Freebird

It is NOT customary to bring a gift for the host. There are two gas BBQ grills that you are welcome to use as well as a charcoal grill if you prefer. This is really casual, don't overthink it. Just show up and have a good time. Food will be provided on Saturday for lunch and there are usually leftovers for those who want more in the evening. There is no set charge and everybody is welcome to eat but there is a donation can for those who wish to help with the expenses. There are soft drinks and water available but you must provide your own beer or whatever if you so choose.

Thank you Skid. I sincerely wish that I could be there but it's just not possible due to previous commitments. I know you will give our love to Patsy and the family.

Just so everybody knows, flowers have been sent on behalf of us all.

From what I was told yesterday, arrangments have not yet been made and we should get word as soon as they are. Flowers were sent to the home today on behalf of all of us.

I truly hate Yamalube. I've tried it and my experience was that after as little as a thousand miles, especially in hot weather, shifting became more difficult, finding neutral was more difficult, valve noise increased, etc. I just hated it. When I bought my first RSV back in April of 1999, the first service was included in the deal. I had it serviced a day before leaving on a few hundred mile trip from Texas and touring Eureka Springs, Arkansas and surrounding areas. I could hardly wait to get back home and change it to Mobil 1. I've used Mobil 1 for close to 20 years and it is all I use in my vehicles. I use the Racing 4T in the RSV. Haven't looked at the specs on the third gen but the Mobil 1 VTwin would likely be the choice for it. In my opinion, there is no way that Yamaha would attempt to deny a warranty claim due to the use of Mobil 1's motorcycle specific oil. They would have very little chance of winning that battle. At any rate, it is a chance that I am always willing to take. Warranty or not, I buy and use my vehicles for my personal enjoyment and anything that takes away from that enjoyment is not worth me fussing over. I'll use what I think is best and worry about the other stuff should it ever come up. I will say one more thing. I had an issue with one bike to the point where I ended up filing a lemon law suit against Yamaha. That was around 2001 or so and part of the final settlement was me signing a non-disclosure agreement. I can tell you though, the subject of "what oil I used" was never brought up.

Should be exactly the same. Do you question any particular step?

I'm glad that you were able to jump on here and post. You are and always will be welcome here, as is your mother. The account is secure and we really want you to stay in touch. A part of us has moved on to a special place but the rest of us will be here and remember Dan for the brother that he had become to us.

Yamaha can say what they want but it would never hold up in court. This has been beaten many times. As long your chosen oil meets the specs required, they cannot deny warranty based on you using a different brand. I use Mobil 1 synthetic in everything I own and will continue to do so. There are consumer laws that make that very clear and Yamaha and other manufacturers very well know it and would never choose to fight that battle.

Yes, Diamond R shut down a couple of years ago. I'm tagging @Carbon_One with this post. He used to make some Don't know if he still does or not. I'm sure he will reply.

Eileen and I rode over to the Quaker Steak last night for dinner. While there, I let them know that we planned to be there again this year on Friday night June 1st. Weather permitting, they will reserve the outside patio area that overlooks the river as we have done before. If it rains, we will be seated inside. I told them maybe 30 people but I just looked and so far, we only have about 15 signed up for that dinner. So please, add your name as soon as you can.

Folks, it hurts me more than I can say to have to report this news but it has to be done. We lost one of our longest and most active members today. Yammer Dan has forever left our group and this world. I don't have all the details yet but understand that he had, at long last, found and purchased a trike somewhere down in Tennessee. He, his wife, and his son or son in law drove down to get it. Yammer paid for the trike and headed home and I understand only made it about 4 miles when something happened. It is very unclear right now but it is possible that he had some type of medical condition that possibly caused him to come off the trike. It is with such a heavy heart that I report this sad news. Yammer has had more than his share of bad luck over the past few years. More than many people could take. I understand that he was so very excited that he had finally found a good deal on the trike of his dreams and was so very excited about surprising all of us at Maintenance Day. Yammer was the first to admit that he was generally a loner and did not easily take to groups of any kind but he had found a group within VentureRiders that he felt accepted and comfortable with. I am so thankful for that and that we were able to count him amongst our many friends. There will be more posted as more is learned but for now, please keep his wife and family in your thoughts and if you are so inclined to do so, please say a prayer for the entire family. I will miss him. I'm sure that many of you will as well.

There have been many gun discussions here. I don't have a problem with it so long as it doesn't end up about being political. There are many different opinions regarding the banning of guns but most of the discussions here have been more along the lines of the enjoyment of the shooting sports or just the guns themselves.

This is pretty much a regular even in conjunction with Freebird's Maintenance Day. On Friday June 1st, we will leave from my house at a time to be determined, usually around 5:30, and ride over the the Quaker Steak in Vermillion, OH. Please sign up on the calendar if you plan to join us so that I can let them know how many of us to expect. It's always a great time. Also, please sign up for Maintenance Day if you haven't done so. It helps if we have a close estimate on how many to expect before ordering food for lunch on Saturday. We are thinking about going with Fried Chicken this year. http://www.venturerider.org/forum/calendar.php?do=getinfo&e=507&day=2018-6-1&redirect=1

Unless you know the year model that they came off of or a part number, the only way is to look inside the muffler. I THINK that 2010 and later had them in the header pipe. Also, I think before 2006 and earlier did not have them I'm not 100% sure though. I can tell you that on my 2013, there were none in the Mufflers.

Skid, it's easy to find them without the cats. There were only a couple of years when the cats were in the muffler, then they started putting them in the down pipe. I will also tell you that some are louder than others and I'm not sure how to know before buying them. I once had them on my '99 and they were just very slightly louder than my stock mufflers. When I bought the '05, it had a set on it already and they are quite a bit louder than stock. Not TOO loud but certainly louder than the first set I had and neither were modified.

Supposed to be. You can hose it out and etc. I bought the hitch from Carbon_one. Easy install and should work well. That sounds like a decent price out the door with those accessories already added. The aftermarket gull wing top is 2500.00 and the fender, depending upon which one you get, can run close to $1000.00. With my fender color matched, I paid $965.00 for it. Nuts in my opinion.

There are a lot of people turbo charging and super charging the Slingshots. It all depends upon how deep your pockets are. Several kits available. Around $5,000.00. I won't do it. It is quick enough for me as is. I'll change the exhaust at some point but that's about it. Any other changes and/or additions will be comfort related. These kits take you from the stock 175HP to the 300HP range. https://www.slingmods.com/turbos-superchargers

Those T-Tops look pretty nice but I decided against it for two reasons. 1. PRICE. It will set you back around $2500.00. The fabric top I bought was still high at $1300.00 but at least a little better. 2. FUNCTION. I actually like the fabric top because you can easily remove the canvas and have a completely open cockpit. It folds up and can be stored in the compartment behind either of the seats. The fact is though, the accessories for the Slingshot are just crazy expensive. The aftermarket guys are making a killing off this stuff. I know that all bike parts are expensive but it seems to me that the Slingshot bling is exponentially higher than motorcycle goodies. One thing that I quickly realized was needed was a rear fender. I was blown away at the prices. Carbon_one made his own rear fender and if I were more patient, he would have made one for me but he has been really busy and I didn't want to push him. So, I broke down and ordered one a couple of weeks ago. It turned out really nice and came color matched and SHOULD have been very easy to install. It WOULD have been very easy to install if ANY of the holes in the mounting brackets had lined up properly. As it was, I spent a lot of time modifying, drilling, grinding, etc. to make it work. What should have been a 20 to 30 minute job ended up taking me about 2 1/2 hours. I think it looked great when I finally got done but wanted to choke somebody when I was installing it. For the money they charge, I shouldn't have had those issues. I will also say that a rear fender should be standard on these things. You can see how dirty the rear of mine is from just a short ride last weekend. You end up with mud and water all over the rear end if you don't have a fender. Here are a couple of pictures just after I got it installed yesterday afternoon.

Utopia products are always fantastic. They just get it right.

You better listen for sirens. You stole that rig.

Looks like most our our local brands are on that list. Good to know.

I think I posted about these last year. I ordered several from Rural King and they work great. I hate the new cans.

A lot of the old threads still contain very relevant information. I can't tell you how many times I've been asked to restore pictures in various 10 year old threads. Now the main ones are in the tech talk areas. I could purge threads in the Watering Hole and etc. Right now, the only ones that get purged are the classifieds and links to Ebay forums. The only way I would consider purging threads in any form would be simply by date. I certainly don't have time to go through each and every thread to determine which ones should be kept. That's why it is important to post tech type information and questions in the proper forum. I do delete posts by date every so often and when I do, it is simply by date and some good tech posts would get deleted in the are posted in the watering hole.

As I mentioned before, I got up on a Saturday morning and decided I was going to buy a Harley that day. I got to the dealer in the afternoon and after quickly deciding on the Road Glide instead of the Ultra Classic I sat down with the salesman to negotiate the deal. I didn't dicker around much. The 2013 was the year before they added the boom audio system as standard. It did have intercom and CB standard though. Mine was single color black with some minor stripes. I don't remember exactly but the tag hanging on it as around $23,500.00. He came back with a quote that just added the prep and tax and etc. to that price. I just told him, I'm not going to sit here and dicker with you. I'll pay the $23,500 out the door. That will include all extra charges and sales tax. I also want $1,000 worth of accessories included and a 20% discount on them. He was gone about 5 minutes to talk to his manager and came back and said "ok, you have a deal". It was quick and easy. I probably could have done a bit better if I had been in the mood to negotiate for an hour or so but just wasn't interested. I left with almost the full thousand worth of accessories that I wanted. Riders backrest, saddlebag guards, a couple of other things. The only thing that they didn't have in stock was the handlebars that I wanted. I took the accessories with me and installed them at home the next day. Went back a couple of days later to pick up the handlebars and they offered to install them while I waited for $125.00. Having installed handlebars, I knew that it could be time consuming so let them do it. The first service was also included in the price. The service with synthetics was usually $300.00 or so. After that first one, I did it myself.

I don't think I've ever seen replacement plexiglass for them. You would think it would have been available and maybe it was but if so, I sure never ran across them.