Should I ditch the car when I get a motorbike?

lvm

missile wrote: »

Owning a m/c is more expensive than you might think. Get the bike circa March and keep the car until then.

Your boss might not be too happy! Get the bus or maybe the tram if and when Edinburgh council ever gets their act together.

Can I ask why wait til March? Because weather will have picked up and ok to ride? I heard that over winter is the most popular time to get them cheap because people aren't riding them so was thinking that might be a good plan.

I'm thinking if I can pass the test before insurance is due 23rd Dec then I could just declare SORN and only bike if I need to. I don't have any clue how easy/hard the test is and when I've riden for first time on Friday I may ditch the whole idea!!

Luckily I'll be fine with work - I work at home the majority or the week anyway

Trams in Edinburgh? Think at this rate I'll be long gone when they start running. I heard they're only doing Haymarket to somewhere now and scrapping the rest! Ridiculous!

scumboss

I used to run a car (Honda S2000) and bike. Car was for fun and bike for commuting. I sold the car back in April obviously I didn't want to do this as the car was fantastic but I'm saving for a house deposit. I have a CBF125. I would say it's the cheapest form of motoring transport you can buy. It costs me £80 pound a year to insure, £16 for tax and I service it myself. It does around 300 miles to £14 which I think is around 100mpg. That's urban driving! I get more if I take it on a run. Buying gear can be expensive but you don't have to go all out. My jacket and trousers were £60 each, boots £180, gloves £50 and my helmet cost me £250.

Winter can be a pain especially with all that snow we had last year. On the whole I've haven't missed having a car. I use my father's car once a week to do my shopping but I could always get it delivered if I couldn't.

Cash-Strapped.T32

Trebor16 wrote: »

And you think it would be perfectly safe to ride a motorcycle "to the conditions" when those conditions happen to be snow and ice?

It depends; In any situation where the cars are crashing more often, then "Not with 100% certainty" would be my answer, because on ice or snow they're what'll kill ya, not losing control of the bike - It's the classic biker trade-off, only amplified.

On solid sheet ice or real snow you won't be going more than 15/20mph & losing control & dropping the bike is no worse than a You've Been framed video, but the driver behind who hasn't got a clue how to drive on snow might well...

Get both feet down on the ground & skid along like you're riding a snowmobile, I often felt more confident than the cars on any given road, especially on hills where you saw one car near the top brake, and then like dominoes all the cars behind it got stuck because they had to stop - Hell, I was riding through ankle-deep snow in a lane of my own past all these cars who were going nowhere, who couldn't even pull over to the side of the road they were so stuck.

Of course I was freezing like !!!!!!y & my fingers were falling off, but I eventually got where I was going, every time.


Imo, it's patchy black ice that's the real nightmare, not the highly publicised blizzard conditions where cars drop like flies & you get 20-mile tailbacks on the news.

It's where people still want to be doing 60, 70+ on the motorways, when the weather isn't visibly bad enough to slow drivers down, but you know that in the shaded bits it'll be icy..


I ride an 850v-twin, a 400cc scoot & did the last few years on a light 125 so I certainly understand the differences between handling small & large bikes (and I won't even be bothering to insure the 850 over winter).
This year I don't have the 125 in running order, so I'll be on the 400 & I intend to stick to the motorways this year & just find a nice truck doing 50mph, and shadow him each day to work & back..

missile

lvm wrote: »

Can I ask why wait til March? Because weather will have picked up and ok to ride? I heard that over winter is the most popular time to get them cheap because people aren't riding them so was thinking that might be a good plan.

I'm thinking if I can pass the test before insurance is due 23rd Dec then I could just declare SORN and only bike if I need to. I don't have any clue how easy/hard the test is and when I've riden for first time on Friday I may ditch the whole idea!!

Luckily I'll be fine with work - I work at home the majority or the week anyway

Trams in Edinburgh? Think at this rate I'll be long gone when they start running. I heard they're only doing Haymarket to somewhere now and scrapping the rest! Ridiculous!

You can indeed ride all year round and I have been out on my bike on January 01st. However you do need very good level of observation to better anticipate the risk and a degree of bike control that a novice rider may not have.

You may save a few quid on the purchase price during winter, but even a low speed spill can be expensive. You will enjoy your biking much better as the weather improves.