Kiwiwannafly

Similar: Perfect day on a perfect smooth Swiss engineered road on a K100, getting adventurous with shaving the footpegs and sliding the front tyre a little. Then blown away by several Jappos - a Honda 750 four K1!!, GS750 etc. Talk about ego deflation....till I caught up with them at a cafe, took a closer look and slowly began to understand. All of them shared a common theme - Fritz Egli frames.

Dude! You stole my bike! LOL! Nah, my fork lowers are painted and I still have the original exhaust. This is definitely the place for good oil on VFR's - even Gen5 and older. Can't help re: Power Commander map sorry. I picked up an ex-English model imported into NZ after a hard neglected life of salty roads with a long litany of predominantly electrical corrosion issues. Our relationship vacillates between threats of fuel line cuts and matches, and kicking over in the surf and letting the sea finish the work it started. And then there are the days when I prod her in the ass and she just howls with delight. That V4 is damn addictive. Where's the abandoned air strip? Been over a fair bit of the states (well actually a fair bit of the world now) on 2 wheels, but don't recognise the backdrop at all. I'll dare to bet the VFR blew the snot out of Tom Cruise's ZZR (Top Gun pun)...

My daughter has two pairs of sunglasses. The Raybans are pretty good, the Roybins hmm....not so good.

Twas time for a new chain cause the old one was pretty knackered and making funny clicking sounds. But being the tight arse that I am, I thought saving a few bucks on a chain should tide me over. And a "DID 530 O ring" chain from China seemed to fit the budget. Note at this stage the sprockets were both looking pretty tidy - symmetrical, no sign of hooking or wear. From day 1: New Chinese "DID" (yeah right!) chain required adjustment at about 50km. Not a typo. 50. Required re-adjustment at about 200km and intervals of about 200km ever since. Required lubrication (like chain was rusting and squeaking) at about 500km, and similar intervals ever since. Ran out of adjustment, so shortened chain by 2 links (I know - serious alarm bells) So at about 5000km it is completely rooted & time for a genuine DID 530 VX3. Rear sprocket is well chewed now especially near the tips of each tooth - they are up for replacement too. As a comparison I put the Chinese "DID" next to the new genuine DID. And guess what? They measured exactly the same length. Except the old Chinese DID was 106 links (108 minus the 2 I cut off) and the genuine DID was 110 (not cut to 108 yet). That's a 4 LINK STRETCH!!! Master link pins were as loose as (expletive censored). O rings were visibly sloppy around the pins too. Permanently greased - pfft! Moral of the story - just don't. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32880942533.html?spm=a2g0o.ams_97944.0.0.2356v5Yvv5Yv3z&pdp_ext_f={"ship_from":"CN","sku_id":"12000027369291254"}&scm=1007.26694.140541.0&scm_id=1007.26694.140541.0&scm-url=1007.26694.140541.0&pvid=7602e4d3-7d19-4f77-ba10-da44bf9867d9&fromRankId=11751190&_t=fromRankId:11751190 Photo 1 - follow the links Photo 2 - side flex between Chinese DID and new genuine. PS - Don't need lecturing. This is a cautionary tale - not one I need tutoring on.

Not quite 74 yet (mid 60's) but still pursuing my 10+ year dream of circumnavigating Africa solo by bike. Was on my way (twice!) but second time covid sent me home after a 2 month lock down in Morocco just on the Mauritania border. Another Transalp, another day soonish and I'll be back. Wrecked knees on an adventure bike? Pah! I'll manage just fine.

Substantial repairs to my gen5 fairing - had the luxury of a hot staple gun on loan. Stainless staples melted across the breaks adds a lot of strength and you're able to keep the outer surfaces flush. Topped this with fibreglass backing as well. Look carefully at areas to be repaired, especially where they mesh with other panels - some tricky little tabs and slots that once broken can go unnoticed. 3M makes a 2 pack epoxy plastic repair - hard, semi-rigid and flexible plastic to suit various locations/flexibilities. Really good stuff but damn expensive. Also need a mixing nozzle - this stuff sets amazingly fast so one mixing nozzle per use. Check headlight mounts, back of all places where front and side fairings mesh - these holes often are cracked - pretty thin plastic there. Of course in the interests of dedicated weight saving you could ditch them all for the extreme nude look.

I put mine back together again after removing about 20 years of English salty roads and criminal neglect. Yet to ride the 929 shock mod for an opinion. Better looking than it did when I picked it up.

LOL! Always had a thing about the earlier models before sensibility and de-tuning kicked in. Not seriously looking at the moment - still have Africa just put on hold till things open up again.

You find a TL1000 with that kind of milage, stick it in a big suitcase and I'll shout you a trip to NZ. Yeah, did a m/c license test in California years ago on a GS750. The guy rolled his eyes when he saw the bike, but couple of minutes into the slow speed stuff he flagged the rest and said "so, you're already pretty familiar with bikes". Sold my R90/6 in Miami after a trip from Ca to Alaska north of the polar circle & back, then x-country via the south. Flew to England, bought a K100, did Europe & Turkey return, then shipped it to NZ. Many miles on it here before heading around Oz on a TransAlp. Then back to Europe and grabbed another TransAlp for a round trip of Africa. Unfortunately covid put that idea on hold at the Moroccan-Mauritania border. Couple of months there locked down before I could get back to Europe and then head back to NZ - for another couple of weeks in isolation before getting turned loose on the latest acquisition.

I'd say in someones big suitcase when they moved here. Apart from the speedo and odometer in miles I'm pretty happy now. But OMG the hash butchery of the electrics! Bought it as a non go-er from a guy who said the electrics were dead, even with a brand new battery. After I got it home I pressed the kill switch ton 'on'. Everything lights up - but no starter motor. A set of starter motor brushes later fired up first time. But ran a bit warm - one radiator with a bad split. Fixed that, then took it for a little 600km test run, changed the sludge, ran it again and changed again, this time with filter. Re done the horrible crimp on wire patches, new chain (story about that elsewhere on here), new 929 shock mods, rebuilt forks, brakes, paint job on body, wheels and forks. Hope to roll again soon before winter descends. But whatever - we ride 365 trying to ignore wet undies.

😄 this is a sadly neglected old girl ex England where they do nice stuff like put salt on the roads. Ok if you wash that shit off every 5,6,7....years. Never mind, she's found a loving home now.

Apparently sarcasm is wearing its stealth cloak today.

Hmmm...better check the brake fluid level. Nex minit: It is OK to run the hydraulics on used diesel oil and mud isn't it? They seemed (surprisingly!) to work averagely well on this before I opened it up (after 20 years). Apparently a similar viscosity, appearance and rank smelling oil was common to the forks too.

And when your camel back runs dry and you've still got 300km to the next road house (for those not familiar - there aint NOTHING in between road houses)?? Yeah, and the ice WEST (assume you mean VEST)...the chances of finding a freezer every hundred km out there is ....oh yeah, there's one next to the snowflake on the flying pig! Parts of Western Australia can be pretty hard core. Rivals Western Sahara. I know - rode thru both.

Harden up guys - met a fellow idiot in Western Australia, sheltering under the one tree for hundreds of kms. His Enfield had a thermometer attached - 52C. Science experiment for the day: evaporative cooling of a water soaked t-shirt in extreme heat and low humidity conditions - i.e. WA 50+ degree day, long way from the coast and a bit of humidity, 90-100km/hr. Felt cooling effect for approximately 180 seconds. At 240 seconds bone dry. Nope - wasn't going to wear leathers that day.....