Re: Mirrors

[Rich Weyand <weyand@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 01:30 PM 3/6/2000 -0500, Andromeda & O'Neal Long wrote:
>This is exactly what I do but with a little twist.  The inner half 
>of the mirror is wasted anyway, so why not put some blind spot
>mirrors there.  There are several really stylish model available 
>at autoparts stores.  Once you get use to them you feel naked
>riding without them.


Neal's right.  The ones I found are cylindrically convex (not shaped
like a section of a sphere, but like the section of the side of a beer
can), and wedge-shaped, so they angle the view.  They were $1.19 apiece 
at a local auto parts store, and were called "Hot Spots" or something 
like that.  These are rectangular.  The width was perfect to take about 
the inside 40% of the stock ST mirrors, while the height was perfect 
for two of them per mirror, one above the other.  For 5 bucks and change, 
I now have even better side views than the convex circles, filling in 
the spot between the stock mirror and the corner of my eye without a lot 
of extra fish-eye view of me and the bike.  None of my normal viewing 
area on the mirror is blocked at all, as my arm still hangs out just a 
touch past the wedges.  For those with a top box, the edge of the wedge
mirror is about even with the view of the edge of the top box in the 
stock mirror when I tuck my arms in.  And they look pretty trick too.

BTW, these are designed for auto rear-view mirrors, and you are told
to put the thicker side of the wedge toward the outside ("<== this side
toward door" is molded into the back).  For the bike, you want the 
thicker side of the wedge toward the *inside*, aiming the view very 
hard outwards.  This is because the blind spot on a bike is much
forward of the blind spot on a car relative to the driver position.
Or maybe it's the different mirror position.  Anyway, the wedge really
wants to be toward the inside, or you will just be looking at yourself.

Thanks, Neal!


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