definition of sweet

I love to hear stories like this, I felt great passing litre bikes on
my ZX-6R you must've been in hysterics doing it on a 250.

That's excellent, my mate going nuts (taking way too many risks) on
his RGV250 couldn't beat 2:20 or something, but it was in real bad
shape.
I was in the medium group and it seemed a lot of riders were sitting
on 2:03, I really wanted to go faster but didn't have the confidence
to pass. I finaly did work my way to the front, got over excited and
treated the marshalls to a display of white hot magnesium fire.

That sounds pretty expensive.
My suspension was definatly the weak link on my bike[1]. It was doing
all sorts of nasty stuff in response to my mistakes. I had it all
done over by Promecha with 'gold' valves and new fork springs. It
cost a lot less than $1000 but I think that may be because the 6R has
a very good base to build on and all the internals are easily swapped
out for better ones.
The difference was pretty remarkable.

I'm doing Superbike School level one at Broadford on the 20th so I'm
pretty keen to see how it goes.

[1] not including me of course

 

Penny just dropped... actually, two pennies...

Penny 1.) both you and Jorgen must've been quoted for ride-in-ride-out work,
ie. having the suspension place pull the forks and shock out and put them
back in once they were done, as opposed to you doing it in your garage and
leaving the bike hovering above the ground on its sidestand and a pile of
phonebooks under the sump for a day or two. There's three hours of extra
labour right there.

Penny 2.) Gold Valves come in two flavours; rebound and compression, and,
depending on the bike being done, suspension places will replace either just
the compression ones or both, so there's the possibility of another
$120-$130...

Moral of the story, do the dis/assembly yourself, save enough money to pay
for a couple of trackdays at which to enjoy your new suspension...

 

time* !

Last time I pulled a set of forks out of a bike, it was 11:30pm... you're
not getting paid when you're sitting on the couch at night after work...

Can you see how, coming from you, such a comment might just bring a wry
smile to the face of a grad student with an after-hours part-time job?

 

Hell I spent most of my last track day on the KR1 ( 250) dicing with a Guzzi
1100 of circa 80s vintage setup as a track bike. Nothing really to brag about -
the power to weight is about the same (he's got a lot more torque, KR1 weighs
half as much, but has only 2/3rds the HP etc), was fun, although he got a bit
pouty when I finally overtook and he nearly blew a corner trying to get back
around

Tight corners are better suited to lighter bikes, have a look at the times of
the 250 GPs vs the 1litre MotoGP bikes - there's not as much in it as you would
expect on most tracks - sure the 1 litre bikes scream down the straights, but
the overall laptimes don't differ by as much as the additional 100odd hp (ie
double) would suggest at first glance

JL

 

...snip

Ahh yes but time is money as well, some of us don't have an abundance of time* !

JL
* and some of us have neither an abundance of time NOR money :-(

 

Last time I did work at midnight I fitted an aftermarket muffler to a Bandit,
and failed to notice that the bolt I'd removed was badly corroded and hence
snapped off when I put it back, requiring drilling out and helicoiling - I swore
not to do maintenance tasks at midnight after that

Errm yeah OK, point taken.

Can I rephrase as "have made a number of lifestyle decisions which have caused
my disposable income to be probably indistinguishable from yours ?"

My postgrad degree is 45K (and rising every semester) alone......

JL
(if I could flog some cages I'd have some money again - anyone want a car ?)

 

John Littler wrote
~

<<<<<---- aus.cars is over there John!
(But this is where you come back afterwards and brag about selling it!)
Clem

 

?)

Aus.cages ---->>>> that way

 

Yeah thanks guys, unfortunately none of those guys evinced the slightest
interest :-(

JL

 

Gary Woodman wrote in message ...

Yeah OK; you (and Johnnie5) win!
I've visited there a few times recently and they're waaaay to the right of
us!
Clem

 

John Littler wrote:

<snip>

- anyone want a car ?)

Thanks, John, but no thanks.

regards,
CrazyCam

 

I thought I was "Right" but I was mistaken (aus.cars = redneck fools).

Boxer

 

aus.cars is over that way ===>

Doodle is wrong again

Gary

 

Gave them up for Lent hey ?

JL
(you're obviously not THAT crazy

 

Aye, Lent about 15 years ago now.

Oh, I dunno..... ;-)

regards,
CrazyCam

 

[...]

And might I add 'knowledge'?

I'm a complete whimp when it comes to anything mechanical, as long as it's
not encased by a Lian Li... I wouldn't have the first clue about what to do
with the stuff. So I leave it to the professionals - and I'm quit happy to
pay for that. Conversely my computer programming skills do pay well enough
so I guess there's some balance to it.

I'm interested in hearing about my alternatives. I'll be hunting for the
1:59s next time I go whether I try not to .. or not, so I better get the
suspension fixed [probably won't get better half approval for a complete
upgrade yet ] before doing so or I could end up in a world of hurt. I
believe the dude's exact words were "my _pushbike_'s got better suspension
than that".

Cheers,
j

 

Yep. I feel like I'm a high still, and it's been two days already - in fact
it's just getting better, now that I'm finally picking myself up from the
heat exposure. I can just sit down, close my eyes and play it over and over
again in my mind. Gotta watch myself, or I'll turn into a complete nerd who
can't think nor speak of anything else

Another fav moment was being behind a group of _three_ high powered bikes,
catching up with them before Honda, one in that corner, one in Siberia then
the last one on top of Lukey heights. That was another moment of "awesome".
I'm grinning right now just thinking about it.

I think the best thing about doing a suspension rebuild would be to go back
and do the same again, even harder than last time, and maybe come closer to
the 2:00s, consistently. However if I pit myself in the medium group and
ride with others who ride with approximately the same "% usage of bike" as I
then there's no way I'll be able to keep up. It could be fun trying though.

If I could afford something bigger like an R6 or a GSXR600 I'd go for it in
an instant but I really don't wanna do any more loans atm - with a car loan
already for the next 2-3 years it will have to be cash.

Smoothness is the key I found. And good tyres When I was down about a
month ago I tried to really concentrate on the throttle control, and it paid
off on Tuesday - it just seemed heaps easier. Also gone was the feeling of
fright when touching pegs. Carrying higher speeds into the corners, a
reasonably quick turn to the right angle and then trying to be smooth about
throttle control straight away and trusting the bike to carry itself was the
thing.

At one stage I got the feeling I wouldn't make the end of the Honda corner.
Track was very hot at that time, felt things start to slide a bit etc, I was
touching both peg and knee, my line wasn't the best and I think I forgot the
main law of looking into the turn so I lost confidence - only time it
happened over the day.

I wasn't gonna chop any throttle nor hit brakes, so I just stood the bike up
and then rolled off throttle a bit, then on the grass did a very gentle turn
back onto the track. Having ridden pushbikes in the Oslo winters has tought
me a few good things about low friction traction, obviously - the bike
didn't even slide a little bit, once. (And a good thing that was too).

Was that on the same day? What part of your bike is in magnesium, might I
ask? Hope it was the footpegs?? (None of mine is).

Cool. The internals of mine are probably quite worthless, so they'll be
changing pretty much everything in it I'd say - what's there is worth SFA,
that could explain the higher quote. I'm trying to imagine what it would do
for the feeling of the bike, maybe I'll do it and take my time saving up to
the "dream bike" which is a 2003 or 2004 R6 rather than a 2nd hand one.

Awesome! I want to do level one again having already done L1 and L2. Steve
reckons it's a good thing to do, gives a different perspective breaking it
down to the basics again. I'd be wanting to join you for sure had I not used
up my quota with the better half already wrt course costs. Doing a high
performance driving course on Sandown with Jim Murcott on 7/2 too, that's
already booked.

Hope to catch up with you on a ride day some day

Cheers,
Jørgen

 

Moral of the story, do the dis/assembly yourself, save enough money to pay

Not all of us have even remotely the amount of spare time on our hands that
you must have.

 

~
Errrm; just keep a bit cool... that track can bite (like ANY track) and
adreniline is the atom that seeks to attach itself to the ****-up molecule!
[Err sorry; I was channeling Intact Kneeslider there].
But trust me; an overestimation on the road can hurt but on the track
things happen a whole lot faster!!
Clem
(Ask me why I limp!)

 

[...]

Good points! Thanks. I'll limit my riding until I've gotten the suspension
looked into, now that I know what I know about my weight and its current
capabilities in regard to that weight. Probably a good thing.

Why do you limp?

(On or off track?)


Cheers,
Jørgen