When the going gets tough ....

Our Indian Summer is over and the leaves are falling big time, even though the air temperatures became mild again temporarily last weeekend.  If you haven’t already done it this is a good time to decide whether to lay the Wing up for the winter or prepare properly for riding in winter conditions.

The risk of snow and ice is still low, unless you live or ride on very high ground, and there are still riding events and activities on the calendar to be enjoyed as well as the occasional day when the weather presnets a glorious riding opportunity.  Last Saturday here in Lancashire was such a day and I’m now kicking myself that I didn’t grab the opportunity.  The Manchester Salvation Army Toy Run is also coming up (November 19th) and there are other worthwhile (and worthy) events still to come too.

If you decide to lay the bike up for the winter, as I might have to do in order to face another hip operation, then it’s important to give it a little care and attention as you do so.   Dave Partridge, proprietor of AwingAway and Tecnical Editor for the Federation Website  wrote a very helpful article on Laying up your GoldWing last year which you might want to read again.

And if you are going to lay the bike up don’t forget that you can surrender your tax disc and get a refund from DVLA; I discovered after an interesting series of encounters with our local DVLA Office that timing your arrival at about ten minutes before they close, so 4.50pm, even on their bsuier days, ensures a short or no queue at all or anyway some pretty snappy service because they all want to go home.  If you haven’t read it, my article about the DVLA has its entertaining moments.

But let’s not get too defeatist that the biking season is over just yet.  Let’s think about continuing to ride as winter approaches – and therefore about the implications for our riding skills and style, the extra things we need to look out for and deal with as hazards on autumn roads. continues………

Click on the image for an enlarged view

The Royal British Legion Riders Branch are organising an A666 Ride again this year starting from the Petre Arms at Langho and ending at Manchester Cathedral (where there will be organised bike parking) where a special (short) service will be conducted by a genuine bishop.

Arrive by 9am, depart 9.45am.

Nice Badge

Following the Service there will be a move towards the Boothtown Royal British Legion Branch for what’s described as an “all night party” beginning at 6pm.

All riders are welcome and you will be invited (possibly expected) to donate £5 to the Poppy Appeal in return for which you will be given a “666″ Badge.

I did this Ride last year and it’s good spectator value, even though the A666 gets a bit urban and boring as you get close to Manchester.  I particularly enjoyed watching ex-military bikers trying to turn the years back by standing up straight and holding their stomachs in as they stood or strutted around.

A worthy cause, good riding experience trying to ride among a vast array of different sorts of two wheeled vehicles and some good biker company – and you get to park in Central Manchester free and have a stroll around even if you don’t fancy the Service or the “All Night Party” afterwards.

Contact for futher information is Jimmy Torrance:

0161 434 5620 or 07946 700702

In what must be a record time, the Federation of UK GoldWing Clubs has provided a group of Wingers in the Midlands with a fully functional Club Website well before their new Club has even been launched.  It comes with a package of advice and training to help make a solid, perhaps even a flying start with their venture – and the same service is available, free of charge, to any group of UK Wingers who want to do something similar.

As you can see from the screen capture which heads this article the new GoldWings North Midlands website has an eye-catching design.  On closer inspection, if you click on the link to pay a visit, you will see that it comes pre-filled with a starter set of photos and even one or two articles, including one about their local riding attractions.  The aim is to equip Steve Corbishley and his colleagues with the wherewithal to capture interest in their planned Club ahead of its inaugural meeting in February, so that Wingers who might want to join can make contact and get involved from the beginning.

The Federation can do this, and could do it again tomorrow for another group of Wingers on request, because they have gathered both the skills and the experience to do this sort of continues………

If you haven’t already read it, Part 1 Strengths and Opportunities should be read first.

Membership numbers of the national Club have been in decline for over ten years and the rate of decline has been steepening, which indicates clearly that the appeal of national Club is diminishing and that the Club, or perhaps those who run it, are getting at least some things seriously wrong. Taking a proper look at the Club’s Weaknesses, i.e. its internal shortcomings and challenges, is as important as assessing the external Threats.

The more ruthlessly honest you can be with yourself about the downside, the more realistic your plan can be and so the better will be its prospects of successful implementation.

Writing this part of the analysis presents difficulties for me as an outsider to GWOCGB who has often been accused of “taking a pop” at the Club, so I hope you’ll forgive me for erring on the side of tact; it’s not my intention to rub anyone’s nose in the Club’s difficulties, merely to flag up the way forward. You may therefore have to read between the lines of what follows and apply your own knowledge to the list if you want to get to the hard truth of it.

Although it’s important to be aware of them, you don’t automatically have to do something to correct all the Weaknesses and challenge all the Threats. For example some aspects of the Club’s democratic systems may be a handicap in business terms and therefore a weakness for business planning purposes, but such an important part of the Club’s traditions or democratic nature that it might be unthinkable to change them, even if they are a handicap to competitiveness. A Club isn’t only about being competitive and financially successful – although of course it does have to be financially viable. continues………

Dave Partridge

Dave Partridge, who offers mobile servicing for GoldWings , under the trading name of AwingAway, based on Staffordshire, has just come up with some very tempting prices for servicing – including the opportunity to get your MOT done free of charge providing it’s done at the same time.  You get a free 10-point safety check on the bike even if an MOT is not required.

That strikes me as a staggeringly good offer and reason to get your MOT done while Dave’s at it, even if it’s not yet due, so that you can get yourself synchronised for next year.  Giving your bike an annual service and safety check is no bad thing regardless of the mileage you have done and doing it every year at the same time makes it easier to remember to do it.  Dave might even send you a  reminder next year!

Obviously this doesn’t include the cost of any additional work which might be needed, but it’s a fixed price for the service and the fixed prices are very keen at that – substantially lower than you would pay probably elsewhere.

Dave is a qualified motorcycle technician and a GoldWing owner himself.  He’s also th technical Editor of the Federation of UK GoldWing Clubs and you can pick his brains, free of charge, about any GoldWing technical problem you might have by using the Technical Enquiry Service on the Federation’s Website.

I’ve heard nothing but glowing reports of Dave’s work and can therefore thoroughly recommend him.  He will travel reasonable distances to do servicing work, which could also be attractive to you.  Dave is offering an innovative service to Wingers which is proving very popular.

You can contact Dave on 07795 095043 or by email to dave©awingaway•co•uk

You can also view a leaflet about Dave’s services which details his prices by clicking here.

Build on your Strengths

SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) is a business planning tool, a way of taking stock of where a business (or a not-for-profit organisation such as a club) stands and which way it should therefore try to go in order to achieve its goals.

It can also be used to conduct a feasibility study, for example to assess a development idea or to help decide whether there is a viable way forward towards the organisation’s goal or not.

There are doubtless more expert ways of doing a SWOT analysis than I have used but you don’t have to be a business guru (and I certainly wouldn’t pretend to be one) to make a useful list of planning factors under these four simple headings.    The first step is to define your organisation’s mission or aim, in the context of which the relevant strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats can be identified.

A SWOT analysis doesn’t by any means solve all the problems but it has valuable potential to point the way forwards.  Well run businesses (and voluntary organisations) do this sort of thing regularly and probably frequently, at least once per year.  On the continues………

There has been a lot of coverage in the media of new proposals by the EU which are feared to be very threatenning to motorcyclists because they prohibit modifications to the bike, or some parts of it – a freedom which many bikers think is fundamental and also to frustrate owner-maintenance.  Demonstrations have been organised, including slow rides on motorways, to show disapproval of them.  It isn’t like that and although there is threat in some of the ideas, some of the proposals are actually favourable to bikers.

The British Motorcyclists Federation has done some serious homework and posted a set of notes on Facebook about these EU Proposals in order to demystify them. The proposals do include a plan to prohibit modifications to the engine and drive train of motorcycles but they will not prohibit changing components (i.e. doing any work yourself on your engine or drive train) so the idea that the proposals will stop bikers doing thier own maintenance doesn’t stack up.  Our Goverment is against this proposal anyway and BMF will continue to lobby and campaign against it so it might never happen.

The EU also proposes to make ABS compulsory on all large motorcycles but this will only affect new ones (in due course) and may also never quite happen.

The proposed compulsory On Board Diagnostic equipment will not monitor speed etc but merely keep a record of faults and “out of range” occurances as an aid to maintenance and repair.  The proposals include requiring manufacturers to allow bike owners to be able to access the information and the release fault codes and other maintenance information outside the manufacturers’ dealer networks, which will prevent them cornering the servicing market on their bikes.

So there are aspects which are a potential threat but some of the proposals are good ones.

You can read the BMF post in full (and comment on it if you wish) by clicking here.

The bottle kiln is an iconic Staffordshire building and might therefore feature on the new Club's badge

Another new and independent GoldWing Club will be forming during this winter off-season, this time in Staffordshire – although they are casting their net wide enough to cater for neighbouring areas too, hence the intended name, GoldWings North Midlands.

Steve Corbishley, who is one of the movers in this venture and the person to contact for more information, is relatively new to GoldWings.  He joined both GWOCGB (Staffordshire Wings) and GoldWings North Wales to explore his options. He even turned up at the GoldWings North West Christmas “Do” in January this year, which is when I first met him.

Having tried his new clubs for size he likes the independent model.  And having travelled to GoldWings North Wales with some other Staffordshire residents for a while, they now fancy forming their own indendent GoldWing Club closer to home.  GoldWings North Wales will be sad to lose them as members of their Club of course but the hiving off to form a separate Club in and around Staffordshire is entirely amicable and indeed GoldWings North Wales are helping them every way they can.  There is of course every chance that GoldWings North Wales and GoldWings North Midlands will see quite a lot of each other next season anyway.

There are already enough Wingers on board with this idea to form the core of the new Club so it’s a question of when rather than if it forms.  The idea of delaying the inaugural meeting until February, just prior to the start of the next biking season, is to give other Wingers a chance to hear about the plans and be in at the start if they wish.

The intention, unsurprisingly, is to affiliate with the Federation of UK GoldWing Clubs once the Club forms and so the prospective Founding Members have already approached the Federation – and have already been offered advice about how to go about things (such as delaying the formal inauguration until February) and with setting up a Club Website, which you should therefore have a chance to visit fairly soon.

Staffordshire Wings, of which Steve is still a member, got itself a bit bogged down in a protracted discussion about where to meeting in the continues………

First Recipient - Dave Sharp

In any GoldWing club, and in any other club come to that, there are always takers and givers, the givers being the ones who do the grafting without complaint and often without seeking the limelight either.  For ‘Appy Wanderers and for the past seven years, Dave Sharp has been one such Giver.

On the occasion of his impending retirement from his day job, Dave has also decided to retire from his volunteer role as co-founder, chief scribe and Tail End Charlie par excellence of  the ‘Appy Wanderers GoldWing Touring Club.  Dave is hanging up his marshal’s hi viz vest in order to give a bit of priority to his personal bucket list for a while – before old age starts creeping up on him, he wants to tick off a few of the things he has long wanted to do as soon as his chance came.

Dave is a colourful character and by no means a shrinking violet but he has wilingly played, at least as far the public view of things is concerned, second fiddle to the more gregarious (and certainly much noisier!) Barry.  Dave’s willingness to serve uncomplainingly as Tail End Charlie for the ‘Appy Wanderer’s ride out and tours for years and years is nothing short of heroic.

Much credit goes to Dave’s wife Julie who, with Barry’s wife Tina, will have kept the pair of them under discrete control and will doubtless have dug them out of holes from time to time.  The ‘Appy Wanders’s team of “givers” has expanded in recent times and this has allowed Dave some relief from his self-imposed labours but as Barry has made clear in circulating his thanks to Dave with the announcement of his stepping down, Dave did a huge amount of willing work and without Dave there simply would not have been ‘Appy Wanderers.  As the more literate, and some would say more intellectual of the pair (or at least the better speller!) Dave had a very important role in developing the ‘Appy Wanderers ethos.

This ethos, summed up in the phrase “Riding not Rows”, so no politics, just riding with friends, will be his as well as Barry’s lasting legacy.  As other Wanderers-style regional clubs form around the Country, as is rumoured to be in prospect, Dave will deserve a big share of the credit for inventing the concept and setting the right tone. continues………

Our Government has proposed that the speed limit on UK Motorways be increased to 80 miles per hour.  The speed limit on our motorways, as on all dual carriageways has been 70 mph for over forty years and there are differing views about the value and wisdom of an increase.

Unsurprisingly opinions vary on the desirability of this change and although biking organisations all seem to be welcoming the proposal, there are of course objectors, including the usual crop of blinkered obsessionalists.  There is an organisation called Brake for example which seems to think this is a selfish move by speedsters who want to put other people’s lives at dire risk which will cause “carnage” and that we should be doing everything we can to persuade people to get off the motorways and on to trains and buses.  Back to having a man carrying a red flag ahead of every motorised vehicle then.

The protagonists point out the economic gains to be had from shorter journey times will amount to as hundreds of millions of pounds, which strikes me as a bit fanciful, but they also point out that modern vehicles have vastly better brakes than 1960s vehicles and these out-perform the stopping distances in the Highway Code by a considerable margin, so the extra 10 mph, which in reality many drivers are already doing anyway, will not convey much extra risk.

People might claim to be experts but I’m not convinced there are any real experts on this subject and your opinion and mine might be just as good and valid as anyone else’s.  We, or rather our politicians on our behalf, will either have to take the risk of raising the motorway speed limit to see if it can be done without too much impact on road safety or not.  The idea that it will cause carnage on the motorways if we do this is clearly very silly.

And since the decision whether to increase the limit is a political one, all the other factors which influence political decisions come to bear too and the chances of this actually happening might be fairly low.  Our democratic system is such that the politicians who make the decision whether to proceed with this proposal will end up doing what they feel will give them the best prospect of being re-elected, especially if that is becoming uncertain.  Our best hope of what might be a perfectly reasonable attempt to strike a better balance between risk and benefit on our motorways could easily fall victim to the vagaries of the political calendar and other factors completely unrelated to the issue.

Speed is undeniably a factor in some accidents, so the possibility that increasing the motorway speed limit to 80 mph could lead to more motorway accidents and more deaths needs serious consideration.  We’ve had a 70 mph limit since 1964, so a very long time, so making a change could have an adverse effect – just as a reduction to 60 mph would be a disruptive change and that alone would probably adversely affect road safety for a while.  Adjusting the speed limit either way could lead to an increased number of rear end shunts.

If the economic gains are uncertain (if not fanciful) and the any change is likely to rock the boat and increase accidents at least for a while, the “ain’t broke, don’t mend it” argument has some attractions, as does the idea that the highly congested nature of our motorways (compared with European motorways) makes raising the upper limit too risky.  Will a limit of 80 mph work on the chronically congested M6, where average traffic speed are often much lower than 70 mph?  Will anyone gain from the legal opportunity to accelerate briefly, but only briefly, up to 80 mph?  Without much more extensive variable speed limit sections to calm things down when necessary, which have been successfully introduced on busiest sections of the M25 and the M42 not be much more effective in improving journey times?

But on the other hand in the special case of motorways which are, statistically speaking, the safest part of our road network, it can be argued that a higher overall speed limit, especially in combination with variable lower speed limits would be a safer way of doing things as well as well as improving traffic flow and allowing faster journeys.  And it probably would improve journey times significantly at less busy times and on less congested sections of the motorway system, so why not give it a try? continues………