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Shoot. Much easy getting it back out. Just ride it up the stairs!

You know what? So am I. I'm an airplane mechanic, and have a place for every thing and everything in it's place. Just the same, believe it or not, Mark knows what he has and *where it is.* Back in happier times when he was still more affluent, he had an annual Christmas party for Guzzisti. Food, beer, etc. Lots of it. I cleaned and organized for *days* to make the place look ship shape for the party one year. He told me after that it took him months to find everything again. Ask him anything. If he has it, he'll rummage around in a pile and bring it out. In the above picture, he's on the phone, no doubt telling someone how to fix their Guzzi for free. Salt of the earth, and totally honest. Really, a treasure to the antique Guzzi community.

What the heck’s going on in that picture? It looks like a lot of man power being exerted! Between that picture and the thread about putting the Guzzi down into a basement for the winter, I guess it takes a village to raise a Guzzi.

Just thinking, a "universal joint replacement" is a bong isn't it. Ciao

Either way, having a spare is a good thing. I don't care if they're $20 each. What is the value of not having to tear the bike down? Of not being stranded in a single gear?

(Heh, more of this going on . . . "Hey! Hey, buddy! I got these springs you're gonna want . . ." )

My tyre brand preference is Dunlop, because they're even older then Avon, I think Mr Dunlop invented the tyre entirely himself. Beat that! No, in fact I tried these Avon 3Ds mentioned by Mikko as soon as they came on the market, alas was more then unhappy with them. They felt stiff, undecided, especially on wet roads they left me totaly on my own. This was so already when new and it just got worse. They acceptably performed on hot days only and on hot tarmac. Acceptably. The Dunlop RoadSmart III are my actual favorit because they are predictable and quick and stable right from the first meters (practically) and they keep this nice attitude over the whole distance, 9000km this is. I just feel safe on them, in every weather. About the rear shock: I had mine reworked, a different spring and an adjustable pretensioner was added. Sorry, got no details about the spring. The shop owner, a former technician from Corte&Cosso, once a name like Oehlins in the cross business, said that these ZF/Sachs shocks are of good quality and need only minor modifications to perform really well. I'm quite satisfied with this mods. Don't overtighten the rear mounting bolt (it has a safety nut, you won't loose it) and keep the eylet greased (a little WD40 from time to time) to prevent the inner steel bushings from rusting and the eyelet will last forever (as its owner, of course). The original spring was a bit stiff for single use. I think the new one is softer, even when it's shorter because of the pretensioner While you ask for suspension details: I like my bike as soft as possible (starting always from soft/open) and want the riding height with enough sag (I need 20mm additional preload in the forks for that, btw). In my eyes sag is the most important thing for relaxed road holding, especially at the rear end. Years ago riding height and sag/preload was good for a longer discussion here. Was a good thread IIRC. And sorry now for highjacking the 'My New Greeny' thread

I have a 2004 V11 Sport Ballabio. It had the correct size of boss on the shifter since new. It broke the spring about every 4,000 miles. I tried stock spring, better spring that would not break, but they still did. I was about to do the coil spring mod when Chuck and Scud came up with the fix with the spring with thinner spring steel and two wraps in the coil. I installed about a year and 4000 miles ago and has worked perfectly since. It is the best solution. contact Chuck / Scud about if they are making more or have available

Hello Chuck and Scud, I now have about one year about 4,000 miles on the new spring you provided. Everything continues to work great. If you do another run, I would buy a couple more for the day when I also buy a v11 Lemans in addition to my 2004 V11 Sport Ballabio. Thanks for all your work on this issue. Phil

No to the cost and no to the noise. My bike has Joe Caruso steel gears and neither of those comments apply. Ciao

Way old thread, but back to timing setups. First cup of coffee musing here. HQ gears should last the life of the engine, but such gears - think transmission quality or above - would cost near the value of the bike. Straight cut gears are more efficient than helical (no thrust), but give you that "NASCAR" V8 sound. Lovely for around town, but tiring when droning along. Alloy gears? If we go back 60+ years to the Studebaker car V8s, we find a fiber cam gear! And I know of no failures driving 16 valves for 100K. Rather mild cam profiles I'll grant you, but their performance "Avanti" cam gear was helical alloy. The engineering on the Studes was such that there was crank gear directly meshing with cam gear - nothing in between and no tensioner needed. Where does that leave us? I tend to think that racing engines (fairly frequent tear downs) need gears, while street engines need a good tensioner. Being an owner, have prowled the Kawasaki EX500 forum for many years and cam chain tensioners were a big issue on the gen1 ('87-'93) motors. Fortunatel, the bulletproof gen2 unit swapped right on. They have the silent hy-vo chains and many of them go 100K miles if properly maintained. Says something about the chains in what was essentially a commuter/throw away bike. And this is with the lumpy 180º/540º firing interval they have. I am of the mind that a good aftermarket tensioner will serve me well. Timing setup that Andy Granatelli used to go 168 MPH in a 1963 Avanti. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YG8pdR6VAXw

Thanks for your quick response + interest with my problem.For some reason I have 3 hot wires,the middle or yellow wire we don't worry about,its the other 2 that concern me.Somewhere I read the multi tester is connected to the battery,so if striped wire is hot + plain wire is neg. then things just got a lot easier. When connected I find the multi meter is in overload mode + the numbers are different each time I check (roaming ????). While checking the harness separately I find exactly the same multi readings as when connected to the tps----SOOOOOO what that tells me is there must be a short between the bike harness + the ecu,I will perform a continuity test + see what the outcome is! I purchased a engine temp sensor from MG Cycle however it is not made for the 98 ev ,so beware---they are happy to except a return (there mistake) then I'll purchase the correct one. thank you for your input .

I approached tanking my take off (2004 V11) for the first time with some trepidation after reading others experiences. FWIW, turned out it was NBD getting it back on.

Wat Docc sez.

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Just ride it.

Yes, received. I had houseguests and was away a few days. Your plate should make it out in today's mail. Eric

These parts are that cheap. Once they were "proudly made in USA" by CTS, a competitor of where I go daily. I think some years ago I already did post a link to their site. They sold it as a product meant for "leisure articles" like lawn mowers and the like. 80.000 miles on a big V-Twin definitely is beyond its designed life time.