Ride Report: Around Lake Burton

8 Dec 2012:  Solo Ride

After getting the adjustable kickstand installed, I decided to give it an extended test.  I thought it would happen earlier in the week when I went to the doctor but as soon as I walked in the office and saw a full waiting room, I knew that wasn't going to happen.  The weather has been really mild lately, with high temps into the mid 70s, so I hoped the trend would continue for the weekend.  The forecast called for intermittent showers on a kinda cloudy day so I decided to take a chance.

FZ1 Mod: Adjustable Kickstand

After all of the suspension work, Baby has been inadvertently lowered a little bit.  It wasn't exactly planned but with my lack of inseam I like it.  I resisted purposefully lowering (both of my bikes) because I didn't want to lose any ground clearance or important bits like the centerstand and if I did it I wanted it to be done the "right" way.

Ride Analysis: .GPX Data

Here's some stuff I forgot to put in the last ride report.  Most of the time I run my gps so that it will make tracks during the ride so I'll know how far and where we've gone.  I have been using the website gpsanalyzer but this time I downloaded GPSPrune from the Ubuntu Software Center.

Ride Report: Track Demo and Cheaha

10 Nov 2012:  Finally a ride longer than 20 miles
I was really anxious to ride after not being able to since the last ride.  I'd begged my brother to ride Baby to work one day so he could get a bit of a workout after sitting for nearly two months.  A little seafoam in the tank and he was still running like a champ.  I convinced Cruzman to sign up for the NESBA/Yamaha Bike Demo at the Barber Motorsports Track Day.

Ride Report: Another Long Day...Maybe

16 Sep 2012.  The day before the ride, I discovered that the charger in my tank bag wasn't charging.  Actually I thought I'd have to replace the 12v accessory plug but it was the outlet inside the tank bag.  I have another one but it's smaller and doesn't fit in the hole inside the bag.  Instead of messing with it, I just switched to my smaller bag.

Sam has been sent away

I admit that I've been a very bad motorcycle Mommy.  It's clear I favor Baby over Sam and have since the first day I brought him home.  It's also true that Sam wasn't running well and fell a victim of taking him to multiple mechanics until I found one that could get the job done.  But of course it's not that simple.  I think it's time to step into the way back machine to tell a little more about my history with Sam.

Update

I haven't been doing too much.  Right now I'm recovering from the shingles for the second time.

FZ1 Maintenance: Catching up

Other than oil changes and mods, I've just been riding carefree.  During the Rally, I noticed Baby was running a little rough and suspected it may just need a carb sync.  Cruzman reinforced this when he asked (out of the blue) if I'd synced my carbs.  Uh...no.

Ride Report: Feeling Advanced

29 July 2012

After installing the ELS +4 Advancer I was anxious to go for a nice long ride to test it.  I was so anxious I didn't get any sleep the night before I wanted to ride.  Instead of riding, I hung out with my niece.  Sunday morning, after getting a little more sleep but waking up way too groggy to think about riding, I watched the F1 race and pondered if I'd get the chance to ride soon.

FZ1 Mod: +4º Ignition Advancer

I finished the last bit of the RR Carb Stuff mods today by installing the ELS +4 Advancer.  It's been nearly two years since Cruzman and I did the Carb Stuff (can't believe it's been that long).  Recently I noticed the bike sometimes feels a bit sluggish below 3k.  I figured I just need to sync the carbs but then I saw a post on FZ1OA that made me wonder if advancing the ignition would help.

Ride Report: Eluding the rain

15 July 2012

After I helped (or got in the way) Cruzman get my rear tire on, we decided to hit some of our favorite roads instead of the 400 mile ride I'd planned.  In my rush to get the tire changing stuff ready for when Cruzman arrived, I neglected to put my rain gear in my case.  That would come back to haunt me later.

Maintenance: Tire Changer Mods

About a year ago, I picked up a used Harbor Freight Manual Tire Changer and the Motorcycle Attachment (which is no longer available as I type this).  When I bought mine, used was the only option however now they have them available on eBay.  I knew that it needed modification so it wouldn't do too much damage to the wheels.  There are a plethora of pages out there that explain how to do it and I used information from many of them when I did the mods for mine.

Trip Report: FZ1OA Rally Ride Day 2 and Going Home

9 June 2012:  Ride Day 2

The plan: meet at the Fontana Gas Station at 9.  We weren't even sure where we were going.  With a little extra time in the morning Cruzman left me at camp to ride the Dragon I went to the Lodge for a cup of coffee and ran into iluvmyfz1.  It was a good thing too because he arrived after dark the night before and wasn't sure where the gas station was.

Trip Report: FZ1OA Rally, Ride Day 1

8 June 2012:  Little River RD, again?

The last two years (my only two years) I've spent the weekend riding with whoever I rode up with.  This year I made myself a promise that I'd ride with the largest group I could find and try to get to know more people.  That meant I had no idea where I wanted to ride only that I wanted to ride.  We decided to meet at eflyguy's cabin at 7 the night before at the fire pit.  There were about 5 or 6 guys around at the time and the plan was to have a good ride and be back kind of early.

Trip Report: 2012 FZ1OA Rally Arrival Day

7 June 2012:  I met Cruzman in Blairsville for the ride up to the Fontana Village in North Carolina for this year's rally around 5 p.m.  I got a little confused about where we were meeting even though I told him where I wanted to meet.  Fortunately, I had cell service so after a couple of messages, he was on his way to me while I gassed up.

FZ1 Mod: R1 Fork Conversion Revisited

Lower Triple Do Over.

Back in January I had my front wheels bearings replaced because I noticed a little wiggle with the front tire.  It turns out it wasn't the wheel bearings but loose steering.  It seems you shake the wheel to test the wheel bearings and the forks for the steering bearings.  I shook the wheel it shook but I didn't bother to shake the forks.  During my last trip, the steering loosened up so much I could no longer deny that there might be something else wrong.

Motocamping: The Tent

After my last few motocamping excursions, I think I finally know what I want in a tent.  I haven't spent that much money on my camping supplies in the past simply because I wasn't sure whether or not I'd keep doing it.  It's much easier to go to a hotel at the end of the day than it is to setup camp.  However I find peace in an out of the way camp site so I believe I'll stick to motocamping.

Video: Making Adjustments

I haven't ridden as much as I would like the past few months but I have been thinking about making it easier to video the ride.  New camera?  Not in the budget just yet however I can do something about the mounts.

Gear: Evolution of my sound system

My Bike to Bike Integrated Audio System Solution.

It started not long after I started commuting.  The song of the v-twin and wind just wasn't enough as I navigated through LA traffic.  My first system was simple:  Dollar store headphones that I inserted into my helmet plugged into my no skip cd player that was a leftover from when I owned my Jeep.  That worked well enough until the need to talk to other riders arose while I planned a cross country trip.   Most of the solutions back then cost multiple hundred dollars and weren't what I needed since I only figured I'd use it during the three week trip.

Ride Report: The Franklin Loop

3 Mar 2012:  Are those snow flurries?

I didn't do a real ride in February.  In fact, I didn't do much last month.  I did ride the bike to look at houses but that's about it.  The weather was part of it, my lupie mind the other.  I just didn't feel like riding.  I couldn't stop thinking about my bikes though and have mental plans for both of them.  February was pretty much a wash as far as getting a "real" ride in for the month, so Cruzman and I planned to ride together the first weekend in March.

Ride Report: First Ride of 2012

28 Jan 2012:  Playing Nice with Others

This ride was delayed because of my front wheel bearings.  After I installed the extensions, I noticed the front wheel was a bit loose.  I could actually wiggle it.  With the image of the black powder from my rear wheel bearings fresh in my mind, I didn't hesitate to call OTC to see how much it would cost to get them replaced.  It turned out to be a good thing because the Sunday we'd scheduled to ride dawned foggy then cloudy and finally rain.

FZ1 Mod: Front Suspension Continued

When I last wrote about the front end swap in November 2011, there were still some small details that needed to be done before I could say the swap was complete.  I still can't call it complete, but there are some updates.

Digging into the Archives: Flashback 2003

I finally found my old web pages from when I lived in California.  I knew I had them on one of the many CDs that I'm holding onto!  Here's one of my first ride reports from not long after I'd settled (I was still settling) into my new life in Southern California.

VX800: Sam is home!

Finally, after far too long Sam is out of the mechanic's backyard and back home in the garage.  Last Tuesday, Lawman and I went across town to retrieve him from his rotting existence.  It was really hard leaving him out there but it had to be done.  I'm really glad to have him back home.

2011 in Pictures