President’s Message – November 2019

I’ve never considered myself as a salesman, but I’ve heard people say that if you’ve got a great product you don’t have to sell it, it sells itself.

Naturally a great product needs exposure to sell, it’s a no brainer that if no one knows about it, it won’t sell.

So, with that said I reckon we (your Club) has a great product, it gets good exposure but tends not to sell that well.

I’m referring to our Club rallies.

We run three rallies per year, and we publicise them well in our Club magazine, but try as we do, we seem to attract the same regular attendees with a few exceptions from time to time of course. Not that there is anything wrong with that as members who have attended Club rallies seem to enjoy themselves so much that they keep coming back for more.

I have been guilty of joking with Graham that when we plan a rally and we discuss how many members we envisage will attend, we invariably agree on a number of around 30 to 35 and sarcastically add that we could make a list of who 90 percent plus of the attendees will be.

So why aren’t we attracting more members on Club rallies?

Rallies are a great event to trailer your old bike to & enjoy riding in the country relatively traffic free with the security of a backup trailer.

A bonus is meeting new people in a relaxed atmosphere with great food and the occasional lemon squash (some members relax more than others if you can read between the lines, yours truly may have been guilty of this once or twice in the past).

I guess I’m biased but I would thoroughly recommend going on a Club Rally if you haven’t been before – they are a lot of fun.

On the subject of Roadworthy Certificates, it seems to me that there are a lot of inconsistencies in what is required, depending on who you go to.

Of late I’ve heard some authorised VicRoads RWC Testers are now requiring noise level tests to be undertaken, others require photos of the inner working of your drum brakes, meaning someone who may have scant knowledge of what they are doing are dismantling aspects of your machine that you / we rely on to allow us to safely stop.

Are they overtightening axle nuts for example to the point where they may fail in service? I throw that one in as I guarantee that anyone that has had new tyres fitted to their motor vehicle by a professional establishment and find themselves needing to change a wheel sometime later on the roadside, will struggle to loosen the wheel nuts with the puny manufacturers wheel spanner because they have been torqued up to the max with a rattle gun when fitted.

There is a document available on the VicRoads website “Vehicle Standards Information 4” Summary of registration requirements for motorcycles & mopeds.

I guess it comes down to interpretation – good luck.

See you at the next Club rally.

Ian Snadden

President CMCCV