elizilla

They all do that sir! That connector is a weak point in every Honda since the 70s at least. I don't know why Honda never seems to be able to upgrade that and get this problem to stop happening. You really have to keep an eye on it, keep it clean and coated with dialectric grease, make sure no corrosion starts, because once it starts it goes downhill fast. Consider it a maintenance item, like changing the oil. Now that it's happened, though, you just have to splice some new wires and a new connector, strip out the crispy stuff. Do the best possible solder job with all the connections, and then keep an eye on them because they are you future failure points. If you're bad at soldering, get someone good to do it, because this is not the place to do lousy work! The three yellow wires are interchangeable - you do not have to worry about which one connects where. They do need to remain as three separate wires though. :) There are a lot of troubleshooting documents out on the http://www.electrosport.com/ website, that you can use to check whether your R/R is still good, etc.

How did you get a 2010 800? Its a new model year and they are 1200? Are you sure its not a left over 2009? Custom made feature to have the grips come on with the key and off with the key? Thats rediculous! They must switch off with a switch if thats the case. I would hate that since a nudge on the controller could have you stranded on some backroad with a dead battery, at lunch or at work? I would rewire it myself if that were the case and switch it off and on by the licence plate power, thats what I used for my orginal Do-it-yourself heat grip project. He's in Denmark. Over there they consider the year of a bike, to be the year it was first registered. The manufacture date could be anything. Sounds to me like his heated grips were installed wrong. They should turn off with the bike. However I do know Honda makes some grip kits that have something that shuts them down while the bike is running, if the voltmeter drops too low. Maybe the dealer is counting on this as a failsafe? If so I still don't like it and I would change it if I were you.

What sort of jacket? What size? There are several bargain jackets at Newenough. Maybe one of them will suit your needs.

I think solid color helmets are more visible. Busy artwork and patterns make the helmet blend in with the background more, especially since helmets with bright colors tend to also have a lot of black. Solid color helmets are also cheaper, and white is often cheaper than other solids. Safety win!

Ooh, pretty shiny! I like!

Z Custom Leathers will make a boot to your measure, in whatever color you like, for about what you'd pay for a ready-made boot. I bet you could get them in perf leather. I wear leathers made by Z, and I recommend them highly for service and quality. If I didn't prefer waterproof boots, I'd seriously consider these myself.

Make one out of a plastic detergent bottle, or cut up a truck mudflap.

People can always complain. Not that it does any good! Usually I start by installing a centerstand, luggage, and heated grips. But that's because I don't buy anything with such terrible tank range. So in this case I voted for the tank. And as a matter of fact I *do* ride 200+ miles without stopping. But the main reason I'm concerned about tank range, is not so much so I can ride 200 miles without stopping. It's so I can ride in isolated areas without having to worry about being able to make it to the next gas station. There are areas where you can't leave the slab, if your range is too short. Sure, I may only visit those places once in a while, but I work hard to get to those places, I only have so much vacation, and just giving them up is giving up the high point of a vacation that will not come again soon.

Nice report, nice pictures, brings back memories of when I was there about ten years back.

I had a pair of the combat tourers. They were terrible. I got the itchy rash on my legs like HS describes, whenever I rode long days in the heat. And they were only waterproof until the first two-day continuous heavy rain ride, and after that they soaked through more quickly every time, no matter what I treated them with. And they never got that comfortable, they were always just borderline tolerable. People kept saying "Oh, give them time, they will break in and then they'll be great" but this was absolutely 100% false. I wore them for two years and they never got any better, and meanwhile they got less and less waterproof, to the point where my feet would get wet instantly, even in the slightest rain. Finally I had a two week trip where it rained every day except the day it snowed, and I had to buy boots while traveling because the continuous wet made the CTs split and crack inside, and they started cutting into my feet. Right now I'm wearing a pair of Teknic boots I got from a closeout at newenough. They're waterproof and they've kept the wet out just fine so far. They're festooned with black plastic armor, sorta road racey, and they definitely do squeak. But I have a fix for that. I spray down in between all the layers of plastic with some silicone spray, and it stops the squeak until the next really heavy rain. They're more comfortable than the CTs and I think they are far more protective. They cost a lot less so I feel like they've already lasted long enough to justify their price, and they're still going strong. I always thought it would be fun to have boots with the metal on the toes - you can drag it on the pavement in tunnels and make sparks. I never thought about damaging the bodywork with it. :warranty:

Cool! So which bike are you riding down? :rolleyes: I know it's a VFRD event but I'm half-expecting to see you on the NT. I hope you can make it! I am not sure which bike I will bring. I'm going down there at least once prior to Tmac and will bring the NT then. After I've done the trek once on the NT, then I will decide which I prefer for Tmac.

OK, I signed up and booked a room. See you there!

Dunno about running two full sets on the bike, I've never done it. But I wanted to chime in and say I have a ten year old Gerbing jacket that has had a lot of use. I never had any trouble with it except the time it just plain disappeared for a year, but that's not Gerbing's fault, and it did finally turn up again.

I moved a set up this type of grip heaters from one bike's bars to another, just by carefully peeling them off and sticking them on the other bike. They worked fine for about 30,000 miles, and then one day I was on I-90 in South Dakota, riding up a gentle slope, when my bike just lost power. I turned the throttle all the way to the stop and still I was losing speed. Ruh roh! Fortunately there was no traffic. I crested the hill at about 50mph and was able to regain speed again on the flat, and pull off at an exit. By the time I pulled off I had fought back my panic and figured out what was happening. The adhesive on my throttle side heated grip had given out and the grip had rotated on the throttle tube until it reached the limits of the grip heater's wiring. I wasn't hitting the throttle stop, I was hitting the end of the wire. I was able to rotate the grip back to the proper position, and then simply grasp it tighter to keep it from turning as I went on down the road. My hand got tired but I made it the hundred miles or so into Mitchell, where I got a room for the night. In the morning I went to the motorcycle shop there, got some grip glue, cleaned most of the balled up old adhesive off the heater and glued it in place with new glue, there in their parking lot. No problem. I never did use any more of that grip glue and I've never had another problem. But if I peeled up some of those adhesive grip heaters and moved them again, I'd say to use a solvent to take off the original adhesive, and replace it with some new glue, because a plastic sleeve is not a good surface to maintain long term adhesion when your adhesive isn't new. I would not use JBWeld for this, though. I'd use a purpose made grip glue, or shoe goo or another comparable rubbery adhesive. JBWeld is too hard to remove and you may need to remove it someday. Throttle tubes are expensive and waiting for Honda parts is time consuming - I prefer not to damage them unnecessarily!

Similar temps here. My garage faces southwest, though, so the sun shines in there in the afternoon and evening. And there's no door to the outside on the back wall, so the fan is of limited use. An in-wall air conditioner is on my list as well as a man-door to the backyard, but mainly in summer I just try hard to do my work in the morning, and if things drag on into the afternoon I set the EZ-Up outside the door to shade the interior.

My garage is 18 x 20, so 360 sq ft. You can park two cars in it if it's cleared. Put a fullsize truck on one side and you better be agile if you want to get out. Fortunately I haven't had to worry about putting cars in there in a long time. When we moved here it was a dark cave with a rotted door. My first upgrade was in insulated garage door. Then I installed a suspended ceiling, lots of electrical outlets, wall insulation and drywall. But the electric space heaters still weren't cutting it and the kerosene torpedo heater was loud and smelly. So I installed a ventless natural gas heater that cost about $250 up at Home Depot. It's bolted to the wall and runs off the same natural gas as the house. It costs about 5 cents an hour to run, and I don't run it full time - just a weekend here and there. For the 15 or so days a year that I run it, the cost disappears against the backdrop of my normal gas bill. One thing about it, though, is the reason it is safe to be ventless, is because the fumes are water vapor. If I turn it up high it will heat up the garage in an hour, but it pumps out a lot of moisture, and the water vapor condenses on all the cold metal tools and bikes. I don't like that, so I instead turn it on low and let it heat the garage up more slowly. I turn it on low on Friday morning and by the time I get off work it's comfy out there.

My worst mod was a combination. Heli bars, heated grips with a switch in a project box stuck on top of the left bar, and a NEP throttle lock. These three things together meant there was only one spot that each bar could sit in, where it didn't foul on either the tank or the fairing. And the spots did not match. I don't know how the PO could stand having asymetrical handlebars. I suppose you can get used to anything, but I chose not to get used to that. I removed the throttle lock and redid the grips so they use a different controller, and now the bars are straight and the bike rides very nicely.

Could the needle be worn? How did the bike run, that it came out of?

I had some of those eyeglasses, years ago. They were not light enough in dark places, or dark enough in the sunlight. They didn't change quickly enough. And when I was in the car, there wasn't enough UV to keep them dark. As a result they were irritating and the next time I replaced my glasses I spent the same amount of money to get two pairs, one clear and one dark. Maybe the technology has improved by now and this stuff works better. And at least the motorcycle face shield is never going to be used in the car, so UV blocking window glass won't cause a problem. But I'm still not planning to go first, I'll wait for someone else to review these shields before I buy one.

Here's the basic heated grip setup I have on my 4th gen. It's the third bike I've installed inserts and troller on, and I love it. I've ordered the parts to put the same thing on the new bike, next weekend. Grip heater inserts and 'troller from Warmnsafe.com I saw the KOSO stuff at the PRI show a few years ago and was impressed. If I was building a streetfighter from a salvage bike and needed instruments, that's where I'd look first. Didn't see the gear shift indicator but the pics here look good.

I know a few guys who paint their own, and whose bikes look absolutely terrific. They tell stories of setting up paint booths, heat lamps, wet sanding over and over with this grit and that grit, using buffers, etc. Tedious! But their results are awesome, until they neglect the waxing and polishing for a little while, or spill gasoline on them, at which point they look pretty bad. Meanwhile the stock paint holds up very well even without all that regular waxing and polishing. Is it possible to get anywhere near the finish you find on stock paint, in custom colors? Would I get a good quality finish if I took the bodywork off and dropped it off at an auto body shop to have it professionally sprayed? And if I had it professionally done, say I chose something simple, like the tangerine bike up thread, how much should I expect to spend?

I was thinking of the front. I already like the Hyperlites for the brakes.

Has anyone tried the Skene Photon Blasters? Motorcycle Consumer News gave them a good review in the Jan 2010 issue. Thinking of ordering some.

That's actually a really good idea, even though most tailor's around here only charge $5 or $10 for the work. Of course it's a good idea; that's why I posted it! Saves time and hassle, and if you have multiple jackets and pants, you can buy additional zippers at the fabric store and make "adapters" like this that will let you mix and match on the fly as needed, without constantly having to re-sew things. And it adds a little extra length, which I, as a tall person, appreciate.