June2016

Club Night - 14th June Eastham Ferry Hotel Ferry Road Eastham CH62 0AU

Issue No 216

June 2016

W I R R A L A D VA N C E D M O TO R C Y C L I S T S Group Council 2016-2017 Web Site

IAM Group 5115 http://www.w-a-m.co.uk

Chairman

Tim Brown

chairman@w-a-m.co.uk

Vice Chairman

Ken Smith

vicechairman@w-a-m.co.uk

Honorary Treasurer

Tim Holme

treasurer@w-a-m.co.uk

Membership

Nina Jeffries

membership@w-a-m.co.uk

Associate Coordinator

Derek Jeffries

associatecoordinator@w-a-m.co.uk

Chief Observer

Mike Boston

chiefobserver@w-a-m.co.uk

Honorary Secretary

Rob Cooper 0151 648 4503

secretary@w-a-m.co.uk

Events Organiser

Dave Spotswood events@w-a-m.co.uk

Newsletter Editor & WebMeister

Peter Lovatt

newsletter@w-a-m.co.uk

Minute Secretary & Social Media

Steve Lord

socialmedia@w-a-m.co.uk

Group Shop

Martin Titley 0151 632 3570

groupshop@w-a-m.co.uk

Gift Aid Coordinator

Tim Holme

giftaid@w-a-m.co.uk

Ride Out Coordinator

Rob Tutchings

rideouts@w-a-m.co.uk

Other Council members Lindsay Boston Carl Mason Cliff Evans Graeme Thow

MAGAZINE TEAM:

CONTACT WAM

Editor: Peter Lovatt

Rob Cooper Coopers Upholstery The Old Bank Everton Valley Liverpool L5 0RH

Duplication: C3 Imaging, Liverpool Distribution: The Post Office!

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Welcome to the June edition of the WAM magazine.

Last month we had a techie night with (mostly) Garmin sat navs and how to use them, with no mmain speaker, just a session of workshops with a lot of techie kit there, including about 8 laptops‌..

This month, we are going to try something a bit different - again!!! We are going to try and do something about Social Media - Twitter and Facebook, plus anything else that crops up.

The bungalow is still in a state of a major refurbishment, and have only just got all the rooms finally painted as I type this up, so now awaiting some carpet, and internal doors, among the myriad of list of things to do. So this editorial is going to be brief, and for the first time it will be an online version only, with no paper copy popping thru your letterbox.

So there are articles form various sources for this months issue, (thanks to members for their contributions—keep ‘em coming!!)

Enjoy!

Pete *********************

Congratulation to the following on passing their IAM tests!!

Kate Williams John Temple Steve Molyneux Rob Burns *********************

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Motorcycling in Queensland & Bali 2016 A contrast in cultures Continued from May edition‌..

I managed to catch up with a retired British Engineer friend, who now lives near the Sunshine Coast. I had not seen him since we were together in Papua New Guinea in the early 1990's. {I still have the white, Honda XL 185 trail bike I purchase at Steamships Hardware in Port Moresby in 1991 for 2115 Kina. I shipped it back to the UK when my tour of duty there ended}.

He drove us out towards Maleny some 18 miles to the West of the Sunshine Coast. He remarked that, "the roads, in some ways, reminded him of England".

Indeed some of the rolling green fields & hills do remind one of home. It was not always thus. We went to a tiny patch of preserved rain forest, which had not been cleared for agriculture. It was like going into a different world. Within a few meters of entering the forest along a path the temperature dropped and one noticed the sounds of the forest-birds singing and the like.

There is a viewpoint near the edge of this forest and we looked out over the spectacular, volcanic, Glass House Mountains - named by Captain Cook in 1770 to remind him of the glass furnaces in his native county of Yorkshire. {The mountains are on aboriginal land and their traditional names are much older}.

In Maleny we sat on a terrace, in the balmy air and had lunch. I enjoyed the largest and best Caesar salad that I have ever had, washed down with a glass of the splendid local beer. I reflected on how pleasant it would be to ride in this area.

From time to time large trucks and utes, {pickups}, as well as bikes would drive along the wide street by the cafĂŠ, somehow adding to the easy going Aussie ambience.

All too soon it was time to leave Australia. We duly boarded an early morning train, on Saturday, February 13 2016, at Nerang Station on the Gold Coast line which took us northwards - via Beenleigh - , through Brisbane Central Station, directly to the international airport to the North East of the City.

The journey could not have been easier. We caught Virgin flight # VA0041 direct to Denpasar, in Bali. The flight left at 10:10 local time and took 6 hours.

Brisbane is 10 hours ahead of GMT and Bali 8 hours ahead.

We were met in Denpasar by our Family and taken home to Pegending - about 9 miles North of the airport, near the road to Tanah Lot. Conditions in Bali on the road could not be more different from those in Queensland. Roads are mostly narrow and very crowded. It is very remarkable that no efficient public transportation system exists in Denpasar. There are no trains in

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Bali and no public buses operating within Denpasar. Mostly folk move around by small motorcycles, which are also often used as taxis. See photograph 13.

Photograph 13.

The step thru' is the primary form of transportation in Denpasar.

The Indonesian Motorcycle Industry Association (AISI) expects to see 6.3 million sold motorcycle units in full-year 2015. {UK sales 13,128 in June 2015 & 5,789 in January 2016Motorcycle Industry Association}.

Twist and go scooters are becoming increasingly popular, as are the less familiar manufacturers. I noticed Kawasaki motorcycles, which were hardly ever seen in times past, becoming more common-especially their small traillies. {I rode on a Kawasaki 150cc last year in Sulawesi and found it most acceptable; in that environment}.

Indonesia has around four times the UK's population of about 65million souls.

Annual motorcycle sales-per person-are much greater in Indonesia. {See the note @ photograph # 13 below}.

I soon had my Honda Tiger, which I keep in Bali, back on the road. Petrol is still cheap in Indonesia, approximately one third of the price in the UK. We went out for a ride to East Bali. See photograph 14 .

Photograph 14. Preparing for a ride out to East Bali. Tim's Honda Tiger 200cc machine.

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At this time of year there is quite a lot of rain and it is hot and humid. We took the coast road out, but decided to return via a more inland route, where we had to climb up into the hills - noticeably cooler and more comfortable.

One of the attractions for visitors is the unique Balinese culture. It is rare that one makes a journey without seeing some form of ceremony - which usually stops the traffic. See photographs 15, 16 & 17.

Photograph 15.

Stopping for a funeral procession in East Bali.

Photograph 16. Getting ready to go after the procession has passed.

Hot work waiting in the sun!

Photograph 17. Another dayanother procession-another wait.

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Our house overlooks rice fields. Sadly the fields are gradually being sold off for development into villas. One of the great escapes in Bali, from the noise and chaos on the city highways, is to spend time in the rice fields. The greenery, the terraces, the swaying palm trees ease the soul. See photographs 18 & 19.

Photograph 18.

A Tiger ride in the rice fields of BaliPegending.

Be careful not to ride off the edge of the narrow path!

Snakes in the rice fields.

Photograph 19.

Working the rice fields in Bali. For how long will such scenes remain?

See the villas being constructed in the rice fields, as land is sold off.

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In the 36 years since I first visited this magical island much of real value has been lost to the tourist dollar. Enjoy the places that still remain before they too fall foul of "progress".

We did not have enough time in Bali to do much riding. All too soon it was time to leave. My heart sunk when I read on the preflight email from Emirates, inviting us to check-in on line, that the temperature in Manchester was -2℃. I certainly did not wish to fly back to the English winter.

On Wednesday, February 24 2016 we took off, in the middle of the tropical nite, @ 00:05 on Emirates flight EK399 flight to Dubai. This took around 9 hours 20 minutes. We then had a 2 hour connexion time for the flight back to Manchester, where we arrived at 11:20 in the morning of the same day. We flew on the World's largest aircraft the A380, operated - paradoxically - by the airline of one of the World's smallest countries.

Reportedly Emirates, who have the largest fleet of A380's in the World, use the A380 in connexion with its ambitions to develop Dubai as a global airport hub.

As it turned out it was sunny and cold, but not raining, on arrival in Manchester.

Could have been much worse!

Roll on the next visit to the Southern hemisphere & escape from the North European winters.

Happy, safe riding!

Cheers

Timothy J Dishman WAM-Bali Chapter & Australia Correspondent Great Meols March 6 2016

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WIRRAL ADVANCED MOTORCYCLISTS

Diary of Events www.w-a-m.co.uk *************************

June

14th Club Night - Techo Night - Social Media *************************

This is the link for the WAM Official Forum, set up for Members of Wirral Advanced Motorcyclists ONLY. It is a forum for Associates, Observers, and members of WAM to discuss Official Group Rides out, riding techniques, FLC matters, and similar topics. To join you MUST give your name and Postcode when you Subscribe.

Group name: WAMOfficialForum Group home page: http://uk.groups.yahoo.com/group/WAMOfficialForum

Subscribe: to subscribe to the group send a BLANK email to WAMOfficialForum-subscribe@yahoogroups.co.uk Unsubscribe: to UNsubscribe to the group send a BLANK email to WAMOfficialForum-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.co.uk Once your submission has been approved, you can then post emails.

WAM Dates FLC 2 is 4th June to 9th July FLC 3 is 4th September to 15th October Proposed official ride out dates - subject to confirmation Sunday 24th July, Sunday 28th August and Sunday 23rd October.

Bikesafe dates June 18th/19th, July 16th/17th, August 20th/21st, September 10th/11th, October 8th/9th

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Peter, Following through on the recent photos in the mag.

How about these I took in Vietnam and Cambodia.

Spot how many UK contraventions the guy with the (live) pigs is doing.

I was on a mission to photograph as many extreme bikes as I could, I have plenty more to keep you smiling.

Chris Ash

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How about these for a set of panniers????

believe it or not but there is a bike in there!!

The reason everybody is on the back is because the cab had about 6 people in it!

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20 mph speed limits Last October, police in Islington began handing out on-the-spot fines to drivers caught breaking the 20mph limit. The London borough was the first to impose blanket 20mph speed restrictions in 2013, following trials on its most dangerous roads. Now Transport for London (TfL) has announced that it will pilot 20mph limits on some of its busiest routes, as part of a commitment to driving down the number of people who die or are seriously injured in road accidents in the capital.

Implicit in all of this is the idea that 20mph speed limits actually work. To reduce casualties they have to reduce speed, but not everyone agrees that they do. Asked whether he thinks Islington’s 20mph speed limits have made any difference, Aidan Farrow, a member of Islington Cycling Club who cycles thousands of miles on the roads every year, says he doesn’t think so. “My experience is that they’re ignored by many drivers,” he says. “I don’t think they’re enforced and I don’t think that drivers realise they’re there a lot of the time.”

Statistics collected by the council do suggest traffic has slowed, but only marginally. Before 20mph limits were introduced, 85% of the traffic on Islington’s main roads was travelling at an average of 28mph. After the limits were introduced, this average decreased by just 1mph to 27mph. However, before and after surveys covered less than a year all told. Results from Bristol and Brighton’s pilots of 20mph limits tell a similar story, with daytime speeds in Bristol dropping by around 1mph to an average of 23mph. In Brighton, the council saw a 1mph decrease a year after 20mph speed limits were introduced in 2013, although the average speed of traffic on central roads was already 20mph.

I don’t think 20mph zones are enforced – I don’t think drivers realise they are there a lot of the time Cyclist Aidan Farrow Farrow’s feeling is that the limits would be broken less often if they were better designed to carry traffic at 20mph and he may not be far off the mark. The type of restrictions most councils are now considering are cheaper, sign-only limits - as opposed to “zones” incorporating traffic-calming features. After reviewing the evidence, the authors of a 2014 report by Steer Davies Gleave for the London Borough of Merton found better evidence for zones reducing speed and collisions than for sign-only limits. However, a 2014 review published in the Journal of Pub12

lic Health found “convincing evidence” from 10 studies for both 20mph zones and limits in reducing speeds and accidents.

Collecting the evidence is problematic in the first place, as Ian Roberts, an injuries expert at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, points out. “In the perfect world, what we might do is take the whole of Britain and randomly allocate parts to have 20mph zones, or not, and that would be the best possible evidence,” he says. “You can do that for treatments in the NHS – you can randomise one patient to receive treatment or not – but it’s very difficult to randomise areas of Britain to different transport policies. So for most policy decisions you have to settle for less than the best.”

As far as Roberts is concerned, there is already good enough evidence – for policy purposes anyway – to show that 20mph zones will reduce serious injuries if they reduce car speeds. But what’s most convincing, he says, is the basic physics. A car hitting a pedestrian at 20mph will cause less damage than at 30mph or 40mph because it carries less energy into the collision. There are even models that predict more precisely the risk of death associated with different speeds. However, the predictions will only pan out if everyone actually drives at the lower speed and Roberts has doubts about the effectiveness of 20mph limits without traffic-calming measures.

So are councils still considering zones? According to Brighton and Hove Council, some phase one areas of its 20mph programme covered pre-existing 20mph zones and it will seek to introduce further measures on streets where speeds might not improve. That said, results from the council’s 20mph programme already look promising: casualties are down 12% from an average of 372 in 2010-2013 to 327 in 2013-2014 and, so far, no one has been killed in a collision on the affected roads. On the other hand, it’s hard to come to solid conclusions based on data from a single year, especially compared to years in which there was on average only one road death.

To add to the evidence on 20mph limits, the Department for Transport has now commissioned a three-year, £715,000 study on their effectiveness, which will bring together data from different regions as well as new research carried out on the roads. Results are due in 2017.

Meanwhile, in Bristol, a pilot 20mph programme has already been extended citywide in a £2.3m sign-only scheme. But driving instructor Julie Roberts worries that blanket 20mph limits are contributing to dangerous driving on certain roads.

“We’re being overtaken or we’re experiencing aggressive behaviour from other road users,” she says. “We need to find ways to change driver attitudes so that they understand that 20mph is seen as the appropriate speed in urban areas.” She thinks change will be slow without any street furniture to support the signs.

It’s not just about improving safety and reducing casualties, though. Lucy Saunders, who works as a public health specialist for TfL, says it should be just as 13

much about encouraging people out of their cars to lead more active lifestyles by walking and cycling.

However, she admits it’s not easy to prove that 20mph schemes have these wider health benefits. “I think if you did some data collection now and then went back in 10 years to those same streets, you might be able to see some differences, but over that 10-year period you’re probably going to have changing norms across the whole of society – changes in vehicles, changes in investment in cycling infrastructure – so it will be hard to say ‘Oh, you know, it’s 20mph signs that made the real difference.’”

A subscriber to the health and fitness benefits of active transport, Farrow says cycling in Islington is “a no-brainer”, despite the potential risks. “I’m nowhere near the point where I wouldn’t do it because I thought it was dangerous,” he says, despite having been involved in a few minor incidents himself. Incidentally, a study of 53 cycling fatalities that occurred in London between 2007-2011 found that around half were crashes involving HGVs where speed was not a major factor. However, speed seems more likely to have been a contributing factor when cars were involved.

Elsewhere in Europe, Paris and Milan have announced plans to introduce 30kph (19mph) speed restrictions. Spain has gone further - recent changes to the country’s road traffic laws mean that 30kph limits will soon apply in most urban areas.

The plans are supported by the European Transport Safety Council, which advises the European commission and has called for lower speed limits across all residential areas. In the US, New York City has reduced its default speed limit from 30mph to 25mph and other US states look to be following suit.

As for whether 20mph limits work, it depends how you define “work”. There’s no question that if it was a straightforward choice between being hit at 30mph, and being hit at 20mph, you’d plump for 20mph every time. But if you get hit on a road with a 20mph limit, where’s the guarantee that it will be at 20mph? Reducing casualties depends on drivers reducing their speed and that appears to be happening – ironically – quite slowly.

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A runny nose, headache and constant sneezing – these are just a few of the symptoms hay fever sufferers deal with during the summer. These symptoms can affect motorists in a number of ways. Here’s some advice from IAM RoadSmart’s head of driving and riding standards, Richard Gladman, about what you can do to better cope with it before taking to the road.

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Try to minimise the effects by ensuring your car is clean and dust free and that you operate the air conditioning or ventilation to your advantage, making use of air recirculation where possible.

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For anyone who hasn’t been diagnosed with hay fever and is feeling under the weather, avoid driving or riding and arrange to see your GP as soon as possible. What you might think is just a slight cold can become a major distraction – so get it checked before it gets worse.

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While over-the-counter medicines will help with a runny nose and sneezing symptoms, a lot of these tend to contain codeine, which can blur vision and make you feel drowsy – check with your GP what the best course of action is.

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Your GP may advise you to take anti-histamines to control the symptoms, but make sure you take the non-drowsy ones. If you’re unsure, read the leaflet or speak to your pharmacy for more advice.

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If you need to get somewhere but don’t feel well enough to drive or ride then see if someone you know can take you and drop you back. Whatever you do don’t take yourself - you may just end up sneezing and travelling up to 50ft with your eyes closed and losing control of your vehicle!

Richard said: “If you are stopped by the police after taking a hayfever remedy and driving whilst impaired you could find yourself falling foul of drug driving regulations.

See attached link - https://www.gov.uk/drug-driving-law

“Be sure to check the medication thoroughly and see if it is suitable. But most importantly, concentrate on your route to recovery so you can get back onto the road sooner rather than later.”

Even more fun on a motorbike - as I suffer from Hay fever too. Pete 15

DISCLAIMER:-

The articles published herein do not necessarily represent the views of the Institute of Advanced Motorists Ltd, or the Wirral Group of Advanced Motorcyclists. They are the opinions of individual contributors and are published with the view that free expression promotes discussion and interests. So you have been warned.

Interested in doing the Advanced Car Test? Wirral Advanced Motorists are the people to see. Go to www.wirraliam.co.uk