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MOT fail
MOT
The MOT this morning resulted in a fail which I can't honestly claim to be a surprise. There were two advisories: the chain guard is missing and the front tyre had some cracking. It failed on two points: the headlamp has blown (again!) and the rear tyre is knackered.
What? The rear tyre that I put on for the MOT has failed? Oh, the irony. The (quite possibly non-catalytic) exhaust passed the emissions tests which is where I was expecting a failure.
In fact I had noticed the problem with the tyre beforehand and was expecting to have it put under some scrutiny. The tyre had gone flat, as expected, in the garage and I'd gone to pump it up the day before just to check things through. Curious about any damage as the bike's weight was pressing through the flat tyre I could see that there was some tearing at the base of the knobbles. This had happened on every TKC80 (proper) knobbly as the tyre wore down to nothing and was under stress so for a minute I was wondering why my new (in Moscow) TKC80 was showing this pattern. Then I realised this was the Tourance that had sat upright in my old garage for eighteen months then horizontal in the lockup in Banbury for five. Closer inspection showed that the tearing was all the way round on the one side of the tyre only. How very bizarre.
For the MOT they said they could see through to the canvas in a couple of the cracks hence the MOT fail. The front looks nowhere near as bad which is why it's an advisory.
I have ten working days to right this wrong.
Speed Awareness Course
The Speed Awareness Course was quite enlightening if only because almost everyone in the room thought that a built-up area constituted a 30mph zone unless otherwise advertised. No, you are wrong. Only street lamps (and no other indication) implies 30mph. A built-up area, for what it's worth, is a place with a speed limit of 40mph or less. So, if the speed limit is 50mph outside your house you are not (officially) in a built-up area.
Most of the course was spent looking at the literal indications as well as the transient environmental and local features that you should be using to best judge your speed. Interestingly, to me, no mention was given of the "making progress" feature of modern driving schooling where not accelerating quickly to the speed limit will be a factor in any driving test failure. Perhaps they too include some environmental and local mitigation but pottering about at 20mph in a 30mph zone to avoid running over little Johnny will be a fail.
There was a peculiar rant about the aggressive tailgater being one of the local mafiosa/drug barons whereas I would have thought they were simply flankers from any walk of life.
Finally, a little curio. They went to great lengths to make clear that attendance on the course was a private matter between the people running the course and the police, that we shouldn't acknowledge anyone who'd been on the course should we subsequently see them in case they'd not told anyone else (followed the the apocryphal tale of the husband and wife unexpectedly meeting each other in reception). OK, fair enough. They then went on to say, don't tell your insurance company as they will then know you've been speeding and bump your insurance anyway.
It goes without saying that I found myself on autopilot on the way home and doing 55 in a 50 zone. I slowed down.
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