what did you wrench on today??

[mhardgrove]

Started tearing apart my new to me 81 450t. Removed the seat, tank, petcock, carbs, gauges, and removed the handlebars. This bike has 7,xxx miles on it, and was last registered in 2004, and appears to have sat since as all the rubber is dry rotten. I plan on stripping this down to the frame, upgrading what I can like forks/brakes and have a cycle shop completely go through the motor to ensure it is in good order. Being a 7,000 mile engine I hope if it is "seized" like I was told, it's so because it just sat. If not, I'll rebuild one. Nothing I see points to it being blown, fingers crossed.

I tore the petcock completely apart, took the brass brush to the outer body and will rebuild this as the rubber was rotten and I don't want to fix it later. I removed the bowls off the carbs and both were full of garbage. Will strip, clean and prep the carbs to be rebuilt this upcoming week. The only other issue appears to be brittle wiring, I'm going to research replacement harnesses. That's about it.

[themess]

New Shinko 705 rear tire for the vStrom. The old one still probably had another 1k miles left but I was happy with almost 6k out of the rear 705 dual sport tire.
A 20 mile scrub in in the 35 degree weather, but the wind was gusty blowing things around.

I al so have a Wee Strom. Please describe your side bags. Yours look nice.

[cowboyup3371]

Began taking the top end of my engine off so I can put a helicoil into one of the exhaust mounting bracket holes on cylinder 2. I've always had problems tightening a screw or stud in it and finally had one rattle out. So, time to fix it for good I hope and will have parts by next weekend I hope.

[lurch12_2000]

I al so have a Wee Strom. Please describe your side bags. Yours look nice.

They are Pelican fixed side bags, 18"x7"x13". They are waterproof (verified in many rainy rides) and virtually indestructible. They were on when I bought from the original owner. Easy to use latches and can be locked with padlock. The DL650 is probably the best overall motorcycle I've ever owned. Price/value, 2up riding, varied terrain and riding, mpg/tank range, reliability, fuel injected, cold or hot weather, etc...if you can source an old DL1000 seat they are much more comfortable than the stock DL650 one and swap right out. It will raise seat height about an inch which is actually better for me with a 32-33" leg seam.

[Grimly]

Chopped an inch and a half out of the centre stand to compensate for the lowered front and slightly lowered rear with the air shocks.
Will see how it fits with them tomorrow. I didn't do this until I bought a good condition used one that I'll keep as standard and unmolested, in case I ever want to go back to standard.

Next day:
It fits wonderfully. What a difference to have a stand I can pull it onto without effort. For the past few years things were tired and saggy and it was becoming more of a struggle to get it up. But enough of that.

[60ratrod]

Started draining fluids out of my 07 silverado to do an oil change and to change out my shift solenoids a & b and put the front wheels on jack stands to replace the front brakes

[Grimly]

Bike moving.

The problem...


And the solution...




I was inspired by what I saw on Louis.de

And even though they're cheap enough at Eu40, they look a bit flimsy, especially for 250+kg of bike. They're more suited to mid-weight commuters, I think.

[WolfworksCustoms]

i have a chain hoist that will lift a GoldWing....I can then slide it from left to right side of my shop.....advantage : if hung, your bike cant fall over.....also, you can start it and run it thru the gears if needed.I dont like or trust these new fangled stands.

[themess]

They are Pelican fixed side bags, 18"x7"x13". They are waterproof (verified in many rainy rides) and virtually indestructible. They were on when I bought from the original owner. Easy to use latches and can be locked with padlock. The DL650 is probably the best overall motorcycle I've ever owned. Price/value, 2up riding, varied terrain and riding, mpg/tank range, reliability, fuel injected, cold or hot weather, etc...if you can source an old DL1000 seat they are much more comfortable than the stock DL650 one and swap right out. It will raise seat height about an inch which is actually better for me with a 32-33" leg seam.

Thanks. Look excellent, but a bit pricey. Some of Pelican's models appear to have been discontinued.

[wovereene]

I have been wrenchin on my 81 gs550l café racer. replacing valve cover gasket with a silicone gasket from realgaskets.com. hopin it works well... gonna use mega grey gasket maker on the half moon seals which I really don't like. just stuffed rags into the holes going to crankcase and scraped old gasket off. hopefully the half moons wont leak.

[cowboyup3371]

One exhaust bolt hole is now repaired with a helicoil and so I just need to clean things up and wait for my parts to arrive early next week.

[Grimly]

After the flood, it was obvious the front brakes had been contaminated with oil, so stripped, cleaned and treated the bike to NOS Carbone Lorraine sintered pads. Not sure whether these are disc-eaters or not, so will be keeping an eye on wear.

[Makeitdrain]

Installing a new back tire. New to the forum lots of great advice.

[madmikeracing]

Fiddling with new engine stand design. Used old one but wanted to be able to set more engines on movable stands so had more bench room. Currently 3 engines on the go. Mike

[Grimly]

Had to get 1 1/2 GS engines up off the floor in case the floods come back. Did it with a bit of redneck engineering