MikeWa

Congrats on completing the class. Mike

Prayers sent. Mike

NAPA has sealed beams. Mike

Most likely in the switch. Remotely possible the brown wire is shorted to the br/w or y/r wire in the harness. But bets are on the switch. Mike

Prayers and best wishes are sent. Mike

Whine, chirp. I can live with those. It's the scream and howl that get to me. Mike

Monty They look like a couple of fine young men. You should be proud of them. We all are. I wish you and them good fortune and a smooth journey. Mike

Those would be really dangerous on the riders floor boards as pictured. Hate to loose fellow members that way. Might work for the passenger though. Mike

It is not so easy as it sounds. First I have the front wheel stand from Harbor Freight. That thing is just great. I added additional tie down rings to the floor. They are inexpensive and easy to screw on. I use soft straps so as not to mark anything with hooks. The Rear. If you attach to the rear passengers hand holds they will bend. It can be done but pressure must be minimal. Or put tie downs in the wall and go straight out. I attach to the frame behind and below the saddlebags. It really doesn't take a lot to keep the rear end in place. The Front. Finding a good spot that will keep the shocks loaded is difficult. Too much pressure can cause the handlebars to move. Also the strap can rub on the fairings or other plastic. I use two straps in front for each side. One to hold down and one to pull foreword and hold the bike in the stand. I have used the handlebar near the center and padded the plastic but my bar did move a little. I also attach a strap near the axle to a tie down foreword of the stand. This holds the bike into the stand. There are some other posts that have some good ideas for tie places on the bike. All in all it is fairly easy after you get set up. It just takes me a couple of minutes. The stand is the key. Mike P.S. The piece of throw carpet is a bad idea. It slips when backing out.

I have a pillow Diamond R on mine. When I first got it, it pushed my back to hard. So a little heat and bending on the attaching bar and wallah, I have room for the adjustment to work. I can set it foreword or back depending on what I wear. Love it, wouldn't ride without it. Mike

I did the same with mine. I was able to pry the back of the lid open enough (just a crack)to reach inside with a long thin screwdriver and trip the latch. Mike

Let all the air out and start from there. Mike

Two magnets are better than one. The sensitivity on the street lights can be adjusted. Call your city highway department and complain. As far as running the light goes, the cops may just tell you to explain it to the judge. Mike

I recently went on a road trip with my 08 Venture and a friend with an 09 Ultra Classic. This is an amendment to one of two reports I wrote on our return and posted on this forum. Bike Report 21 Day 6200+ mile trip from Seattle WA to Waco and San Antonio Texas. Comparison 2008 Royal Star Venture 1300 4 cylinder 2009 Harley Ultra V-Twin 103 Stage 2 Kit installed Both bikes were heavily loaded with luggage and supplies. General Info The Venture 6 gallon fuel tank only holds 5.5 gallons from walking to full. I know this for a fact. Drilling the filler neck is now high on my list of things to do. I hope it will remedy this as that other half gallon can be important. I was glad I carried a gas can on this trip. A real issue since so many gas stations have closed. (I have since punched the filler neck out and it now holds six gallons) The low fuel warning light is inconsistent. Sometimes providing ample warning but occasionally not coming on until after the engine stumbled and the tank was already switched to reserve. I just don’t think the quality of this device is all that great. The low fuel countdown odometer was also inconsistent sometimes not coming on until after the switch to reserve. The reserve petcock is very accurate. Switching when the engine stumbles yields exactly one gallon in reserve every time. Count on it so watch your mileage. Gas mileage varied a lot due to wind and altitude. The best was 44mpg the worst was 28. Most of the time it was in the low to mid 30s. Add that to a 5.5 gallon useable fuel supply with limited gas stops and it becomes an issue. The Venture was very sensitive to altitude running poorly over 5500 feet, very bad over 6000ft and terrible over 7000ft. It would feel like it was lugging with very poor acceleration bucking and sputtering and a heavy throttle required to maintain speed. The cruise became useless in 5th gear as it would drop out at the slightest grade. A lot of the trip was at altitude in the 5500 to 7000 feet range so this is a real issue. If you factor in a headwind it often became a 4th gear experience. And a rough 4th gear at that. I tried adjusting the pilot screws to get a little extra fuel and that seemed to help a little. My feeling is the loss of vacuum (air pressure) at altitude affects the carburetor piston diaphragm in a negative way. I actually got to where I could tell the altitude by the way the bike ran. And the Zumo on the Harley confirmed it. The fuel injected Ultra my buddy was riding did not experience this problem. His fuel economy stayed consistent in the lower to mid 40s. Occasionally the upper forties. He did not seem to have a power drop off either. My feeling is Yamaha really needs to quit screwing around and upgrade to a quality FI system. With altitude compensation. The Harley did require premium fuel however and this was sometimes hard to find. I fed my Yamaha everything from 91 octane down to about 84 with no affect good or bad on how it ran. The trunk opening to the front can be a pain when the back seat is loaded with luggage. But this is a very minor thing. I was happy to have the saddle bags and trunk. Handling was superb. We had high winds up to about 60mph from almost every direction. The bike just sucked it up and kept on going. On two lane roads in the wind with semi trucks going by the bike just pushed through. Where I thought the large fairing was going to be a problem it wasn’t. The ride was just plain comfortable with no sign of monkey butt even after several days of 10 or 11 hours in the saddle. I also learned to appreciate larger wind shields, lower fairings and air vents as temperatures ranged from the high 30s to over 100 degrees. Radio speakers in the helmet are a must. Wind and road noise will drown out the regular speakers at speed. The CB radio is also a major plus for communicating between bikes. Just learn some protocol and use it. It may sound dumb at first but it will keep riders from talking over each other and in the end is a better experience. We found that using the cruise control and covering the mic with a free hand when talking helped a lot at high speed. Fuel Mileage The FI Harley Ultra won hands down. Sometimes getting over 10mpg better than my carbureted RSV. More than enough to offset the higher cost of premium. But more importantly the fuel mileage was more consistent making it easier to plan fuel stops. With no surplus of refueling stations, my useable 5.5 gallon fuel capacity and uncertain mileage it seemed I was always the one requiring pit stops. Ugh. Handling Both bikes handled very well. I think we hit just about every kind of road conceivable. The Venture has air adjustable shocks the Ultra does not. So I was able to set my bike for the load and still have a soft ride. The Harley rides a bit harder. On this long of a trip I was very happy with the Venture. My tires are Dunlop 404ww. They worked very well and I now have over 14k on them. They are a replacement for the original Bridgestones which I didn’t care for. Performance Altitude and wind severely effected my Venture. The Harley not so much. Give a big plus to Fuel Injection. From a stop side by side acceleration 0 to 60 was to close to call. From a 30 mph start the modified Harley seemed to have the Venture by less than half a bike length (my front wheel his handlebar) up to about 80 mph where I started to regain some and the test was ended. Very close. Performance at altitude. The Harley hands down. Conclusion Fantastic trip. Would I change my Venture for a Harley?..No. Can the Venture be improved? Yes, but it doesn’t need much. Note I had the Venture dyno tested after my return. It tested very similar to a Motorcycle Magazine dyno test from a couple of years ago. Which I used as a baseline. So there is no reason to suspect there was a problem with the Venture. In my opinion the Venture has better power than a Harley 88 or 96. But it still does not have enough oomph to make fifth gear viable under many circumstances. Thus the need to keep the revs high. Research shows that as altitude increases power is lost at a rate of about three percent per one thousand feet. When altitudes exceed six thousand feet the Venture just does not have enough reserve power to keep from lugging a loaded bike in fifth gear on an incline. The heavily modified Harley my friend was riding had the needed reserve. Knowing this I am quite content to use fourth gear pay a little gas mileage.

If you don't practice on the slow turns you may not be able to on the hard ones. Mike

Prayers are on the way. Mike

No. I believe he is talking about connecting the meter leads together and taking a reading. That reading must be subtracted from your test results. Mike

I don't know where I got the 2008 from. Mike

First 2008=warranty. Have it checked by your dealer and get the problem on record. Do you have a cd changer? If so unplug it. They will sometimes cause an intermittent parasitic drain on the battery. Other components in the audio system can cause this as well. Run a parasitic draw test. Current flow with everything off should be less than 50 miliamp (.050 amp). A reading over about 90 miliamp can run the battery down in a few days. Over 1 amp and the battery can go dead in a couple of hours. Mike

Thanks for all of the sound advice. But for now I think I will just stay out from behind large trucks. Mike

Get well soon. Mike

Glad you came through in one piece. Give the information to your insurance company. Let them track him down and argue with his insurance. Mike

See if you can get something under it. Keep a little outword pressure on it as you try to unscrew it. Good luck Mike

Today I was riding south on Interstate 5 when the front end began to wobble. First it tried to dart left then right then left again. The wobble continued back and forth for about ten minutes. Really had to hold on to the handlebars. In fact it didn't stop until I got out from behind that semi truck. It happened again later when I was on the 410 highway too. Mike

Bought this at Walmart bicycle dept. for under $7. It includes the clamp. I added (glued) a bottom piece because some small bottles could slip out. Mike