KirriePete

Let us not forget that it's not just bikes ..... school friend of Mrs KP had been driving for about 6 months when he went off the road on a country lane, thrown out of the car (no seat belt, tut tut!), landed face down in a ditch unconscious and drowned in 6 inches of water. So go out there and ride with your eyes open and your brain in gear, treat the rest of the world as the homicidal maniacs that we know they are, convince yourself that every blind bend and hidden junction has a tractor full of sharp pointy agricultural stuff waiting to lunge at you without warning, and that every road surface has just been treated to a fresh coating of cowshit and diesel ..... hang on, I've just described my 7 mile commute in this morning!

Wot it says - Saturday 23rd April, meet at Scotriders from 11 o'clock onwards for a 1 o'clock ride-out through 'the toon'. Bring a fiver for charity (Glenlaw House respite centre) and an egg (choccy of course!) for the kiddies (various local charities cop for these). The Picnic Basket burger van will, as usual, be on site to cater for your every meat and bread roll based desire, hopefully the weather will play ball again, unlike the snowed-off Santa Run (snow in April? Not unheard of, y'know!). Want to know what you're letting yourself in for? Here's a taste of last year's run: I'll be there, marshalling in my yellow vest. Anyone?

Supreme irony in that he couldn't get past 56 either!

Just had a look over at WEMoto - they list the XVS rear standard as a 59, not 63 .... ? I'm not sure if the little XVS mill could pull a 16/46 ratio - you might end up with a reasonable top speed ..... eventually ..... but be out-dragged from the lights by milk floats, spaz chariots (remember the Invacar anyone?), 3 legged donkeys etc. If it were me, I'd go for the most extreme off the shelf ones I could get - in this case 18/56 = 3.1:1 (ish) - and see how it pulls from there. Should the bike still feel like it's got a bit more 'go' left, then you could decide whether you wanted to spend the extra getting a custom jobby made up. Just sayin'

Normal flasher relay needs the current draw from 21w lamps to trigger the heater ... that bends the bimetallic strip ... that opens the circuit ... that cools the strip so it bends back again ... that closes the circuit so it all starts again. Hence 'click-click' and 'flash-flash'. LEDs don't draw anywhere near enough to trigger the heater, so the lights just stay on. 2 options: (1) Put a ballast resistor in circuit to raise the current draw, or (2) Get a solid state flasher relay - about a tenner in the UK, dunno what that translates to in kiwis. If it were me, I'd go with Plan B, that way you still get the benefit of lower power drain on the system, so you can put a brighter headlight in or better horns or .... Link to Paul Goff indicators page - he does send out to the colonies, dunno what the charge is though. You're welcome.

Wot? You mean like these: 1. Guy I used to see wandering round town when I first started on 2 wheels had a face full of battle scars - story was that he was riding into town from a run out when an old geezer stepped out in front of him. Old geezer's foot went through the front wheel, ripped his leg off & killed him, biker went over the bars and 50 feet (yards, miles, distances change with every telling) down the road on his face ...... open face lid, years of reconstructive surgery, hence the scars. b. Mate of mine, we'll call him Dennis, knocked off by a car turning right as he was overtaking. T-shirt, jeans, trainers, no gloves. Plastic surgery, months in hospital etc ... iii. Another friend of mine found dead in a field after his bike went off the road - dead straight stretch of road, no junctions, no gravel, no skid marks, no mechanical failure on the bike - why did he crash? Never found out. x. Group of us on a ride out to the coast (Gt Yarmouth? Clacton? One of those 2), came across an accident involving biker and a bus. Biker was under the bus and obviously dead, my mate Kev couldn't hack the sight of blood at the best of times so wandered away from the scene. He called out "Guys, it's not gonna be pretty, his helmet's come off!" closely followed by "Oh fuck, his fuckin' head's still in the fucker!" - you'd be amazed at the amount of puke one 5'6" 17 year old can produce! Not put you off yet? Me either, been riding for 34 years (legally, one or two more 'under the counter') and still intact - last 'incident' was exactly 30 years ago (March 1981) and that was just a broken wrist and knackered ligaments/tendons in my knees. Welcome to the asylum!

Surely no-one's that stup .... Wild Foamy you say? Riiiiight!

*Cough* - The dot is acksherly the light bit of the tyre and should go next to the valve. Agree about not bothering with balancing the rear tyre, what with chains(shaft?), brakes and the like all whirling round, a few grammes of rubber here or there ain't gonna make much difference. Front tyre, maybe, but even then we're not talking a huge amount. Easy enough to do at home - just hang the wheel from the spindle so that it can rotate freely. Spin it and mark the lowest point with some chalk once it stops. Repeat a few times and look at the distribution of marks - if they're close together there's a heavy spot down there, if they're all over the place then the wheel's pretty much balanced. Add some weight to the opposite point of the marks and start the spin/mark/spin business again. Repeat until there's no obvious heavy point - you soon get the knack, or give up in disgust. A good source of weights is to get the wife/girlfriend/cute sister to go bat their eyelashes at the boys from Kwik-Fit ... not that I'd condone any such sexist actions, y'understand, just sayin' ..... Solder is also good on spoked wheels - wrapped around the end of the spoke with a light touch from the soldering iron to secure it. You're welcome.

Every engine is slightly different due to manufacturing tolerances, only you will be able to feel if your engine is loose enough to take full chat early on. So take it easy and get a feel for how the engine is pulling, if it feels tight don't be tempted to open it up, let it bed in a bit more. The early oil change may be a good idea, gets rid of any big lumps of swarf, but don't use a posh fully synth oil at this stage - they can be too slippery to let the components bed in to each other - just use a plain mineral oil while you're running in. Mineral diesel oil is good as it doesn't have friction modifiers (clutch slippage issues) and it's got a lot of detergents to clean the crap out, so your internals should be sparkly clean. Once run in, get it back onto a good semi-synth bike specific oil and change it regularly. Here endeth the sermon ....

^^^^ Wot 'e said, but here's a question or two: Has it just started doing this or has it been like this for 7 months? If it's just started, what happened between the time it was OK and the time it wasn't? Playing the idiot card - you are aware that the gearbox is 1 down, 4 up?

Then they add Motorcycle/scooter as an option on the commute question ..... Here's a handy guide to fucking up filling out the senseless form - SadButMadLad over at Anna Racoon's place Enjoy!

Yamaha Noobs for Dummies: Method 1 - Login, don't give any personal info, ask questions about how to fix an ailing machine. Result - No advice given, some abuse maybe, possibly some references to earlier times when folk arrived, got info and pissed off to flog their nail on ebay, having picked enough brains to make it run. Method 2 - Login, post up a 'Hi, I'm new here' in the Noobs section giving a bit of detail. Follow up with a 'My bike's running rough' post slightly later Result - Advice and knowledge imparted, if a geographical location is also given out it is not unknown for local members to pop round and give a hand. Smiles all round. If you think this is being harsh, try walking into your local bike shop, not introducing yourself, barging into the workshop round the back then yelling "My bike's fucked, what's wrong with it?". If you do try this, please post up a video on Youtube, I'm sure we'll all watch it! Manners cost nothing and get huge rewards. End rant.

For the shit-kicking cruiser look it's just got to be leather jacket & Draggin' jeans, probably with Altberg Hogg boots to complete the ensemble. When it rains, the Aldi/Lidl gear is as good as some more expensive brands, and can be improved by washing & re-proofing with Nikwax stuff (Tech wash to clean, TX.Direct to reproof) - the Hoggs are waterproof anyway. Helmet? I like my Caberg Justissimo, flip-front can be removed to make it open-face, internal 'Top Gun' sun visor, some folk say they're noisy but I'm deaf in one ear anyway so don't really care! Mind you, I tried on a Shoei flippy lid a while back, if I'd had the cash spare at the time it would've been going home with me - very nice indeed!

As everyone else has said - 50+ mph on a 'ped is not to be sniffed at, that's what I tweaked my lads TS50X up to using a 70cc big bore, carb & air filter mods and a hike in the gearing. BUT, even with the extra 20ccs it was still a peaky little f**ker, had to be kept above 7,000 rpm for any power at all and ran sweetly between 8,000 & 9,500, taught him how to use the gearbox to keep the mill on the boil, that's for sure. If you try to get more out of it you will most likely end up with a powerband you can shave with plus an engine that's always going to be on the verge of grenading itself - leave it alone, get to 17 and get a 125. Then pass your test and ascend to the giddy heights of 33bhp - woohoo! (The lad? Went 50 - 125 - 250 - 400 and now rides a Bandit 600, thoroughly recommend a similar progression to any new riders)

Logical thoughts: Squeaks come from moving parts rubbing together What moves in the rear wheel and could rub? Chain/sprocket Bearings Brake back plate Axle/spindle Wheel vs bodywork/swingarm So get lubing! Or clean the dust out of the brake drum (good housekeeping anyway). End of logical thought, possible start of drunken rambling .... or not.

Errrr .... I have to ask the obvious, if the engine's OK why not just get the turbo replaced? Those nice chaps at Turbo Technics will do a replacement unit for a lot less than a new car. Just sayin'

Welcome from just up the road in Kirriemuir. Tracks in the area? Just about any road away from the A9/A90 can now be regarded as a track, certainly not worthy of the title 'road' with all the potholes, gravel and general shite on 'em! [End Rant]

Try giving the switch a squirt with electrical contact cleaner - should be able to get it from your local Maplins or similar. Or you could get some ACF50 and squirt it in - you'd be amazed at the amount of crap that gets chased out by this!

Suggestion 1 - put this query in Workshop rather than Events, Rideouts etc... Suggestion 2 - dig around your local area for a blacksmith or engineering company who can do ally welding & see what they say. Do you have the broken bits of fins? If you don't then whoever does the job is going to have to build up the weld in formation, or weld in one big lump and use the angle grinder to make fins. Suggestion 3 - as you're probably going to have to take the head off for Suggestion 2, you might as well look for a replacement, could work out as cheap as getting an artisan to do the tricky welding bit, and you'll have a spare one you can flog on to get back some of the costs. HTH

You can't beat a good bit of wood . I've had metal sheds in the past, all have been cold, noisy (in the rain) and full of condensation, only improved slightly by slapping polystyrene tiles over every surface. This house had a perfect spot for a 12x8 shed so it was off to my local shed boys (at Paddy in case you're wondering Blackhat) and this is the result: Knocked up a wee bench at the end using scrap timber: Just need one of those wee halogen heaters in the winter and I'm toasty - no condensation on anything even when the temp has got down to -20! Give yourself a bit of wood - you know it makes sense!

Given that the 650 has a 5mm bigger bore than the 535, I would expect the big hole in the middle of the head gasket to be 5mm too small - how steady are your hands with a Stanley knife?

Connor, a few thoughts (welcome by the way!): Stretched throttle cable wouldn't stop the bike idling, it would only show up as 'slop' in the twistgrip Has the spark plug been replaced? Might just need a new one, or the gap adjusted on this one ... Choke sticking on? Head gasket gone? Any farting from the cylinder head? Has it 'nipped up' recently (partial seizure) - could be some wear/damage to the bore/rings (probably worst-case scenario) Like I say, just a few thoughts .... HTH

Definitely onomatopoeic, could also be rhyming slang judging by his initial behaviour .....

See Ben, that's all that (grumpy) Oldgit was asking for as an intro - wasn't hard was it? Y'see, this site (along with the majority of bike sites I would say) has a certain informal etiquette in that new members are expected to make themselves known before leaping in with the 'My bikes f**ked, help!' stuff. This helps keep out the quick buck ebayers who are just looking to move on an old nail they've bought and can't fix as easily as they expected. Once you're accepted as a genuine owner/rider you will find that the denizens of this corner of the interweb will bend over backwards to help you out, whilst simultaneously taking the piss something rotten. In the words of Ogri: A Biker will pick you up when you're down, Help you out when you're in trouble, Stand by you when times are tough, get you a pint when you're broke, lend you his tools when your bike is bust give you a hand when you need it, And fuckin' bury you if you cross him! Welcome!