Skeeve

You were 180deg out of phase? [To be honest: it's the simple things that usually rear up & bite me on the @ss... ]

More important to coat the inside than out: only coating the outside would be just as bad as using the "asbestos tape" wrap, which has been shown to lead to premature failure of exhaust systems due to thermal load. WRT to "improved efficiency" it's not so much that hot air flows better, it's that as the exhaust gases dump heat to the pipes, they grow more dense, and hence slow down more rapidly, leading to increased back pressure. IE, it doesn't flow as efficient... er, yeah. What you said! Theoretically, you could get away with using carbon steel exhaust plumbing if you went w/ ceramic coating inside & out prior to installation, which would make the whole thing about as expensive as a stainless system w/o coating but w/ faster fab time. Anyone for a MAC exhaust? Ride on!

Do the search, read the threads, view the pix: Guzzi totally dropped the ball [spanner? slide rule?] on this one when they decided to "redesign for cheapness" the RAM product. The question about the Scuras' aluminum clutch is not "if" but "when;" it's just a faulty design. Everyone in the U.S. with a Scura who's had a failure should go to the NHTSA complaint website & file their specifics: if the NHTSA get the data, they'll force a recall. IIRC, if they hit a 5% rate, it's automatic recall time for all affected vehicles. Heck, even the overseas riders should list their woes, since it might show the NHTSA the true dimension of the problem. Yeah, it would cost Piaggio some ducats, but better that than someone loses their life because of the dang clutch blowing up. And it's rightly their problem: when they bought Aprilia [& hence, Guzzi] at a fire sale price, they got to assume all the original companies' problems. Que sera, sera!

You are not alone. I keep pointing out to my friends on the LABiker listserve that we (well, some of us) lived thru this once before, & the "origami in steel & plastic" was just as fugly back in the 80s as it is now. Fortunately, I think this is just a "nostalgia" fad [note the 20 year cycle] that will fade just as fast as we get this live action cartoon Transformers film dealt with this summer. They stole all the styling cues for this nonsense back in the 80s from the cartoons, & once the movie has cycled thru its release, this resurgence of bad taste will get old quickly & we can get back to some more classic lines... IhopeIhopeIhopeOhPlease!!!

The story is fabulous, a must read! I love the following line, which I think adequately displays Mikael's writing style: "When you have a Guzzi you are considered weird. It’s like having a green dog,.." Also, the author Mikael was already an owner of a Nimbus [very esoteric Stateside, I've only seen one in the wild, & consider myself very fortunate at that], which is kind of the proto-big block Guzzi in the sense that the company made the exact same bike for close to 30 years (as a sideline to their sewing machine biz, iirc?)

Nah, too much land to cross even at the speeds a gixxer can reach. Better off w/ a G'wing, Harley FLHTWXYZ, or better yet, a Norge! Something comfortable to ride, & a SNICKERS, 'cause like the ads say, you're gonna be there awhile...

Regrettably, the SV1kN hasn't been imported stateside since '05: the USA is still considered a 3rd world motorcycling country for some reason. If Suzuki had offered them with the blacked out frame and other colors than the metallic/orange combo they'd originally had, they might have sold more naked models. The abbreviated fairing on the SV1kS helps the looks a bit. Of course, the real problem was how much worse they looked with the redesigned frame & cr@p styling vs. the original '99-'02 SV650 styling that everyone was crying out for in a bigger version. But that motor is so good it can sell even an ugly bike like the DL1000! Ride on,

Save yourself some time & trouble, & only open the boxes for foreign car filters that have metric threads for mounting...

Far be it from me to criticize the bike [it's lovely], but seriously, photographing a green bike against a green background? Not the way to get your Tenni the recognition it deserves!

Only way to proceed would be to work some deal w/ MGNA [Piaggio] where you can get them at dealer cost, maybe w/ a discount as engined frames FOB Mandello? so that you're not paying for all the parts you'd be replacing. You think AMB pays list? The way to sell the idea is as a "halo" model that makes all the other Guzzis that much more prestigious by its mere existence. Once you can get the price down to the $25k range, mebbe line up a dozen pre-orders & proceed from there. All I know is, I sure wouldn't want to be in your shoes, trying to get such a project off the ground!

Look, it's up to the Tennisti to post their own "Tenni of the month" pics. You can't expect Jaap to do everything for you; heck, he already gave you your own section - it's up to you now! Heck, I'm still bummed about that guy who scooped me on the Tenni I almost bought 3 years ago: I have to gratify my Tenni wishes vicariously thru the efforts of you Tennisti here in Tenni-land. Get with it!

Actually [ekchooullee?], it's goat cheese. But you probably knew that...

Thanks guys, that was the info I needed!

So, what's the O.D. of the stock Sach shock [ergo, what I.D. should be used when ordering springs?] I've seen posts stating 2.25" ID springs & 2.50" ID springs; I suspect the latter is correct, 'cause by eyeball it looks like the 2.25" springs would be likely to rub. But I'd like to be certain...

Auction #s 110140164981 (red) & 110140168328 (yellow). I know the seller from LABikers, he's a good guy, living in MO now. If I had the money, I'd be buying one or both myself; the looks of the Sports/Daytona RS! Best o' luck!

I have NO idea what it is, but it sure passes the Leno test![1] [1] Jay Leno: "Never trust a motorcycle you can't see thru..."

Info on recall here Just relaying info; I have not opinion or info m'self besides the link. Ride safe!

I believe *that's* in NYu Ork state: I'm talkin' 'bout the home of Didneylan'! ;-) Not very much harder to build than it looks: you just need the correct jigs and the right machinery [slip roll rated for 14ga stainless is going to set you back about $500 or more for a cheap HF "Chin brand Alpha" imitation of quality machinery] & some stainless wire & argon for your wire welder. Oh, & already be in biz ordering your stainless sheet in large lots [for the co$t $aving$...] The drawback is the jigs/fixturing. By the time you get done building that, whipping'em out is pretty quick. But unless you've got unlimited storage [eg: movie studio prop yards warehousing stuff going back to the '20s], nobody wants to make up the jig for a low-volume-never-gonna-get-more-than-a-dozen-orders-a-year project... Now me, if I had the time, materials & machinery already, I'd just do it for the experience, but I'm full of blue sky projects that way...

Nah, it's all same-same for English speakers: "couldn't care less" means what you think it does; no place to go but up, the nadir of concern. Problem is, the good ol' USA being a nation of immigrants, people in the process of learning the language, not understanding the [negatively affirmative] construction of that colloquialism repeat it as "could care less," which unfortunately doesn't convey the unconcern they're thinking of. After a generation or to of hearing it repeated incorrectly, it starts becoming acceptable. That's all fine for the spoken word, we tend to fill in what we want to hear anyway, but in written language, you still gotta get it right. Kinda like Chinese, which has a bunch of different dialects that use the same words differently, but in the written language is consistent. I try to fight the good fight by correcting people who don't have it right, but all it does is earn me hatred from the hoi polloi. [sigh] It's a tough job, but somebody's gotta do it!

Edit: title should read "People Who Couldn't Care Less About Motorcycles" Just trying to be helpful! But aside from the slight hangup w/ the title of the thread, I'm in complete agreement w/ you!

I don't understand: what's the dealer going to do to "tune the bike to the ecu?" Most he's going to do is adjust the TPS, which you can do as long as you have a DMM. Somebody who understands actual wrenching [Roper? RacerX?] will probably suss this right away when they read your post... Smells different? How different? Like unburnt fuel? That's ironically a sign of running lean [if the idle is uneven], since the engine is missing & unburnt fuel accumulates in the exhaust until it ignites & causes "popping" or backfires. The Guzzi Ti cans & ECU were designed to work together: the factory actually spent some time getting that right, moreso than the original map in the stock ecu. Everyone using them has stated that their bike runs well once the TPS & valves are properly set/adjusted, ie: the Guzzi "race spec" ECU doesn't like the US/EPA specs of .002/.004 valve lash*, but wants the world spec .006/.008** numbers. About the only way to get better than the Ti pipes/ecu combo is to get a PCIII custom mapped on a dyno... Did you get the other ECU back? Read the frickin' label and make certain they put the correct one in the bike! Didn't get it back? Why the heck not!?! That would indicate an unscrupulous dealer who expects to sell you a PCIII, hook up your original ecu & then turn around & sell the spiffy "performance" unit on eBay for additional change.*** Best o' luck! * - or whatever it is; I just pulled these #s outta my portable dark space 'cause I know they're too small. ** - again, look up the correct values, these are only for comparison purposes, I've got an advanced case of CRS... Heck, the Red Cross won't even take my blood anymore 'cause they think I've got the MOOOOO! D@mmits!... *** - I really hate to say this, & don't want to accuse your dealer w/o real evidence, but felt it bore disclosure because of how many times I've been bent over by dealers of other marques who thought just because I didn't fit their customer profile (or perhaps, fit it too well) meant I was clueless. So eliminate this possibility by due diligence.

Yeah you did! IIRC, wasn't Aprilia's acquisition by Piaggio founded upon the former's too avid pursuit of MotoGP? Too much shooting for the future can be a bad thing, too! Somehow, I doubt Piaggio is going to spend too much time on blue sky development. Having just read a book on 50 years of Vespa, it seems that Piaggio [a company now going on 125 years old or so] is more of a "slow & steady wins the race" kind of company... which would auger well for Aprilia's & Guzzi's long-term stability.

I seem to find blanks being sold on eBay all the time for $8 [which seems ridiculously high to me, for a bit of grooved brass that's going to get notches cut in it, but then I'm notoriously cheap... ]

I find it far more likely that Guzzi (Aprilia) switched to the plastic part for pecuniary reasons, given that brass is about 10x-100x more expensive than an equivalent volume of plastic, and must be machined [using either a CAM turning ctr's. time or an employee's time on a screw machine] vs. running up a set of injection molds & bonking them out by the gross-tillion. [Or buying them pre-bonked, if it's some standard fitting for some other use...] I find this even more likely to be the root cause given the solution for most reports of "runs rough when cold & I'm getting cr@p mileage" seems to be "swap out the plastic for the brass head temp sensor holder" & the followup always seems to be "thanks, that fixed it!" I anticipate having some fun whittling my own out of some spare brass on my mini-lathe one of these days RSN, even tho' I've had no problem whatsoever from the plastic holder: I'm just of the opinion that it's better to replace a known failure-prone part w/ the superior one as soon as is practicable. WRT the air gap, this would only seem to prolong the rich running of a nominally "cold" engine; I'm thinking that the only reason for a gap is so to allow for the differential expansion of the various metal parts & keep things from cracking/breaking. Anti-sieze is pretty incompressible, so unless a pinhole is added for pressure relief, it could be a failure point. Hmmm. JMNSHO,

That's pretty much it in a nutshell; w/ two wheels up front, the commuter problems of crappy roads & riding in the wet are much reduced, vs. a traditional bike [which many people, myself included, just don't figure worth the risk of commuting on in the wet, no matter how good a rain suit we have.(1)] In comparison to any other scooter, maybe it doesn't have much to offer as a 1st bike, but as a 2nd vehicle for someone who already has a bike, it has a nice set of features to justify filling the commuter role & saving the "big bike" for more sporting/touring purposes. Since the front end isn't really any wider than the handlebars, it doesn't seem that it would significantly impact the lane-sharing ability in any way. And the ability to park on hilly ground w/o ever worrying about it rolling off the sidestand or tipping over is pretty neat.(2) Basically, I like the way the MP3 combines the feature set of quads w/ the handling of scooters/bikes, & think it will be a good seller once Piaggio gets hip to the power/wt ratio issue & brings the 400/500cc models over. Ride on! (1) Have you ever seen So.Californians drive in the rain? They're complete idiots in cages in dry conditions, in the wet they're utter boobs, so you need 2x the maneuverability & braking in the wet as you do in dry conditions, when you've got (2) It doesn't even have a sidestand: just hold it vertical, & let the hydraulic lock to it's thing. Cool!