Nephew Down.

Just got back from The hospital.
Went out for a quick ride with my nephews. Approaching a gentle bend at about 50-60, slowing to about 35-40. A car was coming the other way and I can only summise but think my nephew grabbed a bit too much front brake.
When I got to him he was unconscious with blood coming from his nose mouth and cheek
he was probably out for about 5-10 minutes, but was horrible as he was just lying limp groaning in pain.
Fortunately quite a few people stopped as my other nephew, who was pillion with me was hysterical.
I managed to keep calm and working in a trauma operating theatre new what to do although at the time it didn't feel like it.
The thing that got me was when the air ambulance landed in the field next to us!
His visor came straight off the helmet and I thing this is how he got most of his facial injuries.
Fortunately he is fine apart from a broken wrist, cuts to his face, a lacerated tongue where he bit it, one eye is closed over and his lips are bigger than Leslie Ashes!
My biggest worry is his bike.
Its a Derbi GPR 125R and I can only describe it as having a catastrophic failure.
The frame has snapped completely where the front forks go through.
The petrol tank was about 20 yards behind the bike and the front whhel has come off as the bottom of the forks has sheared.
The problem I have is that I have since found out that these bikes had a recall as the frames were prone to weakness which the manufacturers
state " may compromise safety"
I will post photos up tommorow. The thing that I cant understand is that the fairing is ok, both brake levers are ok, gear lever is ok, lights are ok but the front end has snapped clean off!!!
was wondering from a legal point of view if we had any hope of this being investigated and how we would go about it?

Sorry if this is a really long post, but seeing that state of him and the bike has got me thinking that there was something seriously wrong with the bike?

[yorkie_chris]

F##kinell. Sorry to hear this but glad that nothing appears to be permanent.

Were you following at the time then? Did the bike hit anything that you can tell? A catastrophic frame failure could be found as a cause by getting someone to inspect the fracture face, fatigue cracking in alloy leaves a distinctive pattern as the crack propagates through stress cycles before rapid failure begins.

If there was a recall, and you didn't take it in for work doing, I would suspect you have no recourse for it. If the frame failed for no particular reason (i.e not a recall model) then you could have a chance.

hope the lad makes a full recovery it could have been alot worse
1/ what lid was he wearing as on my offs ( and ive had a few) my shoei's have never lost the visor even when liding down the road face first at 70
2/ lot of photos and email of bike to derbi with comment is your bike supposed to look like this after a 35 mph crash ( give plenty of details) and askfor / no demand a full explenation and offer their engineers to inspect it if they wish, hinting at the fact you intend to get it properly inspected by vosa as you fear a manifacturing fault and appropriate action may be needed by you and the vehicle inspecterite

[yorkie_chris]

If you say about 35mph crash then they will say it depends what you rode into!

If the frame failed under braking then that is 100% certain their fault! Like I say, find out what the bike hit, figure out where it went after slide started if any.

Normally, forks will bend before the frame does.

sorry to hear this, glad your nephew is not too bad, i would wait to hear his side of the story first to see if faulty bike made him crash or it broke upon crashing.

Another one down.. not a good start to the summer... Glad the damage wasn't permanent to him...

Did the frame break, causing the crash, or was the frame broken as a result of the crash. ... from the description, sounds like it's the former....

To be honest the bike doesn't matter, all that matters is your Nephew's OK.

If it was the bike that caused the injury.... well... *cough* SUE *cough*..

Hope it all goes well and all that.

[yorkie_chris]

http://ec.europa.eu/consumers/images...tachedList.pdf

Originally Posted by http://ec.europa.eu/consumers/dyna/rapex/create_rapex.cfm?rx_id=232

The products pose a risk of injuries because in some cases fatigue cracks have been detected in one of the tubes of the chassis. These cracks become bigger the more the bike is used, and this could result in a complete break leading to an accident.

http://www.vosa.gov.uk/vosa/apps/rec...freeText=Blank

Fatigue cracking would explain it if the frame failed suddenly especially given a harder than normal use such as very hard braking.
All depends whether broken frame was cause or effect. It's possible that the frame would show fatigue cracking but that it didn't fail until after the bike was on the deck and hit something heavy.

Glad the nephew is reletively well... all things considered.

Sounds to me that the frame dmg is more than likely from hitting something, with the forks sheering off with the front wheel as well, not something that is likely to happen in the case of the frame letting go I dont think. I got a feeling your nephew may not have slowed down at all and the bike hit something hard at quite a reasonable speed. Like's been said, you'll have to see what his side of the story is before you plough in at full steam.

hope he heals quick and well

[rictus01]

likewise I hope your nephew has a speedy recovery.

the visor thing, was probably down to not having it fully closed I'd guess, what lid was it ?

As to the "frame" issue, your discription is a little confusing as the forks don't go threw it.

"The frame has snapped completely where the front forks go through"

was this the yokes; or did it in fact snap the headstock clean off?

On the GPR I believe it's a beam frame which are normally very strong, how ever they do have USD forks so an impact above the wheel would have hit the strongest part of the forks and could well have broken the yoke in some way ?

I appriciate it's not the biggest thing on your mind at present, but when you have a chance, some photos could well help.

Cheers Mark.