Riding in France

The silly 12mm headed oil filter bolts are prone to that. I used
plumber's grips to remove mine. Get a 17mm headed aftermarket one. In
fact, I might have one, or at the least, a decent 12mm one.

Those f/glass rear guards look OK if painted silver.

Serious question here. You can chrome plastic, right? I mean, when you
buy plastic kits of cars and bikes and suchlike, you get chromed
plastic. And the Japs routinely chrome plastic parts on bikes. So why
can't one get one of those plastic pattern rear guards chromed?

Is there any particular reason. I mean, is it too hard to do something
that big, or what? Any platers here know the answer?

 

Are you absolutely positive they don't have an equivalent accord bilateral
covering Swiss licenses?

 

Indeed, I recall posting this to a thread before Tog Tour.

 

Erm how exactly would one go about that then?

 

Yersh... that would be useful.

 

Not at all. They certainly do have agreements in place, but I think
they don't go as far as those with other EU states. They'd not be able
to physically remove your licence, for example.

I've long since given up routinely testing the state of affairs by
setting off all the French speed cameras I can find, and I do know of
one case where the Swiss police have chased a French-registered car
driver for several speeding tickets, but not heard of any the other
way round yet. ISTR I did get flashed by a temporary roadside one
recently, although I was only doing about 55kph in a 50.

 

They didn't when Little Bruvver was nicked in his Swiss-reg Oettinger
Golf. He got clean away. Mind you, that was in the early 1990s.

 

Little Bruvver again. You've heard of the DVLA taking off licence
entitlements when you send away your licence for change of address or
something? Well, with him, they did it the other way around. His came
back with a Class One (C+E) HGV and a bus entitlement on it. He's
still got them

 

Indeed, I was thinking in terms of a silver basecoat with a few coats
of 2pack clear laquer.

IANAplater but the process is fairly simple, you just need to spray the
part with a special conductive paint before plating in the usual way.
My guess is that the demand is not there to do it in less than production
quantities.
But ICBW.

 

Penalty notice arrived for not taxing the B12. I call DVLA, "I sold it
7 months ago and sent the relevant bits of paper to you". They denied
knowledge.

Cue one email containing scans of proof of postage, and sale receipt
from the trade-in. Oh, and the threat of involving my MP (SoS for
Health),

 

He would have had his licence confiscated by the side of the road and
returned to him after his ban.

For the French, it's worse. They are required to redo their driving test
and their vehicles confiscated by the state[1] (IIRC).

[1] Where are the French lurkers when you need them.

 

You're required by French law to have the originals. This was discussed
before the French run, this year. Otherwise automatic riding/driving rights
suspension.

 

Pretty much. Mind you, if you've got an insured driver with you, they can
take control of the vehicle.

 

Hmm, I'd heard that there are agreements between the Swiss/French. The
Spanish/French too.

 

Same for SWMBO. She got given a full motorcycle entitlement.

 

When was that??

 

I tend to take my real licence, and photocopies of V5 and insurance.

 

Lucky for you!

I always have them with me when I go to France, having been tugged
before and it made life a lot simpler then too.

 

Heh. I think the main thing was the licence. They probably couldn't be
arsed with the rest. Also, the only country that asks for the paper
counterpart (IME) is the UK. The rest of the countries don't know about it
(probably).

 

Maybe I've missed something in Champ's post, but what was difficult about
getting a shrug and being told to move on?