perseverantist

Good to know... I'll hit ya'll up in a week or two. Found a decent route for around here following 78 south to Argyle, Gratiot, into Illinois. Fairly curvy for these parts. Once the fields get put in there'll be less worry of debris on the roads/corners. The rain yesterday probably helped clean it up a bit too. Heading out for an Iron Butt Great Lakes Circumnavigation on Monday!

A few pics from the last week...

1,200 +/- 100 rpm... Adjust when warm, the Throttle Stop Screw is just above and slightly left of the clutch slave cylinder. No need to remove any of the body panels as the service manual suggests. Mine was high from day one, I finally got around to it the other day. I was sitting at 1800 at idle.

Ordered the Ixil exhaust, received it in 2 days from Indiana. I'm still up in the air on my decision though... The small pipes have a different tone than what I'm used to, more raspy than a growl. I took the db killers out of both and after a trip through downtown Madison with the tall buildings paralleling me I went back home to put them back in. Too loud for my taste. With them in it's ok, but it's not the same reverberation you get with the volume in a "regular" can. Also the proportion of the the pipe to the rest of the bike is just a little off. I do like how more of the rear wheel is visible. I suppose while I have the old can off I'll see what I can do to modify it. I actually don't mind the factory muffler other than the sound of course. Aesthetically, I think it looks good.

Any pictures of the underside mounting location and a pic with the helmet attached? Seems like the front step may get in the way in this location? Thanks!

Hey there Kedge, nice to see some Wisconsin folks on here! I'm up for a ride most anytime...

If i'm feeling lazy I'll give the bike a bit of a running start, i.e. 6-12", once you've got the momentum going, step on the center stand and let inertia do the work. It's quite a bit easier with the weight of the bike rolling backwards.

I might be up for a Saturday or Sunday ticket. Depends on my schedule. Probably won't camp there though. I'd know more after the 15th of May when my schedule for June comes out.

Wow, that's quite a load! I bet you end up using a fraction of it all and wishing you may have packed less, at least that's what ends up happening to me. How is it hiking your leg up and over that? Enjoy your journey. Liking the pics, keep it up!

Yep! First thing I did when I got home. Woke up to snow here today. Need to get the bike cleaned up and ready to ride again. The dirty white reminds me of the space shuttle after returning from a mission. I'd like to see what the pre-wash situation looks like. I've never seen the Space Shuttle after return. :) Shuttle... First thing that came to mind after the dirty bike condition. I had the luxury of seeing the shuttle piggybacked on a 747 on it's way back to Cape Canaveral. Couldn't believe how dirty and wore out it looked. Here's a pic I found on the internet of the dirty beast.

Yep! First thing I did when I got home. Woke up to snow here today. Need to get the bike cleaned up and ready to ride again. The dirty white reminds me of the space shuttle after returning from a mission.

America's Tallest Flagpole near Sheboygan, WI Mackinac Bridge

I got back from my trip around Lake Michigan yesterday morning around 0100. I left a little bit after 1400 on Tuesday and was hoping to make it around in a day but ran into a few unforeseen circumstances. I traveled clockwise, starting in Sun Prairie, WI, over to Milwaukee, then following near the coast all the way around. Didn't get the required sleep before the ride so after forgetting my pin number to get fuel and then forgetting my pin to get into my phone in Manistique, MI I called it a night and got a motel. Not to mention temps had dropped down to around 36 chilly degrees. Departed Thursday morning, ran into rain around the Mackinac Bridge and then it was off and on rain until I got distracted talking to my wife and kids on the phone, lost track of how many miles I had gone since the fuel light came on and ran out of gas just outside of the Cook Nuclear Power Plant in Southern Michigan. Heavy downpours started at the same time..... MISERABLE to say the least. No one stopped. I pushed the bike for about a mile or so, gave up, and called roadside assistance which took another hour to get to me. My Shoei GT Air helmet didn't perform as well as some of my past helmets in the rain even after multiple Rain-X applications. After fueling up I reluctantly started off towards home. Rode non-stop in the rain from roughly Sawyer, Michigan to the Wisconsin state line, dark, heavy rain, Chicago traffic. Also not one of the highlights of the trip. Just south of Madison I ran into the worst rain of all and was down to 50mph trying to navigate using the white fog line... Rolled into the garage after 1100 miles, 34 hours later, and soaked to the bone. Leads me to a few comments on the 8th Gen.... It handled flawlessly in the rain and poor road conditions through Chicago, almost with a "hang on, I'll get you home" mentality. As far as the cold goes, I searched and searched and couldn't find a warm spot to thaw out my fingers. If I recall, my 5th Gen had a nice warm spot just forward of my knee against the frame where the side fairings jetted out about 2". I could tuck my hands in there and warm them up a bit. I suppose it was due to the side mounted radiators vs the front mounted rad on the 8th Gen. Any suggestions on a spray on coating or applied wax for raining conditions would be appreciated. I'm wondering if the pinlock system had an affect on my vision? Attached is my route from my SPOT locator. I think I have a couple pics I'll throw on here after I post this. http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=0OlIRCJY3dVhptVfPUaT7ZAYhkTFfa6FP

Sounds like a great idea, maybe for a day ride or something small to start a tradition going forward.

MaxSwell... 36, so not terribly young. Epyon007...I live just outside of Madison, as MaxSwell stated, the Driftless area is a great location as is a trip through the Kettle-Moraine forest. Have you ridden anywhere near the St. Croix river? I've head that has nice scenery but haven't made it up that way yet. Off work at 0600, sleeping until roughly 11~12 and then I'm off for the Lake Michigan Loop, back by noon on Wednesday if all goes as planned.