Australian Cycling Forums - Bicycles Network Australia

Was on my cycle commute home from work late last week, on a 6 lane divided road - 80kmh zone, doing about 40kmh when something catches my eye in the nearside far lane. I look across to see a large grey plastic hub cap/wheel cover trundling down the road at about the same pace as what I am traveling at, slowly making its way across the 3 lanes towards me!

It manages to miss all the cars in each lane as it slowly moves across - it's like a heat seeking missile, heading straight for me! There is a moment of indecision, whether to brake or speed up to avoid it, I have no room to swerve as there is no shoulder, just a gutter to my left and ~80kmh traffic to my right! In the end I manage to judge the trajectory correctly, scrub off a little speed and it passes within a meter in front of me! I had to laugh, what are the chances of being taken out by wayward hubcap!

J-C90 wrote:Was on my cycle commute home from work late last week, on a 6 lane divided road - 80kmh zone, doing about 40kmh when something catches my eye in the nearside far lane. I look across to see a large grey plastic hub cap/wheel cover trundling down the road at about the same pace as what I am traveling at, slowly making its way across the 3 lanes towards me!

It manages to miss all the cars in each lane as it slowly moves across - it's like a heat seeking missile, heading straight for me! There is a moment of indecision, whether to brake or speed up to avoid it, I have no room to swerve as there is no shoulder, just a gutter to my left and ~80kmh traffic to my right! In the end I manage to judge the trajectory correctly, scrub off a little speed and it passes within a meter in front of me! I had to laugh, what are the chances of being taken out by wayward hubcap!

Glad you got out of that incident without any damage to you or bike. I must say that has never happened to me before so it is rare indeed.

J

Happened to me while riding my motorbike. Hubcap came off a car coming towards me - it rolled along the middle of the road before veering with perfect timing to hit me squarely on the toe. I was wearing boots, but it still hurt like mad..

Rds,

David P

i was driving once and my bumper hit a cement sheet flipped up off the road by a truck. i remember thinking - lucky i wasn't on my motorbike or bicycle.

Don't worry about the hubcap (wheel cover actually) the real deadly one - very low risk, but deadly - is the stray wheel. People who don't look after their car and the bearings fall apart, leaving a dislocated wheel to career down the road at 80kmh+. People have been killed by this.

il padrone wrote:Don't worry about the hubcap (wheel cover actually) the real deadly one - very low risk, but deadly - is the stray wheel. People who don't look after their car and the bearings fall apart, leaving a dislocated wheel to career down the road at 80kmh+. People have been killed by this.

I have actually witnessed this too, but I was in my car at the time. It was in a 80kmh zone but in traffic that was probably only doing about 60kmh, luckily the wheel(from a 4wd) bounced into the service lane and the only damage was to a parked car. The 3 wheeled vehicle managed to pull up safely without causing any further incident. Could have done some real damage to a pedestrian or a cyclist.

The other thing I worry about is trucks kicking up crap off the road and flinging it at me as they fly past!

Reminds me... Heading home a few months ago "ching", I heard something hit the cyclone fence next to the road just ahead of me. Hockey ball that had escaped the field in Shenton Park cleared another 3m fence and a road, travelled 50m at least.

Never had a close shave with a wheel, but last week, while still just in town I saw a stick on a very narrow road and while deciding the commit which side to go around it, it started moving.
Turned out to be a young Black snake, probably just woken up from it's winter snooze, most dangerous time, thankfully I'd picked the right way to go around it because I still passed within half a meter.

Martin

... Yes indeed, I have been out on the motorcycle & seen the complete wheel come off a box trailer,approaching from the opposite direction, which, as you say, was like a missile heading straight for me.... massive acceleration only to see it pass and hit a front fence behind me, and ricochet to who knows where....it missed me! that's all I was thankful for.

... On yet another motorcycle ride (2 yrs later)... ...past a golf course (60km/h) THUMP!! an almighty chest pain.. .."Damn I've been shot!! only to see a golf ball bounce off my chest.....PAIN LIKE YOU WOULDN"T BELIEVE
No broken bones but three weeks for the bruise to dissipate, through the leather jacket


...what are the odds....



YES I still ride motorcycles and HPV's to this day