BMF Dambuster Rally!

Dambuster 6 - 19th -21st AUGUST 2022 Designed as a traditional, laid-back camping rally, the BMF Dambuster Rally has become a very special annual motorcycling event. It’s complete with live music, fantastic food, a venue steeped in history and an excellent ride-out location to explore the fabulous Lincolnshire countryside, or even a trip to the sea-side. 2022 will be the BMF Dambuster Rally’s sixth anniversary. Live bands will be performing on the Friday and Saturday evenings. Thorpe Camp Visitors Centre, Lincolnshire is the ideal venue to celebrate the heroic deeds of the famous Dambusters raid in 1943. You can pitch your tents among the historic display planes and World War Two artefacts – and it’s situated in deepest Lincolnshire ‘Bomber County’. All of the

NMC Calls for a new e-Scooter Task Force to Develop e-Scooter Regulation

NMC Calls for Government to Establish a new e-Scooter Task Force to Develop e-Scooter Regulation Urgent need for e-Scooter Task Force to get new regulations right The National Motorcyclists Council (NMC) has joined wider calls for proper regulation of the informal eScooter sector and is calling for the Government to establish an e-scooter task force which would be tasked with shaping regulation and considering the wider issues surrounding the role of e-scooters. The number of eScooters (also known as Powered Transporters) has risen exponentially since they first appeared the UK a few years ago. The Bicycle Association recently estimated that there are around 800,000 in use today. At a recent seminar organised by the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety (PACTS) it was

Vnuk: NMC Welcomes New Certainty For Motorcycle Sports

Compulsory third party motor insurance will now not be extended to motor and motorcycle sports away from the public highway, but National Motorcyclists Council (NMC) calls for a wider review of motor insurance A parliamentary Private Members Bill which sought to stop the implementation in the UK of the so-called ‘Vnuk’ judgement has passed through Parliament and will soon become law. The judgement by the European Court of Justice in 2014 was made after a Mr Damijan Vnuk was injured in an accident involving a trailer on private agricultural property in Slovenia. It sought to extend compulsory third party motor insurance to all ‘mechanically propelled vehicles used on land’. Although the judgement set out to correct a problem in overall insurance law,

Police encourage use of dashcam footage

Over 60,000 drivers and riders have sent dashcam footage to the police since 2017, highlighting dangerous driving. One in three cases were actioned by the police, which are encouraging us to upload evidence of law breaking such as use of phones while driving or crossing solid white lines. “The use of dashcam evidence has been variable across different forces, there have been instances reported to the BMF of recordings of serious incidents, involving serious injuries to riders, with GPS locators and third-party recordings being ignored, for unstated reasons, by local accident investigators. Any attempt to co-ordinate and standardise the way this is done, has to be a good idea. That Lincolnshire is joining the ranks, that’s a positive step. In a

Government Confirms That Anti Tampering Proposals Will Not Be Retrospective

Minister says that measures will be limited to environmental aspects and autonomous driver software systems on new and future vehicles, with heritage and sports vehicles, plus customisation protected. Parliament has debated a petition (25th April 2022), which opposes potential new regulations against so called vehicle ‘anti tampering. The petition; ‘Do not implement proposed new offences for vehicle "tampering"’ was tabled by Gareth James and attracted more than 115,000 signatures making it eligible for a parliamentary debate. The original proposals were revealed in a consultation on 'The Future of Transport Regulatory Review – Modernising Vehicle Standards' during 2021. This consultation proved to be highly controversial, generating wide attention in the motorcycle world and the media, given how the wording in the consultation was interpreted

Ten-Minute Charge Battery Developed

Horwin, the Chinese company whose electric motorcycles are already on sale in Britain, has signed up a supply deal for a new type of ultra-fast charging battery – niobium – which it says could reduce charge times from three hours to just 10 minutes (given a fast enough charger). Niobium-powered bikes could be on sale in 2024, it adds. Niobium is a naturally occurring metal, widely used in various superconductors such as the magnets in MRI scanners. With a similar hardness to titanium and ductility to iron, it is often used in specialist alloys and is also a component in some jewellery. However, its use in high-tech batteries is a new development. Consumer giant Toshiba has been working with CBMM, a

Power steering for motorcycles

Power steering for motorcycles sounds like a 1st April spoof, but Yamaha really is working on electric power steering (EPS), with a public debut due this year. It sounds nonsensical because motorcycles, unlike cars, need very little effort to steer – it's one of the things we love about riding them. But the Yamaha EPS system is based on sound reasoning. It's first being developed for motocross bikes, for which the computer-controlled system improves stability, not just reduces steering effort. At the heart of EPS is an electric torque sensor, of the sort used on millions of electric bicycles. Its job on e-bikes is to sense when you are pedalling and how hard, sending that information to a control unit which

BMF decarbonisation policy

The BMF Council formally approved the following policy on decarbonisation at the Council meeting on 9th April. ⦁ The BMF is opposed to any proposals to ban the use of motorcycles powered by internal combustion engines (ICE) while such vehicles are still capable of being run. ⦁ The BMF is opposed to a ban on the sale of new ICE-powered motorcycles while there is the possibility of providing alternatives to fossil fuel and while the electric vehicle charging infrastructure does not adequately support electric motorcycles. ⦁ The BMF supports a technology-neutral approach to powering new motorcycles; we do not accept that electric battery technology is the only approach. Director Anna Zee said "The use of motorcycles, however powered, rather than cars can make a

FIM Mototour of Nations – Kavala, Greece.

For this year the FIM Mototour of Nations will be based at the 5* Hotel Lucy in Kavala, on the North Eastern coast of Greece. Kavala is a port town looking out to the island of Thasos. This is not the first time that Mototour has taken place in Greece, as in 2017 we had an excellent event based on Ioannina in North Western Greece run by the same organising team. Riders will have a programme of chosen itineraries on a variety of tarmacked roads in escorted groups travelling at a steady “tourist” speeds. All routes will be based on Hotel Lucy where, included in the entry fee, participants will receive: 1st day: dinner 2nd day: breakfast, light lunch, dinner 3rd day: breakfast, light

Belgian motorcyclists go for safety

Belgian research identified eight types of motorcyclists; which type are you? To better profile the Belgian motorcyclist, a representative sample of 3,000 Belgians over the age of 16 were interviewed about their use of motorcycles and other powered two-wheelers. The Belgian road safety research organisation Vias studied powered two-wheeler use in Belgium. They identified eight kinds of motorcyclists, but more important, they analysed who the motorcyclists are, how they behave, what their experiences are, how well they are trained, and what their views are on subjects as road safety, intelligent transport systems, et cetera. First the types of motorcyclists. According to Vias there are eight profiles: The Time optimizer: uses the powered two-wheeler (scooter) to optimize travel time during the good season (11,6%).

Battery Swapping Goes Big

The Japanese big four – Honda, Kawasaki, Suzuki and Yamaha – are setting up a new company, Gachaco, Inc, to offer standardised swappable batteries for electric motorcycles and scooters. For smaller machines it could address the biggest drawback of battery-powered bikes – lack of range, and slow charging. The Japanese manufacturers agreed standards for such a system back in 2019, but are now teaming up with Japanese energy company Eneos to offer a network of battery swap stations across Japan. The first stations will be in Tokyo, with other Japanese cities following in autumn 2022. The 'Gachaco' network will use Honda's existing Mobile Power Pack. Being small and light enough to be swapped by hand, the batteries clearly wouldn't suit a big

FIM Meritum 2022

The 2022 Meritum meeting will take place in Southern Jutland, Denmark, at the small town of Graasten. The event is being organised by the same team that put on the Motocamp at Bredbero in 2013, which was generally accepted to be an excellent event. The event has been timed to link with the FIM Rally in Ferropolis so that those who want to can take in both events in one holiday. For those who wish to arrive early the event facilities will open from midday on Thursday the 21st July with an optional excursion offered on Friday 22nd. The event will run from Friday 22nd July to Sunday 24th, with participants leaving after breakfast on Monday 25th Once again the BMF are handling the

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