A Quarter Review Of My Biking Life

The First Three Months of 2017

Hi everybody! I haven't been updating the blog often enough, but I have not forgotten about my very own blog. Like you, I have been busy with life and riding. :-)

It's not really there yet but I guess it wont hurt to make an entry summarizing my rides so far in the 1st quarter of the year.

<The Biggest Changes In My Bike Life>
Jill joins the family. Jill is made by Honda, she has a 100cc 4-stroke air cooled, carburetor and a 5 speed gear box. She has only kicker but no starter. Hell she doesn't even have a battery. I got her because I had to have her. Since the joining of Jill I have been spending quite some time with her because she is very small and easy going places.

<Going Places>
I said I wanted to visit nuclear power plants and I managed to visit one in the 1st quarter. I don't have any dislike for nuclear power - in fact I am awed by it. Don't have to tell me about the danger of nuclear power though, I live close enough to a nuclear power plant so I will be the one who dies first if anything happens, so i know what's at stake.

I have also developed a routine of going to an island nearby having picnic and also go see the japanese navy on my way home. This gives me peace of mind.

Of course the infamous Kawasaki museum as well. A must-go place.

Going to a war monument.

Ride a ferry.

There are also many other places that I have been to in the 1st quarter but I figure these are the ones worth mentioning.

<Getting My Hands Dirty>
I promised myself I will be doing more bike maintenance to gain experience and knowledge. So I did oil change and cable lubing last year, and in the first 3 months of this year I learned on how to perform chain adjustment on Jill, how to change jets on a carb and how to adjust air screw on a carb. Not much technical knowledge per se but I am glad that I did it nonetheless. No knowledge will go to waste so I am going to build more upon this.

I guess this is it. Okay so what lies in the future? I don't know. But for the next quarter this is what I have in mind.
1. Ride more than 1000km to go see a friend, then ride another 1000km with him.
2. Do bike camping will Jill.
3. Adjust chain on Lara.
4. Perhaps cleaning the air filter and change oil for Jill.

Cheers,

CK

The Kind Of Must-Do Motorcycle Touring in Japan

<Top 3 Japanese Motorcyclist To-Do List>

Hi there! I know motorcycling is a very personal thing and nobody gets to tell you what to do with the bike. Nevertheless, in the land of rising sun, there seems to be a certain collection of activities that  most of the riders will agree to. Here they are:

1. Ra-Tour. (A short form of Ramen-Touring)


Japanese likes Ramen big time. Ra-tour means riding your bike going to a place that you like or finding a place you like, cook a meal of instant noodle and enjoy the time. Most of the time the location would be by the seaside, a river, a lake, a forest or a dam. Ra-Tour has since evolved to Coffee-Tour and Tea-Tour.








2. Food-Tour.



What this means is the destination of a certain ride is set to be a restaurant, and having the lunch or sometimes dinner is the ultimate goal of the ride. Naturally the restaurant couldn't be just any restaurant. It has to be famous for some reason or it has to offer some unique menu, like the photo shows.
photo credit to https://www.bikebento.jp/旅の土産

photo credit to https://tinspotter.net/saitama/299/

3. Onsen-Tour. (hot spring tour)

photo credit to http://www.back-off.jp/bo/?page_id=1759

Onsen is the Japanese word for hot spring. And Japanese just love hot spring. I guess it didn't take long for the riders to combine these two elements in one go. An Onsen-Tour is basically a ride that has the hot spring as destination and the bath taking would be the goal of the ride.

Of course there are many more type of riding that the riders will do and are doing. What I did was just trying to show you something that you might not have known. If you do, well then, please look forward to my next blog entry! :-)

Cheers,

Regards.

ps/ one thing that most Japanese riders don't do is ride down to the Starbuck's and spend half a day sitting there

First DIY oil & oil filter change with minimum tools

<Beggars Can't Be Choosers>

Disclaimer: This is a record of my first DIY oil & oil filter change. It is by no means professional work and strictly for the purpose of record keeping only. Lengthy post and photos intensive.

And so it goes, one of my objectives in riding is to be able to do as much maintenance on my bike as I could. The reason is obvious: I will be on my own during my trip and there's only me whom I can depend on. (of course, it would help me to cut down the running cost of owning the bike as well)

The very first step would be the very basic oil change. And so I got myself these tools and replacement parts.

 An oil change pack. Basically just a carton box filled with waste paper, could have made one by myself but since this is the first time I figure I would just buy one. In Japan waste motorcycle oil could be discarded as combustible waste. (it does burn don't they)

 An oil filter for the BMW F-serires. This is labelled as for F650GS but there are a countless of number of users in Japan who replaced this on their F700GS so it should not be an issue.

 This is how it looks inside the package.

 Oil filter removal wrench. Hope this will remove the original filter fitted on the bike.

 The drain nut seal. I have no idea if this is the right one but based on the knowledge shared on the internet among the Japanese users this little ring does the job well. So here it is.

The back of the package tells the measurement of the seal.

I know I should have a socket wrench with an adaptor socket that fits the drain nut on the bike. Well beggars can't be choosers. This is all I have so it will have to make do. I will use the 10mm hexagon wrench. I tried to fit it into the drain nut, it does give some slack when turning the wrench. Does a proper socket wrench have the same issue? (if someone can point that out that would be helpful, thanks)

And I should have a torque wrench as well. But then again, I don't have that so will have to improvise. What I did was to put a line across the nut surface and the engine block, so that I can later use it as a guideline to know how much I should turn the nut when tightening it. Not accurate I would say, but well it will have to do.





And the job begins. Lifted the bike on center stand and warmed it up. Unscrewed the dipstick to let air in, then unscrewed the drain nut with the L-shape hexagon wrench. And the oil came pouring out. While waiting for the oil to drain, I tried to open the oil filter with the oil filter wrench. Guess what? I failed to do that..... The filter wrench wouldn't fit into the filter. So I need another solution. Anyhow, I guess Lara can't wait for another 3000 km before the next filter comes along.

 And now filling her up with new oil. Replaced the dipstick screwed tight and warmed up the engine. Checked dipstick to see if the reading is correct. Yes it is! Total oil filled in is about 2.9L.

And now the dreaded part of maintenance. Oiling the clutch label.
I don't know how to do this really. I searched on internet and went fishing for the relevant youtube clips showing the how-to on the topic.

First, I loosened the clutch cable adjuster. Then, I removed the side mirror and the clutch lever assembly as per photo.

I do not plan to clean the cable as I did not know how to do it properly, so I just took the short cut by spraying the chain oil inside the clutch cable hose. The oil worked its way down out at the other end, and once I confirmed that I stopped injecting chain oil.

And then I fix everything back the same way, just the opposite of I took them apart.

The clutch pull feels much smoother now, although not necessary lighter.

Here is my first oil change and cable oiling! I am glad that I did it. The next step would be chain adjustment and air filter cleaning.
















Wish me luck!

Cheers,

CK

Maintaining The Chain The Right(?) Way

<I have been doing it the wrong way all this while>

After the last ride my chain was getting filthy all over again. It is black (which I suspect is due to the grease meant for protection of the chain ) and there seemed to be dirt in the creaks of the chain links.

I do not know if the looks of the chain is detrimental to the actual performance but I figure if I could wash it well enough for the chain to show itself (along with any unusual stuff stuck in there), then I could at least say I have tried to access the situation and give myself peace of mind.

So I went ahead and bought the chain lube. Finished the previous little bottle I bought last time.

And this is the combination of the chemicals I used. A chain cleaner from Kure, and a chain lube from D.I.D., they are both japanese brands.

I sprayed the chain cleaner the way I would do when I apply chain lube on the chain. That was how I did it in the past and I did not think there was any problem. I do recall I applied too little cleaner last time, so this time I applied an amount quite liberally onto the chain, thinking that should do it.

See? There are droplets of dirt mixed with the cleaner from the chain!
But wait a minute. After a 10 minute wait the stain on the carton box did not increase at all. Which is to say the chain remained dirty! By now I realized I am not doing it right. Not this time, certainly not the last time as well.

So I changed course. Instead of just spraying the cleaner the way I did with lube, I put on a pair of rubber gloves, take a piece of cloth in my left palm and sort of hug the chain inside the left palm, then spray the cleaner well and long enough for me to actually see the dirt drips away from the chain.

So this was the way it should be! And now the chain looks good.

I am glad that I realized my fault and corrected it in time. Never too late to learn. I am a happy man! Next venture is oil change and chain adjustment.

Cheers.

Regards,
CK

Way Too Expensive For The Tire Replacement and Oil Change!

< A Premature Death of My Anakee III >

I would expect at least 10,000km out of my stock tire but I got it changed anyway. As I have posted in another blog entry, it was due to the air leakage at the same spot where I patch up the tire last time.

I guess some people would keep using the tire, or get the tire patched up from the inside of the tire and get on with it, in the hope of squeezing more life out of the tire.

I would like to do the same very much, however, after weighing the risk and the cost of a tire replacement, I have decided to change the tire.

And it cost me a small fortune. Really? USD270 for a tire replacement?? And another USD140 for an oil change that didnt come up the oil filter?

Dear readers please tell me how much you have spent for a Anakee III. Knowing a lower price from you will definitely hurt me more but I need to know just the same.

I somehow think there is so much hidden cost or unnecessary “value added” for these imported brands of tire. 

(I am living in Japan hence Michelin is an imported item)

Can anyone recommend me a Bridgestone tire??  :-)

On a side note, I have decided to do the oil change myself from now on, although I have never done it my whole life. Dear readers, my Lara is a 2015 model F700GS. Can you please tell me what are the tools that I need to do the oil change? The drain nut looks to be the allen type. 

Thank you and wish me luck!

Cheers.

Regards,

CK

Having An Active Volcano As Neighbor

< Never a neighbor this angry >

I believe all of us live our lives exposed to a variety of external elements - dangerous elements - I might add. It could be various kinds of pollution, or hazardous human relationships or natural disaster.

I am lucky enough living in the prefecture of Hiroshima where really few typhoons hit us in a year and there is no fear of tsunami or major earthquake (speaking comparatively in Japanese standard). However, things are not that good for people in Aso. There has been an eruption a few months back and to this day there are still plenty of aftershocks that threaten to scare the tourists away.

The close proximity between the volcano and the human settlements blew me away. I do not have a lot of photos to show you but I did manage to take this video with my cellphone. (pardon my english)

The only major road linking the town to the surrounding cities collapsed with the rumble and there is no word as to when it will be restored. Rumor has it that the state government does not have the budget for a large scale restoration and locals are quite pessimistic about reopening of the said road, and have somewhat resorted to using alternate back roads.

It saddens me to see an otherwise beautiful place being destroyed by natural disaster. However, there is no denying that such is the "cost" of living in this wonderful country. I will let you to interpret freely and make your own judgment of what I said.

Last but not least, one of my riding destinations is the FUKUOKA. It could be dangerous going there but I will do it nevertheless.

Cheers.

Regards,
CK

Calling For A Tow Truck For The First Time

There She Goes...

I guess all riders would go through this one time or another during their riding career – getting the bike on a tow truck.

It happened to me last week, on the second day of the three day getaway trip. I was so excited to ride but had to cut short the whole trip because of this.

Frustrated I was, but I did not let it cloud my day for I understand it is always better to get such experience early on the career rather than later.

The problem came from the patch job I did for my last puncture. 

Apparently air leaks from the same spot after some 2000km since I patched up the tire. It must have been my poor workmanship that caused this so I have no one to blame. I tried to repair the same spot but after 4 failures to revive the tire, I resorted to calling a tow truck to get to the nearest dealer for a tire change.

The arrangement didn't take too long but the time for the truck to arrive took hours. Stranded without mobility was definitely not fun but the circumstance presented itself to me as a lesson.

There were two things I learned from episode:

     1.     It might do me good if I were to use tube tire for my long way round trip. It could be a pain in the ass when a puncture does happen, but I figure at least I can change the tube and wouldn't be left hopeless once a repair of tubeless tire turns south.

    2.     The unexpected will happen during the long way round trip. Instead of facing such irregularity for the first time on the trip, better to experience them now and learn to be patient and do something helpful, rather than just sitting there sourly.

I used my time to see the bikes go by, talk to fellow bikers and, guess what, read! (I have a kindle handy with me all the time)

Finally the tow truck came and I rode shotgun to the dealer.

Too bad the dealer that I went to didn't have any tire for replacement. They patched up my tire and sent me away, asking me to ride no more than 100km/h on my way home.

So there you go, riding on a way-less-than-perfect tire to cover some 300 plus km on highway.

Thanks to this absence of new tire I learned how to “nurse” the tire so that it wont break down half way.

All in all I wasn't thrilled to have my trip cut short, but I was thankful nevertheless to have had a chance to prep myself, no matter how trivial it may seem.

Cheers,

Regards,

CK