[S4Ninja77]

Just thought I'd throw out a warning for those in the east bay. Hwy 580 from about Hwy 13 out to Castro Valley has been riddled with CHP lately. Also, the straightaway on Crow Canyon has been set up as a speed trap with about 5 CHP cars. Be careful out there!

 

[Darkmonster]

Saw a couple of Chp bikes hiding on Friday between Livermore & Byron on the road with all the windmills (sorry, 1st time I had driven it, so don't remember the name) lovely road, I was thinking.....If I was on my bike I would be having a great time...them I came round the corner...and there they were

 

[DaffeDuc]

... guess it's area-wide... 3 - 4 of them on 101 and a few in the less traveled areas (central coast)... saw lots of them on the ride yesterday (about 400 mi. round trip for me).

 

[ScottRNelson]

Radar speed enforcement always increases in the springtime. Expect it to be that way for a few months.

If your job is running a radar gun, can you think of better working conditions than a nice sunny spring day, perfect temperature, and you can write easy tickets all day long?

 

[DaffeDuc]

... forgot to mention... unusually high enforcement this past weekend b/c of the holidays

 

[Guest]

On our side of the bay, in Burlingame, cops always seem to be lying in wait on Carolan Ave. near Burlingame High and also Rollins Road, above Broadway. Just missed getting caught by a cop's radar gun a couple of Sundays ago.

 

[B-Rock]

here's a bit of a tangent-has anyone wired a radar decector into their bike? having a loud red bike gets me more attention from the 5-0s than I like and I want to know when I am being tracked. So, hints, tips, comments on the idea?

 

[DaffeDuc]

you can always use cages to run interference for you.... keep the car between you and the shoulder of the road... they have larger radar signatures.

a few people put radar detectors on their bikes.

 

[Tigre]

I had a radar detector on my bike for a little while. I ended up getting rid of it because of two things I didn't like:

1) it was kind of a pain to run a headphone wire into my helmet to be able to hear an audio alert (visual alert isn't practical--that's the whole point, I don't want to be watching my speedometer)

2) on the Passport 8500 (?) that I had, I wired it to my battery as a pwoer source. The bike produced some odd electrical fluctiations that passed crackly static noise through to my headphones...

Anywho... I just need to last another 4 months and my record drops to just one ticket. Then I'm back off to the races! Actually, I may invest in a radar detector at that point... I know cops aren't impressed when they see the radar detector (although you might be able to be stealthy and cover it with your helmet or something). Seeing as I've gotten warnings maybe 3 times out of 15 times pulled over, I don't think I could do too much worse.

Tigre

 

[Juan]

15 times?????

 

[troyslap]

here's a bit of a tangent-has anyone wired a radar decector into their bike? having a loud red bike gets me more attention from the 5-0s than I like and I want to know when I am being tracked. So, hints, tips, comments on the idea?

Parts Unlimited has a cheap mount bracket that comes off quick. It uses a big rubber band like to hold it. I put velcro on instead. Under the plexiglass shelf i wired an aux. plug with spade terminal connectors for quick removal. Escort 8500 also comes with a battery power model but supposedly not as effective. The site below has an led setup that goes inside the helmet eliminating cords to it.
http://www.radarbusters.com/products/accessories/motorcyles/hard.asp
I had a regular traffic school, a 12 hour school in LA, a 16 hour one in San Diego ( also $120 fee) and over five hundred dollars in fines. Then got another but luckily cop did not show up. All this last year. Luckily different counties, so I requested special offender school twice. I also paid an attorney $100 each time to fight them. Sometimes I win. Bad part is I never get them when really going balistic, I get like 65 in a 55 and such.
California's broke and desperate. Here in San Diego by Palomar Mountain the cops are like flies on Sunday mornings.

 

[Tigre]

Well, since you asked... I counted up all the times I could remember. A few of those pull-overs were in cars. Actually, I did get a couple more warnings that I thought...

Let's see:
[Pulled over in car]
Licensed to drive as of May 1993
1) October 93 - Speeding 57/35 (ticket)
2) October 94 - Speeding 60/45 (ticket) -- in a minivan!
3) March 95 - Speeding 100+ / 45 (warning) -- The cop knew me
4) March 97 - No right on red during specific hours (ticket)
5) October 97 - Illegal lane change -- pulled into turn lane too early (ticket)
6) December 21 1997 - Speeding 81/65 (ticket)
7) December 22 1997 - Speeding 70/55 (ticket)
----
[Pulled over on bike]
8) July 1999 - Speeding -- (warning) and drug search -- about 11pm on the highway outside of Bologna -- I had just gotten to Europe and didn't recognize the cop cars and went flying by one driving slowly in the right lane
9) July 1999 - Speeding on the Autobahn! - (warning) and drug search
10) July 1999 - Cruising in the passing lane (warning, yelled at)
11) July 1999 - Speeding ~75/65 (ticket)
12) September 1999 - Speeding - (Warning) it was bogus anyway
13) June 2000 - Speeding 80/65 (ticket)
14) June 2001 - Illegal lane use -- driving in breakdown lane (ticket)
15) June 2001 - Speeding 75/55 (ticket)
16) June 2001 - Speeding 85/65 (warning)
17) July 2001 - Speeding (ticket, but fought and won--really the cop was just mad at me for doing a wheelie in downtown Boston)
18) June 2002 - Illegal pass (warning)
19) July 2002 - Speeding 90/65 (ticket, fought, and lost)
20) October 2002 - Speeding 85/65 (Warning--cop was former biker)
21) October 2003 - Speeding 75+/55 (ticket)

Don't send this to my insurance company, please!

Do you think this has something to do with my astronomical insurance rates? I thought it was just because I wasn't married....

;D
Tigre

 

[ScottRNelson]

Do you think this has something to do with my astronomical insurance rates? I thought it was just because I wasn't married....

If they have any idea what kind of driver/rider you are, sounds like they're justified in keeping the rates high.

So do you keep a notebook or something to keep track of all these?

I can't remember every ticket I've had, but my history goes back to 1968. When I Used to live in Utah, they awarded points differently. Speeding was like 60 points and you could get about 200 before you were in trouble. Points would drop off after three years and if you went a whole year without a ticket, the points were cut in half. I was real good at getting a ticket about every 11 months so that the points were always there. :'(

I was given the opportunity to take a safe driver course every two or three years, however often it was allowed, to cut 50 points off. I managed several personal conversations with DMV officials explaining what it meant to be on probation. The only thing I can say for sure is that I've gotten more tickets for 52 in a 35 than for anything else, since the first two were for that and I know there were one or two more since then. That must be my natural speed on those types of roads.

What I find interesting is that since I moved to California in 1988 I've managed to keep a clean record. I've gotten a few tickets, but nothing that traffic school couldn't erase (and that is offered only every 18 months). My last ticket was over four years ago, on the Monster, for speeding up to get into a gap in traffic for a freeway exit, not realizing that a CHP was in the line of cars. I don't think I drive very differently since moving here, but the police seem a lot more reasonable and don't run speed traps everywhere like they seem to in many other states.

I'm still waiting for someday in the hills when I get nailed for 80 in a 25. 8)

 

[DaffeDuc]

... with that Yellow ST2, it's just like your (late) Arrest-Me-Red Monster... still sticks out alot... but then again, my loud exhaust alerts them a mile away.