As my first full day commuting with the scooter, I was up and on the road just as the sun peeked over the mountains.
Nice and quiet. Gotta' love it.
The only people I saw for the first several miles away from home were the dutiful morning joggers; several of the young mothers in the neighborhood seem rather determined to run every day, rain or shine. Thankfully for them, and for me, today was nothing but shine.
In fact, I didn't see a car until I hit Main Street..jpg)
I held to the western side of the valley along stretches of what my kids call "cow & horsey roads" as I made my way north to the metropolis. Nice ridin', but chilly. The 10 or 15 miles per hour this scoot finds comfortable over my normal commuting cycling speed of 17 mph sure do add to the wind chill my face feels. I think tomorrow morning the balaclava will be in order.
I had the ol' GPS unit along for the ride and discovered that the speedometer on the scooter reads 16.67% fast. Therefore, when I think I'm traveling 35 mph, I'm only really doing 30. This likely explains why I had several cars backed up behind me for a few minutes when I thought I was keeping the speed limit.
Gotta' watch that. Don't want to rattle the fierce yet bored animals in their cages. Might get ugly.
Thursday, May 31, 2007
Gone by Sunup
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2 comments:
Eurastus, the speedometer on my PX 150 is 8 mph fast across its range of motion... 45 mph is actually 37. Speedometers on scooters tend to be optimistic, by accident or design, I don't know.
In my case, I can do the math in my head, though most of the time I just try to keep up with traffic, and don't look...
__Orin
Scootin' Old Skool
Orin,
You are absolutely right.
As I've gained more experience with the scooter, and spent an afternoon precisely measuring speeds with an attached GPS receiver, I've discovered that the previously reported 16.67% optimistic reading actually is actually a very consistent 5 mph over at all speeds.
This is much easier to deal with than a flat percentage of error. If I know the speedometer is a consistent amount optimistic, it's a simple matter to adjust my speed accordingly.
I'm no longer uptight with what the dial reads. I simply subtract 5 mph and ride on.
Eurastus
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