A great way to instill confidence in scooter safety
Posted: Sun Jun 15, 2008 2:30 pm
My Aero 50 had this problem with the throttle being stuck wide open. I tried to fix it and didn't have any luck, and then it wouldn't start anymore. I can home this weekend and took it out of my Father in Law's garage and put the parts back on that he took off and it started right up.
My parents are not big fans of motorcycles, so I thought they'd be kind of irritated that I got a scoot. I had been hiding it for about 3 weeks at my Father in Law's. (Point of clarification: I'm 21, but my parents pay my tuition, so I do have to care what they think at least a little)
I got excited and told them to come check it out in the garage. They were pretty excited, actually. Not mad at all.
"Does it work?" My mom asked.
"Heck yeah it does."
"Well show us."
I pulled it onto our hilly driveway, between my dad's new Jeep and my mom's new Van and kicked it over.
"Are these things even safe?"
I started to say: "The cool thing about these is that they're way safer..."
and kicked the engine over.
In my excitement to show off my new toy I forgot to put the stand down. I also forgot that the thing was stuck in WOT. Needless to say it lurched, so I slammed on the brake. Unfortunately it was the front brake, not the back, and she took off. In a sad attempt to stop the scooter I * back on the handle bars, thinking I could hold it steady. I popped a wheely at WOT. We both took off right toward my mom's car, me being drug behind.
I had no choice but to wrestle it to the ground because my hand had slipped to the end of the throttle grip and I couldn't reach the kill switch. The Aero turned and I tried my best to pull it away from the car and we both ate the pavement.
My leg hit first, giving me a big, long bump and some minor scrapes. But what really hurt was when my face hit the driveway, chin first. I lost some skin on my chinny chin chin and when I woke up this morning it was oozing yellow liquid. Luckily the injuries were minor and I had the side panels off the scoot so they didn't smash into a million pieces. My chin hit on the front, below my lip, not on the ridge. When I think about it, I'm really lucky I didn't roll my head forward and hit teeth first. That definitely would have torn the bottom teeth from my mouth.
I got on this site and read some more and went back and fixed the throttle problem and have been riding all day. This is the funnest thing I've ever owned in my life. Best 150 I've ever spent.
Today I remembered reading on the internet that if you aren't at least a little afraid of what your bike can do to you; if you get over confident to the extreme: that's when trouble happens. They were certainly right. Lesson learned.
Luckily my parents didn't demand that I sell the thing. In fact, they even rode it around the neighborhood after I got it fixed.
When I finally killed the engine and stood up after I hit the driveway, my dad stepped back and nodded. "Maybe we should get you a helmet," he said.
My parents are not big fans of motorcycles, so I thought they'd be kind of irritated that I got a scoot. I had been hiding it for about 3 weeks at my Father in Law's. (Point of clarification: I'm 21, but my parents pay my tuition, so I do have to care what they think at least a little)
I got excited and told them to come check it out in the garage. They were pretty excited, actually. Not mad at all.
"Does it work?" My mom asked.
"Heck yeah it does."
"Well show us."
I pulled it onto our hilly driveway, between my dad's new Jeep and my mom's new Van and kicked it over.
"Are these things even safe?"
I started to say: "The cool thing about these is that they're way safer..."
and kicked the engine over.
In my excitement to show off my new toy I forgot to put the stand down. I also forgot that the thing was stuck in WOT. Needless to say it lurched, so I slammed on the brake. Unfortunately it was the front brake, not the back, and she took off. In a sad attempt to stop the scooter I * back on the handle bars, thinking I could hold it steady. I popped a wheely at WOT. We both took off right toward my mom's car, me being drug behind.
I had no choice but to wrestle it to the ground because my hand had slipped to the end of the throttle grip and I couldn't reach the kill switch. The Aero turned and I tried my best to pull it away from the car and we both ate the pavement.
My leg hit first, giving me a big, long bump and some minor scrapes. But what really hurt was when my face hit the driveway, chin first. I lost some skin on my chinny chin chin and when I woke up this morning it was oozing yellow liquid. Luckily the injuries were minor and I had the side panels off the scoot so they didn't smash into a million pieces. My chin hit on the front, below my lip, not on the ridge. When I think about it, I'm really lucky I didn't roll my head forward and hit teeth first. That definitely would have torn the bottom teeth from my mouth.
I got on this site and read some more and went back and fixed the throttle problem and have been riding all day. This is the funnest thing I've ever owned in my life. Best 150 I've ever spent.
Today I remembered reading on the internet that if you aren't at least a little afraid of what your bike can do to you; if you get over confident to the extreme: that's when trouble happens. They were certainly right. Lesson learned.
Luckily my parents didn't demand that I sell the thing. In fact, they even rode it around the neighborhood after I got it fixed.
When I finally killed the engine and stood up after I hit the driveway, my dad stepped back and nodded. "Maybe we should get you a helmet," he said.
