Riding fixed gear is like driving without brake lights

Did he bring up whipskids?

Oh, of course he did.

All this talk of rear-ending has made me a little hot under the collar

I think its settled our new brake signal should be Whip skidding. Seconded by Bothwell

I usually establish the rider in front is slowing down by the curious nature in which I begin to get close to them. If someone gets caught out, then they're too fucking close.

Anyone who changes down through the gears in a car to slow down is a n00b, unless you can heel / toe properly. My gf does it and it makes me shudder. Brake, then select the gear for the situation. 'But how do I know what gear to be in if I do that?' She says. FFS.

Continue to fuck my gearbox, clutch and engine mounts into oblivion then.

Sorry, this is neither rant nor cars thread.

Riding fixed gear is like getting trapped in a revolving door.

My signal for slowing down is a shrug and mouthing the words I can't slow down, because I'm impossibly urban.

Riding fixed gear is like getting trapped in a revolving door, whilst the reanimated bodies of Derek Nimmo and David Niven jerkily and fruitlessly engage in a duel to the death, armed only with a collection of roman coins and a 10mm open ended spanner which has gone rusty.

I'm surprised this wasn't mentioned earlier.

Continue to fuck my gearbox, clutch and engine mounts into oblivion then.

Sorry, this is neither rant nor cars thread.

Hahaha! So true.

Can't stand this, neither can I stand over-revving from cold start.

I once walked to the offie without shoes... Never again!

My driving instructor taught me to gear down to slow down. This was in 2010 so not really ancient history.

And that was for a HGV licence or a bus?

I once walked to the offie without shoes... Never again!

Saffas...

Probably not a good idea to start hypothesizing over possible blame apportioning based on pedalling mechanics in the context of non-cyclist perception. There are already enough things that unscrupulous lawyers and deluded judges have in their 'it was the cyclist's fault' arsenal.

^This.

Just so as not to appear too flippant, lazybeard...

My pedalling slows if I'm stopping.
I position myself, indicate clearly and make frequent eye contact with other road users around and behind me.
I only stop when I need to - ie. at lights and crossings - along with the rest of the traffic of which I'm very much a part.
Sudden stops are extremely rare.

All ways to show drivers and other cyclists my intentions.

So far (in over 15 years) I've never once been rear-ended by a motor vehicle. Nor have I heard of it happening to friends. (I do know one or two who've gone in to the back of a bus though, usually after the pub.) As EEI rightly says " When something slows down it goes slower. Period."

Not sure what you mean by giving freewheelers "a heads-up" - how does being told that they (or drivers?) may or may not see that you're slowing, in any way protect you? It's rather disingenuous to make such a bold (and to many of us inaccurate) statement and then moan that we're being defensive and/or not taking your "fact" seriously.

Would it be right to assume your friend here had a rear-ending experience?

Since you ask, Miss Mouse, no - I've never had a rear-ending experience, and I'm glad you haven't been rear ended by a motor vehicle. Have you ever been rear-ended by a bike?

I'm a much less experienced fixed rider than you. When I started 7 months ago, I had a couple of ped-freezing-on-zebra incidents in the first couple of months. I found it mildly irritating, but I didn't stop to think why it was happening until I went out on a ride with some freewheeling mates. Early on in the ride, my close-following friend was forced to take evasive action: "I didn't realize you were slowing down because you don't stop pedalling." That's when it dawned that the crossing-hesitant peds and our near rear-ending incident were down to the same thing - my constant pedalling disguised my deceleration.

Both me and my mate were arguably at fault here. But once there was awareness of this disguised deceleration effect, there were no more incidents. If I knew about it before the ride, I could have told him, and the incident would have been avoided. How could that not help? I would have found that information useful.

As you and EEI rightly say "When something slows down it goes slower. Period." This is true. But people like you and EEI are not the problem. You are experienced and aware cyclists who aren't about to run into the back of anything. The problem is the "nodder" who is pumping along 2ft behind you, who was dumb enough to be deceived by your pedalling approach to the crossing earlier in the day when he was a pedestrian, and so is quite likely to be deceived again.

I think it helps to be aware - especially if you are just learning - that if you are riding fixed gear, the unusual mechanics of the bike mean that you can give out signals which may be misinterpreted by less experienced road users (ever get out of the saddle to slow down?). Because you are constantly pedalling, you will send out one less (fewer!) deceleration signal when you slow. This is just a fact. Might this have potential safety implications, and by extension a positive effect on the way you ride? Maybe it will underline the importance of developing sophisticated signalling tactics like the ones you and BringMeMyFix describe.

That's what I think. However, I am still open to the possibility that I am talking bullshit so bottomlessly stupid that it is too physically painful for a reasonable person to even consider. If someone would be kind enough to explain why.

I tried without shoes again today... some looked at me odd. but might have been the hot pants

I've ridden a polo bike around central london, a polo bike is slow and has a freewheel. People are wary of bikes RLJing. That's it. Even if you freewheel towards a set of traffic lights you could still be doing 20mph+

Today doing a Dr Bike I encountered someone whose rear brake on their road bike was not working and he was confused as to why. On closer inspection there was something installed on the brake cable on the brake caliper. I asked what it was and he explained it was the sensor for a rear brake light, the rest of the system had been removed.

It was one of these devices.

I am not sure that it was designed for a caliper brake.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZlRE6yGDYAU#at=192

The stupidity was the way the sensor had been installed it stopped the brake actually working!

So it was now a device that lied, it told the person behind that his bike was stopping but it couldn't.

It made me think of this thread.

It made me think of this thread.

Flicking my gonads with a small metal ruler makes me think of this thread.

There is a promising career in politics awaiting OP.

Correlation does not imply causation

There is a promising career in politics awaiting OP.

Probably in language.