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Well here's an update for you all. When I got up at 6:00 this morning, my incoming email looked like a ticker tape. Within about 5 minutes, I have about 3,000 emails. New registrations and posts. I had to shut the site down to stop it. Then I had to change some settings to stop people from auto registering. It is not set to allow registstrration only have my approval. I hated to do that because it means a lot more work. Previously, people could register after filing out the form and then replying to the email. Now they still have to do that but still can't actually fully register and post until I manually approve them. I've already banned approximately 2000 accounts that registered last night. I have about 300 waiting to be manually approved and probably all of them are spam registrations also. After banning all those spammers, I then had to go through every topic area of the forum and delete the spam posts. There were over 2000 of them. I think I've got most but may have missed a few. I'll look closer later on but have to get out of here now to take care of a couple of stairlift servicer calls. I don't know why there are those in this world that just live to screw with other people. I would love to be able to pay them an in person visit. After that, I don't think they would ever do it again.

I finally got in over the last couple of weeks and they put a new lens in the right and left eye. All I can say is wow its like seeing a new world out there again. If you have been putting it off dont. Its quick in and out. Both times I was in and out the door in less than two hours and the surgery didnt even take 10 minutes. Crazy the stuff they can do now. Sharon and me got on the bike and put on 150 some miles Saturday. And no more of that funny feeling in my head that I have been getting the past couple of years when going around the curves and there are plenty of those around here. And am back to getting to my list of things that I had put on the back burner until I had this done. Next on my list is me and my Granddaughter are heading out fishing next week now that I can see to tie on a hook or a lure and we should have us a great time. And then I am going to pack up the cycle and pull up to the end of the drive and flip a coin for left or right and take a ride for a few days with no place special in mind. Orlin

We got spammed hard last night. I've had to make some changes, at least temporarily, until I get it under control. We have over 1900 new trial members posting crap. I had had to change the rules so that trip members cannot post until I get it figured out. It will take some time to ban all these and delete the content posted.

I hope that I can make this one. I sure plan to try.

I started to call you when I saw the BANNED message but figured if I was banned surely you had to be.

I spent all day yesterday trying to figure out what I had done, of course I've been there before but on this forum

I would attend

we will be there. you might want to post this on the FB ventureriders page.

I don’t ‘ask” for time off, I tell the boss I won’t be here. Of course that means I sometimes have to sleep on the couch after I tell her. 🤣🤣🤣

Great Job, Don! "Not ALL Heroes wear capes!......and NOT ALL Motorcycle Riders are IT Admin's, BUT I sure am glad YOU are, Don! Earl.

Thankfully your on the ball @Freebird

I will be retired by then and would enjoy that trip.

Debbie and I would definitely be interested enjoyed our last visit there.

I would be hard to say no. Sure would love to see you all again.

Lisa and I would be interested. Should be able to make that work.

I really want to see the technology for battery-powered stuff (tools, lawnmowers, tractors, cars, motorcycles, etc) advance to the point of truly being competitive with their gas-powered equivalent. BUT, my viewpoint has nothing to do with global warming or any of that fear-mongering crap. Two viable, competing technologies will make both better in the end. That's free market capitalism at its finest. The problem we are having now is a bunch of gov't busy-bodies trying to mandate stuff that is not yet truly viable technology to be cost/performance/utility competitive with its gas-powered equivalent. They are working to an agenda, rather than letting free market forces do what they do best. It's going to take several humongous technology break-throughs to make battery powered stuff viably competitive with gas-powered, when you take all aspects into consideration. Tesla makes the fastest production car on the market, but has range limits and takes longer to charge than a gas car takes to fill up. If you just want to go real, real fast for a relatively short distance, don't mind waiting for at least an hour recharge and have a large enough bank account, nothing beats a Tesla. So until EV mfg'ers can overcome the tradeoffs, gas-powered technology will need to not only survive, but continuously improve to stay ahead of the new competition, or it WILL be replaced - eventually - by better technology. Personally, I think the Mustang Mach E is a cool vehicle. If it had more range and could charge to full capacity in the time it took to fill a gas tank, I would buy one in a heartbeat for cross-country road trips, but it doesn't currently do what I need it to do for that (5-600 miles/day @ 85-90MPH) My dream is to have a full electric touring bike that will go a minimum of 200 miles on a full charge, has swappable battery modules that I can pull into any 'gas' station and swap out for fully charged ones in 5 minutes and then go another 200 miles. Rinse & repeat. If it can do that repeatedly, reliably and safely, I am all in. Until then, I still love my Venture (and honda gas mower). P.S. the one thing that really scares me the most about all the EV stuff is the amount of electrons stored and used for operating/fast charging and the intensity of those electrons being unleashed if/when something goes wrong - they move in unison, at the speed of light.

Tina and I would be interested if we can get the time off, had a great time last year. I think the extra days would be nice for those who travel from pretty far away.

Thanks to Flyinfool for this great tech article. Testing for a Battery not Charging. 1. Start by fully charging the battery. A. Charge at a low rate of about 2 Amps for at least 12 hours. B. A faster charge will put in a quick surface charge not the deep charge that is needed. 2. Clean all of the charging circuit connections. A. This includes, positive and negative battery terminals, the frame and engine grounds, starter motor connection, solenoid connections, Regulator / Rectifier (RR) connector, Main fuse connections, and Stator connector. 3. With the bike running at over 2,000 RPM check the voltage across the battery terminals. See note below. A. The voltage should be between 13.5 and 14.5 volts DC. B. If the voltage is less than 13.5 go to step 4. C. If the voltage is more than 14.5 replace the RR and start step 3 over. 4. Test the battery A. With the battery fully charged have it load tested. a. Many stores that sell batteries will do this for free. B. If battery is good reinstall and go to step 5 C. If battery is bad, replace and go back to step 3 5. Test the rectifier diodes, (Unfortunately there is no easy test for the regulator) A. Disconnect all wires from the RR. B. Set your ohm meter to either diode test (preferred) or its scale closest to 2K ohms. C. Connect the black meter lead to the black wire of the RR. D. Test each of the 3 white wires with the red lead of the meter. a. They should each show continuity (low resistance) E. Connect the red meter lead to the black wire of the RR. F. Test each of the 3 white leads with the black meter lead. a. They should each show no connection. G. Connect the black meter lead to the red wire of the RR. H. Test each of the 3 white wires with the red lead of the meter. a. They should each show no connection I. Connect the red meter lead to the red wire of the RR. J. Test each of the 3 white leads with the black meter lead. a. They should each show continuity. K. If all of the tests in C. thru J. pass go to step 6 L. If any of the test in C. thru J. fail replace RR 6. Test the stator. (All stator tests are with the stator unplugged from the RR.) A. Set ohm meter to its highest scale. B. Check from each of the 3 stator wires to ground. a. The reading should all be open. b. If the reading is a low number then the windings are shorted to ground. Stator is bad. C. Set ohm meter to its lowest scale. D. Check the resistance between each pair of white wires, ie 1-2, 2-3, 3-1. a. The readings should be 0.36 to 0.48 ohms at 68°F (20°C) b. The readings should all be very close to the same. c. Readings outside of the range indicate a bad stator. 1. This test is not always a 100% indicator of a bad stator since many less expensive meters are not sensitive enough to measure this small of a resistance accurately. E. WARNING – The following test has dangerous voltage present on the 3 stator leads. Do not touch them. You will get a shock. a. Do not let the stator leads touch each other or you will have a bad stator. F. Set your meter to a scale to read more than 100volts AC. G. Start the engine and hold at above 2,000 RPM. H. Measure the voltage of each pair of white wires., ie. 1-2, 2-3, 3-1. a. The voltage should be over 50 volts AC and could be over 100VAC. Depending on exact RPM b. Each of the 3 wire pairs should show close to the same voltage. I. If one or more pairs of wires show a low voltage and/or the resistance test from D. shows a difference, then the stator is bad. NOTE Run test 3 with as many things turned off as possible and again with as many things turned on as possible. If the voltage is low only with everything on, you might just have too much electrical stuff for the system to power. But it could still be a marginally performing stator and/or RR. By Jeff Borowski August 15, 2013

Beam-type torque wrenches are very imprecise, but much better than nothing. Clicker wrenches should be periodically calibrated, but virtually none of us go to the expense and effort to have that done. But you CAN check them yourself. Checking the accuracy of a torque wrench is not too difficult IF you have at least two wrenches with overlapping ranges. Here's how: You need a high grade bolt and nut - I prefer grade 8 (six radial lines on the head) where a 7/16-14 bolt would allow you to test up to around 70 ft lbs. Make sure the threads on the bolt go all the way to the head, and put at least one large washer on the bolt. Now clamp the nut in a vise with the top side flush with surface of the vice, then screw the bolt all the way in. Set your first torque wrench to a low setting in the range that is covered by your second wrench. For example, if both wrenches go from 10-100 ft*lbs, I would start at 15 ft*lbs. Carefully tighten the bolt in the vise until the wrench clicks. Now switch to the second wrench, set to the same torque, and see if it clicks BEFORE the bolt turns at all. If so, that is good, but you are only 1/2 done! What you have just shown is that the first wrench did not tighten the bolt any LESS than the same setting on the second wrench, but it MAY have tightened it more. So to complete the check, you need to loosen the bolt, then repeat the above steps starting with wrench #2. If this test also shows the second wrench clicks before the bolt turns any more, then you can be confident that both wrenches are setting the same torque, so they are almost certainly both correct. Now increase the setting on both wrenches up to something in the middle of the range and re-do the whole test. The only thing you need to be careful about is to make sure the max torque setting you test is within what the bolt grade and size can handle. If the two wrenches you are testing do not both click at the same setting, no matter which one you start with, then at least one of them is bad. To find out which one, you will have to find a third wrench to test. When you have two wrenches that both click the same when you do the entire test above, then you can use either one of those as a baseline to compare other wrenches. Just an FYI to anyone who brashly wants to claim all Harbor Freight torque wrenches are junk - I have a total of 5 torque wrenches here - two from HF (a 1/4" drive clicker and a 3/8" drive clicker), an old beam type wrench in in*lbs, and two very high quality 1/2" drive clickers that were calibrated by a USAF test lab. ALL of those wrenches test the same in every point where the ranges overlap, so the HF wrenches are dead accurate within a reasonable tolerance. The only complaint I have at all against one of the HF wrenches (the 1/4" drive) is that the gradations on the handle are a bit more difficult to use when setting the torque value - I had to compare it to the other wrenches to be sure I was reading it correctly. So if anyone in the North Texas area wants to check their torque wrenches, we can compare them to mine. Goose BTW - How you store your clicker-type torque wrench is important. If you do not have (or haven't bothered to read) the instructions that came with your wrench, you might be in the habit of just chucking the wrench back in your tool box after that last "click" on the last bolt of the job. But it is important to turn the torque setting all the way down to remove the tension from the internal spring before putting it away. Leaving the spring under tension is the biggest reason why these types of torque wrenches change calibration.

A definite maybe for me. getting the time off could be a stumbling block for me. Seems I am too valuable to be allowed vacation time unlike the rest of the employees, who can get time off whenever they want.