Morning breaks at the Denver Renaissance

There is an airport out there somewhere. And a highway ight here. Time to find a lies heels breakfast and start wandering.

The cost of anything...

So I was sitting at work with a headache, trying to keep my head down and not be bothered by reading material online. I'm such a model employee, right?


So I have had this RV-boner lately, especially about BlueBird Wanderlodges. So I was reading material mostly related to the same when I cam across this blog, and in particular this post:


http://www.cheddaryeti.com/2012/04/17/why-we-chose-maintenance-over-payments/


While this is not an actual evaluation of the pay vs own debate, I definitely appreciate the spunk and fire that these two have and their acknowledgement of the issue while basically telling people that it does not matter.


I also have similar sentiments when it comes to this discussion. It certainly takes some mechanical ability to be on the Own side of the argument but it is not always necessary.


Looking forward to our proposed Colorado road trip in a couple weeks and after reading some of this RV material I really feel like I need to get the BMW running for this trip so that I can regain some of the independence I once had in my previous cross-country adventures!


cheers,
G

Bike around the block tonight...

Finally got both RockyMount racks on the bummer. Time to go downtown and see how they work!

-G

First leisure/shakedown ride!

So I bit the bullet on another 90F July day and took the bimmer out. I didn't get my arms ripped from their sockets, but I did thoroughly enjoy my ride! I even stopped and walked around this little county park I have never noticed before!

The wind was a bit gusty so I wasn't doing anything to wild, but I did notice what might be front wheel bearing noise, hot oil smell, and the engine still makes a terrible racket. I will have to pop open the left-hand head to see what clearances look like.

All in all I will say a glorious weekend. Happy birthday 'Murica!

-G

ABS and first real ride of the bike!

It is official! The BMW R1100S is on the road. I took it down the driveway last night once the transmission job was done, but before buttoning up the plastics. More on the transmission job later...

The one thing I did take care of when I got home from C&C this morning was to tackle the ABS reset. I have found a bunch of useful information here
http://www.largiader.com/abs/absfault.html#light
And a PDF here

http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=676929

Between these two articles I made a nice little jumper to add to my BMW Motorad special tools bin. And the reset was successful!

Later I suited up in full gear, much to my amusement on this 85F day, and took her out for a spin. Put about 10 miles on the clock running down the same route I shake the Suzuki down on.
Initial observations are: lots of shake, plenty of buzz, pegs are too close to my ass for great comfort, engine clacks something fierce.

Time to go shop for summer riding gear!

-G :D

Initial observations

So I had already thrown the "power port" away by the time u thought to snap some pictures, but here is the remote battery tender line, for your enjoyment.

Be free!!

And...time! Definitely the quickest project I have done, to date. The offending parts of the motorcycle are removed and waiting to be taken to the parts washer.

So far I have discovered the following problems in the disassembly processes:

-O2 sensor not screwed in. It was there but loose.

-final drive pivot bearings were way loose.

-lots of mystery grease found in final drive input cavity. No idea what it is or where it actually came from. I am guessing it was a half assed attempt at "greasing the splines." idiot.

-driveshaft is not phased correctly

-driveshaft is not sliding on the splines at all.

-clutch disc is completely barren where there once were splines.

-transmission input shaft has fuck-all for splines.

-clutch throw-out rod is updated type with felt washer.

SO! My conclusion is that this bike has been apart at least once before and somebody did a shitty job of putting it back together!

I hope some day somebody will not say the same of the work I am about to put into it!

Cheers!

G :)