Hey! Your kickstand is down! Hey....!....hey...!

All of the major manufacturers have been putting kill switches on the kick stands of their road bikes since the early 80's. If you try to put the bike in gear with the sidestand down it kills the engine.

Unless of course if you disconnect it because you use the bike for club racing. Don't know anyone who would do that though...

I caught a buddie of mine doing that once. I noticed he rear tire was wearing all fucked up before he did.

......This was a ridgid panhead bobber I may add, suicide shifter and all.....he must have been riding it like that for a month

June 2012, I had used both of my 1-gallon gas cans to top up my tank somewhere before reaching Fort Nelson BC. Stopped for gas at Ft Nelson, refilled the gas cans as well before heading off to camp at Liard River Hot Springs. The next morning, I was a little rushed in getting loaded up; filled up the VStrom at the gas station next to the campground... somewhere about 65 kms down the road I noticed that the gas cans were not visible in my mirrors - someone else in the campground got 2 new gas cans along with 2 gallons of gas - 130 kms round trip wasn't worth retrieving the full gas cans even with that expensive gas up north.

I have managed to ride for a couple of blocks before realizing that I hadn't done up my helmet when I figured out what the banging noise was in my helmet.

I had a scarf riding in some soft leather saddle bags on my Suzuki Marauder about 1 year after I started riding. The scarf had always been there since I started unless it was cold and I was wearing it.

So I'm riding and suddenly my bike feels weird and is kind of jumping around like what I imagine a rear flat feels like, but I was doing 85.

SO I pulled over and checked it and the scarf had wrapped around the front sprocket and threads had worked into the rear axle. It took me 45 minutes with a leatherman tool on the side of the highway to clean it all out of the bike.

Lucky you weren't killed. A woman came close to ending her life in central Australia because of her scarf:

Woman nearly killed in freak hot air ballooning accident in Alice Springs

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Her scarf was drawn into the blower forcing heated air into the balloon canopy.

Bonehead lesson of the day: Never ride your open countershaft sprocket bike wearing boots with laces. You'll never forget the feeling when the sprocket grabs the lace loop and drags your foot into the spinning teeth of carnage...:eek1

Luckily the lace shredded and the boot deflected the sprocket teeth until I could yank my foot away from it. Lesson learned...

I left my ipad on the hood of my car. I didn't notice it until I was at speed and some air got under it and flipped it into my windshield and into the road. I quickly pulled over and ran back to it but a jeep ran over it. The screen was damaged and it was a bit bent but it still worked.

I know it's irrelevant but what. Kind of bike is our hero biker riding...coffee cup guy?

Not all of em!

Fortunately I was in a hurry, and ESU parking was a pain in the ass, so I seldom took my hot air balloon for commuting purposes.

I went for a run and took off my Oakley Radar sunglasses and put them on my roof to stretch and I had already strapped on my boat for a whitewater river trip with my girlfriend.

I drove 30 minutes to her house on some windy roads and when I stopped at a construction zone 5 minutes from her house a little something in the back of my mind told me I had done something wrong.

I mentally reviewed what I'd done earlier and suddenly realized what was wrong. I jumped out of my car expecting the worst and they were wedged under the cross bar, perfectly fine.

Then 3 weeks ago I was fly fishing and went to scratch my head and heard a 'kerplunnk' as my Oakley Pitbulls fell into the moving water a bit after dark. I tried but they're probably in the ocean by now.

Back in the seventies I had my first BMW, a /5, and they still had kickstarters then. As anyone familiar with airhead kickstarters knows; they pivot outwards - not to the rear.

The seventies was also an era that saw flair trousers.



So, here was I in town on a saturday night performing a U-turn on a sloping street and I suddenly needed to perform a dab momentarily with my left foot . . . . when . . . the wide trouser cuff catches over the pad of the kickstarter.

Well, I lowered my left leg as far (and as wide out) as the swing of the lever allowed which was yet short of foot to road contact.

After reaching that limit, and with no way to arrest my tilt leftwards, I fell over fully -- BMW R50/5 and rider.

This is a great one -- extremely embarrassing!

I'm about 100 miles from home on my '99 Connie. Weather is getting warmer, so I decide to switch to my mesh jacket that's stowed in my topbox. I pull over to the side of the road and don't even shut off the engine, because this is going to be a quick change -- 30 seconds tops. I put the side stand down, and dismount on the left side of the bike. I'm standing right beside the bike retrieving the topbox key from my coat pocket... and suddenly, the bike is falling toward me. I grab the handlebars, but I'm no match for the hold that gravity has on the -- shall we say "portly" -- Concours! In my haste, I didn't accurately size up the forward incline on which I'd stopped!

I ease the bike down to the ground as best I can... but as I do, the foot peg lands squarely in the center of the toe section of my boot, trapping my foot under 600 pounds of Kawasaki's finest engineering (sorry KLR owners!). With one foot trapped under the bike, I can't get any leverage to lift it. So there I am on the side of the road with my foot stuck like it's in a bear trap. (and BTW, my toes are being crushed... but I didn't notice the pain until a little later.

Luckily, a couple of landscapers were working across the road. They came to my rescue, got the bike off my foot, and upright. They could have had a lot of fun busting my balls, but they didn't. I thanked them profusely, then scooted on out of there with my tail between my legs.

Wow! I can't compete with that one but I can come close.

One Saturday I was supposed to work, so before hand I stopped by the mall to see my wife where she works. I came back out and couldn't get the bike started. I checked everything, the side stand safety switch, the clutch safety switch and finally I pulled the seat to check the battery.

Since I parked next to the wife's car, I pulled out the jumper cables and hooked them up for a charge. Waited about a few minutes and tried to start and got nothing. Waited longer and still got nothing. I called work and told them I'm not going to make it and that I have to go home to get the trailer to tow my bike. Finally I looked up and noticed the kill switch was on. I never use it so I forgot about it. Don't know how it got switched on.

On Monday everyone was asking me what happened and of course I told them the embarrassing truth - electrical problem.

And the pant leg (flare or not) is more prone to catching in the Carb Tickler button on bikes of the R50/60/5 vintage, hanging the foot up off the ground.

The biggest cause of me dumping the bike (every 3-4 years) is parking with the sidestand, in Neutral, on a slight forward incline. And invariably in front of a crowd. Doh!!

--Bill

are you telling us you left the red kill switch on and the battery died?

The other half & I are riding on Hwy 50 outta Ely, Nv. She's on a Harley with forward mounted highway pegs that put her boots about two feet above the pavement. I'm ahead riding ahead of her approx. 75 feet and being the outlaw that I am, I wasn't wearing my helmet out in the middle of no where, just a baseball hat. Sure enuff, the hat flys off at 70 to 80mph and I just wave to her to keep going, I've got another. We keep riding and she later says that she saw the hat fly off and go under her bike. A little further down the road she pulls up next to me and hands me my hat back:eek1:eek1. Turns out, the hat flew back and caught on the toe of her left boot up in the highway pegs.

I think that he meant that the "kill" part of the switch was "On" so the "juice" was "Off", hence why the bike didn't want to start.


Very embarassing especially after looking at the stand and clutch safety switches...isn't it?

Wife did a nice save on the hat, didn't do as good with the marriage thing... She's been the EX for a while now!!!

Nope, the battery was fine. I just forgot to check the kill switch before assuming it was the battery.

Yes it was.