having enough power to overtake is far more dangerous than having to much

Simon,
I didn't say limit the acceleration... just limit the top speed, though why anyone needs an engine so powerful as to be able to exceed the limit without using gears makes a mockery of the whole situation in the UK. Not efficient at all. Nope I had a Honda CB200 which did 84 flat out downhill with a tailwind on the M62 ...once. But still perfectly adequate and exciting enough!

 

[vernon]

I didn't see the program but did meet a biker a few years ago who was barely held together with nuts and bolts. The doctors told him that one more off would quite likely be terminal but he was going to carry on racing sidecars and just face the consequences. He was very relaxed about it and said it was a case of "when" not "if" he died doing what he loved. His choice and his family were ok about it too apparently.

Not for me but I'd quite like to get a powered two wheeler in the future and ride sensibly.

The problem is that some folk don't realise that the claimed top speeds and 0-60 figures for motor cycles are not targets for their owners to match. My last large bike was 1200cc of brute force yet more often than not was ridden within the law. Being naughty did increase the fun but this is probably the one aspect of my life where commonsense eventually prevailed.

My CB500 Honda is my current source of motorised pleasure on two wheels.

 

[Gerry Attrick]

Simon,
I didn't say limit the acceleration... just limit the top speed, though why anyone needs an engine so powerful as to be able to exceed the limit without using gears makes a mockery of the whole situation in the UK. Not efficient at all. Nope I had a Honda CB200 which did 84 flat out downhill with a tailwind on the M62 ...once. But still perfectly adequate and exciting enough!

Beautifully put. Riding at the limit on an 85 mph machine beats riding in first gear on a 180 mph machine any day IMHO. And yes I have ridden both. Sure, the end result of crashing at that speed on either bike will be the same, but a reasonably skilled driver is far less likely to crash on the former.

 

[Muddyfox]

Simon,
I didn't say limit the acceleration... just limit the top speed, though why anyone needs an engine so powerful as to be able to exceed the limit without using gears makes a mockery of the whole situation in the UK. Not efficient at all. Nope I had a Honda CB200 which did 84 flat out downhill with a tailwind on the M62 ...once. But still perfectly adequate and exciting enough!

My mistake Archie i read your post wrongly .. glad you enjoyed your CB 200

I guess at the end of the day we are all wired up differently .. i watched a programme about base jumping a while ago and thought that the people who do it must be crazy but by the same same token they would probably think i was crazy for some of the speeds ive done on a motorcycle on public roads

Simon

 

[threebikesmcginty]

...I had a Honda CB200...

Still got my copy, great record!

 

[Gerry Attrick]

Aw TBM, that's a sad admission

 

[vernon]

Still got my copy, great record!

A classic!

 

[yello]

I think that it is just that high speed is thrilling and exciting, and unfortunately it is the danger* that makes it exciting. That is why we have things like rollercoasters, is it not?

*To themselves, not to other people.

I don't dispute the thrill aspect but it's not like rollercoasters really. Passengers trust the rollercoaster operators to adhere to the regulations, for their safety. They don't assume there are real risks, or any real chance of being killed on one. It's a safe and danger-free thrill.

Similarly road users place a degree of trust in other roads users. They expect others to adhere to the regulations for the safety of everyone. They don't expect to be killed or injured by someone else. Speeding bikers don't only risk themselves. If they loose control then their bike becomes a threat to the safety of others. It's at best naive to see it any other way.

 

[661-Pete]

Not condoning any of the idiocy, of course, but I have to say: when I'm on two wheels (always pedal power, I've never driven a motorbike), I don't seem to have any problem with bikers at all. Maybe it's just that we're not in the same road space or whatever. It's when I'm driving the car that I've sometimes had the cr@p scared out of me by aggressive riding. Driving towards a left-hand bend (from my POV), oncoming bikers tearing towards me on the centre line leaning hard into the curve - that really scares me, fears of them decapitating themselves on the wing of my car (to say nothing of the mess it would make of yours truly).

 

[Archie_tect]

Sorry to take this a bit off thread but here's a short video of a 1975 green CB200: mine was a 1976 edition!


View: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fDOx5Bo5zU