Chris's Bike Blog » Equipment

Service, Neck Brace and stuff.

chris — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 10:08:50 +0000

I took the Goldwing to Doble’s yesterday. Traffic was absolutely solid
all the way there and back. How glad I am not to have to fight that
sort of thing every day! It gave me a good chance however to compare
the filtering abilities of the Wing and the little Honda 600 courtesy
bike I used to get back and forth. Whilst the smaller bike can
certainly go through smaller gaps I found that I preferred the Wing for
its road presence, lights and low down grunt. I seemed to have to rev
the nuts of the little bike (its redline is at 11,000 rpm and below
4000 it really does nothing) to accelerate smartly and felt very
vulnerable facing oncoming traffic whilst I scooted down the middle of
the road. On the Wing, it was plain that the oncoming traffic could see
me and moved more to its side of the road – which was not the case when
I was on the smaller bike. The service cost me £275. The technician
noted that my rear tyre was getting squared-off. Inevitable I suppose
given the proportion of motorway miles I have done since the tyre was
replaced (a mere 4000 miles ago) but it underscores the fact that tyres
don’t last long on this big heavy bike.

The postman brought me a
belated Xmas pressie – well actually something I ordered only a couple
of days ago, namely a Leatt neck Brace. I have been watching the Dakar
rally on the TV and every rider is wearing a neck brace. It gave me
pause for thought and I ran through memories of times I have been
pitched off riding off-road. There were certainly a few when my neck
was jarred and I decided that a neck brace was probably a good thing. I
haven’t use it yet and am still in the process of fitting the thing. I
expect it will feel constaining and uncomfortable at first – I just
hope it’s like seat belts in cars. When they first became mandatory, I
hated the feel of them but nowadays feel quite naked without one. It
was expensive at £260 but I got a £215 discount (down from £475 ) from Dirtbikebitz
so I feel that it is probably good value – it certainly wll be if it
saves me from serious injury although I surely hope it won’t need to!

Warm Hands Arrived..

chris — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 13:01:00 +0000

Courtesy of the postman this morning. Thanks too to Derek at Pricedright for getting them sent off so quickly. The gloves are a little large but only borderline so I shall keep them. Naturally I had to try them out and with the temperature at -2 deg C this morning, it seemed like a good day to do it. I rode only a few miles but enough to let me know that the gloves were indeed doing their job and keeping my hands nice and warm. My cold thumbs never even threatened an appearance. Probably the coolest digits were my little fingers but this was only just noticeable and nothing to complain about. Had I ridden much further, I should have been wishing for long johns, it was really quite cold although fortunately without any wind to speak of.

Glove pictures aren’t too exciting, so here’s a shot of the Adventure-Spec bars I installed recently

Out and about

chris — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 17:34:00 +0000

Fresh from the triumph of fitting my new crash bars to the BMW yesterday, I celebrated by having a short ride on it today. Having both been laid low by the flu for two weeks, dearly beloved and I have postponed our Xmas jollifications until New Year – assuming we (still) feel like doing so by then, so today there were no distractions like presents to open or any such nonsense – it was on the bike and off! More accurately, it was about 11 am when I dragged myself to the garage, determined to prove to myself that I was still capable of getting the bike off the centre stand and out of the garage, mounting it and riding it.

I accomplished all of the above, only to discover that far from the imagined peace and quiet that would be prevailing on the roads at this time, countless, godless, antisocial idiots were already abroad, cluttering up the place just like a normal weekday. I turned as soon as I could onto the byways and quiet country lanes but found them so covered in mud and water that even with my new TKC-80s, I felt a mite insecure and given my kitten-like feebleness, I reckoned that it would be quite beyond me to pick the darn bike up if I fell off so I headed for home a lot sooner than I planned.

Aside from anything else, it wasn’t that warm. The bike claimed 5 degrees but my thumbs were sure it was sub-zero. Ah well, time to look at Gerbings heated gloves I reckon..

Ils sont arrivés! Or the Eagle has landed!

chris — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 20:29:00 +0000

My crashbars and bash plate arrived from Adventure Spec this morning. They were delayed apparently because the guys at AS had been unable to get up a snow-covered hill to their workshop on top of some god-forsaken moor and as a result were not posted until Monday. They arrived as shown in a rather unprepossessing bag but also as shown, were actually very well protected from the slings and arrows of Royal Mail by various bits of pipe insulating foam and carefully positioned brown paper.

First impressions are of a very solidly made bit of kit with nice neat welding and excellent powder coating. I just had time to fit the bashplate before it got too dark and cold.

The bashplate makes the BMW supplied bashplate look really poor. Mine had split a weld somewhere on the trails of deepest darkest Wales in September and when you compare the welds it is easy to see why. The black AS plate on the right is welded inside and out whilst the BMW plate is welded only on the outside. Where the split occurred I can see only very limited penetration of the weld metal. Also, the AS plate is made from 4mm ally whilst the BMW plate is only 3mm thick. Also, the BMW plate has a welded seam running up the middle, whilst the AS plate is a single piece of metal at that point.

I hope to fit the bars tomorrow and if they go on as easily as the bashplate, it should be a doddle. All the nuts are in stainless steel and the five spaceers that come with the kit are in balck anodised ally.

Finally I got my map and other good news.

chris — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 20:53:00 +0000

Well TomTom came through in the end although the communications through their web site still drive me potty. I had to create a new email address and set up a TomTom Home account in the new name, then the company switched my map authorisation to the new mail address and I was able to to download it. It seems like a needless palaver to me, caused basically by their desire to a) make their products secure from piracy and b) use a system that is designed for people who don`t have a clue about computers. Good intentions and roads to hell come to mind..

I also got a phone call from Chris at Adventure-Spec from whom I ordered crash bars and a bash plate. He says they were being sent off today so with a bit of luck I should receive them tomorrow. I ordered these as a replacement for the SW Motech bars that I had so much trouble with when trying to fit them ( and which I sent back to Nippy Normans for a refund). I sure hope the new ones fit! I do have a bashplate already – the BMW one but that has cracked as a result of some darn rocks jumping out at me and in any case I wasn`t sure if the new bars would fit around the BMW bashplate. Also the Adventure-Spec plate looks more robust than the BMW one. I shall try my hand at welding that up with my little MIG welder, it’ll make a useful spare for someone.

The Crash Bar Saga

chris — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 08:16:00 +0000

More than three months ago, I ordered a set of SW Motech crashbars from Nippy Norman but they didn’t fit
After endless emails, complaints and attempts to fit a replacement cross piece – which suffered exactly the same fault, I gave up, returned the bars and got my money back.

All in all it has been a pretty sour experience and at no time did I get any explanation as to what the root of the problem was. Having some experience in the manufacture of jig assembled components, I am sure that it is a case of an inaccurate jig-set up at SW Motech but I never got to first base in discussing this with them. Suffice to say, I`ll be looking elsewhere for my bike bits in future.

The Powerpark centre stand

chris — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 17:18:00 +0000

Powerpark is a wonderfully misleading name. In one sense it is accurate, but in another quite wrong. There is no power (unlike the BMW K1200LT) other than using the bike`s reverse gear. The stand is nothing more than a shorter than standard centre stand which is the right height to allow the rear wheel to remain in contact with the ground when the bike is on the stand.

I wanted it because I had strained my back during one of my off-road exploits and I just could not find a non-painful way of lifting the Goldwing onto the centre stand, plus I figured that as I am not getting any younger, it would become increasingly attractive as old age wreaked its havoc on my muscles.

It does take a little practise to get comfortable with using it but I have to say it`s very nice in use and getting the bike on the stand is now a doddle – plus it`s a ride-on/ride-off stand and that is nice too.

The only drawback is when wanting to turn the wheels, front or back, for e.g. cleaning. As both are in solid contact with the ground, you need to insert a couple of bits of one inch thick wood under each leg of the centre stand – accomplished by rocking the bike from side to side and kicking the wood as you do. The first rock is the easiest but with one leg on a piece of wood, the second is a lot harder and the bike needs a really good shove. I think a couple of suitably tapered wedges might make this job a lot easier

Progressive Springs and other things

chris — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 16:55:00 +0000

I had just one day at home when I got back from Ireland (just enough to dry out a very wet tent) before I took myself up to Rotherham so that Ian Cardwell could do some work on my bike. I had a number of relatively minor things to do – mostly I wanted attention for my fog lights that had stopped working (turned out to be only a fuse!! But I had looked at the thing and it seemed OK, honest) but then I added a few more “nice to haves” including Progressive fork springs and a “Powerpark” centre stand.

Ian quickly diagnosed the fuse problem with his continuity tester (note to self, must get one of those..) and having fixed the fog lights in short order, turned his attention to the centre stand. It`s an easy enough thing to do in principle but in practice it is quite difficult owng to the restricted access to the holding bolts – I am frankly glad I didn’t try it myself.

With that installed, the fork springs were next. Once I saw how these were done, I realised I could easily have done this job myself but as usual, it`s the old adage of knowing “where to hit it.”

One thing I had wanted Ian to fix was my cruise control that had stopped working a while back. The main light, indicating it was active would come on but I simply couldn’t set it. Apparently there are four microswitches (front brake, clutch, rear brake and gear shift) that can be the culprit for this problem. Ian reckons it’s the rear brake that is mostly the one to blame. However, in all the Irish rain, mine had started working again, so I can only conclude that perhaps some dirt had been washed away from a switch and that allowed it to operate again. I am glad to say that it is still working after my return home.

Ian finished up at about midday and after refusing his kind offer of lunch, I set off home. I noticed the difference the fork springs made in the first hundred yards – they are truly a fantastic improvement over the originals. No longer is a minor roughness in the road surface a cause of irritation – the Progressives simply iron it out. Equally I can ride harder into the corners than I ever felt comfortable doing before, the front seems so planted. I shall definitely go for the Progressive rear spring (and probably shock) if Honda don`t introduce a Japanese `09 model of the Wing – in which case, I could be tempted to go for that..

Fantastic Wiltshire Ride

chris — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 07:07:00 +0000

A member of the UKGers forum had laid on an invitation ride for big trailies and novices over some of Salisbury plain and anxious to try out some new territory and also to see how my Metal Mules performed on the rough stuff, I was keen to sign up. I became rather less keen as I traveled down yesterday to the meeting place in pouring rain and at one point, practically no visibility. I stopped at a Little Chef about 20 miles from my destination for a warming cup of coffee and dithered about whether I should turn back or not. I am so very glad I didn’t because I had a wonderful day. The rain eased considerably and for the rest of the morning it was intermittent showers and grey clouds but in the afternoon, the sun came out and we had a lovely wamr bright day – as one should at this tie of year I feel!

Our guides were all local to the area and knew the plains like the backs of their hands, including the ranges and when it`s safe to cross them!

The rain ensured we had some nice puddles to play in..

We also forded one river that was quite deep and I wondered if the panniers would lifet the rear of the bike high enough to reduce traction! Evidently not enough to prevent me getting through and the panniers stayed totally dry inside. However, the topbox was a different story. I had put a full bottle of water in it and all the bouncing around destroyed it and all the stuff I had really wanted to keep dry and had therefore carefully put in the topbox, was suddenly not so dry! A valuable learning experience. Another was the fact that a road atlas made with a spiral binding can become a loose collection of pages as the spiral unscrews when subjected to a lot of bouncing around!

Non-Fitting Engine Bars

chris — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 16:06:00 +0000

I bought some SW Motech engine bars for the GS from Nippy Normans. They were a good price compared with other makes and they arrived swiftly. Both left hand and right hand bars went on the bike easily enough although the lower bolts must have been made from putty as the hex key started to cam-out of the mushroom headed 8mm bolts as soon as any torque was applied (In fact it was at about 10NM torque -19NM being the amount specified in the BMW service manual for fitting BMW crash bars to the same mounting points) I replaced these bolts with decent socket head bolts.

Problems started when I tried to fit the cross piece between the side bars. Brackets welded to the cross piece and designed to bolt to the front of the engine were too close together with the result that the bolt holes in the brackets and the threaded holes in the engine did not align. I telephoned Nippy Normans to explain the problem but was taken aback by the tone of the response which suggested (a) it was my fault and that I had to use the correct spacers and (b) if I sent a photo they could diagnose the problem. I explained that it was not a problem of spacers and a photo would only demonstrate what I had said. NN then said if I returned the cross piece, they would check it against their stock and if it was faulty, they’d send me another. I bit my tongue because it is obvious the thing is faulty and I don’t expect that checking against their stock will alter the fact. I really don’t believe my BMW engine is at fault!

This is what I am supposed to bolt together…

I posted the darn thing off to NNs with this photo and will have to wait and see what they say.