Auspanglish

On top of it all there are maintenance works being done on the railway line so I have to get off before my destination and take a bus which will take much longer than the train would have. Looks like the seller is willing to pick me up where I have to get off the train instead of having to catch the bus. Very generous and considerate of him. Certainly gives a good impression facilitating gear and pick up! Who ever said they were all Pommy twats? (His words)

Nope. Missed previous train by minutes which means arriving two hours later, which was the window of sunlight I had to get back to Oxford. Will be travelling in the dark at significantly colder temperatures. Bugger. Thank science for GPS devices, navigating unknown territory in the dark is that much more difficult. If this were the amazing race I'd use the express pass. I need a packet of Manup pills...

Yes, I finally came across the info regarding needing a green slip. I hope they don't mean one of those in the attached picture. I actually got a slightly better (by 40p) quote on (comprehensive) insurance selecting social and commuting use versus merely social. Odd. Unfortunately I seem to have clicked on the latter option and will try to swap it over by calling them, or by email, as I'd rather the description of the use I give the bike be as accurate as possible, although if I did break down while commuting I can always say I was on a day trip somewhere. As a nurse I don't work the typical 9-5, Monday to Friday schedule. Yes it's sunny, very few clouds but nippy, as in nipples are harder than Chinese algebra. That is an understatement for a guy who grew up in the tropics and spent the last 15 years on the Mediterranean coastline. At least the rain has held off until tomorrow. Thankfully the bike has heated grips and hand protectors/deflectors so that'll help. Could do with a heated seat. My toasty Swiss brand (IXS) textile suit would keep me warm if it had arrived on time. The soon-to-be previous owner is sorting me out with some secondhand gear. He has also ordered some spare parts for me but they haven't arrived either so he'll be sending them on. Neither of us have been able to get our printers working so we will have to go without the bill of sale. I figure it's surplus to requirements. From what you've all mentioned and what I've read with the tear-off section of the V5C I'm sorted. Tax once I've got that (I assume that is the green slip). The question is, will there be enough hours of sunlight left to press "avoid motorways" or "scenic route" on the GPS for the trip back on the bike?

The quickest way to get there appears to be via Victoria Station. Using bus and then train, or train-tube-train. On the way back, on the bike, obviously I'll take a more direct route. My Tomtom GPS will guide me home. I can't work out whether I can pay the tax before I have the tear off slip from the V5C or not. Bloody red tape. https://www.gov.uk/vehicle-tax-direct-debit

I live by the riveeer!!

I'm seeing that the insurance mob Bennetts is offering breakdown cover, overseas riding and riding other bikes on the back of compulsory, voluntary third party insurance, so not comprehensive but that's ok, for £12.43 per month. Does that sound good? Seems good to me. I could pay £8.33 without the breakdown cover but much prefer roadside assistance. I should be heading down Hastings way on Sunday 99% certain I'll be riding the bike home the annoying thing is from Oxford to Hastings it's only a couple of hours on a bike but it will probably take me four and a half hours by train into London and then down from Victoria Station to Bexhill on Sea edit I have also a quote for £13.30 full comprehensive same as the other one but with comprehensive cover

The 1050 is a very nice bike, one of my best mates had it for several years before recently moving onto the 1200. It's maneuverable, easy to ride fast, gobs of well dosified power in any gear, ABS, good wind protection for the rider, but his pillion wife got battered around by turbulence and he got a great offer for the fully electronically adjustable 2016 1200cc model second hand. Was tempted by a 2014 1200cc at £6000 but really can't justify the cost and it's a waste of so much bike I'll only be commuting on 20 minutes each way 3 or 4 times a week and the odd outing (very infrequently over winter for sure).

History check clear

Most excellent advice chaps! Thanks muchly. Online sounds the easiest; transfer, tax and insurance. I've found another bike I'm pretty much convinced on. I'm going British for the first time. Tiger 955i. Near Hastings, this Saturday hopefully. Need to get boots, gloves and helmet beforehand as all my gear is in Spain; having my very warm and toasty IXS textile two piece sent over though.

What can you spray on the rims and underside of the bike to protect from salt corrosion? WD40? Enviado desde mi m2 note mediante Tapatalk

No way am I riding that bike on public roads without insurance that is a Recipe For Disaster. This time it is a case of buying in the UK and using in the UK so I'm not Crossing any borders either. I don't know the owner and we haven't met yet and I'm starting to get cold feet when my enquiries are only answered in part, very briefly, very few details. He promised he'd get me photos yesterday he didn't. Says he leaves for work in the dark and arrives home in the dark (so why say you'll take photos if you know you can't?). I asked him for the reg number yesterday and he said ok give me a couple of minutes and I haven't heard anything since. So this all may very well be true, he hasn't had the opportunity to get any photos and maybe he was really tired from a long day's work and fell asleep before sending me the reg, but he hasn't sent it to me this morning either and I've said I'm very interested in the bike, although obviously I'm not until I actually physically see the bike and start it up and see it running and at least ride it a couple of hundred metres to see if the thing works. He claims he accepted it as part payment on another bike that he was selling that he has had it for 6 months and the clock says about 49000 miles. I only want the bike as a commuter to and from work I don't intend to do any long-distance trips on this bike and it will suffer the winter salt on the roads. It's actually a Honda Transalp XL600 from 1994. He says it starts up easily with a little choke because it winter and it blows no smoke. Of course it's all his word I am yet to see the bike. It could be just a nice day trip down to the Isle of Wight and back without buying a bike, it's just hard to tell if he's a simple Island kind of guy or if he is deliberately being sparse with his replies. He is asking 850 quid which would appear to be the price this make and model are going for. There's another one online at a similar price but it only has daytime mot as it has no rear indicators and also the owner is very young and he has put this excessively massive exhaust muffler at a ridiculous angle I just want a bike I can jump on and ride and not have to perform any modifications on or revisit the Mot with new blinkers. This is the photo, the only photo that I have so far: JZH thank you for the legal run down interesting how Concepts change so we no longer own our bikes we are but their Guardians it sounds very Australian aboriginal they claim they do not own the land but are its caretakers. it also sounds like the new system may generate some complaints if the entire process is down to the previous owner sending paperwork on so you have paid the owner you have left with the bike but then you may find they do not follow through with the paperwork and claimed their bike back this is why I want a bill of sale even though you say it's unnecessary I would like proof that I purchased the bike from the other person. I can see the running costs of the DVLA we're too much for the budget and they found a way to let it run itself so to speak. I'm not sure if I have your phone number but I'm starting to become more attracted to a 2004 Triumph Tiger 955 for £2,000 via a dealer only an hour from where I live, instead of three to four hours to the Isle of Wight. A dealer may be a little more confidence inspiring and hopefully will involve at least a 3 month warranty. It's 10 years younger, it's fuel injected, this model was the highest scorer amongst its peers in most motorcycle reviews when it came out. It's got a top box, it's got hand warmers it appears to be in better condition and is probably more reliable. My concern with a 1994 Transalp is whether or not spare parts are still available which I haven't checked and if something goes wrong with the bike if I can't get the spare parts and there's none second-hand then I get stuck with a hot potato that I can't pass on and I think a more modern fuel injected bike maybe easier to sell on when I finally leave the island of Little Dribbling.

This is a shout out to UK members for advice and info on paperwork required for buying a bike in England via private sale. How do I organize transfer of ownership? Can I get tentative insurance organized previously to ride the bike home if it ticks all the boxes? Which insurance mob would you recommend? Is there a standard contract of sale I can print out to formalize the purchase? Is there also a form I get the previous owner to sign and then take somewhere to register the transfer or ownership? Anything else red tape wise? Going to Isle of Wight to see and hopefully ride away on a bike this Saturday. I have asked for the registration number to run vehicle history check but is this just via DVLA, or police or where? Online I imagine there are options. Do V5Cs apply to bikes? I'm fairly certain they do and I seem to be reading information online stating that the previous owner must send in the V5C to the DVLA having given me what I imagine is a tear off section 10 as proof on taking the bike home with me.

Joshua is a stand up, honest, competent, responsible and well respected individual on this forum. Your methods of trial and error instead of following established trouble shooting flowcharts has in my mind lead to your expensive repairs. I can't see that you ever ran the workshop manual checks, like Stator AC Voltage output (unplugged), continuity to ground or between phases and resistance. I can't see from what you've written that the checks you may have performed were done so in the logical order for ruling out components. Perhaps you did but it's not documented. The first thing for running these checks is a known healthy and fully charged battery. Nope, you didn't do that. Your first mistake was just throwing in an eBay R/R and the VFRness. No checks documented or expressed in your post. This was a bandaid on a haemorrhage and probably just made things worse. The VFRness doesn't fix existing issues and poor component choice. It helps reinforce the OEM installation when this is assumed to be in decent working order TO PREVENT ISSUES from leaving you stranded. So that was an erroneous assumption if you thought otherwise. EBay R/R... Pffff. Then because of this poor choice of pseudo-solution, your electrical installation caught on fire!! That probably cooked certain sections of the wiring loom, in particular the VFRness as it's intended to work as a bypass and THAT is probably the sole reason some of it ended up having the resistance you discovered AFTER THE FACT. Cooked wires give resistance. Then you just continued doing what poor mechanics who don't have electrical knowledge do: swap parts out in no logical trouble shooting sequence to see if you got lucky. It stands in Josh's favour the fact he refunded you anything at all; he's just too nice a guy. There are tutorials on this site explaining how to diagnose and fix these issues and plenty of generous altruistic people here that could have put you on the right path. You're not telling it how it is by slandering Joshua's website and suggesting people avoid giving him any business. You are attempting and failing miserably to mask your own incompetency in dealing with your bike's issues by using him as your scapegoat. Period. Nail in your coffin: you can't conclude Jack shit just by looking at a stator, it requires testing with a multimeter. The term Fair Weather Friend (or Fellow) is not a complimenting term but the complete opposite. It refers to turncoats who are only friendly when times or circumstances are good. When the chips are down, when you most need them, they give zip in return or turn on you to better their own lot or just aren't there for you. Funny moniker to describe one's self using a derogatory term like that. Poor judgement there as well. I would and have just gone out on a limb for Josh and believe most of us would.

Oh, I read somewhere wheeling the bike backwards a certain distance cleared some ECU memory or something on the 1200... Maybe you just helped confirm that. Has it done it again since?

Go to the download section and get the workshop manual in PDF for your model.

Yes and no. If you are thorough and consistent in your maintenance regime and know your coolant is not old, thermostat and radiator cap are good, air bled, etc, then probably you'll never need to worry. A few fellow VFR owners always say just to swap the display to ambient temperature and "faggedaboudit"!! Then there's Sod's law. If something can go wrong, it will, and if it does, I'd rather know about it. The OEM fan is more efficient when stopped. If it comes on at speeds between, roughly, 40 - 100 Km/h it is rendered useless and will see your electrical system overworked and we all know the 5th and 6th gens' weak points lie in (different) components of their electrical installations. So I think it's good to know what's going on to avoid any possible untoward event becoming catastrophic. Still, it's good to know how it works, what different factors affect it and what those numbers mean and how to avoid overstressing the system. Ignorance is not bliss when you find out the hard way. Read your manuals. Honda, and they're not always right even about their own bikes, has decided the VFR will tolerate up to 120°C. Then the display starts flashing. I have personally seen this at the racetrack on my 6th gen. This is time to stop subjecting the bike to whatever it is you're doing and stop somewhere in the shade, for example, don't switch off immediately, and see if the fan indeed will lower that temperature a bit without the opposing wind from moving forward hindering its flow. Either that, or try easing off the throttle or getting out of bad traffic and out on open roads. The bike is not very proficient at city commuting. Install a manual override, to turn the fan off when you know the incoming air is defeating the fan, try installing it with a timer to revert back to OEM function (to avoid any forgetfulness leading to further disaster). A VTR fan blade will probably only be useful if you use the bike mainly at the racetrack, which few do as it's not exactly the most effective race bike. So, in summary, don't be paranoid, get informed about what's normal and take it as a hot runner. There is a point, at 120°C where you are likely to develop an oil ooze at the header gasket and I do believe the bike shuts down at 125°C but I have no confirmation of this. Thus, temps of 110-112°C which I frequently saw in mixed-use situations were not reason for panic but could, if stuck longer in the aggravating situation, lead to undesirable temperatures and wear and tear on the electrical components like stator, reg/rec, connectors, etc. Knowledge will set you free!!

Why not download the workshop manual off here and have a squiz

The first photo looks like it's an overflow tube, my 5th and 6th gen had two or three overflow tubes: one for overfilling the tank, one for coolant overflow from the radiator and the third for coolant overflow from the expansion bottle. The second photo looks like that tube should be connected to your coolant overflow bottle which is that whitish semi-transparent plastic bottle with the black rubber cap you can see in the lower right background of the same photo. As for the fluid on the floor I'm not sure. Probably maybe coolant? For oil filter quick search on Google with your year model... Don't buy disposable K&N oil filters though, heard a lot of stories of failure with nasty results (their air filters are OK)

That must make for some slippery dykes

At two years old the coolant needs changing if you ask me.

JZH is correct, nothing missing. It's all extremely rusty though.

It's a motorcycle forum not a soapbox.

I may be wrong but I think the fuel pump won't work if there's no fuel in it / for it to pump.

Exackery

Plenty of cheap ECUs to be had from the USA with no HISS, sold on eBay together with ignition cylinder, fuel tank cap, seat release mechanism and one or two keys which you can easily have copies made of. It is no deterrent to organized thieves who then probably re-register the bike across the channel and sell it. Or just steal it to part it out and ditch the traceable bits like the chassis. If needs be, making coded copies is simple with Kaldek's YouTube how to.