Dr Ferrari's Camper Van (off-topic discussion)

Captain Havoc

In further good news, I'll be going part-time in my current job as I'm going to be working part-time in the bicycle industry (I'm not going to say exactly what). I spent three hours regurgitating the rubbish I read on here to a business owner, which seemed to be enough to bore him into submission and offering me a job. So, my fellow boardsies, I thank you once again for shaping my life a little bit more.

*Just seen this is my 7,000 post \o/

bcmf

Wishbone Ash wrote: »

I was distracted by that chap who cycles around with the blue "Up the Dubs" barrel and flags on a trailer.

Bernard Cruise I believe is his name.

Jawgap wrote: »

On an unrelated note - nice to see the R132 getting a much needed re-surfacing - that was a very pleasant surprise on the spin in this morning! I saw them putting the cones out last week and thought they'd be at it for ages, but they obviously got their finger out over the weekend.

If you didnt come home that way you will be in for a bigger surprise in the morn when you go sliding on the chipping they put down .Gonna be a tricky stretch of road for a few weeks

Qualitymark

Some interesting figures from the new Vulnerable Road Users (that's us, folks!) campaign:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2012/1001/breaking42.html

includes:

* Some 76 per cent of those killed or seriously injured were defined as ‘vulnerable road users’ such as pedestrians, pedal cyclists and motorcyclists

* Almost 80 per cent of incidents occurred in the 50km/h speed limit zones

* High risk periods were identified as at between 4pm and 6pm Monday to Friday for vulnerable road users

* The early hours of the morning at weekends were identified as the times of high risk of single vehicle collisions often involving speed and alcohol

* The Garda districts where the highest levels of fatal and serious injury crashes were Clondalkin, Tallaght, Coolock, Blanchardstown, Ballymun, Store Street, Lucan, Dun Laoghaire and Raheny.

Beasty

Qualitymark wrote: »

Some interesting figures from the new Vulnerable Road Users (that's us, folks!) campaign:

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2012/1001/breaking42.html
....

Separate thread already running here on this

Jawgap

Captain Havoc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCDnR6Px-co

Qualitymark

Beasty wrote: »

Separate thread already running here on this

Ooops; looked, didn't see. Thanks.

RobFowl

Well I never !

http://twitchy.com/2012/09/30/cher-rants-about-pacific-coast-highway-bicyclists/?utm_source=autotweet&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=twitter

buffalo

Kintarō Hattori

Wishbone Ash wrote: »

Won't your LBS replace a gear cable on the spot or within a couple of hours or so. Why would you have to wait a week?

I go early in the morning and come home late in the evening, so it'll be Saturday before I drop it into them. The missus can't be bothered too- she'd rather see me walk to the station for a week!

Wishbone Ash

Kintarō Hattori wrote: »

I go early in the morning and come home late in the evening, so it'll be Saturday before I drop it into them. The missus can't be bothered too- she'd rather see me walk to the station for a week!

Aah - I thought you had dropped it into your LBS and they said to come back in a week!

AstraMonti

I see some girls walking on the street and I am not sure if that's makeup on their face or they just lost in paintball.

ROK ON

I stupidly decided to drive to Dublin last night instead of getting the train this morning.

Car died 120km from Dublin. Stuck in the hard shoulder for two hours weighting for breakdown recovery.

Gardai told me do not leave the car and to turn on my hazard lights.
I did this.

Despite this I learned that truck drivers are pr1cks. Most made no attempt to move out a few feet and many passed at speed inches from my stationary car.

I also lost count of the amount that flashed me or aggressively beeped their horn.

Clearly a broken down vehicle in the hard shoulder inconvenienced gem sufficiently that I needed to be taught a lesson.

When on a bike we often view other road users as being agin us so to speak.
Last night taught me that a reasonable large amount of other road users are simply hostile.

Lumen

ROK ON wrote: »

Gardai told me do not leave the car

WTF? That's the most dangerous place to be!

Perhaps they thought you would be at risk of sexual assault.

doozerie

@ROK ON, As Lumen says, being in the car is considered extremely dangerous and any "official" (from the RSA, AA, etc.) advice I've ever seen given for people broken down on a hard shoulder is to get out of the car and stay further in off the hard shoulder itself. That advice is usually given for motorways but it should equally apply on a national road too. The advice is usually accompanied by accounts of broken down cars having been hit, and people all too often having been badly hurt or killed, by another vehicle travelling in the hard shoulder. One account I read recently was of an AA recovery truck driver whose truck, well lit as it was, was ploughed into by a truck in the hard shoulder while recovering a broken down car - I don't recall the exact details but I think the broken down car was behind his truck and it was shoved/piled into his truck. The AA guy was badly hurt, the people (woman and child, I think) they claimed only avoided serious injury because AA guy had insisted they sit in his truck cab rather than in their car while he set about hitching the car to the truck. You'd think that people wouldn't drive in the hard shoulder, and particularly not at speed, but they do.

Any Garda that advised you to stay in your car should be invited to join you, but they also deserve a complimentary punch in the face just for being so feckin' stupid in the first place.

le petit braquet

ROK ON wrote: »

Gardai told me do not leave the car and to turn on my hazard lights.
I did this.

AA advice is to leave the car http://www.theaa.com/motoring_advice/breakdown_advice/general.html

Wishbone Ash

ROK ON wrote: »

Gardai told me do not leave the car and to turn on my hazard lights

Perhaps they may have meant that they didn't want you to abandon the vehicle rather that to actually remain in it.

ROK ON

Thanks.
The Garda was specific. Turn on your hazard lights & remain in the car.

Intact, the RAC helpline (my breakdown insurer) states to stay in the vehicle and to only exit the vehicle if the vehicle cannot be removed from the road.
In this case they say to exit the vehicle at at door furthest from traffic (I guess usually the passenger side).

Everyone said stay seated and don't worry. However having articulated lorries hurtle past every few minutes and then beep their horns is unnerving to say the least.
2 hours of fun fun fun while I waited and waited.

@ Lumen - the cows/bulls in the field next to me were looking at me in a strange fashion. The question of assault was not a remote one!

Hungrycol

Why did you call the Gardai?

doozerie

ROK ON wrote:

The Garda was specific. Turn on your hazard lights & remain in the car.

Intact, the RAC helpline (my breakdown insurer) states to stay in the vehicle and to only exit the vehicle if the vehicle cannot be removed from the road.

That's bizarre, it puts them at odds with some of the usual respected sources of advice on motoring and safety. In addition to the AA link already posted, here are a couple of quotes from Directgov, the UK government's site:

Leave your vehicle
Leave your vehicle immediately via the left-hand door. Make sure your passengers do the same. You should leave any animals in the vehicle, or keep them under proper control on the verge.

Wait for help to arrive
Stay well away from the carriageway and hard shoulder as you wait for help to arrive. Don't get back into the vehicle and don't try to repair your car yourself, even if you think it's a simple job.

The official Irish Rules of the Road page is an odd one though, it has the following:

Always get out of your vehicle from the passenger side. Do not attempt to walk on the motorway.
Get help quickly and do not leave your vehicle unattended for longer than necessary. Wait for help on the embankment side of the motorway.

That's strangely ambiguous, in that it does not actually tell you to get out of the car, just that you should do so via the passenger side if you do so at all. The last sentence above about waiting on the embankment side is unclear too - wait on the embankment side of the *motorway*? Huh? What if there is no embankment on your side, do you run across to the other side of the motorway? Should you bring your car with you? Or should it simply say that you should wait on the embankment side of *your car*? Based on your experience, I wouldn't be relying on a Garda's interpretation of it, that's for sure!

Lumen

More bikes sold than cars in Italy for first time since WW2
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9581180/More-bikes-sold-than-cars-in-Italy-for-first-time-since-WW2.html

Lumen

doozerie wrote: »

That's strangely ambiguous, in that it does not actually tell you to get out of the car, just that you should do so via the passenger side if you do so at all. The last sentence above about waiting on the embankment side is unclear too - wait on the embankment side of the *motorway*? Huh? What if there is no embankment on your side, do you run across to the other side of the motorway? Should you bring your car with you? Or should it simply say that you should wait on the embankment side of *your car*? Based on your experience, I wouldn't be relying on a Garda's interpretation of it, that's for sure!

Note also that if your car is left hand drive you must execute a three-point turn before exiting via the passenger door.

GlennaMaddy

Kintarō Hattori wrote: »

Wishbone Ash wrote: »

Won't your LBS replace a gear cable on the spot or within a couple of hours or so. Why would you have to wait a week?

I go early in the morning and come home late in the evening, so it'll be Saturday before I drop it into them. The missus can't be bothered too- she'd rather see me walk to the station for a week!

Lbs in skerries does pick up and frop off

Wishbone Ash

Lumen wrote: »

Note also that if your car is left hand drive you must execute a three-point turn before exiting via the passenger door.

That reminds me of a stunt I witnessed by a cool dude in a LHD Ferrari at the entrance of one of the long tern car-parks in Dublin Airport.

Getting out and running around to pull the ticket was not for him. He spun the car around on the spot, reversed up to the machine, pulled a ticket, reversed in, and spun around again and headed on his way.

rainbow kirby

GlennaMaddy wrote: »

Lbs in skerries does pick up and frop off

Wish there was one in the city centre that did that, mechanical on the way home this evening and my LBS closes at 6pm :mad: Gonna be Thursday night at the very earliest before I can do anything with it, which is a pain in the rear end to say the least.

doozerie

Lumen wrote: »

Note also that if your car is left hand drive you must execute a three-point turn before exiting via the passenger door.

Bah, foreigners and their strange and fearful driving ways. The RSA have no time for them, they're as bad as cyclists, as per the official RSA mottos of "Welcome to Ireland. Now please feck off!" and "Oh you're riding a bike are you? Well be careful now. And please feck off!"

Jawgap

Seen in Dublin today*



*May actually have been in Dublin

kumate_champ07

smacl wrote: »

Lost a couple of sets of these myself over the year, I had it down to my bad taping technique. Plenty of options on spares on bike24 though I reckon Brooks are just flogging on old sherry bottle stoppers;



Maybe have a few bottles of bubbly over the week and you're sorted

they recently started using the leather scraps from saddle production to make up bar grips, the price is a joke tho, something like 50 a pair

kumate_champ07

Jawgap wrote: »

Seen in Dublin today*



*May actually have been in Dublin

London 5 years ago

http://artofconversation.typepad.com/art_of_conversation/2007/05/index.html

Was watching a BB5 setup video on youtube. I most certainly wasn't expecting the ending.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5zjUaTAQmY&t=3m12s