These grips look sooooo sweet! They are supposed to work on all Kawasaki Vulcan models. Compared to the ones that came with my VN900 these look alot better and people say they get a better grip as well. They come with “super hi-strength adhesive” so they’ll stay in place and look quite easy to install. I’ll definitely be ordering these.
Links:
CruiserCustomizing.com Shop
Installation Guide (PDF)
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I found a link to some interesting sound clips. A VN900 owner has done some modifications to his pipes and recorded the difference in sound. Click here to go to the audio clips.
I picked up my battery today, it was fully charged at 13V. I connected it to the bike and held my breath… YEEEESSS! The headlight lights up and so does lights on the panel.
Now let’s fire up the engine Krrrkk kkrrrkk krrrk kkkkrrkk – yikes, the same horrible horrible sound as earlier, not good. Now what? Let’s try push-starting the bike! So I get a friend to help push the bike as I put it in first and hold in the clutch and get ready to fire up the engine once I get enough speed. It starts up at first try! I drive around a little bit and it works fine. I turn off the engine, but when I start it again I get that same horrible noise. I think I might have a problem with the starter so I’m gonna have to get it to the closest authorized Kawasaki mechanic to fix it. I’ll keep you updated.
UPDATE! There was nothing wrong with the starter – there was something wrong with the battery, I changed it and the engine fired up just fine :)
Not an actual Kawasaki starter, but you get the idea…
It’s finally spring! The sun is up, it’s a few degrees Celsius above 0 and people are getting their motorcycles on the road. It’s that great feeling that only motorcycle owners get. My Vulcan 900 has been sleeping in my garage all winter for the first time. Last year I had it wait for me in a warm and cozy room at the local mechanic/motorcycle shop where they took care of it and changed the oil and filtre, checked the tire pressure, hosed it down with some soap and water and so forth before I got it back. But not this winter, oh no! I was gonna save some money and do this myself… stupid stupid stupid…
12V 10Ah YTX12-BS Battery
If you’re gonna be dumb, you better be tough right? Rite! So I should have read up on how to prepare my bike for winter instead of just parking it and leave it for 5 months. It turns out that everyday you leave your bike without riding it your battery lose 1% of its’ charge, so leaving it for 3 months and it’s practically dead. Leaving it for 5 months and the battery is, uh well, dead… even deader than dead, in fact it’s exactly 4,23Volts of wasted-acid-dead. What I should have done is buy a maintenance charger and had it connected to the battery all winter or at least charge the battery for a few hours once every month. Oh well, I learn everyday! And since I don’t have anyone teach me all this stuff (damn it would have been fun to do a Bachelor of Kawasakis at uni!) I’ll have to learn through trial and error and doing a hell of a lot of googling.
The first remedy I tried was using a friends motorcycle (a sweet looking 125cc Honda!) and hook his battery to mine and jump start it that way. It pumped some juice into the beast, but not enough to get the engine running, not even after we tried push-starting the heavy bastard bike.
Stein Arne and his 125cc Honda
Anyways, after calling a mechanic I got around to buying a battery charger, a CTEK XS 800 designed for 12V batteries like mine. The dealer told me that it probably wouldn’t be able to charge my battery but it would be perfect for next winter so that I didn’t have to end up in the same mess again so I got one and brought it back to the garage and tested it anyway. Just as he had told me, 15 hours later the battery still wouldn’t put out the juice to to even light up the small light indicators or anything.
IT Apprentice Alexander checking my motorcycle battery with the multimetre at work :)
Now what? I’m not known for giving up easy, so I took the battery to the shop that I bought the battery charger from and he is now charging it over night with his über-super-mega-charger and we’ll see if that helps, if not I simply have to go and buy a new battery. I’ll keep you updated! :)
Important! If you’re going to fiddle around with your battery, read the section on battery removal, charging and reinserting the battery in your motorcycle manual! Also, read the manual of your battery charger and never jump start your tiny little motorcycle battery using some ones oversized car battery! Apparently, if you hook up your battery in the wrong way sparkles will fly and the acid inside your battery might end up in your face… that’s right, it could actually explode, so take care and read up on handling batteries. Check out Dan’s MC for more information on motorcycle batteries.
I cleaned my bike yesterday, long overdue! I decided to try to remove the warning stickers that has been stuck to the fuel tank since I bought the bike. One of them simply says “Unleaded Petrol Only” and the other one is a list of English words translated into French in case you ever need a French mechanic, what gives? Oh well, I’ll save the sticker just in case. I looked up the problem on Google and found out that it’s actually quite easy to remove these stickers. Just use a hair dryer! You need to apply heat to the sticker to loosen the adhesive, be careful though you don’t want to heat the paint too much as it might start to bubble. After applying heat for a couple of minutes it was easy to remove the stickers.
Many people recommend using heat guns and paint thinner, I haven’t tried that myself so I can’t really recommend that. Some also recommend using WD-40 oil to loosen the adhesive before you use a hair dryer, that’s probably a very good idea but since I haven’t seen WD-40 anywhere in Norway I haven’t tried this either (Update: You get WD-40 at Clas Ohlson in Norway!). Just using the hair dryer without anything else went just fine on my tank, but if you do have access to WD-40 it might help removing the glue residue that will be left on your paint after removing the sticker.
Oh, and one more thing; don’t use open flame! Not a good idea…
Links:
Motorcycle Cruiser: How to remove stickers from a motorcycle’s paint
Same article as above, but with great photos!
Evo Design Solutions has designed an electric motorcycle. The EV-o RR has two (yes two!) electric engines and is going to compete in the world’s first clean emission carbon free grand prix, the TTXGP, on Isle of Man in June.
Evo Design Solutions has previously designed grand-prix motorcycles and race cars for Le Mans so this is by no means one of those el-bikes you buy for your 5 year old… They haven’t chosen a battery yet but there are rumors of a battery able to move the bike from 0-100Km/h (0-60mph) in 3,8s.
More information
Evo Design Solutions
TTXGP.com
Wired.com’s Blog article
Hubert decided to quit his real estate job in New York 5 years ago and has been riding his bike for 5 years non-stop. Needless to say, his blog is full of great photos telling stories that very few can match. He estimates that he’ll be running out of money in 2015, then he’ll have to get a job – but for now he’s happy riding his bike. He keeps his belongings in his sidecar and spend many nights in a tent. Right now he’s in Lapland in northern Norway. Read all about his rides on his website The Timeless Ride.
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