BratmanXj

I get the usual "When are you going to buy a real bike?" both from riders & retailers. My usual response is: "When you realize I want to ride, not wrench and pay."

When out touring I use a tank bag for easy access to certain things (wallet, food). I have RAM mounts on the clutch & brake levers where I run the GPS & Phones but you can just as easily add a cup holder to the ram mounts.

I've rewired a few cars with solder & shrink-wrap with no problems 10yrs later....but my boats I use crimped weather-tight connections as I've had problems with moisture and vibration wearing out the soldered connections.

Having spent many years commuting around a major metro area (Chicago) this has crossed my mind many times; but as the video shows it can end very badly. Normal "remedy" is a dirty look, a hand gesture and GTFO of there before the other driver wants to take you out. No reason to risk your life AGAIN because of someone aloof on the road.

Same here, local HD shop was having a swap meet and found a set of OEM S.E. touring pipes for $30 in very good shape. They were factory installed on a SE Street Glide and the guy went to itty-bitty short shots (why you'd go drag pipes on a Touring rig I'll never know) but it worked out well for me. And again, at 80mph they drone but are sweet at the 40-65 mph backroads roll on.

Like needing a 19mm / 3/4" hex head for the RS Warrior front axle.

I agree to a certain degree. With my Jeeps I went back to paper elements from K&N and have had less problems with sticking Idle Air Control valves. The K&N was allowing some fine dust into the intake track along with the oil from the filter and was gumming up... BUT this was in a very dusty environment. In a street driven vehicle I did not have these issues when using a K&N.

Ha...I had a COG CDA number as a result of a kickstand failure in the U.P. of Michigan when I live at the other end of the lake. Folded my footpeg and shifter in so I had to "kick" over the peg and hook the shifter with my heal (not fun on a sport tourer). So far no need for a VDA number thank god.

I forgot about the Honda ST1300 & CTX1300 "mini-block" V4 engines, while similar in design they are different architecture than the VF & VFR motors.

Honda's had a long line on the V4 in both sport and cruiser applications. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_VF_and_VFR

A lot of early FI motorcyles used Open Loop systems with only RPM and Throttle Input adjustments in the system. Fuel Trim levels was a set table that needed to be programed. Later models finally got O2's with Closed Loop.

I took a Triumph Rocket III for a nice demo ride and get on the highway and spin it up to 70-75mph and it's just purring along. Shifted once, then twice...Crap, I was in 3rd gear for 3 miles on the highway!

I have no problem with staying motivated...or I'm a workaholic if you ask the wife. I'm just stuck in the typical spring rush of everything, April - early June when the wife gets out of school is crazy around here. I'm a civil engineer so spring is kick of off construction season and I'm swamped at work. Mom has a cottage so its getting everything fixed up and opened up for the season. Getting the house fixed up and cleaned up with all the stuff I want to do. Mom was bugging me about selling her Spree to fund the repair of this little guy. I'm not selling a perfectly good scooter that we bought DIRT CHEAP at a garage sale to fund a project that if I didn't have I would have bought my 3yr old son a dirt bike or quad anyways. I can also use this little guy to start teaching the wife to ride, Its a clutchless 4spd transmission.

So my mother has an older Honda Spree 50cc scooter at her cottage (no place to store a golf cart like the neighbors) but the skinny tires are not the best on gravel and she dumped it last weekend. In-laws had a Chinese knock off Honda CT70 Trail bike sitting in the shed for 10+ yrs since the bro-in-law stopped riding it in his mid-teens. Asked about it a few weeks ago and they said come get it if you want to fix it up. Like a typical young boy, he kinda trashed it but the engine fired up and the major parts are all there (seat is in the back of the car) and even had a new set of "street" tires. did some eBay hunting last night and found most of the parts I needed on the cheap, found a supplier in Zeeland, MI who sells restoration parts the stuff I can't find used. P.S. Does anyone have a line on that magic machine that give you more time and money?

There are a few models of SE touring mufflers. I have 98 db SE mufflers and have a nice burble at idle but get a bit buzzy over 80mph with stock gearing. They are perfect for 45-65mph backroad blasting. SE also made I believe 95 db & 103 db pipes. Anything made for an '07 or earlier should not have cats in the muffler, they would have been in the head-pipe of the bike. If you go over to "the other venture site" there are some tech articles on the brackets and clamps that you'll need.

And that is why I posted the question...hoping someone might have this same thought process. So far other spring projects have gotten in the way and I haven't sat down with the bike yet. On a side-note a buddy did ended up buying the 2-pack of BroView LED H4 light so I might have a "spare part" dropped off in my garage later this week. You don't argue with free.

After I changed my slave I was having issues getting the system to purge all the air. I tied the clutch lever down and let sit overnight, enough air worked its way out to finally start pressure bleeding.

I'll explain the installation.... I put a 10awg HOT "Home Run" from the battery up the spine and into the fairing. Fused & Relayed constant-hot from the HID tapped into "home run" 10 sec delay relay tapped into "home run", triggered from Aux (cigarette) plug, feeding switched hot for HID ballast HID plugged into factory headlight socket I will post a picture of the installation instructions when I get home from work. I made sure to check everything as it went back together, but nothing was pinched the 1st time this happened while the fairing was still open.

I don't have the information off hand but it was based on your recommendation somewhere else on the model HID. This started THE DAY I installed the HID. Wired everything up, came out the next day to a dead battery. I pulled the fuse on constant-hot for the HID while the fairing was apart (finishing up the steering head bearing install) and the bike sat for 2 weeks. Put the fuse back in finished assembly, bike sat on tender for 2 days then took a couple of rides and all was fine. Bike now that a week without the tender (or riding) and I have a flat battery. When I get a chance I'm going to pull the fairing and see what the current draw is across the fuse on the HID kit. Edit: Bike sat most of the winter off of the tender with no issues starting up.

I've had an HID kit in my "parts" drawer for a year now and finally installed it over the winter with new spot lamps and other on the front end. Now the bike goes dead if it sits for more than a day...2nd time I left it off the battery tender that this has happened. HID was installed per the instructions with an always hot going to the relay included in the harnes and a switched (off my 10-sec delay relay) hot going to the ballast, then the pigtails into the factory headlight socket. Anyone ever have an issue with an HID headlight shorting out and always pulling voltage?

So they are following OCC's example with the Dixie Chopper?

I made the crack to my buddy who has a Dodge SRT8 that requires Mobile-1 eurospec 0w-40.... "Gonna switch to that stuff, it will save you a fortune on oil changes" He didn't speak, but I got the idea with the hand gestures of how he felt. I default to my usual Oil Debate response... It doesn't mater much what oil, more that it has oil. I think they are setting themselves up for complaints with older cars that leak who think they can go a whole year with no maintenance.

But that is going against the American ideology by wanting a Duc type engine, even the 1300cc V4 is an oddball in the American touring market. The HD-Indian-Victory-Vulcan all have big torquey Vtwins, the Goldwing V6 has low end torque. People who want high-reving HP buy a sport-tourer like the FJR, not a full dresser. Any of my riding buddies I put on my Venture have no idea how I set the pace that I do, they shift at 3k rpm and lug down the motor because that's how "every other bike" does it. While I do like the nature of the V4 in our bikes we here are in the minority of the market and I can't see Yamaha chasing a small section of the market for us die-hards.

My local Ace Hardware caries a selection of Chrome bolts. They know when I walk in to go unlock those bins since I'm always messing with the bike.