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Early gift for the Coppa, yes IPA time. Cheers Tom. Sent fra min SM-S906B via Tapatalk

I have a (apparently, by age and application) a FBF crossover. It cracked in the center and was nicely repaired. I drilled it for an O2 bung in the center, thinking to get both cylinders, only do discover that it is no crossover at all merely two mashed flat pipes welded together. What a POS.

Did a little research on Boz Scaggs and he was talking about Steve Miller being an influence for (hmm.. Steve Miller that's someone I haven't thought about in awhile).

Neither do I, actually, because I've never had two normal eyes. From things I have heard (my dad lost an eye, and he still plays footy....), I have the impression that someone who loses an eye may, possibly, deal with it better than someone who never had two. But I may be wrong there. How do I deal with it (riding bikes, particularly), I think I scan constantly how much ground is between me and whatever it is I am trying not to hit. Also, how quick is that thing getting bigger? Parallax also plays a part, I think (with only one eye, you have to move your head a bit to get that). One thing is certain: "ball in the air" sports just don't work. No chance. Footy, cricket, badminten, basketball, table tennis, tennis, whatever. Doesn't work. I played field hockey at school, because that was about the only thing in which I had half a chance. As far as driving and riding bikes goes, there are moments when the brain is convinced there is no road in front of me. Here, left-hand-drive, right-hand traffic, is actually a bit harder for me (the left eye doesn't work, but I don't know how relevant that is). For instance, heading in to a left-hand curve with a car coming out of the curve in the other direction, there is a moment where the brain is absolutely convinced there is no room to get past. It requires a conscious effort, in the knowledge that, yes, the road really is there, and just as wide in the curve as where I am now, to just ride through the moment. It is only a moment, but it is there. Anyway, for anyone who wants to know what it is like, try this. Cover one eye, and get someone to put a bottle on the table in front of you. It is important to not do it yourself. If you do, your brain will still know where it is, even with both eyes shut. Try and put a finger on the top of the bottle, going from well above the bottle straight downwards. Get the other person to move the bottle again, and try again. I'd be surprised if you get the finger on the bottle first time. For the adventurous: cover one eye and get someone to throw a cricket ball or a baseball straight at your face. I'd advise wearing protection for that one.

@Drahchir What color are you thinking? Trying to match an original color, or something creative?

I haven't heard any wind instruments in quite a while here.

OK, apologies for lack of updates as life took over, but have made a fair bit of progress. First off I dropped the sump and changed the filter and checked the screen, totally clean, and no signs of anything untoward (corrosion, emulsified oil). So decided NOT to wait for the Roper plate from Gutsibits and button it all back up with new stainless fasteners. Of course the roper plate arrived a few days after this decision . The rear bevel box was a right mess with flaking paint, so I took out the rear wheel and then the bevel, all pretty straightforward. Removed all the flaking paint and a couple of coats of etch primer followed by the VHT case paint (already established as a good match for the rest of the satin black on the bike) and looking a lot better (see pic before final sanding and top coat). With the wheel out I could take a better look around swing arm and gearbox area. Looking around the clutch slave cylinder there was some localised paint flaking underneath it (2nd pic). I reckoned this MIGHT be leaking seals and decided to take a closer look at the slave, given how difficult it is to get at (Caution: understatement alert!!) With the later frame with additional lower bracing there is NO WAY to get that cylinder out without removing aforementioned subframe. At the same time as all this I attempted two different methods of greasing the front UJ. Yes, the bit I'd been dreading. There's a joke in Norton Commando circles that the bike was built around the horn (behind gearbox, in front of rear mudguard). Well I have concluded the V11 assembly line in Mandello started with that front grease nipple! 1st attempt :- heat grease delivery tube on one of my 3!) grease guns and bend it. Result - one broken tube 2nd attempt :- try from underneath with a flexible hose. This required taking a small notch out of the grease gun head to latch onto the zerk. Result - grease all coming out of the notch, none in the zerk Anyhoo, given the rear subframe has to come out for the clutch slave cylinder access, and that means the swing arm too, I could do the UJ (etc) greasing with all that out of the way... More instalments later!

Stucchi copy it looks like. Doesn't have the crossover suport. But with the light mufflers, not a problem. Mistral crossover is well made, even lacking 0.4hp compare to Stucchi. Cheers Tom.

News posted in the German forum: the new V7 model still has 67 ps. There was initially some speculation that it might go up to 80, i.e. the V85 TT motor, but that is apparently not the case. It apparently does have a couple of Nm more torque, though. The pictures shows a green one with twin disks at the front and USD forks (good move, I reckon), which is apparently the "sport" version. Don't know what the other versions are. Edit: I see the white one with the slightly bored looking girl sitting on it has a single disk at the front. Can't say anything about the Stelvio, as I am ignoring it on account of an inground aversion to chook-chasers.

Early on Boz, Ben Sidran and Steve Miller played in the same band.(at UW Madison) (where he became a member of The Ardells with Steve Miller and Boz Scaggs.[4] When Miller and Scaggs left Wisconsin for the West Coast, Sidran stayed behind to earn a degree in English literature. After graduating in 1966, he enrolled in the University of Sussex, England, to pursue a PhD. While in England, he was a session musician for Eric Clapton, The Rolling Stones, Peter Frampton,

Exact experience for me. My FBF was poorly made as well

I have both a Mistral on one bike and Stucchi on the other. The Mistral is certainly better made. Heck, the Stucchi doesn't even line up the muffers right. One points up higher than the other if ther pipes aren't on the subframe bracket.

Do start your repairs after verifying a GOOD battery.

No it's, either a Stucchi or a Stucchi copy. They Mistral cross overs are rubbish as were the FBF ones. Phil

It never occurred to me that they might be anything else. They certainly look like cast items to me.

The other day I was mounting this C-tec remote charging thing to the car. It's mounted behind and under the back of the hood and has 3 LED's that blink once/second depending on the battery state of charge. Green/orange/red. I got sick of opening the hood to connect the battery tender so I installed this which required cutting the wires and re soldering them in this particular instillation. My pet hate/nightmare is soldering loose wires together insitu, it's a propper bastard. There's a few options out there for the job on the bench but I wanted something for the bench and in situ. Here it is, brilliant. The tongs have spring loaded blades to hold the wire halves and you simply squeeze the pliers and guide the bared ends of the wires together as the strands mesh then when you have the mesh correct you lock the pliers. The ends are held firmly in place so you have 2 hands free for the soldering and the joint doesn't move. Brilliant and worth the $15aud or 2 cents USD. Well worth the expense. The Ctec thing is also great. I don't like leaving anything on a tender. I've seen them fail and destroy the battery and surrounding stuff so I connect the tender and when it's charged the battery I remove it.

Live stream of all the new bikes at EICMA; The show is opened to professional only today. They have already uploaded a lot of videos on YT. Its in French, but hey... Just about to bolt to the airport to air my head a little bit from all the US turmoil....

Lots of good info offered. surely seems like the early input from audiomick on your charging system would be a smoking gun. but exactly what/where in the system you have failure would be the question. assuming you love your V11 and plan to keep it, and/or just want to cover your bases as you tick off possible causes for this current problem, just going through the charging system from end to end isn’t that painful of a process, and I’d say advisable for about any older italian. As stewgnu noted, solder/connections on the front end, the wire and connectors back to the VR, the VR itself, and then the grounding connections, are all things that can cause headaches. I’d say inlikely that the VR itself is failed, but could be, and even if not, on my “keepers” i just replace it anyway with a MOSFET unit, including of course the connectors with upgraded pieces (probably more important), check and/or replace original connectors in that run from the alternator, and really clean up and/or upgrade the main ground to frame. Whack all those moles at once, and just remove all or most the hassles that can come from that bundle of electrics, and probably solve your actual problem as well. As chuck noted, a battery going to zero volts would normally be unlikely to want to come back to life, but hard to imagine that it actually went all the way to zero (though anywhere close to zero is usually pretty lethal to a batt). if you’ve got it back to normal or near-normal voltage, then roll with it, but keep your eyes on it. i’ve had lead-acids come back to life quite nicely, semi surprisingly, but my last Li-Ion to go down to under 2V was “killed deader than hell”. damn shame, as that was a spendy one, on a Duc that had a mis-behaving relay and sat for a few months without “adult supervision” (Duc service bulletin came out for that known issue, but i hadn’t seen that till it was too late… sigh). but you can check that battery health within reason.

Apparently there are still people who propogate the assertation that the earth is a flat disk. Some people are just dumb as dogshit.