Flyinfool

OUCH!! That's more than I paid for mine.....

I will likely only use this one a couple of times a year but it needs to hold 2 parts that are 82 inches long x 24 wide x 16 high and weigh a total of 22 lbs. I may even after the first trip decide that I will just have to take the P/U to travel with these parts. There is also about 50 lbs of support equipment if I bring a full 5 gallon jug of Jet A1 fuel. OK I know your is curious as to whats going in the box, so here is a pic. The body is 82 long, the tail is not removable, the wing is 82 long and 24 wide. I would have to build a cradle to hold the parts seculy during transport. That is the easy part.

I went and ordered the hitch for the scoot. I already did the thread on whether or not to use brakes on the trailer. http://www.venturerider.org/forum/showthread.php?t=47141 Now I just need to design and build the trailer. I need to a lot of pricing out parts to see if it is more cost effective to build a trailer from scratch, or to start with something like a Harbor Freight trailer and modify from there. The box needs to be a minimum of 96 x 40 x 20. At this point in time I am thinking of making the box out of marine grade plywood with a one piece hinged lid. Maybe a sloped and/or V nose to help wind resistance. I am still concerned about side wind load in a strong cross wind. That is a big trailer for a bike but what I need to carry is not heavy, just big and fragile. I am open to ideas for the construction of this beast.

OK, you all convinced me. I will plan on putting brakes on this trailer. Those that have had them seem to like them and those that have not had them say you just have to be conscious of your increased stopping distance. That tells me that in an emergency situation I will/may not stop in time. When I hook up my 6000lb camper with electric brakes to my truck, where I have a good progressive controller, I can actually stop faster in an emergency with the trailer than without it. Thanks Thom for those links, that is exactly what I was looking for. I have a start, I just bought the hitch for the bike.

The problem with the cams is that in the USA the constitution gives you the right to face your accuser. You can not question the camera in court. The biggest problem is that some cities see this as such a profit center that they put in the red light cams and then shorten the yellow light to where it nealy impossible to avoid running the red without nearly locking the brakes the instant the light turns yellow and making a panic stop. If the road conditions are less than perfect there is no possible way to stop in time ,so the city knows that they will get at least one ticket with almost every cycle of the light. I especially would not want to have to make that panic stop on a bike and HOPE that the car and driver behind me can match my stopping ability. There is a big fight going on right now in Wisconsin as to whether traffic cams should be legal. I for one am against them. They are to dangerous.

It was really windy here yesterday. I was riding home from work directly into a 30-40MPH head wind. This is the same route that I have driven every workday for the last 10 years so I know it well. I pulled up to a red light, on level ground, fairly new concrete surface. I was first in line at the light. With every wind gust the bike was pushed backwards and my feet on the ground (rubber soled shoes) did not have enough traction to hold the bike against the wind. I had to hold the front brake to keep from backing into the car behind me. This is with the wind blowing on the most aerodynamically clean side of the bike. After reading in several threads recently about parking in gear, and tales of the wind blowing over the bike, I am reformulating my beliefs as to how to safely park this thing. I can believe that with the bike parked with a strong tail wind that the faring and windscreen are acting like a parachute that the wind could move the bike forward enough to fold up the side stand. Parking in gear will/should help to prevent this from happening. I know that I once parked a manual transmission cage pointed up a hill and left it in first gear, and it was able to turn the engine over backwards while it chugged slowly down the hill. I do not know how much force it would take to move a bike while parked in gear but I am certain that it would be a lot more than in neutral.

I only leave my bike in gear if I am parked on a hill, and try to avoid parking with the bike pointed down hill, for several good reasons.

Welcome back. We were beginning to worry about you. Not in a hurry yet but still interested in the bat cables.

See now if you had a 1st gen instead of that new iron......

But I gots to have horns that even a deaf guy kin hear. I still have to figure out where to "hide" them. And with my new HID, Low beam is still brighter than my old High beam.....

I cant really help you much on a 2nd gen. I don't think that the wires from the control box to the ballast to the bulb are long enough to reach under the tank.

Well I received my Certificate of Registration from the state today along with a letter that it will be another 6-8 weeks before I get the plates. So for the next 6-8 weeks I will be riding around with expired plates making me a prime target for every LEO that is looking for an excuse to pull someone over. I just hope that the plates get here before winter comes back.

Well I finally got around to installing my HID Kit. I tried to get some before and after pics of the illumination down the road but my cheap old camera was not up to the task. Installing the kit was easy and took about a half hour of actual work time. It was a mater of remove chrome strip at bottom of windshield, remove headlight trim, remove headlight, remove bulb from headlight. To install, I put the controller on the flat plastic wall straight behind the headlight with Velcro. I tie strapped the ballast and relay to a frame piece that was on the bikes right side behind the headlight. Ran the power lead to my power panel to get battery power. Connected the ground wire to a frame screw that just happened to be in a convenient spot in the headlight area. Plugged the existing bikes headlight connector into the mating connector of the Hid control box. I added a wrap of tape to this connection because it plugs in so easy that I was concerned about it coming apart. Connected all of the remaining wires of the HID system. All of the connectors are different so it is impossible to screw it up. Dress all of the wire to keep them still and neat. That was the easy part. As I mentioned early on I was concerned about whether the computer would like this light. My concerns were justified. The computer did not like this at all. It insisted that the low beam was burned out and automatically switched to high beam. but then it thought the high beam was burned out so it tried to go back to low beam. as well as give a headlight warning on the CMS with its associated annoying flashing red light, and the white headlight reserve indicator on the dash was lit. So now the fun begins. Step one, the CMS. Start ripping things apart to get to the computer to be able to jumper the reed switches. There are a number of threads on here detailing this procedure so I will not go into a lot of detail. (besides this is a PG forum and I was not PG through this whole thing.) Basic steps were Remove windshield, Remove mirrors, (mirrors do not have to come off if you have an offset Phillips screwdriver) Remove dash cover, remove dash, remove CMS from back of dash disassemble CMS to get PCBs out. (Note; while removing the PCBs the 2 displays for the clock and the monitor display will come out and it will look like you broke all of the wires off of them, don't panic, there are no visible wires or connectors, and they are supposed to come off of the board.) As long as I was in there, I jumpered all of the reed switches as long as I was there so that down the road when I replace ALL of the lights with LEDs it will be ready. all of this was to just get the CMS to stop flashing the read light an turn off the headlight out indicator on the display. Step 2, the reserve lighting unit. After sleeping on it this turned out to be quite easy. For the Reserve Lighting Unit, I simply unplugged it, and using some #12AWG solid wire I made 3 Jumpers to stick in the end of the wire harness connector. Jumper 1 was from Blue/White to Blue/Black. This sends the power to the handlebar dimmer switch. Jumper 2 was from Black to Yellow. This provides a ground path for the High beam indicator. Jumper 3 was from Yellow/Green to Red/Yellow. This turns on the High beam indicator. The remaining Blue/Red and Light Green have no connections. (These 2 wires go to the white headlight bulb in case you would want to use that as an indicator for something else) Tape it up good to hold in the jumpers, and you are all set to go. By doing it this way you can easily pull out the jumpers and plug it back in for stock operation. So you ask, "Was it worth it?" Dam right it was. This light is so bright compared to the old one. The beam pattern is identical to the old beam pattern, and focused well. In the short ride that I took no one flashed their brights at me. On a long straight dark road I could see things that were a half mile away. Even in full sunlight the road signs are lit up brighter by this light. Sorry, but I did have a brain cramp and never thought to take step by step pics of this whole ordeal till I was almost done.

I did get my HID installed and all working. I did have to jumper the CMS as you indicated, to get rid of the headlight out warning. For the Reserve Lighting Unit, I simply unplugged it, and using some #12AWG solid wire I made 3 Jumpers to stick in the end of the wire harness connector. Jumper 1 was from Blue/White to Blue/Black. This sends the power to the handlebar dimmer switch. Jumper 2 was from Black to Blue/Green. This provides a ground path for the High beam indicator. Jumper 3 was from Yellow/Green to Blue/Red. This turns on the High beam indicator. The remaining Yellow and Green/Red have no connections. Tape it up good to hold in the jumpers, and you are all set to go. By doing it this way you can easily pull out the jumpers and plug it back in for stock operation.

You'll need the extra gas to get far enough out of range quickly, BEFORE you tell her that she cant come.

Yes the wind can knock over a bike. There was a day at work when a storm came thru and knocked over my KZ750, a Wing and a BMW R900. They were all far enough apart so that they did not hit each other on the way down. In your case, I would look closely for other damage, maybe some one backed into it.

PayPal is not always a good thing. I made a purchase on eBay, paid with PP, 3 weeks later I contacted the seller and was told that the tracking showed the package as delivered. I later found out that they shipped to the wrong address. PP refused my claim because the tracking number showed that the package was delivered in the same city that I live in. I was out all of the money and no product. Fortunately it was only ~$30.

That is why I am thinking of modding mine, So that I do not have to find a "perfect" parking spot, or play as many games getting into the best orientation.

Is this a possible case of the side stand being to long and/or the air pressure in the suspension being to low causing the bike to be standing to straight up? This is something that I always worry about with mine and I was thinking of modifying the side stand to make it more stable when parked.

I work with a kid that is really into scooter mods. Lots of chrome, custom paint, etc, etc. He has been doing a lot of work on the engine and has bored and stroked it from the stock 49cc all the way up to 65cc. And he really truly believes that it will beat ANY motorcycle in the 1/4 mile because he can get it up to 60mph going down hill with a tail wind.:rotfl: He is so proud of it, I haven't had the heart to tell him that the Ninja that he said he blew away probably did not know that he was racing.

Any halfway decent paint supplier can do the color match.

You know it is funny that you mention the carbon brushes just now. At work we are constantly fighting the carbon war in the motors that we make. Our customers look at our $10 carbons and then go to the hardware store and buy some $0.50 carbons of the same size that look the same and complain when they fry their motor. We spend thousands of hours and $$$ testing carbon in our motors to find the right compound. It really does make a HUGE difference. Just from what I go through here at work every day I have learned that I will ALWAYS spend whatever for the OEM carbon in any motor. Carbon brushes are a black science. We tested one from the hardware store but the motor that is supposed to run at 110 - 130°F at full load, ran at 225°F, simply changing to the correct carbon brought it back to 115° That motor would have melted in about 15 minutes. OK Speech mode off now. Back to the regularly scheduled thread.... Now get your but out there and ride some more...

Yes standard blue or red Loctite will damage some (most but not all) plastics. I do not remember the Loctite P/N off hand but Loctite does make a thread locker specifically FOR plastic.

Congrats on getting things turned around. Gee..... I wonder if I should ride down just so BoomerCPO can WATCH me eat a whole cheese cake. After all I am from the land of the cheese head and we know our cheese and cake. Well OK, Maybe not, I hate to see a grown man cry.......

According to the EPM website (http://www.epmperformance.com/motorcycle-shock-rebuild.htm) a rebuild is $95 to $125 depending on model + parts. At a minimum parts will be new seals for which they do not mention a price. So even if you can get it rebuilt for $200 when it is all said and dome, that is still a lot cheaper than buying new ones. I do not need to be able to make easy adjustments to the shock since my loading is almost always the same.