The Motorcycle and The Idiot: A Marriage of Inconvenience

[DukeXTC]

Dear All,

I have just started writing a blog of my feeble attempts at learning how to maintain a motorcycle. I've been riding for over 30 years and can only do the very basic stuff so I've committed myself to learning by buying a 1998 Honda Transalp. You can read about my trials and tribulations (and please leave feedback) at:

http://motorcycleidiot.blogspot.co.uk/

Thanks,

Pete

[utopia]

A well written, interesting and entertaining read, so far.
I look forward to further episodes.

Does the Transalp have the oil in the frame, like my Dominator ?
If so, you may be interested in my tale.
I changed the oil.
The manual says refill in two stages, one litre at first, then start the motor briefly, then top up to the level.
I put more than one litre in the first time, thinking there was no way that extra oil could caues an issue, but in fact I may have thereby caused an air-lock in the oil passages.
Alternatively, a flexible oil-line may have collapsed, I'm still not certain, but one way or another I had no oil feed to the cylinder head, failed to spot this in time, and ultimately wrecked my cylinder head.
I ended up fitting a replacement engine.
The moral of the story being twofold....firstly always follow the recommended procedure to the letter unless you're really sure beyond any doubt that your shortcut is vald....and secondly (most importantly) on a bike with an external oil feed pipe to the cylinder head, always crack open the upper banjo bolt when the engine is first started after any work or a period of lack of use, just to check that oil does in fact ooze from the joint, confirming that you have lube to the head.

I was just wondering if your Transalp may have a similar arrangement.

If you're looking to repair any plastic bodywork, plastic welding (with a soldering iron) can be effective, but for stressed areas like lugs etc, there are a couple of similarly named products called something like plas.tex/tech. I've not tried it myself, but it looks like a good, strong and relatively simple fix for ABS bodywork and I plan to use it on my broken Domminator panels.

Other workshop tips.....parrafin is an excellent, cheap degreaser, and a plastic kitchen roll holder is a valuable addition to the shed wall, and makes your rags last much longer as you can use the paper towels for the really dirty stuff.
One of those magnets on a stick is a good 50p worth too, for finding those dropped nuts and bolts.
Oh, and you'll be needing a UKMOC mug for the endless cups of tea.

These days I've gone all hi-tech and have a laptop shelf on the shed wall too.
With the addition of a couple of cheap speakers I was able, last night, to watch an entire Grateful Dead show (the usual 3hrs or more) while having a tinker with the monster.

[DukeXTC]

Thanks for the advice. Haven't got to the engine yet but when I do I'll keep your experience in mind. The Transalp is the guinea pig, where hopefully I gain the confidence to work on the Monster (and all air-cooled Ducati engines). The next belt is due next March and I want to do that and the valve check myself.

BTW Part 4 of the blog is now online. Now with extra pizzazz :)

[Albie]

A well written, interesting and entertaining read, so far.
I look forward to further episodes.

Does the Transalp have the oil in the frame, like my Dominator ?
If so, you may be interested in my tale.
I changed the oil.
The manual says refill in two stages, one litre at first, then start the motor briefly, then top up to the level.
I put more than one litre in the first time, thinking there was no way that extra oil could caues an issue, but in fact I may have thereby caused an air-lock in the oil passages.
Alternatively, a flexible oil-line may have collapsed, I'm still not certain, but one way or another I had no oil feed to the cylinder head, failed to spot this in time, and ultimately wrecked my cylinder head.
I ended up fitting a replacement engine.
The moral of the story being twofold....firstly always follow the recommended procedure to the letter unless you're really sure beyond any doubt that your shortcut is vald....and secondly (most importantly) on a bike with an external oil feed pipe to the cylinder head, always crack open the upper banjo bolt when the engine is first started after any work or a period of lack of use, just to check that oil does in fact ooze from the joint, confirming that you have lube to the head.

I was just wondering if your Transalp may have a similar arrangement.

If you're looking to repair any plastic bodywork, plastic welding (with a soldering iron) can be effective, but for stressed areas like lugs etc, there are a couple of similarly named products called something like plas.tex/tech. I've not tried it myself, but it looks like a good, strong and relatively simple fix for ABS bodywork and I plan to use it on my broken Domminator panels.

Other workshop tips.....parrafin is an excellent, cheap degreaser, and a plastic kitchen roll holder is a valuable addition to the shed wall, and makes your rags last much longer as you can use the paper towels for the really dirty stuff.
One of those magnets on a stick is a good 50p worth too, for finding those dropped nuts and bolts.
Oh, and you'll be needing a UKMOC mug for the endless cups of tea.

These days I've gone all hi-tech and have a laptop shelf on the shed wall too.
With the addition of a couple of cheap speakers I was able, last night, to watch an entire Grateful Dead show (the usual 3hrs or more) while having a tinker with the monster.

Thats the same as the XT500 engine or very similar.

[Albie]

Dear All,

I have just started writing a blog of my feeble attempts at learning how to maintain a motorcycle. I've been riding for over 30 years and can only do the very basic stuff so I've committed myself to learning by buying a 1998 Honda Transalp. You can read about my trials and tribulations (and please leave feedback) at:

http://motorcycleidiot.blogspot.co.uk

Thanks,

Pete

Please you link is not clickable try using this one with a forward slash on end

http://motorcycleidiot.blogspot.co.uk/

[Albie]

Please you link is not clickable try using this one with a forward slash on end

http://motorcycleidiot.blogspot.co.uk/

No dont as that does not seem to work either. Whats wrong here then with my copy and paste. Not like I have not done before......


PS your day date is wrong but good read that rings true by many

[NewMon]

This looks good. Exactly what I would like to do (I am similar in experience and inability to do much more than change oil and sort electrics). I will be reading with interest.

[Zimbo]

I'm enjoying reading that, looking forward to the next instalment!

[DukeXTC]

Hopefully the link should work now. Thanks for all the positive comments.

[utopia]

It sounds like you may well have the odd damaged plastic panel.
I haven't used the stuff myself, but I did come across a couple of products called plastech or plastex, which look to be a cheap, easy and effective way of restoring the odd broken fixing lug etc.
I've been planning to try it on my dominator, but have stuck (pun) with the gaffer tape and cable ties up to now.

[DukeXTC]

It sounds like you may well have the odd damaged plastic panel.
I haven't used the stuff myself, but I did come across a couple of products called plastech or plastex, which look to be a cheap, easy and effective way of restoring the odd broken fixing lug etc.
I've been planning to try it on my dominator, but have stuck (pun) with the gaffer tape and cable ties up to now.

Not a single panel is unscathed but I'm not worried about how it looks, I've got my Ducatis for that.

[utopia]

Agreed, but usually if the panels bear a few scars, they'll also almost certainly have the odd broken fixing lug too, and that can be a pain as it lets the bodyworks rattle about, and its likely to suffer further damage as a result.
.....which is exactly the situation with my dommie, and is how I came to discover these products.
So I thought it worth a mention.
It looks to be dead simple to use to reform complicated little bits that are beyond the scope of plastic welding, and not too expensive either when you consider the alternatives........apart from the gaffer and ties of course.