Flyinfool

Different brands and different models of the same size MC rear tires do have different weight ratings. You need to check out what you have and factor that into your tire choice. Also most tires can only handle that max weight rating when also at max pressure. Max pressure may be a lot more than what you normally run, If you lower the pressure on a given tire you are also lowering its max weight rating. You have to be careful playing with the numbers. You can not just add the weight rating of the 2 tires to get the total weight the tires can handle of 1700 lbs. As you add weight behind the rear wheel the bike acts like a lever and will be trying to raise the front tire, so as you add tongue weight you are taking weight off the front and transferring it to the rear so a 50 lb tongue weight is really more than a 50 lb weight increase on the rear tire. This also applies for anything else that is added behind the rear axle. So for instance, If the distance from the hitch ball to the rear axle is 1/3 of the distance between the front and rear axle, that means that if you had a 30 lb trailer tongue you would be actually putting 40 pounds of weight on the rear tire and the front tire would loose 10 lbs of weight. It is not really that simple as there are a lot of factors involved that will alter the numbers a bit. But this will get you in the ball park. You would have to do the specific math for your setup. As Marcarl mentioned, ideally you want 10-15% of the total trailer weight on the tongue.

When you get more than about 50 lbs on the back end is when you start to notice the steering getting loose. That 50 includes the hitch plus tongue plus contents of the trunk

HEY!! I resemble that comment.........

Did you by chance watch the Badgers game on Saturday? it was 45°F for that little :snow:globe test. We are getting there little by little cowpuc. It is a tall order that you gave me for the 60°F so that we can get you some for the 4th of July. Although Saturday night did kill off my garden. It is now all done for this year. @RDawson, KY is just a chip shot away, I don't even need the long range nozzle for that..........

The whole dielectric grease discussion is like trying to convert the party of a politician. It can be done, but it really aint easy since all the documentation, and logic in the world will not change their beliefs.

I may be getting older but I refuse to grow up. I am always being told to act my age and not my shoe size.

The other popular mod is to put organic brake pads in the rear to reduce the amount of grip that they have on the rotor, and then put HH pads up front to get more grip. At least this is done on the RSVs. Your RSTD has even less weight on the rear tire so the problem may be even worse and may need even more help like the Butler mod.

My last truck battery I caught in the act of dying. I had parked waiting for someone and turned the key to ACC to listen to the radio. 10 minutes later the truck started to complain about low battery and recommending I start the engine. It still spun and started fine, just like normal. I beat feet to the place I bought the battery from and it tested as bad. Had I not parked with the radio on I would have never known it was going till it was gone. Now every fall for cages and every spring for bikes I do a load test of the battery to see if it is weak or not. Many auto parts stores will do this for free.

Around here there are very few gas stations that have generators, so if the power is out they can not pump gas. There are a LOT of power outages along your route. Check here https://poweroutage.us/area/regions Looking at Gasbuddy.com there are a lot of stations that do not have a price listed, which could mean they are not open. A lot can change by Saturday.

Do you know if your dimmer uses PWM or voltage reduction for the dimming?

Most LED headlights / driving lights are not dimable. The Actual LED element runs off of around 3.5 volts. So there is a voltage regulator built into each bulb to take your 12V and drop it down to the 3.5 that the LED needs. If you lower the input voltage from 12V with a dimmer, the regulator will maintain the 3.5 to the LED as long as you have more than about 5 volts input. If you drop to less than the threshold of the regulator, it will most likely just turn off. You need LEDs that are designed to be dimable.

You think so! You never saw on a cactus? Ask your buddies VAZ or KIC if they are truly out of range. Remember that at one point last winter there was on the ground in all 50 states AT THE SAME TIME. AND then there is that new high temp formula that you instructed me to come up with..............

Everyone's most favoritest machine is all cleaned, oiled, greased and even waxed and polished, and the tanks are all full. Getting excited........... We may get our first frost this weekend.

Wait till you see what I have in store for this year.............. So far I am not broken or hobbled, it is easy to get out to THE shed now.

Welcome to the funny farm....... 1. The petcock is near the right passenger foot rest. Most people set it to reserve and forget about it and just use the gas gauge and trip meter. 2. To adjust the handle bars you have to remove them and then side back into the spline in the new position. 3. Let um rip.

The only way I know to check for sure would be to pop off a fork cap and look. If there is about a 6 inch long spacer above the spring you have the stock springs if the spacer is less than 1 inch you have the progressive.

And this exactly the problem with most cheap LED headlight conversions. the light is not focused correctly so it is scattering light everywhere instead of sending a focused beam down the road. Because there is so much light scatter everything right in front of you looks very bright. This brightness will actually reduce your eyes ability to see at night and make it more dangerous, because you will be less likely to see a hazard that is not right in front of you. The reason that there is little difference between low and hi beam is that because of all the scatter you are effectively riding with the high beam on all the time. These are clear signs that you should try a different bulb, there are some that have the LED element in the same position and approximately the same shape as the filament in the Halogen bulb that will get an acceptable light pattern. But they are never the cheap ones. Another thing to watch out for with LED headlights is power draw, there are now a lot of them that are pulling way more power than the stock halogen bulb. When it comes to anything bright, do not assume that LED means low power. A typical halogen bulb is 50 to 60 watts depending on brand and model, I have seen LED headlight bulbs that were pulling 150 to 180 watts. That is a lot of load on your poor old stator. The other thing I find fun with LED headlights is the claims of lumens that they make, and then to show just how good they are they tell what LED element they are using, I love to go the the website of the manufacturer of the claimed LED element and look up the specs. The bulb makers sometimes are claiming as much as 3 time the amount of light that the LED manufacturer say it can produce. There are only 2 explanations at this point, option one is that they are flat out lying about the light output, option two is that they are way over driving the LED pumping way more volts and amps thru it than what it is rated for, which means it will run hotter, require more power from the bikes electrical system ( see above paragraph), and have a much shorter life span.

The problem with using lubes other than tire lube is that tire lube will dry up and stop being slippery once its job is done. Other lubes may stay slippery for a much longer time and allow the tire to slip on the rim during hard acceleration or breaking. Then you wonder why the tire is suddenly out of balance.

If the bead had somehow come off with proper air pressure you would have known it. it would have sounded like a bomb went off under you with the sudden release of air pressure. I am betting that you were riding on a nearly flat tire and the application of torque allowed you to spin the rim out of the tire. You will have to do some sleuthing to figure out why the pressure was so low in the first place. I would inspect the tire inside and out for any damage and if good would remount it and not worry. If the tire is scuffed on the inside or out side then I would worry.

Sounds like a perfectly good reason to prune that tree to ground level. Then the branches will be easy to reach

I sure wish I had a clue what was being talked about in that vid. I the only 2 words I could pick out were aluminum and Cree. It looked like some interesting mods to some LED lights.

2 TCIs in a week does raise an eyebrow and get a HUH! Unfortunately there is no test for the TCI, I am sure that Yamaha once had a tester but I have never seen one or heard of one that someone had. It is a matter of eliminate everything else and then the TCI must be bad. It is possible that all of your TCIs may be just fine and that the real problem lies elsewhere. the problem being elsewhere would bring in that ugly intermittent electrical issue. When I had to chase down an intermittent electrical in my ignition I made up a couple of diode boards. I used the diodes to monitor various circuits to see if I could then in real time spot the diode that blinked when it should not have. There are some circuits that should always have power so the diode would be always on. It is easy to spot when it blinks off and should not have. The other board was monitoring circuits that should always be off so that I can see a diode blink on when it should not. It is a PITA because it is impossible to find a fault in something that is working perfectly while being tested.

Yesterday I was at Costco, buying a large bag of Purina dog chow for my loyal pet, Owen, the Wonder Dog and was in the check-out line when a woman behind me asked if I had a dog. What did she think I had, an elephant? So because I'm retired and have little to do, on impulse, I told her that no, I didn't have a dog,I was starting the Purina Diet again. I added that I probably shouldn't, because I ended up in the hospital last time, but that I'd lost 50 pounds before I awakened in an intensive care ward with tubes coming out of most of my orifices and IV's in both arms. I told her that it was essentially a Perfect Diet and that the way that it works is to load your pants pockets with Purina Nuggets and simply eat one or two every time you feel hungry. The food is nutritionally complete, (certified), so it works well and I was going to try it again. (I have to mention here that practically everyone in line was now enthralled with my story.) Horrified, she asked if I ended up in intensive care, because the dog food poisoned me. I told her no, I had stopped to pee on a fire hydrant and a car hit me. Well, I thought the guy behind her was going to have a heart attack he was laughing so hard. Costco won't let me shop there anymore. Better watch what you ask retired people. They have all the time in the world to think of crazy things to say.

I will have to pull it out to check, but I really doubt it. That does not mean that you can not take the cover off of this one and sand and polish it then clear coat it to stay shiny. Heck you could make the whole thing shiny if you were that ambitious.

It's been a long time since I had a fortune cookie.