Absolutely YES to ATGATT

[rjs987]

Last weekend I low-sided my ST on a hairpin turn in Wisconsin. I know that if I did not have any one piece of my gear on I would have some serious injuries. There was some road rash on every piece of my gear. My helmet had a small rock gash on the side and road rash on the back, my jacket right sleeve was ripped and shredded from the cuff to the collar, my right pant knee has a few tears, my boot toe and instep show rash also. Only my gloves have no significant marks since my hands stayed on the grips trying to control the bike all the way until the right mirror housing went flying off from hitting the pavement. Missing any one piece of my gear would have put me in the hospital with either head gash, shredded/broken arm, shredded/broken knee and/or foot. See all the pics and the location in my photos. Here are a few.

And this is the only mark on me. This mark is almost gone now.

 

[Dinkie Diesel]

That's what it's all about! It did what it's supposed to. Happy you are in a proper condition to report about it. I admit, I don't wear it all all the time. I just went 1.4 miles from my house to fill up and only put my helmet on. Wanna know what I was thinking the entire time. ATGATT! So what makes a person think they can get by without even for a short trip? Perhaps ignorance? I think, in my case - "yes".

 

[cdp70]

Glad to hear you weren't injured more so than what happened! I had a patient in the ER yesterday who had a full face, joe rocket jacket and gloves on during his crash. A cager pulled out in front of him and he couldn't avoid it. He had significant road rash on his legs and especially his right foot. Doc said he might need a skin graft. He said he only had a 0.7 mile ride to work. He had some docker pants on and they got shredded. Stuff can happen anytime so be careful. Speedy recovery RJS..

Ride safe...
Posted via Mobile Device

 

[SupraSabre]

Glad you are okay well...:clap2:

How did the bike do, besides the mirror housing?4:

 

[rjs987]

...
How did the bike do, besides the mirror housing?4:

The mirror cover separated from the bike and the turn signal unplugged at the plug with no damage to the plug and very minor scuffing of the wiring. The bottom of the mirror cover has rash pretty bad and much of the paint is gone. The mirror folded back on the hard plastic filler piece and shattered and the mirror mount is broken clean off at the pivot. The right engine guard cover is mangled but stayed on. The engine guard looks like no scrapes but I haven't removed the cover yet to inspect further. There is a lot of gravel scratching of the fairing all around the engine guard and around the mirror mount. Lots of sand/dirt packed into those places too. The rear of the bike must have stayed airborne until it nosed into the sandy shallow ditch and the saddle bags ended up with mostly just some sand scuffing. Most of that will buff out on the glossy part, but there is some minor rash/scraping on the outside front bottom corner of the bag. All of this is cosmetic and no apparent damage otherwise! Really came out of this with much less than it could have been. Click on my photo album icon below my avatar to see a Google satellite view of the curve and more pics of the bike. An insurance guy is coming out to look over the bike tomorrow and told me that they not only allow me to do my own repairs and parts replacement, but the gear is also covered, AND they will pay me equivalent labor as if I took it in to the dealer for the work! I like that.

 

[Down Under]

Also glad your okay. This is one topic I'm very passionate about. What speed where you going when you hit the roadway? Is the textile in your jacket and pants the standard weight polyester/nylon 500D or is it something better?

I'm a big believer in ATGATT but I'm also interested in finding out how effective the average riders gear is in a spill. I think a lot of riders get hoodwinked by manufacturers of average riding apparel into believing their products are protective when in reality they are barely adequate.

To cover up is definitely better than nothing at all but it's nice to know that when we do cover up their is a corresponding level of protection. It's good to see in Bob's case it worked!

 

[docw1]

Bob,

Glad you came out of it relatively unscathed. The gear can really help prevent serious damage. Six years ago, I had a crash. My helmet hit the pavement hard enough to knock me out momentarily and leave a bruise on my scalp. Would have been much worse had I not been wearing it. However, the gear didn't prevent a serious ankle injury or a couple broken ribs. Just goes to show, it makes you safer, not invulnerable.

Bill

 

[John OoSTerhuis]

Dang, Bob! Sorry to read about this, but glad you and the ST are in good shape.

A testament for good gear and ATGATT. Thanks for sharing the story and the pictures.

Regards, John

 

[hondaholic]

Way to go, nothing else makes sense, I was in the cage today and missed my helmet - but my wife was talking alot and that may have had something to do with it But seriously, glad you came out of this as well as you did hope insurance covers all the gear too - it saved 'em big bucks on the hospital bill!

 

[John Anthony]

Bob,

Glad to hear you weren't seriously hurt. Your pictures speak volumes. Thanks for the post.

John

 

[Lou65]

After 35K miles of ATGATT recently for some reason I have not been wearing
my flak jacket, but don't tell anybody.... it feels so good.

 

[Spotthegerbil]

I'm a big believer in ATGATT but I'm also interested in finding out how effective the average riders gear is in a spill. I think a lot of riders get hoodwinked by manufacturers of average riding apparel into believing their products are protective when in reality they are barely adequate.

45mph over the top of a car while wearing a shoei lid, textile Spada jacket and belstaff trousers and I was left with an inch square abbrasion with localised swelling on my skin* and a busted collar bone from the hard impact. The padding and fabric made the landing easier. ATGATT

*Believe me, you don't want to experience "them" being abraded!

 

[Firstpeke]

+1

Like Spotthegerbil, I survived my flying lesson, still have some injury issues but the gear did its job.

Glad you are okay, bike not too bad but that RHS engine bar wants checking for damage to the mounts.... and the upper fairing frame for straightness....

Another lesson in surviving an off because of ATGATT.

 

[Peppermint]

Bob, sorry for your get-off but very glad you're OK!

I had a very similar accident on my Vulcan coming home from Americade three Sundays ago. Low-sided and let go of the bike, which flipped and high-sided when the front tire caught traction again on the shoulder. Bike and I both slid at least 15 metres (about 45 feet?); luckily I slid on sand. There's a 11/2-mm-deep gash on the back of my helmet and the side of the chin guard is scuffed. The rest of the gear I was wearing is fine - only scuffs are on the right shoulder of the jacket. I walked away from that without a scratch on me.
I was wearing a Shark 900S full-face helmet, Scorpion mesh jacket (with liner in), Hein Gericke mesh pants (with liner and hard knee protectors in), Joe Rocket leather gloves and TCX GoreTex boots.

Hooray for ATTGAT!

Patty

 

[lectricmojo]

These type of posts make me not feel so bad when I'm sweating and getting crazy looks in my gear in the Arkansas summer... glad you are OK !!

 

[Larrypv]

An insurance guy is coming out to look over the bike tomorrow and told me that they not only allow me to do my own repairs and parts replacement, but the gear is also covered, AND they will pay me equivalent labor as if I took it in to the dealer for the work! I like that.

Bob, who is your insurance provider?

 

[ksievers]

one more tidbit... I am ATGATT with really really rare exceptions.

the wrinkle to me is, if I go anywhere w/o all the gear, my mind is now on THAT instead of being relaxed and intuitive doing the ride.. so by implication, there is no way I am 100% competent (to whatever limitations I have as a rider) when I am distracted by the nagging notion that I am not wearing the pants or the jacket or whatever. when suited up, that little nagger is gone and I am more likely to ride better.

and it's hotter than Hades where I live, in the summer. suit up anyway. mesh is better than nothing.

 

[rjs987]

The helmet is a HJC Symax 2. The jacket is a TourMaster Flex (series 1). The pants are First Gear HT Air mesh. The boots are TourMaster Response. The gloves are TourMaster GX WP Gloves (mesh).

The jacket is listed as:
- Converts easily from a 600 Denier Carbolex? shell to an Armor-Link Mesh shell and vice-versa.
- 1680 Denier Ballistic Polyester in the impact areas provides exceptional protection and abrasion resistance.

The part of the arm that took most of the impact was the 1680 D panel.

The insurance adjuster came today. The guy took LOTS of pictures of the bike. He even pulled out on the engine guard cover to take a pic of the scratch on the guard and found a very slight scratch on the end of the muffler. He wrote down all of the front fairing parts, mirror cover, mirror, engine guard, guard cover, saddle bag, muffler and told me they will pay me for the factory OEM parts pricing as well as pay me the labor to replace each of the parts based on Honda's standard cost/time tables. They are fine with me doing all the repair work myself. He told me he will come back and adjust the claim check for more if I find any other damage as I take it all off.

He also took pictures of all the gear- helmet, jacket, gloves, pants, boots. Yep, the gear is all covered also, up to $2000 worth. He will send me payment for all this gear as well based on MSRP of the gear (or equivalent gear if replaced by a newer model- eg: TM Flex is now the TM Flex series 2) minus 5% for the first year, 10% for each year after that. Most of the gear is less than 2-1/2 years old and the jacket is less than 3-1/2 years old. The gloves only have 2 very small marks on them and he included those in the claim to be replaced. They will send me a check when he gets all the pricing and labor looked up and totaled. It will end up being much more that I will need to replace the parts and gear that really needs replacing since he will base the costs on manufactures MSRP for everything and I will buy from online stores at substantial discount (of course). I will not need to send in any receipts or verify what I buy in any way. They just total it all up based on the information from the manufacturers and send me a check. I will now be able to add some more 'safety' gadgets-equipment-lighting on the bike.

I have Amco (Allied) Insurance on both my bike and my wife's scooter. I bought $500 deductible but they have a rewards program that drops the ded $100 every few years with no accident so for this time my ded is $400. After this claim my ded will be back to $500, but if I go for many years accident free it could eventually get down to zero even though I am paying for the $500 ded. Price I paid for the policy really isn't relevant since it will always be different in different locations and for different bike models/years, but I will say it is comparable to what most of you pay and was the lowest at the time I bought it originally.

 

[hojo70]

Sorry about your misfortune. Everyone goes down eventually. Glad you were prepared for it.

 

[rjs987]

+1

... that RHS engine bar wants checking for damage to the mounts.... and the upper fairing frame for straightness....

Another lesson in surviving an off because of ATGATT.

I did finally remove the mangled right engine guard cover and inspected the guard. It is deformed a little. The very end is flattened a bit (hollow bar) and the end of the bar is pushed up about 1/2 to 1 inch. The mounts look good. The insurance inspector did see this and is including the guard in the claim to be replaced. I haven't removed the upper cowling yet but don't notice that there is any deformation of the cowl in any way on the outside at least. Will see when I start taking more parts off.