No wheelies right?

July 15, 2009 6:40 AM

California scooter filter- I've got a Motorcycle (ride on) test tomorrow at the DMV. What can I expect? Anybody out there recently taken the test and can tell me what's in store? Been riding for years w/o the endorsement. Should I be sweating this test?
posted by Mr.Me to Travel & Transportation around California (7 answers total)

The test itself isn't too difficult but it does get harder if you are on a big bike. I made a point of borrowing a friend's smaller bike because some of the maneuvering is pretty tight.

When I first took the test, I was able to take it on a scooter which made the shifting part of the test rather stupidly easy.

You should be ready to do a weave test through cones or painted dots on the ground, an accelerator test and then a brake within these two lines test.

Really, as long as you're a competent rider, you should be able to roll through it without too much trouble. If at all possible though, you would benefit from checking out the course beforehand. If you can, go by the DMV and watch other riders taking the test and you'll be much better prepared.

Good luck!
posted by fenriq at 7:51 AM on July 15, 2009

Ditto fenriq: Go check out the course tonight if you can. And a smaller bike would make it easier.

Though it's a pretty simple test, the part I found tricky was where you have to ride in a circle between two painted concentric lines -- riding a biggish bike made that awkward (the tester let me try a couple of times, so I passed.) It will help if you can get some practice in turning very slow circles, using the clutch to control your speed. Checking out the course will show you what to expect.

In my test, the only part on the "open road" was a ride round the block.
posted by anadem at 9:03 AM on July 15, 2009

Best answer: Here are some good pictures of the riding skills course.

The key is very slow speed maneuvering with control. If you wobble outside the lines or put your foot down you fail. Also not shown -- practice stopping from a moderate speed with your front wheel inside of a two foot square box. It's harder than you think because the critical point is the patch where your tire touches the ground, not the front of the wheel as you would normally do when approaching a crosswalk line. If you are an experienced rider, spend 15 minutes practicing and you should be fine. You will find the test more difficult if you have a heavy bike with a long wheelbase.
posted by JackFlash at 9:06 AM on July 15, 2009

Ah, just recognized "scooter-filter" -- a scooter should be nice to use for the circle and weave tests. If your scooter has automatic gears then you'll want to use the throttle and the brake, not the clutch, to control your speed. Practice!
posted by anadem at 9:08 AM on July 15, 2009

With a scooter, I wouldn't sweat it. The photos JackFlash posted are pretty much the same as what I dealt with as well. It's mostly just very slow speed, tight circles and maneuvering, the sort of thing that's difficult on a big, long bike, but pretty easy with a small bike or a scooter.
posted by booknerd at 9:36 AM on July 15, 2009

Practice tighter turns than you are used to, as slow as you possibly can go. You almost never do this in daily driving so you can't rely on experience. They'll also make you do a cone slalom, which is only tricky if you try to navigate it like a series of sharp turns - instead, point the bike straight ahead , actually get a moderate bit of speed, and swerve fairly hard side-to-side through each cone.
posted by spatula at 12:26 PM on July 15, 2009

If you don't pass, you can always take the MSF course, which exempts you from the skills test. A lot of the maneuvering practice in the MSF course is similar to that in the DMV test, but you have a lot more room to do it in and they don't expect you to be able to do it on the first try.
posted by twblalock at 4:51 PM on July 15, 2009