Craig

So, I have a different sensor. And the fuse I just blew shows that it needs more than a short to light up. Do you have any idea what the "light on" resistance was? That way i can put one in series with my reed switch.

DO NOT solder the cable. You will end up move significant bending stress to the edges of the region you soldered. That almost guarantees rapid fatigue failure.

What is wrong with what you have? Have to know that to know if you can repair.

Took it for the first ride this evening. I spent a lot more time that I anticipated getting the fairing brackets right. I am still not completely happy with them but I will put a few hundred miles on what i have before I make new ones. I haven't done paint yet. @Jexmatex, there are no mounting provisions provided for anything. To fit the shield to the fairing you need to match drill them. Drilling lexan isn't hard but you need to do a slow speed. I spent almost a minute drilling each hole just to ensure I didn't crack anything. I will try to put up the pictures I have with some commentary later this week.

I tried to weld mine and the spongy aluminum collapsed on me. Admittedly my skills at welding aluminum leave a lot to be desired but that metal was really poor.

I used the Harpers when I replaced mine. It is much higher quality. The factory piece on mine was a pretty spongy casting.

I would pull the sleeves, clean well with acetone and paint them with black Bar-b-cue paint.

Duhhh. I feel stupid now. That is part of it. Thanks for the clue, I needed one!

Which way does yours tilt? I have to fix this, now that I have noticed, it will drive me nuts.

I apologize for the lack of updates on my Laverda Fairing. I have two brackets mocked up and life overcame any more progress. Once thing I have noticed is that my fuel tank is much closer to the left cylinder head than the right. I think the tank is riding on one of the charcoal canister lines that routes to the right and above the air box. Has anyone else seen this? Maybe my hose is mis-routed.

We are getting near the point with China that we reached with Japan in the late nineteen-seventies. Mid-to early seventies "Made in Japan" was still a joke that connoted low quality. Ten more years and I think we will feel the same way about Chinese industrial products.

I gave up on flat footing ten years ago. Right foot on the brake, and roll butt a bit to the left and left foot flat, holding clutch in. very stable, never have to worry. I am never in neutral except in the garage.

There is an Industrial Metal Supply in San Diego that can probably get you tube stock that you could fabricate brand new pieces with.

I haven't tried it and I can only see two difficulties. 1. How would you keep the chips out of the transmission case? 2. I would go larger than 7/16-20 however. The 7/16-20 is so close that you would end up cutting through the 10mm threads which would make it very easy to cross thread. and very leaky.

Thanks for the insight. I am happy with the current braking performance, but better brakes are always better...

I don't have time, money, or knowledge to try out a bunch of different suspension updates for my Ballabio. So I am hoping the collective wisdom here can help me sort out a few options. Rear: Buy SavageHenry used Ohlins unit and have it rebuilt. Buy a new HyperPro. Cost is about the same here when all is said and done. Can anyone comment on the merits between these two units? Front: Have Todd at Guzzi Tech rebuild my Marzochhis Graft a Suzuki GSXR fornt end on. The cost here is quite a bit different, but the suzuki should bring much improved braking performance. I like brakes. I can do all of the labor for the options (other than the actual suspension unit rebuild) 90% of my riding is commuting but occasionally I get out to some twisties. I am not a particularly aggressive rider and I mostly want a bit better response on choppy roads.

I haven't done it yet, but I have seen mention of ditching the steering damper. This would lighten the apparent effort.

That is exactly my thinking, executing it is a bit more problematic. Does anyone have a font that looks like the script MG uses? I certainly can't do it by hand.

Changing the entire bike to a blue, probably similar to Subaru WRX Blue Pearl. Might call it the Azzuro Corsa...

I made some progress this weekend. I trimmed the fairing to fit around the fuel tank and forks and proved that the Ballabio headlight bracket holds the light in a good place for the fairing. I plan to fabricate some brackets from the headlight mounting bolts to the fairing itself. Those combined with brackets from the valve cover bolts should be sufficient. I will run the fairing mounted and unpainted for a few hundred miles to check stiffness before I finalize the mounts. More difficult is dealing with the brake and clutch hydraulics. The instrument support interferes with the hoses well before full lock. I have a LeMans instrument bracket on order from Harper's but Piaggio evidently has to mine the raw materials before they start another production run. I will probably pull the clutch line and re-route it around the spine to take up some of the slack, and try to gently reshape the banjo elbow. The front brake reservoir also interferes with the instruments which is another vote to switch to the triple clamp mounted instruments. I also verified that the bars have to be very low in order to clear the fairing. They have good clearance, with the previous exceptions, when the bar holders are as far down on the forks as they can go before the fork tube reduces diameter.

Thank you for reporting this. I have an 04 and the ITI instruments (or rather did, until I replaced them with VDO)... GottageTone, could you post your source for the brake lights?

I'll add my two cents and amplify what GT and FT said. You are in a very damp climate. You need to go over the entire grounding system and clean it up.

I am on travel now and can't check my bike, but I could swear that I have separate instrument panel indicators for left and right. I think the center indicator lights, starting from the top, are high beam, then oil pressure, then neutral, the low fuel. The outer two on the top are green for the directional indicators. Is this another crack induced fantasy?

Its hard to say. These handles get made by the thousands per year. The speed nuts can be put on simply by pressing (I can't say for sure that they do that, but it is an authorized assembly method) which is why they are faster than normal nuts that need to be threaded. The pressing operation can be automated fairing easily, or even have a semi-automatic pressing tool made. Threading a nut onto the bolt is more difficult to automate or fixture. Or, they could just be really cheap. If they were really concerned about preload clamping the handle they would use a cotter pin rather that a nut. Just my opinion.