Raven's Roads
Living an interesting life: the travels and musings
of motorcycling author Linda R. Moore

Jun 6, 2006

Allow me a small preen

This is the first time I have done this much on my own, unsupervised.

Here’s what I did:

I undid the eight hex bolts (6mm) which attach my footpeg assembly to the frame. I had to improvise some leverage using a socket wrench, and it involved thinking through the problem to figure out where the wrench went.

When the assembly dropped, I unfastened/loosened my shifter assembly. (10mm.)

At this point I could see where the problem lay. There is a crack in the jb-weld, and it looks like an impact. It looks like, at some point, the footpeg assembly once again crashed against the cover (one reason why I’m getting crash bars)–though I haven’t dropped it on that side since the original incident last winter. So perhaps some car door was banged against the bike, or it was kicked. I shall never know. I’m just glad that it happened now, and not halfway down highway 6.

Then I removed, using a ratchet and 8 mm socket, the four bolts that fasten on the right-hand cover. This is an over-cover that overlays the main cover–I can’t remember why, or what, exactly, it’s protecting, but several bolts from the main cover lie underneath it. Removing the main cover is easy, but I’m going to leave it there–it will take me a long time to chip off the jb-weld ready for the welder, and it’s hot out there. That can get done tonight, in the nice cool evening, and then I will be ready to find a heliarch welder (which means they use helium instead of oxyacetaline…I wonder if this will change my bike’s engine tone to squeaky :-P)

With a bit of luck this part of the adventure should be done with tomorrow, allowing time to wheel the bikes out of the park so it can be re-asphalted on Thursday.

It’s still hot, hard work–fiddly, and annoying. But it does, I admit, afford a small shiver of satisfaction that I now for sure know how to change my own oil, take my side covers off, and do basic maintenance.