So I was reading Easy Rider magazine the other day, the August 2011 edition. And I ran across an article about seatbelts for bikes. Yeah, you heard that right…seatbelts for motorcycles. It seems the geniuses at Honda have decided that motorcycle riders should be belted in (or is that on). Anyway, according to the article it seems this is a serious project.
So while all intelligent human beings know that you want to be as far away from the motorcycle as possible if you go down, and the best way to do that is to not be strapped to the bike, Honda feels you need to be strapped in/on but still be able to get away and they seem to have an answer. According to the article they (Honda) are working to incorporate (are you ready) ejector seat technology into this system. When the computer senses that the bike is tipping over and is beyond recovery, it releases the entire seat and inflates the airbag backrest. I can just see some poor schmuck in a parking lot whose bike falls over and the seat goes sailing into a parked cars windshield (there’s a law suit) and the air bag deploys leaving this guy/gal looking like a fool.
In another article in the same magazine, same issue and by the same author, Bill Bish from NCOM, More automotive safety devices are coming to motorcycles. According to Mr. Bish, within the next two years motorcycles might have technology such as collision detection, speed limit warning devices, information about the automobiles around you, and information about the tightness of road bends. All of this will be transmitted to the rider through different means, one method mentioned in the article is a vibrating seat or special gloves. Just what I need in southern Virginia in the summer…gloves.
Ok, maybe it’s just me but if you want all of that crap buy a car!!! If you need to design all of this technology to overcome the unique motorcycle problems I have an idea. Leave motorcycles alone!!! Whatever happened to people making their own decisions and being responsible for their own actions. Pretty soon vehicles will drive themselves and humans will never have to think again. And don’t tell me this stuff will never happen. You know that eventually some politician who has never ridden a motorcycle in his/her life will decide that we (riders) need all of this stuff and no one will argue, it will become law and that will be the end of our great sport of riding motorcycles. Not to mention what this will do to the cost of bikes.
Hopefully they will leave older bikes alone and I can enjoy riding the way it was meant to be. Ride safe, have fun.
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