Comment by ph33t | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ph33t | Hacker News Reader

One thing to understand, my Harley riding brethren, Harley cannot be targetting you. They are clearly targetting new riders. The combustion engine is a hobby as much as anything for 1/2 the riders I know; for them, it's the fun of owning a bike. Unless you have a lot of money, the only way to fix an oft-broken motorcycle is by doing yourself. I've owned a similar (not Harley) bike for a number of years. Parts are always vibrating off off the damn thing. It is loud; I do believe it helps make you visible. Yes, that is anecdotal, but I have ridden bikes with all types of pipes and I find it 100% true. I am much safer (heard) with my La Chopper's Curvedd pipes than the very quiet stock pipes; meaning, many fewer close calls.

So, they are looking for riders that don't care that their machines will (ostensibly) be more reliable (less vibration), saves money on fuel, and is quiet and efficient. I care about none of those things, BUT I want Harley to stay in business, and if they can do that while attracting new riders, I fully support them.

A side note, gas sport-bikes accelerate insanely fast now ... imagine how fast they will with an electric engine ... scary!

The main issue I have with Harley and all the loud bikes is that riders are remarkably rude and inconsiderate. Yeah, I'm passing a very general comment around, but I don't think it's wrong.

Any time you ride that thing past someones home you wake everyone up if they're sleeping and completely ruin any sense of quiet that may have existed.

If your neighbor fired up a chainsaw (or six) 20 feet from your house at all hours of the day, I imagine you'd consider that neighbor similarly.

So if they loud bikes go away, I'm all in favor. I think you're all acting like jerks for riding them.

Second that. I have lived on Overtoom in Amsterdam, one of the main avenues in and out of the city center. On any given night there would be 1000s of vehicles using that road. But for some reason the hey look at me motorcycle crowd would love to open up their throttles at 3am, you never heard anybody else except for the occasional ambulance.

I was under the impression that motorcycles were made to be artificially loud, as just like the existence of the engine, the bike being loud is a major selling point. Is this true?

The problem is that they are so fast. So if you call in a seriously scary and illegal noise at night the culprit could be a state over before anyone arrives. So it's obviously a non starter and nobody calls the police. But then there is a cultural of it being normal and so the problem never goes away and only gets worse.

Motorcycles are your right to ride if you have a license. Scaring the living daylights out of people every day is not.

Nor is waking up whole neighborhoods for your own gratification.

Stock exhausts are not terribly loud, though it's hard to make something that's automobile-level quiet in a motorcycle sized package.

I wouldn't be opposed to a noise restriction, provided it was implemented reasonably.

Exactly. One could argue that bikers are disproportionately responsible for this problem, but they're far from having a monopoly. There's no shortage of people with a "tuned" Civic/Impreza/Neon or cheapskate businesses operating shitty old trucks, at least in my area.

Loud pipes save lives. A life is worth more than having motorcycles pass you by without disrupting your peace and quiet.

If your life was really worth all that much to you, you wouldn't be riding a motorcycle.

Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.

This is a very anti-motorcycling point of view.

The fact is, motorcycles are unsafe mostly because of drivers who just don’t give a shit and feel entitled to the whole road.

Yours is a very anti-social point of view.

Motorcycles are unsafe by design. You want high acceleration, great gas mileage, and awesome maneuverability? Well then, you don't get the same protection that a car gets. It's basic physics.

The fact is, the vast majority of people choose to drive 2+ ton metal enclosures (with much larger total cost of ownership, mind you) and you choose to drive something that actively puts you in danger. That choice is entirely on you as are all of the consequences because, let's face it: no one but a few psychopaths want to be responsible for someone's death. Your argument that drivers don't give a shit rings absolutely hollow.

As for entitlement, if a horse buggy or low speed moped gets on the freeway and gets obliterated because they can't function like the cars that the roads were designed for, do you blame the cars or the person who decided to get on the freeway in an entirely inadequate vehicle?

I'm all for motorcycles on the road and I'm all for designing safety systems (that don't make life worse for everyone else) into them and other cars on the road to reduce accidents and fatalities. You, a minuscule minority, however, do NOT get to noise pollute our environments far beyond what is reasonable in a dense urban/suburban society just for your own enjoyment. The vast majority of drivers have long ago voted with their wallets and ballot boxes that the quiet, safety, and size of cars is what we want.

I agree somewhat, but it's not all driver's fault.

As a car driver, I don't feel entitled to the whole road, but I also don't shed too many tears for the idiots who lane split and ride like maniacs - ironically, maniacs who appear to feel entitled to the whole road.

I'm a cyclist most days, so I'm acutely aware of how oblivious and dangerous car drivers can be... so it seems crazy to me that most motorcyclists would choose to buzz between them unpredictably at high speed, instead of riding in a safer fashion.

Not at all true, unless you add an illegal straight through or race pipe. Or remove the baffles.

Motorcycles are comparatively loud, especially big V twins, because a) a surprising percentage is intake noise - there's a huge intake pulse from a 1200cc V b) the engine is open rather than behind a closed bonnet with noise absorption c) they tend to rev much higher than equivalent car engines (not Harleys)

Passing the legislated noise tests (specified engine revs etc), bikes are often quieter than a car. With some bikes now too quiet for comfort around pedestrians in town. Harleys somehow are always obnoxiously loud - My guess is probably mostly from intake pulses given current EU noise regs.

I don't know about the EU, but straight pipes are somewhat common in the US, and de-baffled exhausts are almost ubiquitous.

>I was under the impression that motorcycles were made to be artificially loud, as just like the existence of the engine, the bike being loud is a major selling point. Is this true?

They don't come from the factory that way (regulation), but people add aftermarket parts to make them that way. It costs a good amount too; $2500 installed depending on what you get.

They don't come from the factory that way (regulation)

They effectively did for a very long time. Harley has a performance parts division, complete with a thick catalog of custom exhausts, cams, intakes, and most importantly an EFI "tuner" box. Harley dealers were more than happy to install whatever you wanted, and even kept a stock of already modified bikes ready for sale.

They were fined $12 million for this awhile back. 2012, I think.

This is so true. I’ll be happy to see Harley bankrupt and biking forbidden. Not to mention the insane velocities and traffic hazard the bikers pose.

Source: have lived near a road.

The bikes aren't the problem. Stock bikes are surprisingly quiet. As someone who likes riding (Suzuki Bandit 600, Yamaha XT660X) and is perfectly happy with stock pipes, I don't appreciate being lumped in with the idiots, and I would absolutely fight against a ban.

Absolutely, the people are the problem. Those are clearly not Harley bikes though.

No on is proposing a ban on 2 wheeled vehicles, or at least they shouldn't. But I'm all in favor of banning ANY vehicle that can't pass a very strict quiet test.

> Any time you ride that thing past someones home

without any context I could imagine you were talking about a Lamborghini.

I doubt the "loud pipes save lives" concept holds water. The normal rumble of a Harley doesn't bother me. When one of those riders goes out of their way to gun it through residential neighborhoods just to be obnoxious they should be fined

It absolutely does. Maybe not in a residential neighborhood, but when it's rush hour, and I'm stuck on the highway in my truck with bikes splitting lanes, its really nice to get an audio warning that one of them is coming by at a close distance.

So loud pipes just distracted me from the other 30 vehicles on the road.. Thanks

And thankfully soundproofing of cars makes those loud pipes irrelevant. They are kind of like car alarms, if I happen to even hear them, obnoxious, I ignore it

You're contradicting yourself, and I can't figure out why.

If the soundproofing in a vehicle fails me, I mentally tune out the constant obnoxious and consistent noise of things like loud pipes.

Id rather pay attention visually to the vehicle's on the road including motorcycles, not be distracted by one asshole on the road

I'd find that argument more compelling if not for the fact that most of the noise is focused behind the motorcycle instead of in front of it. How about we get rid of the intentionally loud exhaust system and replace it with a forward facing speaker playing ice cream truck music. In the name of safety of course. Doubt many Harley riders would go for that even though it is congruent with the claims of a desire to use noise to make a cyclist's presence known to other drivers.

Motorcycles have horns. If a rider needs to warn another road user of their presence, they have a perfectly good option under their right thumb.

Alternatively they could do away with lane splitting. It's dangerous and unnerving for everyone else.

Part of the big appeal is the loudness of the bikes. I don't think I would want a harley if it was quiet....also if you don't like it because it's loud, chances are that you will not enjoy it and will hold negative connotations with it.

Granted there are assholes that like to knock out your side mirrors but loud bikes definitely make themselves aware of other drivers when their cross section visibility is much less than a car.

I would think that the more scorn you show for these bikers, you are just upping their own sense of glee.

> I would think that the more scorn you show for these bikers, you are just upping their own sense of glee.

I don't doubt it, but it does make my point.

Loud pipes == jerks.

I read that some people [1] actually enjoy being woken up at 2am by the roar of a motorcycle engine. Imagine that.

[1] https://www.theonion.com/wow-check-out-that-motorcycle-revvi...

Especially if you can hack them to play around with the power delivery - the weight of the battery might make handeling tricky on a bike though.

A Hybrid scooter in the classic Italian style or the Honda c90 style might make sense for delivery riders deliverooo etc

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