tinyminds

Jason...long time no hear! I have a pull out sofa bed available if anything falls through...there may one other option but it is unsure at this point...PM me your phone number or Kevins and I will send you a text with mine. It would be good to see you both again. Keith Thanks Keith. PM'ing it over, will figure something out.

Coincidentally, Kevin (kwr8727) and I are going to be in the area this weekend on the way to Mt Mitchell to pre-ride a mountain bike course for a race we are doing in July. My VFR remains abandoned in my garage. Was thinking of coming to visit for VFR crew Saturday night yet rooms seem to be booked up. Is anyone holding onto spare rooms or plan to cancel / leave early to make a room available? Let me know. Thanks. Jason

Sorry I missed Tmac this year guys... but I was just up the road looking down on you from up above kwr8728, teague, and I spend 3 days up there on the alternative two wheels this year! We were hoping to stop by and visit Saturday night but after riding for 8 hours we were toast. Next year though for sure! Glad everyone had a good time.

So I posted a couple months ago that my R/R finally gave out, even with all the wiring mods you could think of. I honestly had one of the most solid charging systems I've ever seen on a VFR, holding a solid 14.3v no matter what accessories, lights, etc I had turned on. Here's the start. I'm riding home one night, my left headlight shuts off ( I have HIDs by the way ). Odd... I have my headlights switched separately, so I switched it off and back on to reset the ballast, well when I did this it shut the other light off too... so i'm riding up the turnpike with no headlights at night time. I glance down and I see my dash getting dim.... uh oh.... I knew what was happening instantly. Well this section of the turnpike is pitch black dark, not the area you want to break down in. So I flipped my emergency blinkers on and halled a$$. The next exit was about 3-4 miles way. Not sure if I would actually make it that far, I was going to give it a shot. I hit the exit ramp 3-4 miles later @ about 140mph (Disclaimer: for legal purpose these speeds may be exaggerated) and the bike died as I'm about half way down the ramp. I had enough speed to make almost to the gas station off the exit, then I pushed it the rest of the way. I take my right side fairing off and see the nice and toasted R/R connector, then just called my wife to have her hook up my trailer and come pick me up. I get home and hooked the bike up to the tender to recharge the battery. Then a couple weeks later finally decide to verify my assumption... disconnect the stator, test resistance across the stator: 0.7, 0.8, 0.8 ( looks good ). Hook it back up, start the bike up, voltage with no headlights on is 12.3vdc, with headlights on is 10.7vdc ( so only one headlight will actually start up ). I disconnect the monitor wire.... nothing changed on the R/R output, the R/R wasn't even warm to the touch. So I ordered a new R/R. Two months later.... I finally decide i should probably get my motorcycle fixed. I've been so busy with mountain biking and cyclocross races I've not had any free time. So, I install the new R/R.... I'm getting the same results as before, 12.3vdc w/o lights and 10.7vdc w/ lights. Not cool! The way my wiring is I have two additional red wires going straight to the battery (fused) besides the two that go through the bikes wiring harness, as well as additional grounds and a bypassed monitor wire, so there is no other area's for issues to occur that aren't obvious. Could the new R/R be bad too? I had used one on another VFR so I tested this one before I took it off the other bike and it charged around 14vdc. So I hook it up and same thing.... 12.3vdc. So.... I disconnect the R/R and test the resistances again with a different meter with the same results: 07, 0.8, 0.8. Hmmm....... So, with the R/R disconnect I start the bike and test voltage across the stator with the bike running: 32vac, 32vac, 0vac. With the bike running I test resistance again: 0.7, 0.8, 0.8. Craziness. Resistance is fine, but voltage output on one circuit is 0vac. I've heard of this before but never seen it. So because i have spare everything laying around, I put another stator in the bike and hook up my original R/R and ....... chaaaching! 14.3vdc again. So I put the new R/R on the bike since I have it, put the old one that has 45k miles on it and still running strong in my drawer for a spare. In the end, I learned to not only look at resistance, because in this situation it tested normal even though the stator was shot. Also proves that no matter how well you wire something up.... something else will fail. Owe well. its fixed now! Sorry for the long writeup, just thought people would find this interesting with all the common R/R failures around.

The first couple of races I did I took them off. Then I got stuck out 20 miles from the start in the rain without my rain gear. That sucked. But if you draw a line from your mirror to your saddlebags, they really don't stick out much farther than one another. Honestly my saddlebags give me my space. It forces the riders to keep a little more distance away from me. They bump each other all the time, they know how to handle themselves if they clip my bag at least its a nice smooth surface to bounce off of, as oppose to them clipping my saddlebag bracket or something else that could hook onto their bars. There is a nice scratch on my right bag from a guy getting a little to close and his left shifter scraping my bag. Luckily my bags are rattle canned matte black and I can repaint them easy enough. But there are a few races where on major roads the riders are required to stay on the right side of the center line. Haha.... if you have ever done a bike race you know this can be the most challenging thing ever to control. So to help with bike control I go to the front of the field and put my saddlebag on the center line and slowly fall back through the field forcing them over. I would much rather have my bags that close to a rider than me. Primarily to answer that question it just gives me my space.

Local/non-UCI races are more self organizing. The officials plan out our positions at the start of the day so no race director is needed. The radio's allow for us to communication to each other and make adjustments in positioning during the race if needed. USA Cycling requires everyone on a moto to have the same training, so everyone when in a race should be on the same page on what to and not to do before we ever start. Tthe front official ( moto2 ) keeps in touch with the rear official ( moto1 ) and the middle officials ( moto3-4-5-6, etc ) to do time splits so that the riders know how large or small of a gap they have between one another. (Example: when we made a right hand turn onto Highway225, I radio the following: " Moto2 to Pro 1/2 Field, leaders will be making the right turn onto Hwy225 in 3....2.....1..... Mark" When mark is said the stop watches start. Say there are 3 groups, The leaders, the chase group, then the field. When the chase group gets to the turn then moto 3 will repeat 3...2...1.... mark, to get the time split from the leaders to the chase, same thing with Moto1 with the field. Once times are confirmed, the time splits are relayed to each group by its designated moto. We repeat this every 10 ish minutes so they riders know their progress. That makes up the majority of the radio comm when things are going as planned, just keeping the riders informed of whats going on.

We have HYT TC-610 UHF radios (one of the only models they make that are water-resistant. We have a pretty solid 3 mile range on them. We had custom headset made for Multimode PTT, meaning we have multiple PTT buttons for different channels on one radio, one for race radio between officials, stage, support cars, etc, and one for comm with the police officers. Owe and in the defense of Motorefs, that guy driving the camera guy around that hit that spectator was a part of the media team, not an official :P

Webster Roubaix Race ( A really really dirty VFR @ the end of the day Note: I will not be using my VFR for this next year, bad bike choice :P ) As some of you know I"m an avid cyclist / racer ( hence the avatar picture ). Over the past year I somehow found myself heavily involved with the cycling racing world in and whole new way. Several years ago I kind of lost my interest in riding my motorcycle, mainly in part to my move to Florida from Kentucky, and the drastic change of riding terrain. That lack of interest is also what has made my presence here on this forum more random than before. At the end of the cycling race season last year someone found out that I had/have a history with motorcycles and recommended me check out the USA Cycling Moto Officials Program, so I talked with some of the local people over Florida Cycling and was convinced to go with several others up to Chicago for the weekend to do a motorcycle / cycling training class that is required before you are allowed to have a motorcycle along side the cyclist in any sanctioned race. Then the season began. The first couple of races were kind of scary. You can sit in a class for days and them talk about what to do, what not to do, etc, but when you get out with a race, adrenaline is going, racers are at there max and going at 100% of their capability as their heart rates hover 160-200bpm for 2-4 hours. The responsibility is beyond imaginable. Nearly all of these races take place on open roads where 5-10 police officers are involved, usually none of which have any experience working with cyclist or an open road race situation, so it's my responsibility to coordinate with them via radio comm's doing rolling enclosures, basically pulling over vehicles, clearing the entire road as 150+ cyclist come barreling along at 40+ mph. Its simple when the pack is all together, but once the fields start breaking up and you have 3-5 groups of cyclist spread out across a 5 mile span, it takes 10+ additional people to keep these random cars stopped until the last rider is clear. Sounds crazy huh? At first its stressful but it takes a certain type of person to handle it I suppose. Besides controlling traffic we to keep the cyclist under thumb as well, there are a lot of rules that have to be followed, enough to fill a couple hundred page book, everything from coordinating riders dropping back to cars or going through feed zones to get water/food, to in races arguments, crashes, and flat tires. It takes trust on both sides, it takes a person that has a history in cycling and in motorcycles to do it honestly. to understand the riders lines, and assume what riders are going to do before they do it. I've found myself beside a field riding along then next thing I know I'm boxed in on all sides with cyclist going 30+ mph. I hold my line, they hold theirs, and everyone will be ok. I know most of the riders here in Florida so their is a certain level of trust there. It's different when I'm out of state working races and don't know the riders, you just hope for the best! The days usually start out early, first race goes off at 7-8am, and we need to be there at least an hour early, which wakes us up anywhere from 3:30-5:30am depending on the location of the race. 200-300 mile days at 20-40mph can make for a long day, so we have to be prepared and coordinate amongst the other Moto-Officials to find time to eat, drink, take restroom breaks, etc, because you can't just stop a race when your tired or its hot out, which its Florida, most of our season is 90+ temps. It doesn't sound like as much fun as it is, but once your out there it usually seems go to smooth, and when things don't go as they should thats what we are there for. Our primary purpose is safety. Safety for ourselves, the cyclist, cars that are on the road, spectators, everyone. We are the mediator for everyone. Our road season has came to an end for 2010, and I look forward to next year, but also looking forward to having a few weekends back to relax as well during the winter break. My first race of next year will be my first race out of the country as I get to head up the Tour of Bahamas with another local official. How often do you get paid while on vacation! Here's a couple pics from the year of my Viffer @ work: 2010 Florida State Road Race Championship - Pro 1/2 Race! Pro1/2 Race State Championship (5 laps to go) Sugarloaf Race Weekend - Masters 35/45 Race

Have 3 corded ones with variable speed so I don't have to change the bits out. One keeps a cut-off wheel, one has a grinding tool, and the other a cutting bit. One of the most used tool I own excluding the sockets, and screw drivers... and a hammer every now and then! Tried a cordless one and returned it... like someone else said, no power for heavy grinding jobs.

I had a cheap POS mounted behind my fairing and it worked OK, Its faults were more because of it was a POS in my opinion than where it was mounted. Later I mounted my nice radar detector on a ram mount so I could use it in my car as well. Couldn't compensate mounted a $250 detector behind my fairing and it possibly getting damaged in the rain or something. I had no issue having it mounted on a ram mount though. In conclusion the ABS plastic doesn't seem to effect its performance to answer your question. :blink:

Just touch it with a screw driver but be careful not to hold it there or it can weld it across the terminals. It will spark but its not going to hurt anything.