Skeeve

First off: The "add goo" rubric is solely for those experiencing poor mileage issues or doing short-haul commutes in cooler weather, where the excessive "engine cold" fueling prevents the engine from coming up to temp in the brief ride time before shutting off & you wind up getting "mayonnaise" in your engine as a result. Ratchethack rides on Mt. Palomar frequently, which is about the only reason I could foresee someone needing to add goo to their sensor holder here in sunny Lo-Cal So. Cal. [where the money is plastic & the people are too!]: we're not exactly on the list of "cold environments" Guzzi had in mind when they were working up the injection map... Secondly: if you already had the PC3 on your bike, why would you add a variable to the system? The PC3 isn't adaptive; any added variables essentially require a remap [altho' you can get away w/ some minor changes & not end up outside the "acceptable performance envelope." Don't bother removing the goo: get your PC3 remapped w/ all the present variables [make sure the engine is good & hot when they do it] and you should be happy once more... and then don't change anything!

I think I know this: they wanted the stand off so that the sensor wasn't perpetually heat-soaked by the surrounding finning. Kind of a "can't see the forest for the trees" issue... Of course, if they'd just plugged straight into the head, the conduction path would be thru the sensor body and we wouldn't need to worry about adding goop, heatsinks or any of the rest of this... Maybe they were concerned about melting the connecting wires? Irrelevant to our concerns, anyway; we've got to work with what we have!

Dave, pay attention! The goo doesn't have any caloric of its own! Get with the program; the goo only changes the speed of the sensor registering the change in engine temp (frequency), not the amount of that change (amplitude.)

No. Adding the "goo" doesn't cause the temperature to deviate from what the Guzzi engineers intended: it merely enables the sensor to follow the changes in cylinder head temp. more closely; the incorrect fueling at high or low temps is exactly as intended. Adding a heatsink similarly does not cause deviation from the factory settings, but again allows the sensor to track the reduction in CHT more accurately rather than its own accumulated stock of heat [1] since it is so shielded from airflow and has such limited surface area thru which to shed heat (via radiation or conduction.) Here's the deal: The stock CHT holder has a brass base [for conducting heat from the cylinder head to the sensor], and a thermoset resin upper half [to insulate the sensor from excessive heat transfer from the body of the sensor, vs. the conduction via the sensor tip.] Complaints about this sensor center around its delay in allowing the sensor to come up to temp when riding in cooler environments and the propensity for structural failure upon removal attempts. But here's the deal: the stock sensor holder never needs to be removed in the general scheme of things! The sensor can be unscrewed, some thermal conduction goo added, and screwed back in. Hey presto, my fingers never leave my hand - magic! The brass sensor holder [that was stock on the 1100 Sporti?] was replaced because it allows too much heat transfer, even with attempts to reduce this effect by "finning" the brass body. What's funny is that the gap between the sensor tip and the inside surface at the bottom of the hole the sensor screws into is about 2x that of the plastic sensor holder! So the more rapid changes to fueling in cool environments experienced by users of this part [whether stock or retrofit] is entirely due to heat conduction via the sensor body, rather than via the sensor tip! Sorry, I'd post pics if I had 3 hands & the time to futz about with this, but I just measured a plastic holder vs. the brass SxS today & spent some time thinking about what the differences between the two parts meant. Moral of the story: add the thermal goo to your plastic sensor holder while the part is relatively new & unlikely to fail upon removal of the sensor, and don't worry about it after that: you've expended minimum effort to resolve one of the biggest of the cold weather riding concerns. Add a little heatsink to your sensor if you ride someplace warm, to counteract negative f/x of the "goop" in that performance regime. Any fueling problems after that are factory-induced [lets not reminisce about how badly Mandello has bungled the FI maps in the past (Centauro, anyone?)] and can be cured by one of the competing aftermarket means of injection-map rectification... Cutting and splicing into the wiring harness to add the resistor per Ratchethack's exerimental experience is an option for those who want to have the ability to dial in a little extra fuel & subvert the Guzzi engineers' idea of what the proper fueling should be, but at that point I think I'd rather just go with one of the other ways to doctor the entire map, not just confusing the ECU by twiddling the heat sensor... Meanwhile, it's your ride, do what you want with it! I'm still interested in reading about your experiments, even if others think you're nuts... [1] I'm really dreading all this talk of "inertia" etc. in reference to the heat sensor, for fear that soon the whole topic will degenerate into descriptions of "caloric" & phlogiston, but there you have it...

Because there can be no debate that this is one bitchin' custom, so unless everyone [including the lurkers who never post] starts posting their own [AOL] Me too! [/AOL] about how much they like this bike, there's no hope that the thread can catch up w/ the CHT sensor thread [or even the sloppage sheet thread, which went to 20-some? odd pages when there is no question that Roper's kludge was the best solution extant for solving the V11's oiling difficulties under acceleration...] No dissention, no bulk posting, it's as simple as that! Meanwhile, I'd just like to get back on topic & add: "Me likey!"

When your only tool is the jawbone of an ass, everyone looks like a Philistine...

Humorous or humourous; "humerous" just makes me want to sing ".the arm bone is connected to the shoulder bone..." & it all goes downhill from there!.. As for the part about tricking the ECU, it's important for people who don't want to shell out the $ for a Power Commander because the factory map Guzzi supplied is defective, as it keeps subtracting fuel the hotter the motor gets, instead of adding fuel for cooling once the temperature exceeds a certain level. I'm enjoying the banter, even if some of you seem irritated by the ongoing attempt to find a sub-$100 solution, albeit partial, to the v11s' imperfect fueling at environmental temperature extremes...

Neat video! Did you take into account the cam lobe height? I understand there's a clearance issue there on stroked Guzzis...

Hey Ratch', here's an idea: They sell "under spark plug" cylinder head temp sensors, which being connected directly to a probe inside the combustion chamber [aka "the spark plug"] might be considered a more accurate reading of CHT. What about a negative feedback loop utilizing one of these to adjust your pot on the stock unit w/ the goop, brass body & heatsink? That way, as the fuel is leaned out too much, the temp sensed by the spark plug CHT decreases the resistance on the pot, so the ecu senses the higher temp and increases fuel, cooling the combustion chamber. [or is that the other way round?] Anyway, I think that with enough sensors, resistors and whatnot, we can fool the ecu into doing what Guzzi should have had it do in the first place...

I've only seen total output #s for the factory posted before, but nothing broken down by model. IE - "2005, 10,024" which would be including both big & small twins of all models. [That # is just off the top of my head for the example, btw: don't take it as anything realistic!]

It's not a tank protector, it's a chin pad! [Ref: old 50s race bikes had a pad for the rider's chin when they were stretched out at full tilt...] Armor All will make it shiny [& slippery.] Replacement w/ the CF unit will make it harder & lighter. Replacement w/ an actual leather pad will make it even more retro & have greater cachet than the plastic pad. Me? I'd make a steel replacement so that magnetic tankbags would have something to work with!

What Raz said: given a reasonable combustion chamber [no FBF 'top hat' piston domes!], you almost can't have too much C.R. w/ pure ethanol. Which helps make up for the lower power content of the fuel. Good luck, & definitely keep us informed of your progress!

Talk about going out w/ a flourish! That sounds like a real performer: "Always leave them crying for more..."

Sorry, the look isn't working for me. I suspect I'd like them much more under the "hips" of a Sporti or Daytona RS, but they're just out of character on the smooth "beetle butt" of the V11s... JMNSHO, of course! If it works for you, then more power to ya! Thanks for the tip & pics, so we can make up our own minds w/o having to test the waters ourselves!

Look, you asked for help. Greg [who is widely recognized here as being one of the more expert of expert opinions, given that he works for MI and has written a book on these bikes we love so much] offered the input that yes, in fact, your friend needs to drop the tranny & get the plate welded. Regardless of your beliefs about how serious or not the drop the bike might have been involved in, it would be right thing to do for you to tell your friend that he should do a close exam for other damage and get the plate fixed. Riding w/ the crack will only propagate the crack until the plate breaks; its the nature of physics [not to be confuzzled with "fizziks," which is the study of carbonated beverages...] As an aside, there has been evidence offered in the past that Guzzis are prone to unfortunate amounts of damage in simple tipovers, as they weren't designed to be ridden shiny side down, but have reasonable expectation of lifespans exceeding many other brands when kept rubber side down. One might say, "those are the breaks" if one was prone to excessive punning, as I have been known to be!..

Oh, come on, Pete: how can you be soft-selling the consumables when everyone knows he really needs the Keihin 41 FCRs if he wants any kind of satisfaction from the Spot... ...of course, they probably won't help his fuel usage issue any!

... is a well-behaved cat! At least, until it starts to go off... eewww!

Telling them they're wrong isn't likely to win you any friends; you might want to mention that due to fact the oil pumps drink unfiltered oil, you're just looking to decrease the chances of further repairs being required down the road... BTW, thanks for the geography lesson! I had to pull up Google maps to find out what distances were involved for you; seems like dealer #1 is about 10mi away, and dealer #2 is Hope you're back on the road in a jiffy & experience no more mechanical woes.

Sounds like there's a need for a damn good sieve on the pickups then!

Does the new QV Griso use the same [or essentially same] box & filter as the old 2v Griso? 'Cause if so, I saw the latter on ebay, and it's a wonder of fitting an airbox into a long, shallow volume, but w/ all the kinks & twists and the small volume that the intake bells pull from, likely to prove somewhat restrictive as Pete suggests. Don't forget the experience when they were developing the MGS01: power increased linearly w/ airbox volume, which led to the oddball fuel tank shape as they kept sacrificing fuel volume for airbox volume! Now, as to how to achieve the large airbox volume w/ the QV motor, it's easy: mount the puppy in a Tonti frame so you can get the shock(s) out of the way of where the airbox needs to be, beef up the frame tube diameter to improve rigidity so it can take the added power, wrap the whole thing in a V7 Special retro theme and laugh all the way to the bank... Too bad Piaggio has NIH syndrome so bad...

See! I told you Ratch' would know!.. Gneiss, sandstone: it's all the devil's music to me!

Could be that it's leaning up against that huge chunk o' sandstone that's trying to hide behind the bike in the photo, but only Ratch' would know for certain...

I dunno, Pete, that sounds too "up tempo" to me; you sure it's not to the sounds of the Percy Faith orchestra, interspersed with the soothing strains of Muzak?

That's not beer... it's used 30wt! How to make beer: Take 4 cans of instant beer [bud, Miller, Pabst, what have you] pour into pitcher Add 1 can of Guinness. Voila! Instant beer!

Well, plugs are more certain than Slime, so if it wasn't suitable for plugging, neither was it suited to Sliming... scoundrels! General rule: plugs in the center 1/3 of tread are fine, and you just decrease the speed rating of the tire by one level; by the 3rd plug, you're generally running out of room for adequate highway speed [we all know bikers regard the posted limits as merely suggestions, right? ] and need to pop for a new tire. Plugs in the outer 1/3 of tread are generally considered as allowable to get you somewhere to change the tire, but I'll confess to using a tire w/ a plug in the outer 1/3rd for a couple thousand miles on my daily commute [never exceeding 80mph, on a tire rated to 150+mph...] before I figured I'd gotten enough wear out of it to merit replacement. Plugs in sidewalls are right out, altho' I could see being stuck in the middle of the desert and doing it just to get myself down the road to the next major city where I could replace the tire, but I'd be limping along at 35mph on the verge...