A damn good seeing to.

Hello.

So my bike has had it’s first service. It was meant to have it at 600miles but I had to use it for work. It was meant to go in last Saturday, but the road was 5 inches deep in snow…So by the time I got the bike in, it was sitting at 1060miles. Nevermind.

So I dropped it off at Scott Murray’s at 11am ish on Saturday there and asked them if they could fit my heated gloves as well. No probs they said, and asked if I would like them wired through the ignition or just straight out the battery. Through the ignition only allows them to come on when the ignition is on, through the battery is always on.

Through the ignition I said, and then left. I had also ordered a new rear back brake lever which costs £15.

3 hours later and I got a call to say “your beast is ready!” and to come get it when I want. Cue a trip to SM!

So when I got there my bike was sitting outside the workshop looking different somehow. I actually had to double take because I thought something was missing off of it…but it turns out they had cleaned it top to toe….thats what was missing!The dirt.

I swooned inside and said hello to the boys. I got a wee print out and my heated gloves back. Jon, the co-owner of Scott Murray, was telling me what they had performed and said that my oil tank was overflowing with oil when they opened it! Far far too much oil they said. Then Dave, the mechanic, took me out to the bike and told me all the stuff they had done; Changed the oil, the oil filters, cleaned the whole bike, cleaned the chain, tightened it up cause it was really slack, checked all bolts/fixings, cleaned the brakes, mended the rear brake pedal to the best of their ability and fitted the heated glove cable through the ignition. Superb!

All in all the service came to £102. Not bad for all that I say!

The cable comes out the front of the seat and Dave left some slack so I could tuck it away when I’m not using it.

The fixed brake lever. A damn good job by anyones standards. Dave took the brake off the clutch casing and straightened it out all he could. I can actually use it now!

Clean as a baby’s bum. Superb job by the boys at Scott Murray.

The cleaned chain, which was tightened.

The bike is now running superb and I can use all of the rev range now, whereas before I had to limit myself to 4,500rpm, I can now go all the way up to the 7,500rpm redline.

I can’t say a better word about the Scott Murray team and the superb standards that they have. A really great job and well worth it! I go nowhere else for anything.

After picking up the bike I headed out for a ride over the Cleish Hills. It was beautiful and a great afternoon for a quick ride and some snaps:

So there you go!

Tonight was really wet, but I didn’t care cause I had my heated gloves on!!

WOOOO

Cheerio

Now that I have got that out the way…

Everyone drops their bike once…Everybody.

So this morning, it was nice, sunny, bit cold and some surface sparkle. Ok I thought, did my usual routine - T-shirt, Long Johns, Socks, Thermal top, Trousers, Boots, Jacket, Neck warmer, Rucksack, Earplugs, Balaclava, Helmet, inner gloves, outer gloves, on bike, go.

Get to the end of my road, turn right, back end steps out so I put my foot down, its so slippy that my foot goes as well and DOWN WE GO!!!! Hooray.

Somehow I managed to get away from the bike but fell in such a way that I could see it scraping down the road….NOOOO!!!

I got up, cried a little and then attempted to pick up the bike. It was really difficult cause my hand kept slipping on the throttle, but after all my mustered effort, I got it up.

I was expecting to see lots of scrapes and lots of badness, but upon inspecting the right side of the bike, only the end of the handlbar weight got damaged…and the front brake lever end….oh wait a minute. The rear brake lever is bent against the clutch case…thats not meant to be like that is it!?

I looked round to see 2 oldies in a merc asking if I was ok. I said yeah, Im just great and off they toddled.  I am going to have to get the brake un-bent I said, as I gently got on the bike. The engine light was flashing on the dials….oh no. But I turned the bike off and on again and it was ok. I did a 3 point turn on the slippy ground and proceded back to the house to sort this mess out.

Once I got back, Mum was just about to leave for work, so I said I had fell off but I was ok, and that my brake lever was bent and I was going to try and fix it.

A broken screwdriver later and it’s half assed bent back a wee bit. I try it and the brake works fine, but because of the angle its at, as soon as I put my foot on it the brake pressure is 100%, so that was going to be a bit awkward.

It took 20 minutes to sort out well enough to get going to work again. I did 2mph until I hit the main road, everyone was looking at me funny cause I had both feet dangling ready for any wobbly moments!

Everything else was ok, I got to work ok, 20 minutes late. It was really dirty on the road today, lots of salt. I had my sunnys on cause it was sunny….and they were all salty too.

Anyway, thats that. I have fallen, I am really lucky cause it could have been worse. I was expecting the tank to at least have some marks on it but not one! Well done Yamaha, yet again.

Check out the pictures of the outcome below….so so so sad. Sniff…

Winter in February

Hey guys, just found this picture that I took on Saturday.

This is why I didn’t take my bike out. My Mum parked the car up the drive facing down after trying to get out the street…then 10 minutes later, this was the scene:

The car slid in to the bushes…

Forget taking a bike out in that!!

Bye

Confession #2 and the warmth…

Having only been riding for 3.1 weeks, I thought I was doing pretty good! But in quick succession, I have hit 2 wing mirrors.

 One of which was written about before…but this one was special.

I was merging as usual through the home-bound traffic, when the lights up ahead turned red…there was a big articulated lorry to my left, and an Astra to my right. I usually have to watch for my mirrors hitting stuff so as I summed up the gap, it all looked rosy. So I proceeded ahead until BANG. I look down and my right grip/front brake lever has hit the Astras wingmirror, gently pushing the mirror to a different angle…

HOW. EMBARRASSING. What makes it worse is at the last set of lights there was a boy on a 125cc with an L plate on who was zooming about, but I had the 660cc beefcake so showed him who was boss….till that moment.

The lady who was driving the Astra shook her head at me and I just waved at her. OOPS. Then I pinned it and got away. FAST.

Anyway, mirror, signal, check for clearance before merging…

The second topic tonight is WARMTH! OOOOO. I got heated gloves!

Klan heated gloves. Excellent value at £70 inc P+P. Arrived a day after I bought them.

When you open up the packet you see the two gloves with connections sticking out them, lots of cables and an on/off switch. There is also instructions and stuff under the gloves there.

Of couse these are under gloves. I could have opted for an all in one glove, but then you are restricted to that glove, if you want to have warm handies. So with these, I can either have them under my winter Richa gloves, or my RST summer race gloves. Well done me.

The gloves connect to another bit of wire that goes up your arms and down your chest. This way, when you take the gloves off, they dangle like your gloves did when you were a small child. Great street cred available as soon as you do that… The connection from the dangle wire goes to the switch, which sits neatly at your crotch, which then connects to the wire that goes to the battery under the seat. All the wires have waterproof connections and all stages of the process are separated…i.e. Gloves can come apart from the dangles, the dangles come apart from the switch, the switch comes apart….blah blah, so basically if one thing breaks, you can easily replace it! Superb on Klans behalf. Well done them.

Under my winters. You can see the cable stick out just above the drawstring to my gloves. This would then run up inside my jacket. I am only wearing a jumper here so thats why you can see it!

With the heated gloves on, I am able to easily make a fist, however I have came to expect that gloves will loosen off and mould to your hand as you use them, both my gloves have done this so far, so I expect the Klan ones will too. Nice.

So thats that. I thought, yes, I’ll just read the instructions and hopefully it wont be too difficult.

Instructions: Unpack Klan gloves. Attach red bit to + on battery, attach black to Ground, switch on and off you go…

WOW, lets do it. I find the manual for my bike to locate my battery. Can’t wait really, cause this is the answer to all my cold fingered, miserable journey blues!! Battery….battery….AH! Battery, page 6:21.

It goes something like this: “To locate the battery, remove the pillion seat.” Easy, just turn the key, hey presto. Off it pops.

“Then take off the main seat, then the side panels, then unbolt the tank, then disconnect the tanks electronics, then take the tank off, then fiddle about some more and there is the battery…”

Are you kidding me??!? So thats that shot in the head right off the bat…Never mind. The bike is due for a service this weekend, seeing as how on Saturday, we were snowed in and I was in no shape or form ready to take the bike out in the snow!! So I’ll just get the boys at Scott Murray to fit it. I am meant to take the bike in at 600 miles for an oil and oil filter change. But seeing as how I missed the chance this saturday, i am going to have to ride the bike a wee bit more. Never mind. Scott Murray don’t just do a Oil and Oil filter change. They check all the bolts for initial loosening, clean the chain and give it a good look over. Top stuff, all for no more than £80 he said.
Excellent.

Heres a few pictures of my dirty bike…

And one of my crazy cat.

Ill have more pictures up soon folks!!
Thanks for reading!

Confession #1

I tried so long to keep it in but it has finally got the better of me.

On Monday 5th February 2007, at around 6:02pm, at Barnton, Edinburgh, Scotland, whilst merging through stopped traffic, I Gordon Fraser clipped someones wing mirror. It was unintentional and I must admit, in my defense, the car driver was being a maniac and sitting nearly on the white line. I felt bad at the time but kept riding, more for my own safety than anything else.

There. I have said it.

I also hit something huge on the road tonight, and the front wheel danced. In quick succession I crapped my pants.

I think it was a pebble or something…

Anyway, I’ve cleansed my soul.

Night all.