I took Her Holyness round to my local MOT test centre to be greeted with a failure sheet. Excessive play in the rear wheel bearings. Ok, I thought, the bearings have been in the wheel a few years, done a few miles, lets get some new ones. Off I head on a trip to Moto Rapido, picked up some new bearings and rear wheel spacers and sorted. Or so I thought! Took my Monster back to the MOT centre after fitting the new bits and again, failed! More scratching of head was required, then I decided to double check my spannering from the night before. Off the wheel comes, and off rolls one of the bearings under the sofa in the secret workshop! The brake disc hub is deceased, cream crackered, ********, falling apart, dead, broken! As the rest of the wheel looks like a bad day in a paint removing factory, I decided a job for the winter needs doing right now, well more yesterday!
The poor old Brembo had given up. 18 years of abuse. Around 70,000 miles covered, left to rot in Cornwall somewhere on the back of the Monster. The poor old thing needs retiring. Thank you old Brembo for keeping my bike upright (most of the time) and rolling along. A quick trawl through eBay and a replacement was found.
A trip to High Wycombe on a Sunday morning and this 'new' wheel was swapped for £50. A few phone calls on Monday and a local powder coaters was found and I ordered all the new final drive dampeners (cush drives to me) and disc bolts were ordered from Bedfont Ducati.
The rear wheel was picked up from the powder coaters a week later. The rear wheel looks good, a few little blemishes from some marks that were already in the wheel, other than that, it's a vast improvement on the original wheel!
After a quick trip to Feltham Tyre Centre to get the tyre swapped over and Bedfont Ducati (I still can't help thinking that is funny, a Ducati garage in Bedfont... Strange!!) to pick up the new final drive dampeners and disc bolts and the wheel was back fitted in it's rightful place! No play in the bearings at all! A years medical passed and now the old girl is back on the road.
I have ridden the bike home tonight as it seemed to be staying dry for a change. The old bike felt better than ever, I hate to admit it, even better than after having a full service at Rosso Corse!
After my (forced) early refurbishment of the rear wheel, it's time to get back on to planning the refurb for the front end. The front wheel needs powder coating / painting, overhaul of the braking system, and I might change the clocks back to the standard speedo / idiot light set up, oh and not forgetting a respray on the tank. One thing though, I can finally see the end of this madness!!
Then I might start rebuilding the Bandit... Or not!