Ouch

[dmthomas]

Was riding home last Thursday looking forward to a long weekend when a mincab pulled out of a side road across my path . I wasn't travelling very fast as it was a busy road in rush hour, so managed to scrub most of my speed before impacting his front wing and duly flying over his bonnet. .

Fortunately it all happened 50 yards from a hospital and the rock is a heavy, well-built machine, so damage to me was limited and quickly seen to.

My rock, however, is pretty poorly. Mashed at the front, and oil is leaking from several parts of the engine (including cylinder head). It's also scrapped in all the usual parts you'd expect from crashing down on one side.

The other guy was at fault and has accepted blame, so it will be going over his insurance, but not sure I want one of their 'approved repair agents' fixing her up half-heartedly and leaving me with a twisted frame or worse. Has anyone got any advice for dealing with the fall out?

[boxermania]

Depending on the damage and the age of the bike, the insurer might just write it as a total loss. This is good and bad depending if something is owed on the bike. You can always insist on keeping the old bike or at least purchasing it from the insurance. You can always sell the good parts........

I wish you a rapid mending of the body and the soul

[riceburner]

Was riding home last Thursday looking forward to a long weekend when a mincab pulled out of a side road across my path . I wasn't travelling very fast as it was a busy road in rush hour, so managed to scrub most of my speed before impacting his front wing and duly flying over his bonnet. .

Fortunately it all happened 50 yards from a hospital and the rock is a heavy, well-built machine, so damage to me was limited and quickly seen to.

My rock, however, is pretty poorly. Mashed at the front, and oil is leaking from several parts of the engine (including cylinder head). It's also scrapped in all the usual parts you'd expect from crashing down on one side.

The other guy was at fault and has accepted blame, so it will be going over his insurance, but not sure I want one of their 'approved repair agents' fixing her up half-heartedly and leaving me with a twisted frame or worse. Has anyone got any advice for dealing with the fall out?

Very similar thing happened to my first Rockster.

Get the bike to a BMW dealership ASAP. They're very used to sorting this sort of thing out and will check the bike over properly.

[sjbmw]

Glad you are OK.

I took one of those flying catapaults in July and I am still healing. But my dealer took care of everything while I was in the hospital. Pickup, insurance, repairs. The manager even sent an email to board members here for me when I was laid up to get the word out that I would miss the MOA rally.

Call your dealer, get the bike in there, see what your options are.

[dmthomas]

Cheers all.

I'm getting it taken to my BMW dealer instead, so hopefully will get things sorted and be back on the road soon.

Public transport sucks and doubles my journey time...

[ronnierockster]

Glad your OK. Your Insurance should sort out alternative transport for you, while your bike is being fixed. As it was another parties fault they should pay for you to have a hire bike! Cause public transport sucks. RR

[dmthomas]

The insurance did contact me about a replacement bike, but get this -

I told them my commute to work takes 40 minutes on the bike, which is true. Never taken a moment longer thanks to filtering, a bit of speeding and the joy of always being at the front of the traffic lights.

However, UK insurance companies have an agreement between themselves now that if public transport offers a reaosnable comparative journey time, then a hire vehilce will not be offered. The absurd thing is the way they make this decision.

They compare journey times on public transport given by the tfl website (Tranport for London) website and journeys on road given by the AA route planner, which is of course based on a car and takes average car speeds into consideration NOT bikes. Both of these journey times come out at around the same at 1hr 20mins i.e double my normal bike commute.

So I'm left on the train taking twice as long to get to work because the AA reckons I can't get to work in less than 1hr 20min on the road. Smells fishy to me, but if I demand a replacement bike, I may be the one paying for it if the other guy's insurance company decide to look into it. Whilst it does only take me 40mins, I can't exactly tell them it isn't done at the legal speed limits.

Pretty gutted 'cos it wasn't my fault and I'm fully insured, yet despite that I'm the one who is being most inconvenienced. Anyway, rant over...

[Doug]

Glad you are ok..in the end its all that matters.

[mdouglas]

If the other party is at fault then your insurance company's policy re replacement vehicle has nothing to do with it. If it was your fault then a different story. Sounds like you need to get the legal assistance crowd involved to fight your corner. Replacement bike is only the start. You should be getting the costs of all your damaged clothing/ helmet etc all reimbursed from the other parties insurers, plus your excess.

[malcy]

My uncle dropped his 200 mile old 1300fjr yam(his fault so own insurance claim) earlier this year in a 15mph spill on a roundabout (engine bars were fitted)
Looking @ the bike in my opinion (round bikes for 17 years & mechanic for 10)it was mainly cosmetic damage but pricey & worth doing on a brand new bike
The insurance company wrote it off & gave him more money than he had paid for it in the first place.
They said that the engine bars MAY have damaged the engine casings I thouht that they were meant to save the major bits in a spill?
they also said that they dont repair many bikes now as its more economical to write them off.
But at least you were ok thats the main thing