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Use Titanium and you never need to concern yourself with the surface finish ever again. If the bike was dumped in a salt water lake for 100 years all that would be left would be pristine titanium fasteners. Phil

I know you're getting up there in years but surely you haven't forgotten what a bikewash really is?

The saga of Bubbles continues .... In my last contribution (a generous term, that) to this thread, I explained why I needed a new rear disc for Bubbles. I did eventually find a new EBC disc at a reasonable enough price. It arrived. Not wanting to put new parts on the parts bike, I put the new disc (and new pads) on the Tenni, so I could put the very serviceable disc from the Tenni on to Bubbles (with new pads). Everything went fine with the Tenni and I cleaned up the caliper and bracket while I was at it. Moving on to Bubbles, I removed the caliper and brake bracket and started removing the six bolts holding the disc to the wheel. Four came out. Not wanting to round over the socket bolts, I removed the spindle the rest of the way and removed the wheel to my work bench. There, I hit the two tough bolts with PB blaster and propane flame to try to loosen them up. Despite trying to be incredibly careful, the sockets were rounded over (first time I touched them on this bike, so I'd like to blame P.O. ). Out came the drill. Drilled a hole into each bolt. I was able to get one out with a Speed-out, leaving a single bolt. Speed-out well-situated, a little torque, and ... snap. Speed-out sheared off inside the hole. Obviously, my drill bits didn't make a mark on the hardened steel. Shite. Called a local machine shop; they recommended a place with an EDM; that place recommended another; which said even if they could get it in the machine, it would take hours to burn out the hardened steel, to the tune of several hundred USD, so just buy a new wheel. I talked to an engineer friend of mine who said he would have no issue riding a bike that had five of six good bolts holding the rotor. However, my wife disagreed. If you've never had to get hardened steel (carefully) out of a threaded hole, it is possible. You can't drill it out, but you grind it out . A stop by Tractor Supply and Harbor Freight and I was armed with a 3-pack of chainsaw blade sharpening Dremel bits and a kit of a score or so of diamond encrusted bits of all sorts of shapes. After going through two of the chainsaw sharpening bits and on the third, I could probe a tiny hole -- the previously drilled out space beneath the hardened steel. Expanding that tiny hole with a long, tapered diamond bit, it looked like this: A little more grinding (I felt like a dentist -- kind of fun) and eventually a good sized chunk of hardened steel popped out. A little more fine diamond grinding and I was able to clean up the hole with the chainsaw sharpening bit. Then, a more robust extractor and the rotor bolt came out, threads and all. Existing threads in wheel where mostly intact, so passed a thread tapper through to clean up: Very light file on the flat at the rim of the hole, squirt of compressed air and voila, problem solved. Several hours and $16 of abrasive drill bits later. Cheers, FreyZI

I just spent 3 weeks in Italy/Switzerland/Austria/Germany riding the Alps/Stelvio/Dolomites, etc and all over Northern Italy...with one to 3 well experienced guys riding the new 1300 BMW's and me on a stock 2020 V-85 with 90,000 km on it .....There is nothing the BMW 1300 can do in the tight and steep mountain roads that the V-85 cant do except blast for a minute on the straights..and in fact the v-85 can do the tight steep Stelvio and Dolomite switchbacks better..you just have to use the gearbox more and push it harder..on the highway it'll run along for hours at 155KM just fine...Plus you have the Character of a Guzzi Air Cooled under you..:-) No rider modes,traction control..etc...just fun.

My Ohlins and doccs shindy have 2 spherical bearings. One on the shaft and one on the male rod end bolted to the lower triple clamp. The question was if the Hyperpro has an additional spherical bearing fitted in the damper BODY clamp that attaches to the lower triple clamp rod end fitting the same as my Ohlins body clamp. Therefore you have a spherical bearing in the body fitting another one on the triple clamp fitting and another on the rod end 3 in all. If the Hyperpro damper body clamp fitting does have a spherical bearing fitted then you can't use the std lower triple clamp spherical bearing set up and need to either have a solid triple clamp fitting such as the one I made up OR replace the damper body spherical mount with a solid bush. Phil

This is the best I can approach understanding this: The secondary bearing in question is not the one at the shaft attachment to the frame (that one is tertiary). The primary bearing is in the Heim/Rose joint off the triple tree. The additional bearing in question is apparently attached to/ built into the damper body, whereas the Shindy mount has a solid clamp to the body. (I am prepared to stand corrected on this business . . .)

No problem; enjoy Kansas! It is going to be a test for me. I have never yet ridden in a motorcycle group per se. The maximum I went out for a ride were three, that's a long time ago. Since I got a confirmation notice, it means the ride is happening; more than two people have subscribed.

Liked "Murdered by Love" from the first time I heard it years back on an FM blues show. Looked for the original by the Blue Monday band. Found this version with Roguie Ray and some smoking geetar. No CDs available, so I bought VINYL.

There is/was this contractor that is the best in the Tri-state area . I happen to be the man he trusts to take care of his mechanical needs. He tests everything he uses/works with . He found that the Robertson head fasteners were superior to Torx AFA spinning out , the lifespan of the tool bit , etc.

Pretty happy with my Hyperpro damper too mate... Been about 70,000 kays and no issues. Cheers

Johnny Gotta-Gotta Boom-Boom could get me a ticket-ticket riding with this in my head . . .

This is such good procedure! I am happy to report mySport's Japanese Shindy passed the tests after ~68,000 miles/ fifteen years . . .

5 months ago..Daryl Hall at 77yrs old Joe Walsh at 76 yrs old...Are these Cats cool or what?

No, mate. That is not a common hammer. That is a precision adjustment tool for specific British motorcycle models. Well, all of them, actually.

At the BMW Dealer in Escondido, CA a few weeks ago after I had dropped in to see the new Guzzis they were carrying (Thanks Scud for the tip)...they also had a BMW Scooter/Motorcycle that was electric. $15K for a 75 mile range...good looking, but I just don't get the price vs. range ROI...one can get 3 nice used Guzzis for the price of 1 electric BMW scooter/motorbike.

First

We're talking about motorcycles that are more than 20 years old, and not even known by a large part of the population. Finding a buyer takes time.

I suppose I could buy @Tom in Virginia's V11 to bring a Spiner to the XX'th, but, even now with "only" three Guzzis, I can't keep up with DMV bureaucracy and maintenance, etc., much less ride them as much as these sweet beasts deserve. But I can at least get the V85 ready for the run down to Tennessee. And, you'll be seeing double as first-time-Raider @AJ Howard will be on his Oreo Guard, too. He and his on the left in this pic of a ferry ride across the Ohio River in May. We're taking two days, with an RON as usual at Princeton, W.V. Kathi will drive the "support van," which means she'll also get to control my road food. Sigh. Life's full of tradeoffs. In the meantime, my Guardia is on the lift for its conveniently timed 12.4K service. Best, Bill

Successful "BikeWash" (154 mile shakedown ride) today. Today was mySport's 24th anniversary, so extra-special. On the lift, now, for tires and brakes and such . . .

THX for your quick input. I was explicitely asking for the type of it because most retailers sell them only described as "Honda VFR" or whatever Jap bike people want to pimp. No hint about the stroke in these cases. In the meantime I've found a shop that's selling LSLs for 135,- Euros, so my question from above has become a bit pointless. Sorry. I measured my Bitubo and found the necessary stroke being something around 65 mm. Before I tried to refill it, with no real success alas. It's not too difficult to open, the tricky thing is to find the correct amount of oil to be put in. A drop to much and it becomes sticky, one too less and it's burpy again. In my eyes it really makes no sense to do this if you don't have the possibility to refill the nitro cushion. As soon as this unit is anything less but perfectly smooth your cornering is spoiled. That's my experience. In this case you better go without these 400gr of now silly balast only. THX, Hubert