Move quickly to get on two wheels

Sep 30 2008 Harriet Ridley

Move quickly to get on two wheels

IT'S been fifteen years since I passed my motorcycle test, and how things have changed.

Back in the day, I signed up for a five-day intensive course riding one of the test centre's 125cc which I was even allowed to take home at night.

On the Monday, I'd never ridden a motorcycle in my life. On Friday, I was whooping with joy, clutching my new licence and jumping on the Kawasaki Z550 my cousin handed me down. Of course, I crashed at the first corner, unused to all that extra power...

Maybe it's not such a bad thing after all that passing your full motorcycle test has become somewhat more of a challenge.

Faced with the credit crunch and the rising cost of public transport, my brother - as many others out there - has been contemplating getting a 50cc moped to slash the cost of travel to work.

A 50cc is all you need to get swiftly from one end of a big city to the other. He doesn't have a motorcycle licence, just a car licence. So he popped in to see me one early morning to ask me what he needed to do to get on two wheels.

I may be a motorcyclist with experience but I must confess that passing your test nowadays has become so intricate - especially with the Second European Driving Directive about to kick in - that I didn't have a clue. So I set out to investigate.

If you have a car licence, then it will act as a provisional motorcycle and scooter licence too. If you don't then you'll need to apply for a provisional licence - the form is available at the Post Office.

Once this is done you need to pass your CBT (Compulsory Basic Training) to ride anything up to 125cc on L-plates and restricted to 14bhp if you're 17 or older. If you're 16, then you can ride a scooter up to 50cc and restricted to 30mph.

All new scooters of up to 50cc come restricted to 30mph anyway. But if you're buying second-hand, chances are the scooter may have been derestricted so watch out. I certainly derestricted the 50cc Piaggio Typhoon I bought in 1997 to tear about town on!

If you want to ride bigger motorcycles, then it's time to pass your test. It's advisable at this stage to get further training, although it's not compulsory. You can take an A1 light motorcycle test, but there's no point as you'll be stuck riding bikes no bigger than 125cc and restricted to 14bhp. For good. It's best to pass the standard motorcycle test and ride around on anything restricted to 33bhp for the following two years, after which you qualify to ride with as much power as you like.

If you can't wait two years for your big-power thrills and you're 21 or older, then it's time for Direct Access training. With this you pass your test on a big bike to instantly obtain a full motorcycle licence without passing Go!

At the moment the motorcycle test - whether standard or Direct Access - consists of two parts. Theory, where you sit down in a classroom and answer questions on the Highway Code, and practical, where you ride around with an instructor on your tail barking orders down an intercom.

You'll have to perform emergency stops and the horrible U-turn, but it'll be nothing like the new part of the motorcycle test that the DVLA was supposed to introduce in September this year, which has been postponed six months because of the lack of new test centres.

This is the Second European Driving Licence Directive (2DLD) and adds to the above a whole new slow-speed part performed at newly-built super-test centres around the country.

It involves 18mph circuit rides, slalom, figure of eight, stacks of the dreaded U-turn and even some off-road sections to test how good your bike control is on dodgy surface. All of course at a higher cost to the wannabe motorcyclist.

So it's time to get in quick if you want to take the current test.