Thumper Club Forum
Club House => Chatter => Topic started by: guest7 on May 14, 2007, 08:23:39 AM
-
Saturday morning saw me finishing off a job in a place called Cregiau (pron. cry-gah) some miles from home, reached via one of Pat's commuting routes, the excellent Llantrisant road.
I had dragged the black sidecar out of retirement the day before and this was its first run on a bendy fast road. How the hell did I ever ride an outfit with tele forks? The GB outfit has spoilt me and going back to the XBR was a shock. It's focused my mind on getting my second set of links sorted I can tell you.
I thought I'd call on Pat after finishing the job, but he wasn't in. However as I left his road I spied a familiar Comstar wheel on a drive. There then followed a very interesting half hour chatting to a biker who told me he was selling his XBR (see separate post).
I got home and parked up the outfit and there it stayed for the rest of the weekend. I managed to get out to the pub last night with Jethro, Julian and Rob and yes, I am typing this with a hangover.
Toodlepip
GC
-
Spend Friday with wife packing for her trip and her going on and on about whether to buy a digital camera and then on and on about whether she bought the right one.
Saturday AM was final packing and then driving her to Port Talbot for to catch the Heathrow bus - Oh she is off to Kyrgyzstan for two weeks - I am on domestic duties.
PM Generally settling the boys in and getting the house into some semblance of order.
Sunday - Same as Saturday except less driving
I think the bikes are still there in the shed.
Steffan
-
Steffan - could have dropped in for a coffee - just outside PT - mind...
Knackered - Jen was away Wed night so I had the boys to myself. Would have been fine if the ME had gone for the couple of days. Sat Dad came down to stay - kinda weird he cleared off for 30 years and we are still seeing if the relationship works - cannot really see him as my dad - just the bloke who gave me a Y chromosome. Big sis and neice came over too - first time Neice has met her grandad - she is 19. Ususal madness of gym, swimming, ballet etc for No1 on Sunday morning.
Oh - the old man brough one of my ebay purchases with him - a TZR250 2 MA frame, cost me all of 99p, now I can have a good look at the frame without needing to get the engine etc oout - and make sure I have made all the platres brackets etc I need before sending it off to the welders.
R
-
Your wheel is done btw Rog. The bad news is the bill, it's £39.01 more than your new frame.
I thought of using some tactic to soften the blow, but I couldn't think of anything clever.
Get a work list to me and I will aim to be over at yours later this week, I can bring the wheel then.
Cheers
GC
p.s. did you get the email I sent the other day?
-
No bikey stuff this weekend (well, not of the engined kind anyway). Picked the Missus up from Gatwick after her "girlie" week in Lloret del Mar in the early hours of Sunday morning. But I did manage to ring Colin Hilliard to check up on his progress after his accident while working abroad. It appears he is going to suffer with a limp for the rest of his life and may have to sell his BMW 1150 GS for something more manageable such as a F650 Dakar (not a bad choice) He is hoping to make the Annual Rally in July but is playing it by ear at the moment.
-
Weekend report: Work :(
Best wishes to big Colin though, very sorry t hear about his accident. Hopefully will meet up at the annual rally!
-
Oh - the old man brough one of my ebay purchases with him - a TZR250 2 MA frame, cost me all of 99p, now I can have a good look at the frame without needing to get the engine etc oout - and make sure I have made all the platres brackets etc I need before sending it off to the welders.
R
Thanks for the offer, I'll remember that next time.
Speaking of TZRs I don't suppose anyone has a 3.5 or 4 inch rear wheel they might be interested in parting with??
Steffan
-
Just sold a TZR rear...
take it you are looking for 17"
R
-
GC - yup got your email - just been fighting the monster and having parent to stay so not been up to much. Jen is in late toinight but I will try to get it done.
£40 for the wheel - OK. About double what I was hoping and half what I expected - so just about right then.
R
-
Apart from finishing the dismantling of Abigails engine, nowt bikey done here either :-(
Sorry to have missed you GC, and to think I'd only gone for a walk cos I was bored around the house (sigh!) Good long walk though :-)
Sunday spent taking my boys to visit Gramma in Chepstow, whilst Lynd did collegy things.
BTW Abigails casings are at Ultrawave getting sonically washed today. The crud is proving stubborn to remove, but progress is being made and they think all should be finished tomorrow. Reported results are 'as new' but I'll wait till I see it for myself. If they are that good, this will prove an excellent method of cleaning up bike casings. No grit or glass bead to foul oil ways and as it's only a solution at work, none of the bearings have had to be removed. Also even unseen places get the sonic treatment, if the fluid gets there, it gets cleaned, including inside and around bearings and oilways. Will report back :-)
-
Went to a Rally on the Big4 run by the Ruffins MCC about 25miles south of Ludlow had an excellent meal at the pub and several pints of beer whilst talking to people a good do, except that early Sunday morning there was drunken woman F,ing and blinding for sometime very loudly.
Sunday got up it started to rain and I headed back to Ludlow For The Marches Transport Festival it rained heavily allday and spoiled the event somewhat, the Norton started third kick after being in the pooring rain allday and I got home somewhat wet.
-
I am covered in glory! I have SO many brownie points I may offer some for auction on Ebay! I finally finished the metal gazebo that her indoors has been waiting for since the beginning of the year...and she LOVES it! then just to make sure i had TWO halo's, on sunday i spent all day (well, it was peeing down here, so no great loss) wallpapering the mother-out-laws bedrooms....and finished off the weekend doing a bit of painting at home...I am just too bl00dy perfect in everyone's eyes!!
I should have booked the full 2 weeks at the TT, i'd still have points to spare!!
pip pip
-
Ugh, another weekend wasted on non bike things... Sat am, frame with french log book turns up for xl125 (cheaper than buying a type approval certificate!) but turns out to have arrived with no paperwork + a missing engine mount + no lockstops. Good to see french ebay bike breakers are every bit as big ripoff merchants as english ones eh? We had driven the breakers in the week to collect, and the paperwork wasnt there, and they wouldnt let me take the frame, insisting it had to be sent. Possibly to avoid giving me the oppertunity to strangle the person trying to palm off that pile of crap as good condition.
Probally will end up slicing the mounts off the original frame and welding them to new if paperwork makes its entrance.
Then it was a trip out to the shops, which is a hour each way alone and an extended wander round places trying to find mrs f a birthday present (which she boiled down to a popcorn machine or a candyfloss maker) but she balked at prices, had a meal where 3yo son did not decorate anyone else with food and was generally behaved (shock) , bought nothing. Came home and mrs f goes on tinterweb and buys both for less than half the cost of one alone in big shops, yes I could have screamed as Id suggested that friday without spending a precious weekend day like that...
Sunday a server that hosts a bike site that I help run lost one of its hard discs and I had to spend morning and early afternoon persuading it to come back up cleanly and restoring stuff from backups, then tidied garden of concrete posts and other stuff. Decided to start converting our bread oven into a storage shed (breezeblock with a cast concrete roof, that should ok if we have a nuclear disaster) by theraputically smashing the shelves and bread oven bit out the interior using a sledgehammer, and opening the hole up big enough to make a doorway in with same blunt instrument. Realized shed is fine if you are a 4ft dwarf (im 6'3) so now must devise a cunning plan to lift concrete roof two breezeblock courses without cracking it using tiny acro's and a scaffboard. Or just leave it and watch my head and declare it the garden tools shed or something and build something bigger later on...
All of this is because centre shed has become corrupted with non bike stuff, and I need to evict the diesel steam cleaner and concrete mixer out of there. We wont talk about the mower that ive been stepping over in the workshop entrance, which when It gets too much in the way I put in the middle of the garden till mrs f complains too much...
Relaxing evening sunday spent on net, resulted in ebay visit and eventual aquisition of a original xt500 rear guard, but at 40 quid in the end. Made me wince that price but I do think itll finish the rear end nicely..
-
Heavy rain on Saturday with stiff NE wind from the Balkans etc. Stove in the workshop going well and refurbishing 'The Minx' paintwork. Typical late '70's Italian stuff. Blow job, textured finish, metal worm patterns on the underlying metal. Clean back, phosphate, 'Bondaprime', start flatting.
Sunday better day but still overcast and cold wind from NE. Full thermals, leathers and 1 piece oversuit, balaclava etc. for run over part of the proposed Rolling Rally route. Steady away, no heroics, surface a bit broken but no tar spraying and scattering of chips to date! Radar gun in expected position! Osprey with large trout slung in the undercarriage, keeping station at 45mph over a loch alongside the road for 30 seconds. Marvellous! You could be lucky. Further east, towards home, and had a touch of drizzle just to make the surface 'interesting'!
Arrived and Kat had the workshop stove on and cocoa ready. Spot on.
Kat had been out on her own run and on the outskirts of Perth had been behind a large dark blue car which behaved erraticaly for 800m, then tentatively indicated left on approaching a lay-bye, havered and then at the last minute dived for the end of the lay-bye, stopped and appeared to have 'Razzer' blue lights in the back window. My dear wife thought the whole thing was poor driving by some dithering incompetant, but refrained from giving the driver 'The Viccies'! Nearing home 2 miles further on, the large blue car appeared to be behind at a distance, as she turned into our drive.
After getting off the 'Boy Bros' and removing her gloves and helmet, Kat was aware the large blue car and two traffic cops were in the drive!
"You are aware that we are conducting an intensive road safety campaign towards motorcyclists?" "No."
"We tried to stop you in the lay-bye". "Oh! I just thought you were driving badly, dithering about and held back until you made your manouvre. Your blue lights in the back window look like those things 'Razzers' fit when 'customising' cars"
"Oh! We're pleased you didn't recognise us and we are now going to check you have a valid tax disc, MoT, and insurance, no loud exhaust, a legal size number plate and sufficient tyre tread depth". "Carry on, Officer".
" All seems in order. That's an unusual sports bike you have. powerful?" "No, 400cc, 33bhp, called a Honda Bros".
"Oh! Bye".
You are warned, please be aware of large dark blue cars with little blue LED's in the back window, there isn't a 'BOOM BOX' inside! Some of the foregoing conversation is paraphrased and should not be taken verbatum or any admission by either party to any act, which might be construed as contravening or likely to have contravened............
C U next month, all being well, Bill.
-
Just sold a TZR rear...
take it you are looking for 17"
R
Shame!! Indeed, as I said a 3.5 or preferrably a 4.00. It is part of an ongoing crypto-project that I tell myself I am not doing. Let's call it stage 2 or maybe 3 of the Skorpion perfection scheme.
Cheers
Steffan
-
Damn that ebay bought another thumper (Pegaso 650) downside is I have to sell the xbr & the xr400 to make room for it
-
No bikey stuff this weekend (well, not of the engined kind anyway). Picked the Missus up from Gatwick after her "girlie" week in Lloret del Mar in the early hours of Sunday morning. But I did manage to ring Colin Hilliard to check up on his progress after his accident while working abroad. It appears he is going to suffer with a limp for the rest of his life and may have to sell his BMW 1150 GS for something more manageable such as a F650 Dakar (not a bad choice) He is hoping to make the Annual Rally in July but is playing it by ear at the moment.
Thanks Bill and Smudge for your wishes. I will try and make the Rally because it is always great to catch up with you guys. I have booked the time off work so I will see how things go. One thing I have noticed over the past 9 months of not riding very far is how unfit you get riding the bike. All I can manage at the moment is about 25 miles before problems with my left ankle start and that won’t get me to Bristol. So I will try and build up the mileage over the next 2 months in preparation for the trip to Dent.
Dam that BMW gearbox it’s so agricultural
Best Regards
Colin
-
Dear 'The Kaiser',
This is not intended to lead to ridicule or be patronising, BUT!
Have you considered a Burgman etc? I have spoken with several ex-sports bike riders who for arthritic, hip replacement or crash damage reasons been unable to endure or ride any other form of motorcycle. They are now able, thanks to the FF large scoot, go out with their friends and indeed humble some of these friends with the twist and go.
Just a thought and I hope you continue to mend.
Cheers, Bill
-
I know I would be in serious trouble if I had a 400 Burgervan !
Bloody quick,and handle well in all weathers.
Great for the Traffic Light GP.
Jethro
-
Can't seem to get my head around loud exhaust and small number plate being a safety aspect, there is a case for loud exhausts being safer as peeps less likely to miss you. Certainly on the ball with bike recognition, is it likely, to them all non scooters are recklessly fast sports bikes?
Paul
-
Dear 'The Kaiser',
This is not intended to lead to ridicule or be patronising, BUT!
Have you considered a Burgman etc? I have spoken with several ex-sports bike riders who for arthritic, hip replacement or crash damage reasons been unable to endure or ride any other form of motorcycle. They are now able, thanks to the FF large scoot, go out with their friends and indeed humble some of these friends with the twist and go.
Just a thought and I hope you continue to mend.
Cheers, Bill
Hi Bill,
Thanks for the suggestion of a super scooter I must admit I had not considered them. I have read that they have a good reputation among their riders but I’m not sure one would fit the bill for me.
People like Jethro, who I have known since the club started no I like to travel to rallies with all mod cons and the kitchen sink in tow so I would have a space problem. But if needs must in the future I may need to scale down my extravagant life style and camp like all the rest.
As I have already said I will start to increase my mileage on the bike and see what goes. But thanks anyway for your suggestion.
Best Regards
Colin
-
Here you go Colin:- eBay item no. 250114888698
That should carry most of your kit and leave room for loads of Jail Ale carry-outs!
-
Is it me Bill, or has the scooter numpy got the decimal point in the wrong place?
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=250114888698&ru=http%3A%2F%2Fsearch.ebay.co.uk%3A80%2Fsearch%2Fsearch.dll%3Fcgiurl%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fcgi.ebay.co.uk%252Fws%252F%26fkr%3D1%26from%3DR8%26satitle%3D250114888698%26category0%3D%26fvi%3D1
BB
PS This might sound like a difficult crossword clue if you haven't read the previous post.
-
If he wants a £100 deposit the decimal point is in the right place. In the trade, NFN, if he thinks he can get 700 as a start bid.
ps I don't mean to offend our Norfolk members.
-
Me thinks the man is serious about the £700-00 start price for a D10 Watsonian.
Here is the price straight from the Watsonian website tonight [16-5-2007]: D10 trailer - £1,044
Buy a lot of motorcycle/superscoot with that!
Regards, Bill
-
However he is selling it for a friend - thou it has been used on his scooter....
R
-
However he is selling it for a friend - thou it has been used on his scooter....
R
And when you look at the auction for "his" scooter, he is also "selling it for a friend" - dodgy or what? I wouldn't touch a Vespa anyway, but especially not that one....
-
Here you go Colin:- eBay item no. 250114888698
That should carry most of your kit and leave room for loads of Jail Ale carry-outs!
Hello Mr William Shipley Rutter,
That was a good try but I’m not taking the bate me old mate, I think its DEER WHISTLES at dawn for you Billy Boy at Dent.
I shell come armed with some incriminating photos of past Thumper Club Rallies.
Best Regards
The Mandarin Marauder
-
Oh dear.............