Scooters, Helmet Cams and the MotoGP

Hello all.

This morning as I began my day, I began thinking about my bike and what I would get as a replacement. I did my usual routine of getting my trousers on (which I have just noticed have a massive rip in the arse….I’ll come to that in a mo), then I put my boots on, then jacket, bag, visor pouch, earplugs, helmet and out to the bike. All the while I am still thinking about bikes. Then I think to myself, what about a wee 50cc scooter for the winter months? Cheap to buy, cheap to run, cheap to insure…they don’t go fast enough to need full on leather gear, comfy textiles and bob’s your mothers brother.

To test this theory out I decided to ride my bike at 40mph for a while and see what it would be like. I must have got about 400yards and got fed up….

So forget the scooter idea, I need to get to work asap as I usually dont leave enough time to take it easy. I get up at 7:35am and get to work for 8:50am most days. If I got a scooter I would need to leave at 10 to 8 perhaps…ach, whatever. I would miss the speed.

If not a scooter then, what will it be? I can’t really think about it at the minute as I still need to shift this Buell. I called them up yet again and asked how it was going and if they had had a chance to think about my bike…and he said..”What..you mean to buy?”

He had forgotten completely. So hopefully I shall hear from them soon. I just want to know if they intend on buying my bike so I can put it on AutoTrader or MCN or something like that…although I am really hoping they will buy it off me.

Weather permitting I am going to Cupar Suzuki to test ride a GSR 600, to put to rest the worry that it has unforgivable fuelling and throttling. I have heard its a right arse to live with, but the rest of the bike is a gem…we’ll see.

Helmet Cams have always interested me. I love the idea of being able to record what you are seeing and show people. It’s also intriguing to watch it and see if you see other things that you might have missed. So in order to have a helmet cam I would need a bullet cam like this, and either a camcorder or a pmp to record on to. It would cost around £300-£400 for all the kit.

When my brother passes his test it would be great to record the places that we go, more for sentimental value. We’ll see…

The MotoGP returns to our screens this weekend for the Brno GP. So far this season it has been a bit of a shock. Good ol Casey Stoner has joined Ducati and has left everyone for dead. Even the god that is Valentino can’t keep up. Say what you like, but it is very obvious that machinery plays a big part in Stoners success. He is a talented rider though.

It begs the question however, what it would be like if Valentino had Stoners setup. Remember I am not that much of a Valentino fan boy, but he is the worlds greatest racer and with the problems at Yamaha arriving quicker that Stoner’s Ducati, what would it be like if he were to switch to the Red machine and Bridgestones? One can only imagine…

So hopefully over the past 4 weeks Yamaha have sorted themselves out…well not really Yamaha, more Michelin. Their rubber has been utter crap this season and has let most of the Michelin riders down and not just Vale. It’s only really been brought to the viewers attention because the worlds best is struggling. You don’t really hear about Dunlops…And with the new regulations limiting tire numbers for Michelin and Bridgestone, Dunlop riders can have as many as they like. And there is no limit!!

Maybe Vale should switch to Dunlops……hmmm maybe not.

Ach well…another week over. The weekend will soon be over as well. And it’s meant to be raining for most of it.

Thanks for reading.

G

Lonely Hearts Club

Evening all.

As I rode home in the dusk light, I found myself behind 2 sportsbike riders. As we trotted along at 30mph I suddenly got a sad feeling wash over me. I have never ridden in a group yet. Even riding behind these 2 blokes on their white R1 and green zx10 i felt excited. There’s something fundamentally cool about riding in 2’s or more. You feel cool. I guess it has as much something to do with the machinery that you ride, as it does the numbers. If you were in a group of 10 125cc’s, I’m sure you wouldn’t feel that cool….or infact you would, cause you would be on 2 wheels…i dont know…

I guess I will find out what it’s like when my brother passes his test in Sept….

Anyway,

I am tired and going to bed.

Night

Raining and peeping

I don’t get it when drivers peep their horns at bikers.

I was happily travelling along on my way to work the other day and it came to the Forth Road Bridge. Cars usually queue up here and today was no different. So what I usually do is slow down to running pace and filter through in between the cars. Of course sometimes the cars start moving whilst i’m doing this so I speed up to continue filtering through. Then this fool in a banger of a ford van thing starts blasting his horn at me. So I brake and turn round to see what his problem was and he’s shouting and waving his hand pointing forwards….I was and still am completely baffled by this as I was in no danger of hitting any car or any car hitting me. We were going along at a safe speed and I was going 5mph faster to keep slightly ahead of the flow.

It didn’t anger me in the slightest, just made me wonder what his problem was….did I annoy him because he was stuck in a queue? Did I get too close to his rusted pile of crap that he called a car? Who knows…and it’ll remain a secret as I have no intention of speaking to this fine example of a human..

It was pouring down tonight. I got very wet. My gear is crap.

I purchased the RST gear and it was claimed 100% waterproof. My ASS. At the slightest hint of moisture the jacket doesn’t bother it’s arse to repell water and the trousers, which are already falling to pieces, do an even worse job. Hopefully the bonuses at work are kind to us this year and I get enough to re-gear myself in Gore-Tex.

As winter draws closer, I can’t see me riding my bike if I have to wear the RST gear. Call me a big girls blouse, but you try wearing stuff that has no thermal or waterproofing at all.

Hein Gericke stuff looks good…there’s a new shop at the West End, so I see a wee trip in there coming up.

My brother sits his bike test in a few weeks, and he’s all caught up on the “what if I fail” frame of mind…I’ve told him to get a grip and start being positive…fingers crossed.

ANNOUNCEMENT:

I have now secured myself the www.yamyambiker.com domain name and it’s now active so hopefully you that do read this can pass on the URL a bit easier rather than my other one.

Thanks and keep reading!!

YamYam

A wee vid of my bike!!

Hello all.

Just thought I would get in to the video blogging crap and test one out. So here it is!! It’s my Buell XB12Ss Lightning. Best viewed with good speakers and lots of bass.

Comments welcome!!

I’ll try and get some more up before I have to let it go….sniff…

I am going to test ride the GSR600 on Saturday 18th so stay tuned for that!

Thanks for reading,

G

P.s. I am wearing flip-flops and I have just washed my bike, so thats why there is a dodgy sound when I am walking and water and stuff all over the place.

Better naked than not…

Hello all.

After my monster post the other day I am surprised that you can be bothered to read anything more from me. But there you go. I hadn’t posted in a while and thats what happens!HA

So to recap, my Yamaha MT-03 melted. So I got it repaired and then part exchanged it for a 2005 Buell XB12Ss Lightning Long. I’ve had this for 2 months now and have just had an insurance renewal quote. £1800 smackers. Then there is the 3 services a year at over £200 at least. Mega money.

So now I am going to sell the Buell to pay of the loan I got for buying it, then start afresh, aboard what I should have got, another Japanese machine.

The shortlist, in descending order is:

2007 Yamaha FZ6 S2 Naked
2007 Kawasaki Z750
2007 Honda Hornet
2006/7 Suzuki GSR 600
2007 Kawasaki ER6-F/N

I am looking to spend around £4500-£5000 on the bike and a lot of the manufacturers are doing the 0% Finance lark, so that should be handy. The Suzuki garage is also offering £99 fully comp first years insurance for newly passed riders. So thats a shame really.

Today I went to the local Yamaha dealership and had a good look around the 2007 FZ6 S2 in White! It looked superb. A completely different riding position to the Buell. The seat is big, the dials are cool and the bars are nice. Lots of space on the back for my girlfriend (The first time I have sat on the back of a bike in ages) it had lots of room and nice peg positions.

Big tank, holds 19l of unleaded. Nice chrome mirrors, a middle bar on the handlebars. Lots of nice little touches that give it that extra something compared to the others. I then had a test ride on a 05 FZ6.

It looked a wee bit different and it was styled different as well. Different seat, dials, tank etc. When I first got on it it was wierd. The bars are quite far out. The gear changer is quite high up as well so you either need to learn to touch your shin with your toes, or use the stamp on it method to change down. The brakes were good and the bars were nicely spaced. It’s a very agile bike as well. Slow speed riding is stable and comfortable. The biggest thing that struck me was the complete lack of any sort of vibration. Unbelievable!

In order to get the most out of the FZ6 you need to rev it. Once you get above 3000 rpm ish the bike starts its smooth accelleration curve. Get to 10,000 however and its a whole different ball game. The bike surges forward at this until the 14,000 or something red line, sounding amazing whilst doing so. It’s not the grunting powerful sound of the Buell, rather a high pitched shriek but great all the same.

6 gears are great. The Buell has 5 and it doesn’t really matter as once you are at the national speed limit in 5th, your only doing 2,500 rpm, so you still have all of that rev range to accellerate with. But on a Jap 4, you need that extra gear I think, in order to cruise on the motorway and not feel like you are rushing the engine.

After heading round some side streets I got back to the dealership and spoke with Alan about my and my brothers intentions and he said he would obviously be able to take care of us better if we both went with Yamaha.

I left with a good feeling about the FZ6. Its exactly what I would need. I am going to test the GSR 600 to see if the snatchy fuelling I’ve read so much about is that noticeable. Then we’ll see what we can do about selling this Buell.

If anyone is interested in buying my Buell, it’s a 2005 XB12Ss Lightning Long, it has 6000 miles on the clock, black with gold wheels and a thumping great big 1200cc V-Twin.

I’ll hopefully get the ride on the GSR next weekend. I’ll keep you posted!

Thanks for reading folks!!

EDIT:

Here’s pictures of all of the bikes: