Motorcycle and Scooter appreciation

Ah grim....are they known to be oil burners? How many miles?

British bikes always had the reputation of leaving apatch of oil anywhere they went. My R80 was the same for many years. Eventually I went round and fixed all the leaks. If I leave mine on the side stand oil leaks into the left barrel resulting in a cloud of burnt oil when I start it.

I changed all the driveside seals on my Triumph just after I got it, and it was concerning just how little interference was involved with the interference fit. Maybe that's why they demand that the rider drain the oil before just about any maintenance task: it's usually already drained anyway

Very often, neutral switch, oil pressure switch should be simple fixes but they require dismantling half the bike to be able to get a spanner on them.

Damn, and I thought I had it tough removing 4 bolts on a sump guard to get to the in-line gauze oil filter. Ha!

In fairness a lot of the procedures look worse written down but you would struggle to work them out without a manual.

No photos but I was up til late yesterday, as my master/caliper rebuild kits and amazing purple Hel Performance braided lines arrived.

Stripped and cleaned the rear caliper but didn’t rebuild the master yet. Waiting on a different o-ring for the caliper as they sent the wrong size before I break everything apart again. Front got the full whack.

Plus, while I had it off I also stripped down the sticky near-impossible killswitch button. It will kill the engine but was impossible to un-kill as it would stick in place.

Now it has the cleanest most satisfying click of all the clicky things. Just gotta hope I never have to use it again.

Went for a 120 mile test ride to make sure the brakes were working. Feels much lighter action on both than before, almost disconcerting. Definitely stop the bike though!

Just going out for a test ride, be back Tuesday :)

Ha - made me chuckle too.

Most of my early riding experience was going to get parts from breakers yards.

Need a part, go to breakers, get part, come home, fit part, test ride, something breaks. Repeat....

If only breakers were local enough to make it worthwhile for moto stuff. One scrapyard has been my go-to for mtb/bmx, but the good stuff hasn’t been coming in of late.

But yes I went to get a quick coffee in town centre and test the brakes, and came home via Avebury, Devizes, Stonehenge, Salisbury, Warminster, and Chippenham.

It's a classic with bikers. Pop down the shops for 20 bensons, quick tour of Europe and home :)

Well as I headed Salisbury way, I started seeing signs for Southampton/Portsmouth. No passport on me or I’d have been very tempted.

@Jung seems to be to a degree. Normally they’re just assembled poorly. Some people report new bikes that drain oil.

Anyway, seems like I got to the bottom of it, literally. Sump gasket seems to have given up the ghost. Easy enough fix, apart from removing the headers first, which means removing the header studs and bolts.
Out comes plus gas...

Did London and back M4/M3/M25 on Sunday just for the motorway practice - needed a full there-and-back day to satisfy curiosity. Decided no, it is not worth the time saving.

Fuck me the M25 is bad, eastbound I had my front wheel sketch out at 75mph on a pothole, and there were channeled ruts for miles at a time. How? Awful. Also got punish passed and wanker-signed at, while at 70-80 by a guy going over 100. Gotta love London.

Headwind and rain was so bad I was doing a press-up motion for hours at a time to try keep the front feeling planted.

Speedo cable broke within 30 miles so I was relying on gps for speed.

So. Curiosity satisfied. If pushed, I can do hours on the motorway on the DR, but no. It is not worth it unless exceptional or unavoidable.

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Motorways on a motorbike are just fucking shit. End of. Only reason to use them is if you need to save time.

Here's a curious one. Anyone inside the M25 know how one can get about renting industrial space? Maybe shared with others. I'm hitting plural on project and it's getting very fucking boring taking out and stowing tools away every day.

Sitting on a massive GS or the Harley I took across the US, the motorway is strangely pleasurable.

The 700 miles of motorway I did in a single day, on a rainy day in March about 5 years ago, on an MT07 with no windscreen was single handedly the worst day I’ve had on a bike ever.

Motorways on a motorbike are just fucking shit. End of.

Not exactly exciting but always feel slightly relieved getting on the motorway with the RSV. Surprisingly comfortable and runs a lot cooler. I do get your point though, most of the time it's a misery.

@Chak @Soul I can imagine a long cool dry day on a highway on some giant Goldwing or Harley you might actually enjoy it with some James Taylor or America playing.

But really, wouldn’t choose it again unless it was a necessity. Sunday was about ticking it off from an endurance and “if I had to, could I?” POV. I prefer whenever possible to do something at my leisure, so then if push comes to shove I have the experience under my belt.

Talking of push coming to shove, my dad has been going on about getting a bike since getting jealous. He has an oldboy license so can legally ride anything, except that his last bike was 40 years ago, and a 125 Kawasaki. He doesn’t want power or weight or speed, just that sensation.

I told him to just ride my GN125 tracker, zero power but also zero weight and good fun. He wants his own new bike. Spent days steering him away from the Royal Enfield Bullet Trials 500 replica.

He sat on a Honda CRF250L and kinda fell in love. Sorry not sorry, dad.

Good choice!

I fucking hate motorways, though admit to deriving some pleasure over the years traveling at warp factor 9 on the Peage across France.

An hour ride in the pissing rain on A roads/dual/motorway was ok today until I stopped to check the map and got rain on the inside of my visor, at which point it turned into a dangerous shitshow for the last 5 mins of trying to balance mist/rain/not getting glasses wet.
My cheap rain suit and V-wipe combo worked well up until then to make it a normal-ish ride though, with only one minor incident as I spun up on white paint overtaking.

No Pinlock on the visor?

I skipped straight to contacts after a couple of winters. Pinlock or not, glasses and helmets is a ball ache.

Got dad to drive around the pub carpark for half an hour on the 125, and get used to motorcycles again after a 40 year hiatus.

He enjoyed it but clearly refuses to just take ownership of my 125 for a few months until he’s comfortable enough to ride larger capacity.

He of course found the super low seat height appealing, but also the light weight. Now the CRF appears too tall but low bikes are all too powerful.

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There's a reason a lot of people put their bikes away in the winter. Another one to look out for is low winter sun. Had a friend ran into the back of a low loader that he couldn't see properly because of blinding morning sunlight.

Worth having a decent winter lid with working pinlock and internal retractable sun visor.