13Nov18, 7014 miles, $9964.81 spent so far...
Great riding weather this week. It often helps when I am coming down the mountain in the truck to think that I get to ride home on the bike. Now if only there were no other drivers around during the afternoon rush.
I have noticed that I have been marking the frunk cover with my shoe when I mount and dismount because I am not swinging my leg over the back like I have done on all other bikes since I put a top box on this one. I have been endeavoring to mount a little different to avoid this but it looks like the damage is done. I may need to repaint the cover at some point.
Two more things that I would change are that I would prefer a larger fuel tank and the seat. While the seat can be changed it is also not necessary for the commute and the aftermarket seats are pretty expensive. Which brings up the point of this exercise, that is; to see if commuting by this bike is actually cheaper than buying a car over a 5 year period. There are items that I have bought but are not really necessary for riding back and forth to work. The top box itself is an example. I don't actually need the top box, I just wanted the extra storage and have a place to lock up my helmet. I don't need to lock up the helmet at work because I can just keep it in the truck, maybe to put on after someone cuts me off and slows down.
I have broken out the items that are not needed for the commute on the spreadsheet to give a more accurate representation of actual costs involved. Things that are just something that I want, like the larger windscreen, saddlebags or the engine guards that I am looking at would not be included. Oil, gloves or the bike itself would. The bike was ready out of the box to ride to work, I did that the first week on it. Everything I need in my truck I carry in the backpack and my lunch box fit in the frunk. So most of the expensive stuff that I have bought are not actually necessary, just stuff to make my life easier.
Motorcycle following distance.
Everyone knows that you don't tailgate a motorcycle because they stop faster that a car. Well, almost everyone. But, wouldn't the inverse be true then? Could a motorcycle ride closer to a car because the bike stops faster? The short answer is no. While it may seem like the thing to do when someone is being a jerk it is actually more dangerous for the biker.
First of all a short lesson in distance, time and reactions. If you are traveling at 75 mph you are traveling at 110 feet per second. Your reaction time is not better than 120 milliseconds, the fastest ever recorded. But that is the reaction time measured in a lab with the subject hooked up to sensors to see what the time was between the stimulus and the brain registering it. After that you need to add in the time it takes for your actual reaction like applying the brakes. Most people have a total reaction time somewhere around 750 milliseconds, about ¾ of a second. People that are really quick like drag car drivers can get down into the 450 millisecond range but those people are rare and as we age reaction time tends to slow down. So the average rider is going to travel about 82 feet before they can react to a hazard at 75 mph.
But wait! The car in front of you also has to react and apply the brakes and on a motorcycle you may be able to see over the top of it and react faster.
While this may be true there are other factors in play. You don't know what the driver in front of you is seeing and may react to something that you don't. If you are assuming that the car you are following is going to react after you then you may not react as fast because you didn't expect that vehicle to react at all. If you are following a semi the speed of electricity is also working against you since it can take a third of a second for the brake lights to come on after the driver steps on the brake meaning that the truck travels about 35 feet at 75 mph and if you are less than 2 car lengths back you can run into the truck before the brake lights even illuminate. On top of that you can't see what the driver sees. Keep in mind also that the driver in front of you may NOT react to a hazard because they don't see it as such. There are many hazards that a bike rider has to watch out for that a driver of a car or truck does not. Some MOST people are not even paying enough attention to spot hazards and just run them over. When following a vehicle too close you may not see these hazards because you may not have line of sight to them before the car in front hits them. Once the car you are following hits a hazard the car may move (up, down or sideways), the hazard could jump up in your path or you could find a bigger hazard as a part falls off the car in front. At night your line of sight could be even worse. Potholes are no problem for the car in front of you to straddle, but hit one dead center at night and it could ruin your night.
So stay back with the bike.
You are not going to save much gas by 'drafting'. Mythbusters showed that you need to be far closer to the truck to do so. You are not intimidating anyone, someone sees a bike close up in the rear view and most people just assume they are an organ donor. And if you are trying to keep other vehicles from slipping in front of you, just back off and let them. Odds are that driver would have just tailgated
you anyway because it is pretty clear that they don't understand what a hazard they are.