He kicked my bandit over.

Well, not everybody on two wheels is a brother.

Had a nice restaurant meal last night, when I went back to my Bandit it was on its right side on the concrete floor of the Hilton Doubletree lower level carpark. Front brake lever snapped, right bar end scratched, right forward indicator bent outta shape, and worst luck, right Kappa pannier had borne the brunt of the fall, and has a nice crack in the lid that will be a bitch to plastic weld, if that is possible.

Disappointed but not surprised.

You see, on the way to dinner, I had an encounter with a two wheeled 'brother' on one of these...

Its an electric mountain bike. I'd heard of them. I'd even looked into them. They are not road registrable, because they don't comply with ADR. No lights, no indicators, etc. They are not for use on public roads, because the motor at 3500W/4500W is waaaay above the 250W limit in Oz/NT.

So back to the story.

I'm waiting to pull out into the traffic onto a main road on the way to dinner. Nice big break after one ute, with a mountain bike cruising a distance behind. So I pull into the traffic behind the ute, and well ahead of what I think is a normal bike, doing no more than 25km/h.

Nekminnit, the dude on the 'mountain bike' has drawn alongside me and is giving me what-for for cutting him off (hows that, a bicycle complaining to a motorbike rider). So I apologised. 

Not good enough for my new friend. So he follows me and has a crack at cutting me off!  

We pull up at some lights at the end of the 70km/h section. Yes, he has been keeping up!

So at the lights I lifts my visor and say, look kid, sorry, but a word of advice, That thing aint road registered, you are mixing it with highway traffic, you are not visible, and if 20+ years on two wheels has taught me anything, it is to keep your attitude in check and not try to argue with the other metal on the road at 70 clicks, especially when all you got is Tshirt, board shorts, and thongs.

My young friend had a different point of view. So I told him to piss off and go play somewhere else.

He seemed to have enjoyed my company, or perhaps he was hanging out for more of my words of wisdom, because he followed me to the hotel. But maybe he changed his mind about my sage advice because after he watched me park my Bandit, he rode off. Goodbye and good luck, kid, I thinks. Shrugged it off and went inside. Nice meal, good company, took it easy on the vino, bid goodbye to my friends..... and found Suzi on her side when I'd finished   

NT Police helpful but reporting it was an exercise in getting a 'job number' for the insurance company.

Anyway, guess I will get to try those Pazzo levers I've been wondering about. The indicator and the bar end came up fine with a bit of gloss black, you wouldn't know unless you looked hard now. The difficult part is finding a replacement lid for the right Kappa K33N pannier, I'll ring the insurer on monday.

So Darwin riders, if you see a tall kid wearing a matt black Fox dirt helmet on a blue tonka toy bike, don't wave. He got no respect.

If you find out who he is the cops will charge him with criminal damage as well as put him off the road

Don't worry ,Karma will put him under a truck .

+1 to that.

madmax wrote:If you find out who he is the cops will charge him with criminal damage as well as put him off the road

It shouldn't be too hard to find him. Darwin is a small place, and he is in/about the Nightcliff area. There are also only 9 bicycle shops and 3 motorcycle shops in town, the next lot are 400km down the track at Katherine, which would be out of range.  His is a pretty unique bike. I'll find him, and I will let Mr Plod deal with him.

given the facts you just stated,

 and if he`s a local,

 he`s not real bright.

Hope you have a happy outcome.

Thanks for the heads up TB. I'm down the track a bit so my commuting takes me down TBD / Stuart highway from the city so hopefully I'll avoid this oxygen thief. You're right for giving him some advice re the legality of his bike. I'd imagine police will be keen to keep an eye out for him regardless. Did they seem interested?
Bill.

Seems it's more prevalent than I thought, hopefully there's some CCTV footage where you parked.



BTW, the cheapo ebay levers have been okay on my bike for 3 years now, there were a couple on here that said theirs had faded, but I haven't heard anyone say they had failed.

TropoBone wrote:

madmax wrote:If you find out who he is the cops will charge him with criminal damage as well as put him off the road

It shouldn't be too hard to find him. Darwin is a small place, and he is in/about the Nightcliff area. There are also only 9 bicycle shops and 3 motorcycle shops in town, the next lot are 400km down the track at Katherine, which would be out of range.  His is a pretty unique bike. I'll find him, and I will let Mr Plod deal with him.

Might pay to approach Hilton management, let them know some criminal interference occurred with your bike (that's been reported to police) while parked on THEIR premises and ask if any CCTV cover in that area, then request footage (as a valued customer etc). Makes it easier to press the point home when you find him (which I'm sure you will).
Seems to be a lot of antisocial road users around these days.

Lots of people disappearing into crocodiles bellies, too.   
Sad to hear about your pride and Joy. 
As Gus said Karma will catch up with him.

Wether it was elec bike twit or someone else, what an arsehole act!   
The crocodile belly that Bosco was taliking about sounds about the right thing for him

Well there are some good things about living in the NT.
The place is small enough for the coppers to take an interest.
I reported the kick-over. 
NT Police have rung twice to let me know (a) they are looking and (b) someone that behaves like that usually turns up in front of them, eventually.   
And -- they don't bust you for tail-tidy mods 

Looks like it's only a matter of time before the get him then. Arsehole like him are always going to do shit like that and get caught eventually.  

Most push bike riders are jealous of us.Don`t argue with them just put your boot out and push them over.
works for me,however I`m in NSW where road rage is rampant.If they don`t pay rego or road tax they don`t belong
My 2 cents worth
Cheers Gentlemen