Power Commander, Mistral Upgrade - Part One

[kenr]

Today was the day ! I had the V11 booked in to fit the Mistral cross over, exhausts, and power commander.

 

The day started really badly - I was late leaving and in a rush, started up the bike to let it warm up while a got my helmet on, threw my jacket over the bike and when I turned around there's lots of smoke coming out of my sleeves ! I hadn't realised that the lining had touched on the exhaust and was melting Fortunately the damage was only slight.

 

I finally set off and got less than 5 minutes down the road when a truck coming the other way dumped a stone around the size of a tennis ball. I watched in slow motion as it bounced once and then hit the front of the bike ! There was a loud bang as the headlight exploded and showered me in glass, but since I was in a line of traffic with nowhere safe to pull over I decided just to carry on my way. When I finally stopped the damage showed how serious things could have been. The stone had bounced up from the road - if you have a V11 with a fairing there is a small section at the bottom middle under the headlight, and the stone had hit this with such force it had distorted the metal surround of the headlight. It was the force of the distortion that had shattered the glass rather than a direct hit from the stone. After hitting the headlight the stone had put a small scratch in the front mudguard as it had dropped back to the ground.

 

I arrived at Moto Corsa just as one of the guys was heading around to Conquest to load up an MGS01 - apparently it has been sold to a customer who has managed to get it registered for daytime use on the road ! I took a walk round to take a look. The bike IMO looks fantastic. I didn't get a real close look as they were loading it into a van at the time but from what I could see the finish didn't look that great - particularly on the carbon fiber, but I guess this is a race bike first. Anway, I would definitely make room for one in the garage

 

So back to Moto Corsa (stopping briefly at the van outside Three Cross which makes the best bacon butties youve ever had !). The guy is at work fitting the power commander and getting everything else sorted when - the cross over which they ordered up specially has been delivered wrong and won't fit ! After a bit of discussion we decided to go ahead and fit the Mistral cans to the stock cross over so work continues when - there's a big mark on one of the exhausts. It looks like something was stuck under the carbon fiber weave and has left a really noticeable mark. After some more discussion we agree to go ahead and fit the cans and they will order up a new outer and replace it later on.

 

So I am stood behind my bike which is up on the ramp when just as I am thinking it really isn't my day I suddenly notice a nail in my back tyre !! Its right in the middle so we talk about taking the wheel off to get it fixed next door while everything else is finished off. I figure if it is going to get fixed I might as well try to find out how bad the damage is, so I try to prise the nail out with a scredriver, and out pops a small stone ! So my tyre is in one piece after all, and maybe not everything is going to go wrong for me today.

 

So having finally got everything on and set the bike up using a stock map downloaded from the web (we cancelled the dyno booking until the cross over comes in) the next thing was to get the headlight back together. Fortunately they had just one spare in stock for the V11 and so apart from the small peice of the fairing which is really wrecked everything was pretty much back to square one. The guy in the parts department was telling me that getting hold of spares is getting increasingly difficult - he heard that they haven't been building V11s in the factory for around a year or so and apparently a lot of the spares that are coming in are parts that have been stripped off of bikes that are already built. It's kind of worrying if this is true - not sure what this might mean for spares availability in the future. btw - if you happen to be waiting on some parts from Italy just now apparently there is a 5 day public holiday to respect the death of the pope.

 

So now for the highlight of the day - the ride home. Even without the Mistral cross over and with only a standard map from the web, the bike drives much better. The power is more linear through the whole range, midrange is much stronger, and excessive speed comes up much more quickly than it did before. The bike really feels much better and it will be interesting to see what difference the cross over and a custom map will make.

 

So overall:

 

MGS-01: Gorgeous looking bike, although finish quality looks like it could be better.

 

Mistral: Order processing and Q&A obviously not a strength. I'm also not over impressed with the quality of the finish TBH - the glaze over the carbon fiber is so thin you can feel the weave underneath. But having said that in combination with the power commander the performance gain is significant, and they aren't the most expensive exhausts out there, so fair enough, and I do like the look of them with the bike.

 

Power Commander - went on easy, and obvioulsy a top piece of kit.

 

Ride home -

 

 

Trucks = 1 Ken = $300 down but still in one piece

 

 

Part 2 to follow - I just hope it all goes smoother than Part 1

[al_roethlisberger]

Yikes, what a day.

 

I dunno, if I were you, and the repair for the headlight is anywhere over $200.... I'd look into this HID equipped complete unit as an alternative:

 

http://www.jwspeaker.com/catalog/forward_l.../model_8100.htm

 

See thread:

 

http://www.v11lemans.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=4527

 

 

If I get any trouble with my stock light, this is what I'm going to replace it with if it'll fit in the fairing(depth concerns).

 

al

 

 

[Mike Stewart]

Ken,

 

I hope part II works out better than part I . If I started the day out like you did, I would of turned around and given up. My hat is off to you for pushing through all the issues you dealt with in one day

 

Good luck,

Mike

[jrt]

No kidding- I'm with Mike. After the jacket and the rock, I wouldn't have waited for strike three.

Good luck with the next phase.

J

[kenr]

Al,

 

I already had the HID upgrade from Nippy Normans - unfortunately the full beam isn't working properly anymore. I mailed for a quote for a new bulb - and the new running total for repairs including the bulb is $500 !! The bulb alone is $200 !

 

 

I'm starting to wish I had gone after the truck driver and got his number

[tikkanen]

Hi Ken,

 

What a day! You should have stayed home, for sure.

 

I'm getting my Scura dyno'ed next week (at last!!). I had my engine back from the importer last Friday and Brian Fynbo, my mechanic at Italian Bike Store, put the engine back in the frame. But guess what? The w....rs at the importer's hadn't assembled the engine correctly which caused the engine couldn't turn!

 

Only one thing to do: Get the engine out of the frame again and start all over again...am I impressed

 

Søren

[Alex-Corsa]

.  My hat is off to you for pushing through all the issues you dealt with in one day

 

Good luck, 

 

I second that too , hope that everything works at the best of luck next time (or every time) around. Having unlucky momments is sometimes innevitable,well

hopefully they just stay little and that's at least what I can say for the better.

The other day was my speedo cable (inside) cut and now I have no tachometer

indication. Anyway ...who needs it...LOL.. I really am in a mood of not riding the bike until is fixed and this will be done sometime soon.

 

Best of luck