60,000 Mile Spark Plugs

Last weekend I celebrated my birthday with friends on a three day weekend, riding around Scranton, Penna.  We had a great time and the VFR ran perfect, racking up another 800 miles.  We even met the guys from American Pickers at our hotel.

Mike told us that the day before he had scored a Vincent Black Shadow in Milwaukee.  Hard to believe.  I guess they were out picking in the area.  Mike was really cool, but Frank was kind of jerk.  I don't know if he was hung over or what but he was pretty non-responsive to anything we asked him.

It was a great trip, eastern Pennsylvania has some awesome riding:  long stretches of isolated roads and fast sweeping turns.  You can read the trip report here.

I had been meaning to change the spark plugs in the VFR, but didn't get to it until today.  The last time they were changed was in 2006 at 40,000 miles when the dealer did it. 

I was intimidated at first by the process, which is why the dealer did it 6 years ago.  The shop manual said to remove the side plastics as well as the gas tank.  I have small hands so I didn't need to remove anything; I just lifted the gas tank.

The plugs came out easy and the old ones still had the correct gap after so many years.

Buttoned the bike back up and it's running perfect with 101,032 miles on it.

VFR Hits 100,000 Miles

I've been waiting for this day for several years!  I've been wanting to get a bike over 100,000 miles for a long, long time and it seemed like it took forever on the VFR.  I bought the bike in 2003 and in those first few years I was racking up nearly 20,000 miles a year.  At the start of the 2010 season I had 91,500 miles on it but enjoying the KLR and my inability to commute to work anymore really cut down on the yearly mileage.  Last year I only rode it 2,500 miles.

To make matters worse at 99,800 miles the VFR developed an issue charging the battery.  A month and $750 later, I got it back yesterday from the dealer.  I took a nice ride with my friend Craig and pulled into the garage yesterday evening with the odometer showing:

I spent last evening going over all my receipts and records I've accumulated over the years.  I was surprised to find that I'd spent nearly $9,000 maintaining and farkling out the VFR over the past 9 years.  This included 4 sets of chains and sprockets, 7 sets of tires and 33 oil changes.

Today I went out to finally put the 100,000th mile on the bike.

I wrote up some information on the bike and the miles on VFR Discussion, the best VFR website out there. 
click here

I've been thinking about selling the VFR, worrying about taking long, multi-day trips out of state on it.  But it runs great and I feel like the bike has a new lease on life.  It still runs smooth and strong and I don't have a clear idea what I would even replace the VFR with.

I'm taking it on a 3 day trip to Pennsylvania with friends in less than 2 weeks.  Can't wait.

Springing Back to Ride

In the winter I cover up my bikes, remove the insurance and pull the batteries.  I try not to think about riding for the winter and retreat into my video games and books.  This year however we really didn't have a winter.  I decided I'd had enough and put both bikes on the road a week ago.

The KLR was really all set; the only thing it needed was a headlight.  $25 for a single bulb!  Otherwise the bike is completely sorted out.  I made so many modifications to it last season that I can't think of a single thing I would add to it.

The VFR had a dead battery.  I replaced it last Friday and took it out for a 20 mile ride and it ran great.  It s so nice to ride such a smooth bike again.

I have a group of riding buddies that live in Connecticut, New York and Rhode Island. We've been riding together for about 8 years now.  We were all lamenting that we didn't do much riding in 2011 so we decided to meet for lunch and plan some rides in 2012.

My intention was to ride the VFR down to the lunch meet in Connecticut last Sunday.  I went to start up the bike and the battery wasn't very strong, but the bike did start.  I rode to the ATM and shut the bike off to test it.  The battery had almost no power and the bike wouldn't start.  I was able to get the bike going down a small incline and pop started it and rode it home, swapping it out with the KLR.

My friends and I made some good plans for the season:  at least one ride together a month, a 4-5 day trip to Virginia and West Virginia and some weekend trips to Pennsylvania and the Adirnodacks.  We threw in some dual sport rides too, like a 3 day weekend in Vermont.

A couple days later I took the VFR apart and diagnosed the problem as a fried rectifier/regulator.  This is a notoriously bad part on the VFR.  This is my third one, but I haven't replaced one since 2005.  I'm waiting for the new one to arrive now.

The VFR has 99,820 miles on it.  Last year I started the season with 97,000 and thought for sure I would break 100 K.  Now the R/R is holding me back.  When I do break it I will post up some kind of maintenance report on how the VFR has fared over those 100,000 miles.

It's felt great to be riding again.  I felt deflated after my aborted trip in August so the several month lay-off has really helped.  Look for a more active blog with more ride reports this year.