Kari takes her first road ride on Sunday September 15, 2013

Kari decided she was ready to hit the road last Sunday morning. We got all set, boots, gloves, jackets cell phones and half helmets. The full face helmets are safer with more protection but we needed to be able to hear each other.

We were just going to stay in the neighborhood, but we needed to go down to Eastport Shell to get some gas. We started easy. I had Kari shift up to second gear, initially she forgot to shift down into first at the stop signs. The one little hang up we had was the tight dog leg turn down on Washington/Boucher. After the curve I pulled to the side because we had a truck following us. Kari pulled behind me and the truck pulled in behind her.

The driver got out and started giving Kari an obvious new rider some pointers. The one thing she did was put her foot down going around the turn. He also suggested boots, which Kari hasn't found yet, and full face helmets; I explained the half helmet training situation. I had talked to Kari about the turn before we got there. I told her to enter slowly and take it at a comfortable speed. It's tough to explain to someone how to do something before they have the experience of doing it.

We took the bikes down to Annapolis City Marina, our marina, I stopped on fourth street and parked my bike, Kari did the same. I told her that I'd forgotten that the gas station is up on a pad and that she'd have to negotiate the bump up and that the tire would be hitting at oblique angle. I had her practice on the marina pad where there was no traffic. She did fine.

We went on to the gas station and filled up the little wing. I'd wanted her to go into the station from the North side of Severn so that she wouldn't have to cross traffic. We would then get back on Severn at the light and cross though the light into Eastport. Kari had mentioned that she was having a problem swinging wide on her right turns. I tried to councel her on how to approach the turn slowly and at an angle that wouldn't cause her to swing as wide. We tried a few more right turns and wound our way up towards Louis' house. We then took a right on President Street and another right on Hoover St. which is a loop that crosses across President and we'd be on our way home. We both stopped at the stop sign at President, we waited for traffic to clear I crossed President and Kari waited for the next car to pass. I was about a block away looking in the rear view mirror, I turned and paused to wait for Kari. A car was in front of her, when it moved past I saw her standing there but the bike was on it's side in the road. I rode back up circled around her and parked my bike. She was OK, a dinged ankle and shook up but OK. A passerby offered to help us pickup the bike. I mentioned the youtube video I saw on how to pick up a Goldwing, he and I bent and got the bike up. It was actually easier than I expected, but he was a fairly big guy. The bike had leaked some gas and radiator fluid, there was a rub on the edge of the fairing near the left mirror, otherwise the bike was fine.

I had Kari take her helmet off and told her to sit relax and shake it off. I hugged her and told her the bike was fine. I think she was more shaken and embarrassed than anything. We got set and brought the bikes home.

All in all it turned out OK. It's why I got the Silverwing, an older less expensive bike that she can learn on.

I worked on the Silverwing last week; lubed final drive, cleaned brakes, trimmed the left muffler

As I previously mentioned there was a ticking sound from the rear end of the bike that I couldn't trace down. I decided that I might as well take the final drive and the rear brake off to see if something was rattling around.

To get to the final drive the rear drum brake had to come off. I had wanted to check how much brake shoe was left and it was squeaking badly. I was going by the Haynes manual, they said the muffler had to come off. Unfortunately, I didn't find the section in the back on 82's that said the muffler didn't have to come off. They also had a picture of my brake configuration. The one I used for diss-assembly showed the brake rod going to the bottom of the hub; the correct one shows the rod going to the top.

I pulled the muffler, brake and wheel hub off easily, having already done it on the Goldwing. I cleaned everything off, there was a lot of old grease, actually there was a lot of mixed grease. Inside the brake and hub there was dust grit and grime.

I measured the hubs and there seemed to be ample material on the shoe. The worrisome thing is that the material inside the hub that the shoe rubs against seemed a bit on the thin side. I measured another 2mm's left. I don't know what it takes to get a new ring inside the wheel, I imagine you get the correct ring and press it into the wheel.

After the cleaning I greased everything with Honda Moly 60. I put the whole thing back together, it seemed to be smooth.

The one thing I think I discovered is that the left muffler (a Harley replacement) has two nub bolt holes welded on. The one closest to the front of the bike seemed to be very close to the left part of the rear swing arm. I didn't use this hole to attach the muffler, at least not yet. While the muffler was off I trimmed down the nub on the grinding wheel. I also took the shaft of a cold chisel and banged a dent into the side of the muffler where the center stand was supposed to go. It looked like hell but the center stand no goes up all the way, or nearly so. I mounted the muffler and tested the placement with the center stand, it fit well. I used the muffler sealant again and bolted everything up.

The bike was ready for Kari to ride on her first road ride.

Front Brake Reservoir Issue

Since I had to change all the brake fluid on the "Phoenix K" I took a look at the " Little Wing" and it looked like it could use some brake fluid also. I hooked up the vacuum pump and changed the fluid in the wing.

When we got home from Kari's training ride I noticed that we had some drips out of the reservoir. I looked at the reservoir and the inside wall looks as though it might be a little deformed outwards. I looked up pricing on line and found replacement kits anywhere from $40 to $70 dollars. A call to Crofton Powersports (my local Honda dealer), they priced the parts at almost $100! In an effort to conserve cash I don't have I decided to do/try a home fix.

When I was cleaning and checking the K100 wiring I found that many of the connector boots were shot. I couldn't find a replacement locally and didn't want to pay BMW pricing. I bought a bicycle inner tube and fashioned boots from it and sealed them with zip ties.

For the brake reservoir, I cut a piece of tubing and sliced it so it would lay flat. I poked a couple of holes in it for the screw and screwed it down under the lid. I didn't tighten too hard because I think the screws are just going into plastic, I didn't want to strip the threads.

I'll find out tomorrow if the fix works. We're doing Kari's third training ride.

Kari's First Ride

Although, I'd given Kari a "walking" lesson a couple of weeks ago she really didn't ride the bike. She surprised me this week, she came home with Motorcycle Endorsement Learners Permit.

After going to the Farmer's Market for veggies we went over to the empty mall parking lot at about 8:30 am. I started her lesson with a walk down the lot while slipping the clutch which is what she'd already done. She then did the same thing ending in a left turn, then a right turn. She next did a pylon walk. She was getting tired, her hand was tired from the clutch, and it was getting hotter. To finish up I had her do a walk and then lift her feet up.

Here are the videos:

A quick change of the front brake fluid

Kari has surprised me by going to the MVA and getting her learners permit. We talked about riding the Wing tomorrow to the farmers market, then going to the mall and doing a riding lesson. We're out pretty early, I think we'll get to the mall no later than 8:30, which should give us some time on an empty parking lot.

After changing the brake fluid on all three brakes of the K, I looked over and noticed that the brake fluid was low on the wing. I had the vacuum pump out and ready to go. The only problem I ran into was that the Wing uses DOT 3 BRAKE FLUID. The beemer uses 4. I had an old bottle of DOT 3, it had never been opened so I used it. I don't think it's the best but it would do until I get a fresh bottle of DOT 3.

The flush and fill went without a hitch, except that I did over fill the reservoir and spilled a little on the tank. I wiped it off, and went and got a soapy paper towel to wipe things down. I hope that did the trick.

Saturday... A new Wild Goose Chase, Mirrors and a Seat

On Saturday I'm setting up times to go look at another set of mirrors and a rear passenger seat. Looking at them again I think neither one is going to work. The mirrors are an aftermarket set for sport bikes. I'm not really into the style. I think I'm just going to end up going to ebay and buying a new mirror.

These are the mirrors I'm looking at buying.







They're a little too "Cats Eye" crazy. The carbon fiber look is big these days for almost everything, but I just don't think they'll look great on the old mini wing. I do like the idea of the integrated turn signal.

The seat I'm looking at is the rear passenger seat from a VTX 1800 with seat back cushion. I don't think the seat will work but I think I can use the cushion because mine has rotted away.

Here's the seat and cushion.








The cushion for my bike lives on the back of the box and is part of the hinge/spring unit that holds the box lid up when open.

A Wild Goose Chase for Mirrors

I think I mentioned that the left fairing mirror got bunged up at some point in it's life. Someone drilled out the top of the ball joint on the base to stem connection and put some epoxy around it to try and keep the whole thing together, which it does. The bad thing is that the epoxy doesn't hold the ball joint in place and the mirror slumps down.

***Place Picture here



I've been on a quest to find replacement mirrors. I actually found a fairing in Florida that had the identical mirrors on it for $25. The problem was that the drive was 3.5 hours each way. I didn't buy it. I saw mirrors on ebay, a single mirror was $40. I fell back on my old standby, Craigslist.

I found two sets of mirrors. When I left in the morning I said it didn't really matter I was coming home with a set. The first set was from an old Katana 1100. They were scratched which didn't bother me. Unfortunately, I hadn't anticipated that the angle of the mirrors when mounted on a bullet shaped fairing don't match the same angle.  No matter how I angled them, I couldn't make them match the angle of the OEM mirrors. The owner had these up in Locust Point, about two blocks from Fort McHenry, He listed them at $50, but quickly came down to $30 without me asking.

The second set of mirrors was from a 2005 Yamaha R6 for $30, They were in Jarrettsville. Although, I had passed through Jarrettsville a couple of weeks ago, I hadn't been up there since my cousin lived there 40 years ago. These mirrors were plasticy and didn't fit any better than the others.

I didn't buy either set. Although, I did call Walt in Baltimore and tell him that I was going to look at the angles to see if I could work with his mirrors. 

One possabilty is to build angled cleat blocks similar to what we do on sailboats to get a fair lead on a line. Of course the problem is of course it's alot of work.

The search goes on.