Almost t-boned a left turner

Beautiful day yesterday, balmy 60F and off we go in a ride.


Finished the day with near 170miles logged in the odometer, not too shabby all things considered (left home 12PM and was back 5PM, refueling only took about 3.9 gallons, average of 43mpg). Mind you that included a stop for lunch in a nice Italian restaurant in Ben Lamond (CA) where I had a nice steak.


I have a weekend route that starts in Sunnyvale, heading north through CA-280 and next to CA-92 turning to the Skyline Blvd (CA-35), CA-09, Santa Cruz and up north through the Pacific Route (CA-01), heading next through La Honda and back to the CA-280.


It has a little bit of high speed highway, lots of curvy roads in the mountains crossing redwoods forest and the return following the Coastal line.


Up in the Woodside (CA) mountains in the Skyline blvd was a bit chilly (lowest temperature about 48F) but overall a pretty nice ride.


Only unexpected event happened in Santa Cruz, while leaving the town to follow the Pacific Route (CA-01) going North. A small pickup truck decided to leave a gas station and cross both lanes, heading to a parking lot.


The old fart crossed my way but I managed to slow down to avoid a collision, I guess the fact that I was doing 30miles/h and the CBS (Combined Breaking System) in my ST1300 saved the day.


Thought about going after him and giving him a piece of my mind but realized that I still had 70 miles to go and just about 1h of sunlight.


Have this in video, will upload it soon to youtube.


I'm considering the idea of installing some auxiliary lights in the ST1300, like I have in the other bikes (fog lights in the I/S and LED Rigid Industries spotlights in the vstrom).


Cheers


Savago

Glad you were managed to escape.
I had a similar close call yesterday.
3/4 ton pickup at a T-intersection did the start-stop-start dance before accelerating into the main road.
Would have been fine had he not been towing a 30 ft car hauler.

Thanks to STella's ABS because it kicked on for a second.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Great you had a nice ride with the one exception-best part you back at home in one piece

Way to be alert.....we need as may lerts as we can keep....

Silly four wheeler..

T

glad you avoided an accident and also glad you didn't go confront the guy even if he was in the wrong

Glad you were able to avoid the BDC! :yes:

As for auxiliary lights, I have LED Headlights and 2 10W LEDs on my forks. But I find when my headlight modulator is going (I use them when I'm not on a freeway), I find that most will do a double take and come to a screeching halt! This happens for left turners and right turners, those coming from the right and pulling out in front of me.

Is it 100%, no, so I have the Stebel (type) horn to wake them up out of their stupor!

The 30s video (the left turner pops up at 18s):
https://youtu.be/VqLWg-idJKE

Sorry about the video being shaky, the gopro mount is a bit loose as one side of the bracket broke.

Generally I ride with 2 cameras (1 in the trunk and 1 in the front fairing), but the front facing camera battery was dead at the time of the event.

Glad you squeezed through. Curious... why do you have your camera pointed at your back?

As I've explained, I generally use 2 cameras.

In a general case, I point the one in the trunk facing the rear to cover the case of being rear ended (and the one in the front facing incoming traffic).

When I noticed that the front camera battery was dead (at the lunch stop), I switched the trunk camera to point to the front.


In a second thought, I should have just switched the cameras.

Understood, thanks.

Savago said:

As I've explained, I generally use 2 cameras.

In a general case, I point the one in the trunk facing the rear to cover the case of being rear ended (and the one in the front facing incoming traffic).

When I noticed that the front camera battery was dead (at the lunch stop), I switched the trunk camera to point to the front.


In a second thought, I should have just switched the cameras.

Click to expand...

As an outsider I have to ask: is the threat of collision where you live so high that carrying cameras standard fare?

DavidR8 said:

As an outsider I have to ask: is the threat of collision where you live so high that carrying cameras standard fare?

Click to expand...

I don't know about the OP but after reading the many accounts here of actual rear end collisions it seems like prudent insurance just like motorcycle insurance. And with the relatively low and largely one-time cost of decent quality cameras and the fun of having video on any day it seems like a fair investment.

Not that it's the first thing or even something that every rider should do (like drivers in Russia) it could have multiple benefits. The positioning wiring and otherwise setting a couple up is the biggest hurdle to my personal inertia.

I never was rear-ended in California, but I was once in Brazil and since then I became a bit paranoid about the subject.

It is cheap insurance, it is possible to buy an 'ok' action camera today for 60-70 bucks and install it in the trunk.

The higher quality gopro I generally reserve for the front.