Winter Hack
What what what.
My last post to have the blue banner of information said that I was in a so-so mood, had done 24486.3 miles on my GSR and…go to yamyambiker.com.
Since then, as you can see with my new blue banner of information, I have increased in mood by 3 bars, I have covered 2619 more miles on my GSR and you’ve still to go to yamyambiker.com.
So what’s the chat? What have I been doing that’s so damn interesting to keep me from my YamYam duties. Well as you know, I sometimes go for ages and then end up writing a long assed post, so perhaps this might be one of those moments. I’ll start from where I left it…that is I had just reviewed my current jacket (Wolf Titanium if you ask), I had been told I would be better suited to a scooter because I couldn’t handle my Kwak ER-6n and I was off to Tenerife. Not before emailing West Coast Harley about their current Buell stock, a small yamyam probe to see what the deal was (deal…get it?)
Well I got back from a spectacular 2 weeks of sunshine, sleeping, eating (a lot) and bobbing in an extremely cold pool. Like a true Scotsman, I sucked it up and I was in there pretty much every day, floating like a fleshy coloured iceberg, whilst others sat shivering on their sunbeds. I didn’t care. I wasn’t thinking about work, I wasn’t thinking about the thousands of troubled thoughts that plagued my mind on a daily basis. For 2 weeks (well, 1.3 really) I was awol from my mind, from my life back in Scotland and all that was really to do was decide what to eat (crisps or bread), what to wear (usually just shorts…easy ladies, and a t-shirt) and what to do; float or read…or watch a film…or go for a walk.
We arrived back in Scotland to an extremely cold, windy, wet Saturday morning, having had our plane delayed a wee bit. I sat on my couch at 6am deliberating whether or not to go to bed or just ride it out and see how far I made it. I went to bed.
It was great being back really. I love Scotland and no matter how many Hunters Chicken I ate (a delicious meal prepared by someone other than me in a restaurant filled with alcohol and sunshine), it’s still no match for the stiff, crisp Scottish air. Refreshing some might say.
Before heading away on holiday I had realigned my broadband duties from Virgin to O2, because I found Virgin’s internet to be slow in the evenings, slow enough that I had to buffer some films from Sky Player a few times.
What a mistake that was. From the get-go O2 were dismal, utterly dismal. Think along the lines of trying to open a YouTube video, only to have someone actually come out of your screen and scream “Who do you think you are!?” at you for even trying. I couldn’t load any videos, surfing was a task and I was totally fed up. However I had a 30 day “Happiness Guaranteed” period where I could opt out and nothing would be said of it. I gave it a little while as I was promised that the service would start to pick up shortly because of some maintenance they were doing to the lines or something.
Well guess who got their math wrong? ME. I got back from Tenerife thinking I had a good week left of my 30 days, only to find that I was actually, from Saturday of my arrival onward, 1 day in to my contract. The service was no better by the way, still as crap as always. I should have been getting 8mg. I was getting 0.3mg.
So with no time to lose, I called them up and got my MAC code, then requested my account be cancelled to be told that I am now “within contract period and it’ll cost £160 to get out of it.” After much argumenting and deliberating from O2 I got out of my shockingly bad contract and luckily I was able to go to a more safe bet, BT. Now that I have, my internet is ace, I can watch films, watch YouTube and I’ve even updated www.gordon-fraser.com to celebrate.
But all this has taken it’s toll on my time available to post here, that and just getting on with riding my bike every day with pretty much no incident.
Since getting back the weather has steadily decreased to the point of no-feely-handies. So I decided that it was time to forget looking swish, and buy some hand guards for my Gisser. I did buy them (£38) and fitted them with Dad with a little trademark Fraser persuasion.
What a difference, my hands are now wind free and really a lot warmer. Then the weather got to the point that in the morning my bars would be iced up, so really even though my hand guards were preventing wind and rain from chilling my fingers, I was still holding on to a frozen piece of metal, so my hands still got numb. The ride home however is a different story and I am ever so thankful I took the plunge and fitted them. I also re-fitted my screen unit and it’s keeping a lot of the rain and draught off me so that’s ace. The only problem is the increase in ease of speeding. I am always so used to having the drag on my body that the position I sit at naturally on the throttle is causing me to cruise faster with the aerodynamic advantage of the fairing. It has been a few times I have glanced down to see that I am not sticking to the speed limit without knowing it. ANYWAY.
Hand guards were from a V-Strom 650, for all you like minded GSR riders, and can be picked up from your local Suzuki dealership.
I mentioned the email to Buell Glasgow.
Well I sent a wee informal “Now that Buell is going south, what deals you got?” email to them and I’m not exaggerating here, 8-9 calls later they are still trying to get me in to have a chat. I’ve decided to forget going for a new Buell because I spoke to Stuart @ Jacksons Bikes about it and he said that because of the miles I do, I could quickly find myself in a position that I need a part and they can’t supply it. Say if the engine management computer packed in, and I couldn’t get a replacement, that’s my bike written off, even if the rest is in mint condition. So aye, even though I LOVE LOVE LOVE Buells, I just can’t justify it really. I’ll stick with the pain in the arse and rusty boy until it packs in (it’s been a while so touch wood nothing will happen…)
So that’s really where we are at. It’s a week until christmas, Blair is soon to be a Daddy (it could hit off anytime now) and work is busy as feck.
In a week there could be a small, brand new Fraser in this world. After a year of utter SHITE, I am desperately holding on to the hope that it’ll end well. I am hoping.
2010 is a new year. It’s a fresh start. One things for sure, it really couldn’t get any worse than what 2009 was. If it does, there’ll be bigger problems than my hands getting cold, or BT internet. 2010 could be the greatest year of everyones lives, purely for the fact that we had one of the worst years just before it. I hope for all our sakes it will be.
AHHHHHHHHH
It’s definitely time to draw a line under this post. Word count is 1308 as of this word HERE.
—————————————————————————————————————-
Go check out my home website WWW.GORDON-FRASER.COM and feedback me.
All the best for the remaining 2009. I will speak before the bells.
Thanks for visiting all,
GORDON!
One serviced GSR
Evening all,
Saturday saw my baby go for it’s first service. 9 a.m sharp at the Garage.
My brother’s GSR was also due for a service and we were both booked in at garage, however I was 9, brother was 12.30. Blair was told that if he came early with me his bike could possibly get sneaked in as well. So I was up 8am and ready to go by 20 past.
Blair arrived and announced that he had forgot his service history booklet…so had to go for that first. I said I coulnd’t as I needed to be there 9 sharp, so I would just meet him there.
9:35 he turned up, but I didn’t care because I was sat outside staring at the garages B-King, with a new set of 2 bros exhausts. Beefcake.
This is Blair arriving for a 9am service at 9:35…
After we booked the 2 GSR’s in, we were both given courtesy bikes, which went something like this:
2 pretty old SV650′s, which is funny because Blair was set on getting on of those as his first bike. I really didn’t like them but B was insistent that it was a good deal because it looked cool and was cheap.
He changed his mind when he had the hire bike. Hate isn’t strong enough a word. But I was enjoying the twin again, even after a short time away from the ER-6. However I also thought for the first time since October last year, I can’t wait to get back on my bike.
The sound was good, the power was nice but the whole experience reminded me of the ER6, and I think I have got to the stem of the problem I had with the Kawasaki.
The SV had a 160 rear section, with the same brand and model of tyres I had on the ER, and I felt totally unstable. B felt the exact same way, affraid to lean it over because it felt so vague. Perhaps had I attempted another brand or even model of tyre, I would have had some confidence in the ER6. But then I remember the wierd steering and thin-ness of the Er6 and I am still totally solid in my decision to get rid of it. I am much happier now.
So there you go, another weekend away! It has felt a long weekend, I have been up early both days, today I was up early again to clean my bike tip to toe. It was quite dirty but I got it back to spankers again. The paddock stand forks I got for the stand last week are great, but they marked my swingarm…so I’ve taped the stand forks up with insulating tape which will hopefully stop them ripping the paint off the swingarm.
I’m off,
Thanks for reading folks!
Gordon
Repair Bills and Suzuki
Goodevening all.
This weekend was a mixture of good and bad. But lets be positive and start off on the good.
Got the ER6 back on Friday, one of the windiest days so far this year. It was looking ace in the dark, really shiny and it was cleaned quite well. Got all my still dirty gear on and headed home from the Garage. It was a weird feeling riding for the first time after the accident. But moreover it wasn’t a secure feeling on the ER6. Really twitchy.
The repair bill was quite reasonable. The parts list was as follows:
-
Gear Lever £25.98
-
Generator Cover and Gasket £52.62
-
L/H Front Indicator £23.67
-
Front Brake Lever £25.45
-
Rear Brake Lever £20.30
-
R/H Footpeg and bank sensor £46.62
-
Clutch Lever £7.67
So there you go.
On Saturday I went to the Suzuki garage and started arranging the GSR. I chatted away with the guy about it all and gave some details, £200 holding fee which they refund me in a weeks time….silly, and some details about the ER6, at which point he asked what the condition was of it. I said that it was good condition and that it was a test ride bike so has marks on the footpeg hangers. There is also a crack on the fairing. At this point he took interest and asked what sort of crack etc. And eventually he said well we need to do a workshop check before agreeing on the price for the ER6. He wants it in showroom condition so may need to order some parts in. Ok I said and off we went, agreeing that Saturday was the time to do it all.
When I arrived home i went out to the ER6 and took the front fairing off to inspect in in the kitchen and it was scraped to buggery. If he sees this he’s going to know that it was dropped etc so I need to replace it.
So I will call the Garage tomorrow and get one ordered as I dont really want to go in Saturday and they say “ooo it’ll cost you £200 for a new one so we’ll take that off the part exchange price..” when it actually would have cost me £50. At least it gives me proof of them trying to pull my pants over my head. But it’s all depending on what the boys at Suzuki deem to be “Showroom Condition.”
We’ll just have to wait and see. Me and Em went out for a 2 hour ride today and I put the helmet cam on her this time. Which shows a really smart angle. I’ll convert it tomorrow and post it up to let you see. However the lens gets dirty again. I am starting to think that this camera will only be really good in the complete dry weather. But it was a good ride out and already my confidence has came back.
I also got my quote through from Express Insurance, with £395 as the official quote.
So yeah, I’ll keep you posted on what happens with Suzuki.
Thanks for looking folks,
Gordon
Post Crash Video – Snow blues
Hello everyone.
I took my helmet cam to my very first day back at work, which also happened to be the icy/snowiest day. Instead of being sensible and getting the bus in, I decided to be an idiot and go on the bike..but I got there in the end. Shame the very next day I would be flying through the air…
Here it is:
Pretty cool except the rain getting on the lense of the camera. But it did show some cool effects as I got to the bridge! Psychadelic…if that’s how you spell it…
I will hopefully be heading to Suzuki this weekend to trade in the ER6 for a silver GSR600, brand spanking and the final bike I will own for a while.
I am still to confirm some stuff, but it looks like I will only get £1900 trade in for the ER6, because the garage “doesn’t sell many” which I think is crap. But there you go.
I will get the 0% finance dealio, as well as the Alpha Dot, 12 months road tax, 12 months AA cover, first service free, courtesy bike when in for a service and I have asked for a deal on crash mushrooms….hahaha
So aye, I am looking forward to it for sure!
I’ll update you before the weekend to let you know if I will have my first new bike of 2008! HAHAHA.
Thanks for stopping folks,
Gordon
p.s. The music in the video is Biffy Clyro, Wave Upon Wave from the Infinity Land album…it was on at the time so that is why i used it. Plus the microphone that I got with the camera was crap, so all you heard was a really distorted voice and wind noise. Sorry bout that. The intercom that I am looking at will hopefully have an OUT socket for connecting up an audio feed. More on that later.
Last Chance Cafe & Crash update
Hello all,
Firstly the quote for damage to my bike has came in.
After I dropped my bike off etc I gave Stuart a call back the next day and we chatted about what to do. The options were that he orders some of the parts and he plastic welds and paints the fairings, or just orders all the parts except the fairings and tries to make them look as un-broken as possible.
So the option two was better because 1: it was £200 cheaper and 2: Stuart is a wizard and I’m sure he can make it look presentable.
The parts list was a new front brake lever, a new right hand peg, a new engine casing, new rear brake lever and a new gear shifter. This all comes to £212, with labour etc totalling it at £284.
I was a bit surprised as I got a quote for the peg and lever at Edinburgh Kawasaki and it was £60 for the peg and £30 for the lever. Which means that for £122 I am getting the engine casing, rear brake lever and gear shifter…I got a new rear brake lever for the MT-03 and it cost me £15, so say another £15-£20 for the gear shifter and it leaves £92 for the engine casing. It is a cast lump but £92 for f*ck sake. OEM parts eh…
So yeah it’s all good on that front, I was expecting at least £400 of work, but I suppose the fairing would cost a bit anyway.
Bike should be ready to go this week some time. I can’t wait because it means I will be moving on for the final time. And this time I have to get the right bike.
I was looking at the Z750 before and I was totally dead set. I had read the reviews online and they all pointed to a nice bike. But then I read my BIKE magazine, which I respect 100% and they said the Z was completely crap, bottom of the table in a shootout with a Street Triple, Hornet, Fazer and a GSR600.
They said the forks were crap, the power was pretty gutless, the handling was good but the whole experience was disconcerting and very uncomfortable. I was really disappointed. Then I read the reviews for the other bikes and although the Street Triple didn’t really come out top in anything tables wise, it was their pick of the bunch. Fair enough, but they forgot to mention the ludicrous pillion pegs. This was a one person bike from the off, which was also disappointing.
The I looked at the Fazer, which had a pretty duff write up as well. But it was closely matched to the GSR600. Which my brother has.
Upon reading the review the GSR was left in pretty good light, with great power, great handling and great looks, but fell on tank size and snatchy throttle issue.
It left me thinking…What do I want from a bike?
I want:
• Comfortable
• Fast
• Stability
• 180 rear section
• Comfy 2 up riding
• Good dials
• Good lights
• Nice posture
• Quality build.
The GSR has pretty much all of those, with exception to the tank range, which tops at 140 miles by BIKE standards, which is what I am getting with the ER6 at the minute so no change there.
I would have had a GSR off the bat had the throttle issue not been there. Basically when going from no throttle to introducing the throttle there is a lurch. Going from Positive throttle to rolling off the throttle, there is a negative lurch. This not only is annoying but it unsettles the bike mid-corner and can be quite dangerous should you forget about it.
However upon reading the GSR forum for a bit, I came across the o2 sensor eliminator fix, which you buy for £18 and it fixes the snatchy throttle. It does this because as a standard bike the GSR runs lean, to pass fuel emission regulations. This means that at low throttle openings the bike lurches about. This o2 eliminator tricks the bikes ECU in to running rich, which removes the lurchyness.
If this works, then I think the GSR would be a great bike.
But with all this said, I have to remember one thing: This will be the very last chance to get it right. I have had 3 bikes in a year and I can’t go on like this. So I think I will go for the GSR, which will make me have the same bike as my brother but I like the looks, it sounds amazing and has everything going for it. But should this O2 Eliminator not work, I could have to put up with it for at least 3 years. Anyway, I am just glad the ER6 is going, because it’s unsafe.
Sorry for the long post folks!
Thanks for looking again,
Gordon
YamYam Motorcycle Accident #2
Hello everyone.
Last night I had a pretty major accident. I made a video of the damage and explain what happened. I’ll add a diagram of it in a mo.
2nd day on the bike in 2008 and a major crash notched up already. Bring on the rest of the year…
Expensive mistake
Hello all.
Today’s ride in to work was interesting. The peg, although halved in real estate was still useable. My ankle/calf was quite sore due to the dodgy angle it was at. The brake lever, as predicted was fine, and in fact I actually thought the braking power was increased…but I dont know why.
I called up C&J Wilson and asked how much it was to replace the parts I had broke.
£51.80 for the peg!! £29.90 for the lever!! Wow, that is a lot of dough for not a lot of metal.
He did however suggest a pair of aftermarket pegs, which would give me 1 spare and that came in at £40. So for a pair of pegs its cheaper than 1 OEM Kawasaki one.
That’s where they make their money then.
I’m heading in this Saturday to pick them up. I may just get the pegs and forget about the lever as it’s not a big problem. I never used the length of the brake lever anyway!
Thanks for looking folks and please continue to do so! I appreciate all of your great comments, big or small!
Cheers
Gordon
My new bike.
Here it is in all it’s washed glory. You could eat your dinner off it.
I’m still awaiting the arrival of the drag bar, but I am going to order all my accessories this Wed….OOOO
Thanks for looking
Gordon
New bike blues, loosing the front and the missing sticker…
Well it’s gone.
My brother said it perfectly;
“Most people, when they pass their test, they get a banger. Then they get a better banger. Then they get used, then new, then dream bike…You’ve went, test, new bike, dream bike. Of course you’ve got to come down.”
As I handed over the keys to my Buell I didn’t feel anything. No sadness, no regret. I was moving on. But then upon returning home from the garage, I hit rock bottom. The ER6 is a great bike. It’s fast enough, nice riding position and good handling. But it just sucked that I had a bike that wasn’t as nice as the Buell.
Not only that, but on the way home a few irritating things appeared. The mirror has a really loud vibrating noise at any RPM. The front tyre is crap in the wet (See further down) and the bars are hopeless. But I knew all these things when I made my decision, and all of them can be overcome with some thought and money.
As seen below, I have ordered some drag bars. These should come pretty soon, if not today and I’ll post some pics tonight. The mirrors will be sorted too.
The front tyre though, is a big problem. I arrived at Em’s house and picked her up. I was on my way down in the emotions department and just wanted to get home to sulk. So off we went and Em kept saying how great the pillion seat was. I headed up the hill beside the graveyard only for the front to go light and I lost both traction in the front and the rear. It was pretty scary, but controllable. Em was like “What was that?!” and I replied, “oh nothing, just the bike losing all grip on the road…”
We then got on the motorway and headed up 15miles to our turn off of the motorway. As I headed around the slip road we hit a shiny bit of road and again, the front lost grip. Very very unsettling and not good for either of our hearts. Arriving home I had a look at the tyres and found, to my amazement, that the rear was a Bridgestone and the front was a Dunlop…Now some may disagree here, but I have always been told, never ever mix and match tyres, especially not different brands. And here I had a BT020 rear and a D202 (I can’t remember the make so I made that up…) No wonder it felt weird.
So I added the anger to my downer and started picking holes in it.
Then we had to head off and get Blair’s new bike. His brand spanking, really smart GSR600 in red. Off we went and I was extra careful due to the tyre situation and the wet leaves on the road.
Eventually we got to Cupar Motos and headed inside. Blair had talked about some Alpinestars Gore-tex gloves on sale for £59.99. I told him to shut up. Gore-tex is dear. But there they were. I think they were called Jet Roads…but I tried them on and really nice fit. Comfy, warm and snug, and most importantly, Gore-tex lining. I have Alpinestars Gore-tex boots and not once have they leaked or let me down. So I shall be picking some of those up on Saturday.
We had to hang about for a while because the guy was talking to a couple who had just bought a GSXR-1000 race replica bike…he’s going to die then….
Eventually we got seen and B did all the paper work etc. In the meantime I looked around the showroom and saw the GSR600 demonstrator that had been offered to me at £300 plus the Buell. I was thinking “why didn’t I just buy it?”
We headed outside and the guy brought Blairs bike round from the back. It looked amazing! The red was so nice in the sunlight and it was pristine condition. I left Blair with the guy talking about how to start it and sat on the ER6. It’s not that bad I thought.
It started to pour down and Blair was on brand spanking new tyres, on a brand spanking bike, on a brand spanking Licence….not good. I made sure to say take it easy and he did. We got home and everyone came out and had a look at the two bikes…
Come Saturday night I had started to emerge from my depression and started thinking about what mods I could do to my bike…
Sunday was a recovery from the Saturday night, our housewarming party a year on since first moving in! It was a great night and a good time to think about something other than the day’s events. I got up early (9ish) and started work on my bike. I wanted it looking brand new.
2 and a half hours later it was cleaned. It was really mucky, so much for it being cleaned for me picking it up, but it looked brand spanking! I was really chuffed. I also rotated the gear selector round a bit so I wasn’t trying to touch my shin with my toes and it works perfectly now.
29th October 2007
So today I headed in to work on my new bike. It was remarkably easy. The gear shifter mod was great. Flicking through the slick box was no problem and holding a steady 70-90mph was no problem. But I needed to get the front tyre issue resolved, and my insurance as I was still only covered for the Buell.
When I got to work I called up the insurance folk and I am now covered for the Kwak and they are refunding me £344!! I don’t want to think about how much the Buell actually was to insure, but my policy runs out in January 2008…so with 3 months remaining, I am covered for the new bike but have nearly 350squids refunded…hmmm
So that was good. Then I emailed C&J Wilson, the place I got my bike from and told them about the tyre issue, and also that I had noticed that only 1 side of the bike had decals on it, the other side was plain…was this because it was dropped!? Who knows…
They emailed me back saying the tyre will be replaced free of charge and a new decal has been ordered! Result!! Not only will I have matching tyres and matching sides to the bike, but I’ll have £344 to spend on getting stuff for the ER6!!! Ahhh.
Ill post up a mods list in the next post and once I get home I’ll put up some of the pics of my new bike!!
Sorry for the extremely long post!
Thanks for reading folks, and keep checking back! I am now 9th when you do a google.com search for YamYam!!! OOO
Gordon
On the bike hunt – Part 3 – Yamaha
Hello all,
Yamaha. I had one, then it melted. But despite all that, I was desperate for a FZ6.
Fast as you like, smart as you like and exactly what I wanted.
However I really had to think long and hard last night, as things have started to get a little cloudy surrounding the whole bike thing.
So what came out of it was that most people are offering me £3k for my Buell. The difference to get any new bike is £1500-£2000 and that’s just too much financially. Thus, I spent a wee while phoning around various garages that I had visited for a test ride to see what they had to offer and the outcome was not great.
For most of them I still had to fork out some money. I don’t want to, I can’t afford it, I need a direct swap. This was not a possibility for most of the garages, even for the demonstrators which had only decreased as little as £300 from new…
So I finally remembered the ER6n I test road a few weekends ago, and I wrote about it in part 1. Yes the bars are stupid and it’s not the fastest or the best looking ( I am warming to it though) but it’s cheap, fast enough, a twin (I love twins), cheap insurance and comfy for 2 up. Great. So I called back the guy from Edi-Kwak and spoke with him about a direct swap for the demonstrator which looks like:
He said yes immediately. 4k on clocks, 2005 plate, great condition, Full service history (owned by Edi-Kwak since new) and taxed. 3 months parts and labour warranty too.
I still had some thinking to do so I said “I’ve still got some thinking to do” and would call him back later. The reason was I still had some deals on the table from other garages, Yamaha, Suzuki and Kawasaki Perth. You may wonder why I have left out the biggest Japanese manufacturer here and theres a good reason for it. Honda are just too bloody expensive. £5500 for a Hornet…no thanks.
So a few of the deals were Buell+£800 would get me a brand new Kawasaki ER6n. My Buell+£300 would get me the GSR600 demonstrator, complete with Renthal bars and nose fairing….a good deal I thought.
But no no no. No more money can be spent.
So it was back to the ER6n for me. To be absolutely honest, I am relieved to be going back to Japanese. I am relieved that it is a twin, and I am relieved that it’s different from anything else on the road. So I called up and set Saturday as change over day, the day that Blair is getting his brand spankers GSR600, in Red.
In actual fact, I am really looking forward to having a bike that I don’t worship. I absolutely love the Buell, it’s my dream bike, but I was always worried that it broke or I dropped it or how much it would cost to keep. Now that the Buell is going and I’m getting a cheaper one, I can see myself starting my customising stage of biking. I will most definitely need new bars, new grips and maybe new mirrors. Then it’s seat, exhaust, clocks…you get the picture. And I shall do my best to document it all on here!
Then, after I had made the decision to go with Kawasaki, I called up Yamaha and explained the decision I had made and he suggested I go for their demonstrator I used. 100ish miles on it…he came back with Buell+£1000…instant no.
So I’m set! I will be swapping my beloved Buell XB12Ss Lightning for a Kawasaki ER6n in Galaxy Silver and red.
Plus, it’ll be the first ride in my entire biking career that I will not be riding alone.
And I can’t wait.
