SV-Wolf's Bike Blog

[sv-wolf]

Hi Blues. Thanks for your good wishes.

Yes, we have the 650 Tenere here, and it has some good features, but it is too heavy. I'm skinny and I want a bike that I have some chance of lifting by myself if I need to. I could manage the DR650 with a reasonable effort, but not the Tenere which is 24 kg heavier. I like the fact, also, that the DR650 is basic 1990s technology and can be fixed by any village mechanic with a half-decent set of spanners.

All my mithering over which bike to buy is now at an end. I did the deed today and signed on the dotted line for a new DR650. It got it at a rock bottom price. All that has to happen now is for DVLA (the UK vehicle licensing authority) to register it and then I can pick it up - probably in about a fortnight. Can't wait.

A panel was scratched during transit from the States, so the dealer is waiting for a new one to be shipped over. It should be here by the time I take the bike in for its first service and they will fit it for me then. Given the price I paid for the bike, I'm not complaining. I'll need some mods and accessories for it to turn it into a proper long-distance bike (a larger tank for one thing) and they will probably have to come from the States or Japan. That will add to the cost, but I reckon I'm still within budget, and it'll be a new experience for me as I have never added much in the way of aftermarket gear to a bike before.

I nearly - very nearly - also bought a little second-hand rust-bucket of a Serow. The dealer was offering it for just £1.6k The idea is to hare round the local green lanes on it until I set off on my trip next spring. At that point, I'd sell it on. There is a huge demand for Serows among trail riders, so it would be easy enough to make a quick sale on it without taking much of a hit on the price. I was tempted, but I couldn't quite get my head around the idea of buying two bikes in one go. I'll think about it for a couple of weeks (and then buy it).

I think I'm getting used to the Fireblade. The round trip to Reading was about 160 miles and I only experienced discomfort in the last twenty or so, and that was only mild. Now that I have the Airhawk pad adjusted to my needs, riding the Blade is much more of a pleasure. I think I'm beginning to bond with it.

[sv-wolf]

Well, it looks like the United Kingdom has survived the Scottish referendum - it's still one country and not two. But there are now going to be endless recriminations and bad feelings on both sides of the political fence. Campaigners are already sniping at one another. and there have been accusations of vote rigging which have given the conspiracy theorists a field day.

I've never come across such a lot of hot air, wild promises and dirty tricks in any political campaign as in this one. The shock waves will reverberate for years. And even though the Scots voted (by a relatively small margin) to remain part of the UK, there will now be huge constitutional changes on both sides of the border.

It was fun, though, watching the Westminster government go into a complete panic-driven meltdown when they realised that the devolutionists might win the vote. What a bunch of clueless tossers! 'Scuse my French.

Oh well, at least that means I won't have to get my passport changed.

[sv-wolf]

Well, I rode the DR650 home yesterday from Reading through the back roads (about 80 miles). My verdict: the bike is hilarious: light, flickable, comfortable, a good companion on the road. Loveeeeerrly. A good choice, I think.

I had to use a few faster A roads on the way home, which were a little tedious, travelling at running-in speeds (max 55mph). As soon as I have her fuel changed, though, she will, I think, be near perfect for what I need.

The downside (there has to be a downside): it's a Suzuki; it's cheaply made; it will need some fiddling and fettling and lots of adjustments to get it up to scratch; and (something I failed to check because it never occurred to me) it doesn't have a fuel indicator. WOT!!!! I will have to use the trip indicator instead. Running out of fuel in the overtaking lane of a motorway might not be a good idea.

A few common cheapo-bike problems forced themselves on my attention instantly. The mirrors are looser than they could be and will need sorting. Then the plastic fob came off the key first time I tried to take it out of the ignition. There were a few classic Suzuki problems as well: the gearbox is clunky, for instance. But hell, I rode the SV for years, so that doesn't trouble me much. Oh, and yes, it has an absolutely crappy single-disk front brake, which gave me a fright the first time I came up to a roundabout and tried to stop. I knew about this before I bought it, so I'm not complaining. I will just have to get a second disc added.

Apart from that, I haven't had a bike with a choke and a reserve tank for years. Nostalgia!

There are also a lot of touring/off-roading mods I will have to make. I will need to fit a bash plate and some crash bars, a gel seat, a larger tank, a headlamp protector and a centre stand. I will also need to get some custom luggage made (I'm not paying Touratech prices for a pair of large sardine cans.)

Despite all the issues, the DR captivated me instantly. While the comfort problem on the CBR means I am taking a while to bond with it, the DR is already a member of the family.

[dr_bar]

I know some people use Ammo cases from surplus stores for Panniers, others use Pelican cases.

[Hanson]

Hud,

Congrats on your DR650. I hope that you have a lot of safe fun and adventures on your new bike.

I like the overpriced sardine cans from Touratech. One nice feature is that they can be mounted on either side of the bike so that the same pair of panniers can be used on different bikes even if the silencer is on different sides. I hope to get a Super Tenere down the road and it's exhaust can is on the left side where my DL650A has the can on the right. All I will need to purchase for the S10 would be the model specific mounting rack and I can use the same set of panniers on either bike just by swapping sides. This is not true of many other brands where the panniers are not ambidextrous. One set of Zego-Pro panniers and two racks is, in most instances, more economical than two complete sets of panniers for two different bikes.

I do love the idea of ammunition cans for those with fabricating skills and an anti-establishment attitude. There is a certain utilitarian appeal to this idea and I have seen some pictures of very clean implementations. However, this would never work for me because all of my ammo cans are full of ammo.

Safe Travels,
Richard

[sv-wolf]

The DR has now had its first service and all is well. Almost. The dealer doing the service pointed out that the lower end of the engine case (clutch cover) has been spray painted and is now bubbling - clearly the paint is not heat resistant. It's only a small area and I hadn't noticed myself. I rang up the guy I bought the bike from. He said immediately that he had done the spray painting since the bike had a small scratch when it arrived from the States, but he had understood the paint to be heat resistant. He offered to rectify the matter. It was a civilised conversation. I feared he might try to deny responsibility and we would end up getting tough with one another. I hate confrontations.

I now have to make about twenty modifications, some of them to turn the DR into an adventure bike, but several also just to get it running optimally. The bike comes, according to the helpful DRriders forum, with several kamikaze features that can result in the engine self destructing. Great! There are two screws, for instance, just under the engine casing which can work loose and disappear into the engine. They can be secured with Loctite or something similar in ten minutes. There are also two useless parts which tend to tear off and take part of the frame with them. They can be removed. There are a number of other issues, but all can be rectified simply and easily. The bike has been around for twenty years and Suzuki have not seen fit to take the very simple steps required to sort out these problems. Is this a form of planned obsolescence? Caveat Emptor!

Glad to have found the DR site. At least I know.

[sv-wolf]

Oh hell. Here we go. Suddenly, it is autumn: greasy, brown leaves are piling up on the roads again, the air is chilly, afternoons are dank and miserable, and the hours of daylight are declining fast. This morning I turned on the heater before tumbling out of bed, and dressed with a groan and a shudder. Not even global warming brings me any comfort these days. As each year declines into winter, I feel the cold more. Last year I stopped pretending I was still 30 and bought myself some heated gloves. As I sit here in front of my laptop, I'm seriously thinking about a heated jacket. Toughing it out no longer seems like a badge of honour.

I've not ridden now for three days - three whole days. There has been nowhere to go. (At least when I was at work I had a reason to gear up and get out on the bike every weekday morning.) But that's just an excuse: since when did I need a reason to get on the bike? The truth is, I feel homey: chilly and autumnish. All I want to do is turn on the central heating, make myself a drink, and curl up with a good book. Or at least, that's what I tell myself. In reality, I feel too restless and irritable for anything to satisfy me for long. Every November, this moodiness comes upon me with particular force. I curl up on the sofa. Then I uncurl, and pace up and down. I check my emails. I try to do some jobs around the house but quickly get bored, and curl up again. Then I sigh, get into my gear and go out on the bike, but I feel cold and miserable and after a short ride I come home again. Nothing satisfies me. The agitation only lasts for a couple of weeks, but it comes upon me every year as regular as the winter season itself.

Right now, I need to get lunch. At least I can rely on my stomach to prompt me into coherent action from time to time. After that I think I will take a ride into Baldock and see a friend. He's a market trader and has just taken a stall on Baldock's Wednesday market. This morning he put up a post on his facebook page to say that he was already freezing cold standing around waiting for customers. Baldock market is in the High Street, an immensely wide medieval thoroughfare, which invites the wind to whip down it at this time of year. I don't envy him.

This evening, there is a bike club meeting. That will divert me for a couple of hours. And I need to ring a friend who is just back from a short holiday to Istanbul. Another friend has just emailed me to say she is off to the Sudan for Christmas. That will give me opportunity to pass another couple of hours feeling jealous.

[sv-wolf]

I rode the Blade into Stevenage today and made my first visit to the camera shop. I'm looking for something I can take on the trip. It needs to be compact and sturdy, have at least 12 megapixels and a reasonably wide angle lens. I looked at a range of cameras at around £400. My head is still a fog of numbers and letters and types and makes and features but I think I'm beginning to get some clarity. I'll probably have to spend a couple of days on Snapsort.com before making a choice. One of the most compact cameras I have seen so far which still gives very good quality is an RX100 mk1, but it is a Sony, and since Sony have contracts with the Israeli military I'm inclined to boycott them right now. I also checked out a TZ60, a HX400 and a Nikon D3300. My head is buzzing.

[drumwrecker]

Kathy and I are very pleased with our Lumix cameras.
By the way I think its not the number of pixels but the quality of the lens that matters most.
When are you coming over?

[sv-wolf]

Hi DW. Yes I like Lumix cameras. I used to have one till I came off the bike in India and smashed it. The one I owned had 10x zoom on it - brilliant. I need the pixels so that the results are of magazine quality and can be blown up without loss of definition. I'm hoping to sell some of them to travel magazines who generally recommend 12 mexapixels or more for publishable copy. I generally get half a dozen really good ones (out of the thousands on the memory card).

It'd be great to see you. I'll send you an email.

Regards

Richard