Motorcycle and Scooter appreciation

Yea that’ll happen !

Absolute filth of a ride today. Both literally and ironic-figuratively. The guys who suggested going out all cried off so I was with this ex-crosser enduro madman.

This was taken shortly after the first of two daft offs.

Slippery as a slippery thing. Took it slow as I could, but sometimes you gotta gas it out of trouble.

What a great ride though, even in knee-high ruts and lanes flooded up to the seat. Even in the rain, starving hungry, with no water left in the 2L bladder, I would have been smiling if I had any energy left in me!

Drenched to the bone, and barely 50 miles door to door!

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You running pirellis?

Michelin Tracker.

They’ve been on the bike over a year, so rear is more than half worn. Even brand new it would be tough to find grip in the slop today

Bah humbug. Left stranded by the Italian wonder. Sodding dead battery. I assume the charge side wiring has shit the bed somewhere new…..groan.

Michelin Tracker

These are at the top of my shopping list. Currently trying to figure out whether to stick with the factory size or go wider.

Let the strip and rebuild commence!

@jambon Salutes, that looks like proper shitfromthebutt kinda slime. Where you riding these days by the way?

Looks simar to the pirelli I have, which are shit in comparison with the starcross/enduro i had before. I need to swap back.

A very apt description of the conditions, this one was near Hitchin. There was a 20m section where I was riding with one foot down and the rear end fishtailing, if only it was deliberate eh! Mainly riding in Beds, Herts and Cambs these days but probably more Herts if anything due to the amount of boats. Can really see the appeal of going further afield like Wales/Cumbria.

@Jung tough luck mate, been there. Hope all gets diagnosed and fixed soon enough to put your mind at rest.

Ranks as one of my shortest lived repairs! Ah well. Ah well, can’t be too complicated.

Blew a fuse on the alternator side. Weird - will have to keep an eye on that.

@skinny there’s a lot of arguments of personal preference vs skill vs terrain with dirt tyres. I went to a TRF meeting with a friend who is a member. One of riders really hates on Michelin Tracker. He had a lot of reasons why and none of them applied to me. For one, he was on a hard enduro bike often riding a lot of slippery rocks. Everything he seemed to dislike didn’t factor into lanes I ride.

We had very limited grip at times yesterday, but we were driving through rain-saturated chalk/mud mix and lanes flooded to our waists. Kenny was on Trackers as well, but running bibmousse inside rather than tubes.

Even more than 50% worn, my trackers found grip whenever I truly needed it, like up a muddy verge. I messed up the climb, and was maybe 45° to it because of the ruts, but with a lot of gas and some clutch I climbed out.

Of course, I was sliding sideways and did a full 360 turn by the time I was level again!

@jambon they are cheap enough you can’t go wrong. At times no tyre will grip, but at relatively low pressures the Tracker are very serviceable.

Some prefer the Enduro Medium as a rear. I have a fresh set of Trackers waiting at the mechanics (stock was low all year, so we bought and stored them for me) or I might have tried.

As for changing from stock size? I don’t think it’s worth it til you find the limit of their ability in standard. Too much risk of swingarm rub if you get the measurement wrong.

Very weird. Time to get the multimeter out?

Oh 100% simply for the terrain I ride having a Starcross up front is so much better than the pirelli mixed use tyre. Also I found that the mid use tyre was no better on road than a Starcross. So why run a compromised tyre if there is no gain.

Doesn't matter here if I run no road legal tyres. But in UK sure would.

Discovering how reasonably priced knobbly tyres are was a nice surprise, they're almost on par with bicycle rubber. Might go with Trackers front and rear, a little rear squirmage may even be a good thing as I'm still learning how the bike moves around. Sound advice on size too, ta!

@jambon yes super cheap! I also had a compliment of sorts from a very experienced roadie - he tried the bike and didn’t dare lean over because of how soft I had the tyres (~8psi). After that he said he was well-impressed having seenh me lean the bike over cornering on the road. Even for a novice like me I just explained it’s how they feel, and you get used to it.

@skinny for sure. You are riding in dry hard terrain, no? Walking the Camino it looked a lot like this, and I would expect a hard compound enduro tyre to be better suited…

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Yeah exactly that terrain.

What did you do wrong ;)

Sorry to teach you to suck eggs, but is there a magnet problem? Both field and if they are starting to come unstuck. Did you solder and use leaded solder on the joints, have had issues getting the cable joints clean and the joint resistance low.

Careful as some knobblies are off road only. Also that they don't last long on the road.

Get used to the fact the bike will move around under you. The idea is to be relaxed enough to let the bike either sort itself out. Once you have that sorted, tell me how ;)

Even for a novice like me I just explained it’s how they feel, and you get used to it.

If it right in your head then that is alot of the battle won.

Thanks, Michelin Trackers are road legal so no issues there. Coming from a road background learning to feel comfortable with the bike moving around is taking some getting used to, but very satisfying. I was so successful a few days ago the bike actually laid down on it's own, pretty impressive I'm sure you'll agree.

The biggest problem with knobblies on the road is how fast they wear. Everything I’ve had here from Dunlop Geomax 360 MX tyres, through to Kenda Desert rubber wears the knobs out double quick if you attempt anything spirited on the tarmac.

A little bit restrictive if you have substantial road miles to get to the trails.

Nothing that I can see. Checked everything again yesterday afternoon and it all looks fine. I suspect the battery got a bit low cranking it in the cold and then pulled enough juice to fry the fuse. Will see.

Have been caught out by the tyres in the past, when going on road between lanes.

My believe is that off roading riding helps on road riding, especially getting used to the bike moving on its own and not be phased.

Ah the mysterious electrical fault, in that case you need to make a sacrifice to the electrical germlins ;)