pete roper

And at altitude, on salt!!!!! I met Bill at the National in Malibu and saw the Meteor. Lovely man, fantastic bike!!!! Pete

If the lines are missing or have been removed the important thing is that the trunnions of the couplings be aligned. These are the 'Crosses' in the front and rear universal joints and they must work in the same plane so that when the shaft is assembled it looks like X-----------X not X-----------+ As it were. Pete

No. It's a crap way of setting up carbs at the best of times and was obviously suggested by a retard. With an ECU you risk a much greater chance of frying the ECU by pulling one HT lead than you do of just frying a coil in a points system. A set of guages or a twinmax costs very little. Spend the money and do the job correctly. Pete PS Did you get your 850 brakes sorted Lee?

Well, I must be quite barmy then. I bought my Convert from a picture on the web, flew into Detroit to pick it up and then rode it 7,000 miles around the USA. It had no real service history and was twenty something years old and you know what? it didn't blow up. Then I bought my Scura from a pic on this board, sent it to Houston for MPH to replace the clutch and put new springs in and service and then rode it across to LA in the company of another nutter on a Coppa Italia and you know what? They didn't blow up or kill use either! Over some 20 years I put well over half a million miles on my first SP that turned into a hot-rod and it never failed to get me home. This last weekend me and me mate Steve on his EV touring and me on my Griso 1200 rode nearly 2,000Kms to a rally and back, the 1200 Griso is a brand new model so by all accounts you read it should of stranded me at least twice with something horribly terminal and expensive and I'd have to wait months for parts. Even though it pissed down with rain coming back through Sydney, (AKA the Arsehole of the Earth.) it obstinately refused to break down or fail to proceeed. Neither Bart's Mk IV LeMans or even Phil-the-Bill's NTX even though he had to hold it almost at valve bounce to stay with the rest of us on the Newk-Arsehole Expressway. Can anyone explain what we're doing wrong here in Oz? Is there some way we can make our bikes horribly unreliable so we can piss and moan too???? Pete

I had a CZ 250 twin on loan but also had a 350 with a Velorex chair in London in the early eighties, one of the best bikes I ever owned. and the only one that would go FASTER tyhe more weight you put on it!!!! I wish I still had it, it was a CLASSY motorbike. Well made and strong as an Ox!!!! Pete

If things are still the same, and they probably are, the museum will only be open an hour a day. If you're REALLY lucky you'll meet the terrifying 'Mrs. NO-TOUCH!' she is the awe inspiring ogre who guards the museum! Sh used to follow you round very closely and if you leaned across the rop barriers in front of the bikes she uset to issue the blood curdling shriek of 'NO TOUCH!!!!' first time it happened to me I well nigh shat meself!!! Pete

Of course 20 or so years ago it was essential for every high-bling tosser, (Like me ) to have a Lockheed variable ratio master cylinder on their Guzzi. Poxy thing actually worked quite well but like most of this stuff once set to where you want it you never look at it again . Rally thogh Greg I'll be interested to hear what you think as at the moment the one thing that is leaving me a bit peeved with the 1200G is the performance of the front brakes. Its not like they're spongy or anything, they just don't seem to have either the bite or the stopping power I would of expected. I know you love the petal rotors, (I'm still waiting to hear the cool whistling noise! ) but to me, or at least for me, there is something lacking. I'll try pads first, (They made a big difference on the 1100.) but if that doesn't work I'll spring for a whizz-bang M/C. Oh, and the new tyres worked wonders. I dunno what was up with the OE Metzlers but they went off in a flash. Pete

The V11 style sloppage plate will fit all V11's and also 1100 Sport-i, Centauro and Later Daytonas with the 'Broad' sump. I'm out of them at the moment but I'll do another run if you want three or more. Cost? Dunno, it depends on the cost of the material, metal prices are through the roof at the moment. Pete

Yup, standard 8 x 1.25mm thread with a 13mm head.

Shit! I just logged in after a while away. Mate? What can I say apart from 'All the best for a swift and complete recovery.' My heart goes out to you. Pete

Yup. we did it at my workshop this arvo. It is comprehensively 'Donald Ducked'! Pete

It sounds like you ent down fairly hard. Try Moto International and MPH for the Coppa bits. Inspect the points where the front mounting tubes bolt to the timing cover too as there are super-vulnerable on spineys. I have a spare sump and spacer off a Centauro in LA, same parts, just different colour, that you can have cheap if you want. New bits will probably be poisonously expensive! Pete

On the tacho there is a point at which there is a yellow area, (7,500?) followed by a red area at 8,000 or so. I should remember this seeing as I've been riding one of the poxy things for two weeks but I can't because I rarely look at either of the clocks Thing is the 'Yellow line' is the gear shift indicator. No, obviously you won't want to sit in traffic in 2nd gear at 6000 unless you are a cretin but if you want to make fairly rapid progress out on the open road that is where you change gears. Holding it for long periods in the yellow zone isn't particularly wise and it is best to avoid the red zone all together but odd excursions there for a second or two will do no harm. If you want a Harley? Buy a Harley! The Guzzi big block, even in it's earlier itterations was never meant to be plonked about at wide throttle openings at lower RPMs. While I've been in the US riding the Scura I've done plenty of pottering about in the LA hills and mot of the time the engine was kept between 3,000 and 5,000. Out in the hills and sweepers of New Mexico it got a much beefier workout, despite the heat. Great fun, even if I did fall off and try to fling it down a ravine. You get that if you ride hard to have fun Pete

If you think this is true of the old 4V motor I can tell you that the 8V is in a completely new ball park. Pete

The shown 'Outsider' is specific to the Cali 1100 on models with the deeper sump. My guess is that using one of the outsiders for an earlier sump would be a better bet as it would lower the sump less. Having said that either solution would require the aquisition of another sump and the outsider and while it might be possible to get the sump off fleabay the outsider is unlikely to be available second hand. Using the 1100 'Deep Sump' may well give you ground clearance problems as well. If you look at the 'V'-sump the beveling of the edges aren't there for nothing, although it was designed for use with the Tonti frame rather than the spiney. There may also be clearance problems with crossovers and the like on V11's. I'm NOT trying to put people off the idea. I like the Harper's product a lot and have one on both my 'Vert and my SP but I would suggest caution before going hell for leather at it on a V11. Pete.

Once again it's a case of the ignorant leading the cretinous. 'Little bits of chalk?' Oh for f@ck's sakes. Yes, nowadays every 'gloid and his half-wit brother uses the net but it really is getting ridiculous! Mind you, I've got a really good bridge to sell you. One owner, high miles but well maintained....... Pete

After we left Santa Fe I; Dropped my cellphone on the freeway! Fell off the Scura on 190 in New Mexico Broke down in some place that if it wasn't called Bastard it should of been in Arizona. All in all that wasn't the best of days Not much damage from the spill, (Caused by gravel on the road and me pushing too hard like an idiot.) broken brake lever, plug and cap. That's it!!!! Breakdown was the relays, (two of them at once!) going tits-up in the heat. we simply jury rigged it by playing musical relays till we got to Bastard's sister town of Bumf@ck where we picked up a couple of new ones at an auto parts place along with a plug and cap. The Kawasaki shop in Bumf@ck didn't have, or even know, what a TIG welder was and anyway they couldn't repair a lever because of 'Liability Issues' Useless retards! I only use the rear brake for steering anyhow so I just rode on to LA and Jon who I'm staying with had one of his crashed LeMans so everything is tickety boo again. It's a great little bike now the springs and clutch are done and MPH tuned it beautifully, it runs faultlessly. Top stuff! Pete

As an owner of both an 1100 and a 1200 I'd stongly suggest that you ride both before making your decision. Not to disparage the 1100, I have had mine for two years and 38,000Kms and it has been both enjoyable and practically faultless, but the 1200 is in a completely different league as far as engine performance is concerned. Pete

Plate went out yesterday. Paypal address is the same as my email motomoda optusnet.com.au If you've already done it I've recieved no notification from paypal? Pete

Take the plugs out and have a look at them. If they are horribly sooty then the bike is obviously over-fueling grotesquely. Obviously there may be any number of reasons for this but my suggestion would be to give it a thorough service and tune. If you can find someone, somewhere, with either the Technoresearch package or an Axone tool this will greatly assist in diagnosing what may be the problem. While poor temperature sensors will cause over-fueling I'd suggest that the ETS would have to be compeletely stuffed and the bike to be running at 'Full Choke', ie a fully enriched map, for it to drink 14 litres or so of fuel in an hour and a half. If you can't find anyone locally with the proper diagnostic tooling you can check the ETS resistance using a multi-meter, a kettle and a thermometer. t'll tell you if the thing is working or not anyway! Oh, and what is your current ambient temp in Alberta? If it is still quite cold you may well find you can get an improvement simply by packing the ETS holder with thermal paste but that alone won't sort this. It sounds as if it has got a couple of more serious *issues*. pete

Mate, I wondered what happened. I did reply in a PM with my contact details etc but recieved no reply. Having said that I have a feeling that my 'Clever' 14 year old son has been trying to hide the fact he's been downloading cyber-porn from his parents and this has stuffed up our computer settings a bit so my message may well of gone AWOL! Anyway, my email is motomoda optusnet.com.au with the *at* substituted with the ampersand of course Try that, and hopefully your inbox won't fill up with pictures of girls with unfeasibly large bossoms! Pete

If you can't find Greg's instructions here they are hosted on the Guzzitech dk site. Pete

19,500 high mileage!!!! When I wrecked out my little hot rod Tonti it was like Grandfather's Axe but at over 750,000 miles it had never failed to get me home, (Although it was a close run thing on a couple of occasions!) If you want advice in Atlanta try looking in the member profiles for Bill Hagan and PM him or try asking for him on Wildguzzi. He's sold his V11 and rides a Norge now so I don't think he visits here often but Bill is in Atlanta and is ex-army, served in GW1 I believe so you'll get a great welcome from him and lots of useful advice about who, where and why in Atlanta. Pete

Look, never mind the peculiar litter-bin/motorbike/sex theme, look at the sign behind the bike! The 'Green Welly' stop!?!?! God give us strength! That's where the REAL perverts are! So what was that bike doing there....? Hmmmm.....? Disgusting!!! Pete

On the screen and bars issue. I Have the *big* screen the factory made for the 'G'. On the 1100 it was brilliant, for me. I am 5' 10" and have a horrid body with tiny, stubby little legs, a long back and arms and no neck. With the 1100's wider bars the screen was brilliant for ME. I honestly believe that the 1100 Griso couldn't of been more custom made for me and my comfort, it was brilliant! The narrower bars of the 1200 mean I sit up slightly straighter and while I haven't finished fiddling yet I feel I'll need to get a screen about 1 inch taller for it to work as well. My mate Mark in Sydney took a 1200 for a demo ride and said that he felt that the bike needed risers with another 3 inches of pull-back! This from a man with a Daytona Racing! I hate to think what he'd been smoking before he said that!!!! At the end of the day there are SO many aftermarket bits available either direct or by small modification that I'm sure that even all you flamingo-necked, mole-footed, hunched-backed retards could find *something* to make them, (The bikes!) work for you! If I can, anybody can! Pete