Fozzie

22 hours ago, RideWithStyles said:

Kill joy might aswell get as much use out of the jumper while time is nearing? Lol.

 

Sounds like aload of line managers / bosses very unprofessional there, word of your shuffling/ looking else where shouldn't have gotten anywhere further around the chain than directly.

None of that is your problem of internal same ranking bickering, hopefully gets sorted quickly and remember just keep looking to the light!!!!

My family household has a rule, my sister and mum have their birthdays in the next 10 days. Rule is you aren't allowed to discuss Christmas until clear of those days, and my mother is one woman I know not to cross 

I've had a lengthy discussion with the big boss, and it settled the boat somewhat. If he is being honest, the amount of nonsense being peddled by others is quite bad. But there's no guarantee he's playing a straight bat either. It seems I'll progress whether I go or stay, but at the same time there's bad blood there now. 

Mixed news. 

I've measured the crank big end gap, I'm not sure it should be measured in the bike like this. I'm pretty sure it needs to be removed as the crank bearings are pressed into the engine casings, which are in turn pressed and torqued down. So I'm going to slowly pull the engine down to the bare components, and measure it all. But initial reading was 0.3mm gap, the book says I should be seeing 0.4-0.65mm with a max service limit of 0.85mm. Has anyone got any possible narrative on why the clearance is tight? Absolutely no radial play though, which is promising. 

Scuffed piston skirt... Oh dear. The oil level was low. Poor lubrication?

Oh dear oh dear... Nice even cross hatch apart from this face. I know single cylinders have uneven combustion forces, which can contribute to this. But 20k miles? I've ordered a new top end. 

Deep gouges in the cam. The bearings feel ok, but a little rough. Also to be replaced for an all new item. Weird, the valve rocker for this cam lobe was chewed up badly too, the other one is fine. So either the valve clearances were done poorly, or the clearance tightened. Again, insufficient lubrication could have played a part.

I've bought enough bits, and paint to refresh the entire engine now. I have all bearings, a top end is in the post, and all other components. I will need to spend a good day taking the engine down to its basic parts, measure up everything that needs it, and repaint the thing as well. Once together and oiled, I'll spin it up on the bench with a drill to make sure it's all spinning freely and in time. Then steadily rebuild the bike with the new frame, will take the chance to rebuild/repaint the forks, and all bearings for the wheels and so on. Always on the look out for the remainder of the bodywork in good condition. 

Good morning

My girlfriend tried to go out yesterday in a Christmas jumper when we went out for food. I told her she had to wait at least one more week, as there's a fairly obvious line between jumping the gun and dressing for Christmas mid-November

Back to work and unfortunately more stress. Last week was a bad mix of ongoing bitterness of many in the team towards a redundancy process, I had a second stage interview for a job elsewhere, and policy dictated I inform my line manager, which just seemed to set off a really torrid situation. Even though it's nice some managers are trying to block my departure, others had caught wind of it and then tried to put pressure on to leave to increase the pain on the bosses. And I just felt a bit played with, and closely watched. Which tends to be the quickest shortcut to my last nerve. I've managed to get a meeting with the big boss this week, so I'm just going to lay it all out bare and see what he says. 

Never used Fertan stuff, will be doing so now going off the reviews I've heard here!

Got a good few jobs that need it pretty urgently. 

10 hours ago, megaross said:

Yeah I almost got sacked in my last job for working on a "f**k your politics, I'm doing it anyway" basis. Never relented but I was well shot of it.

 

 

I've seen people do this, but those who love office politics spin it into things like "not a team player", which usually your actual team disagrees with 

Tensions are running high at my place, so there's a lot of misinterpretation going on at all levels. So I'm being careful and measured in how I navigate it, but there have been some who have gone bitter and are now trying to stir things up. And that's the bit I find it hard not to respond to. 

Fortunately I'm no where near as hot headed as I was. I used to see blowing up the situation as a form of "cutting to the chase", and waded into fights that weren't mine. More than a decade ago I had a line manager who frequently had complaints (but was sweet with the bosses), and we all quietly knew she was accessing our e-mails and digging for dirt. After ignoring it, I got fed up of her personal snipes at me and others, and I decided to flush her out, and the end result was a meeting where she thought I was going to be fired, had print outs of e-mails where I was critical of her. And I replied with print outs of personal e-mails where I showed it was staged to prove previous complaints of her accessing peoples accounts had been correct. It didn't go either of our ways, it became 5 rounds of HR meetings! My big boss was right "Why did you think to involve yourself like this?".

Was a learning experience for a few folks, I'm from one of the first generations to grow up with the internet, so e-mail hacking, or cracking into myspace/facebook to stir up drama was common. It was far from my first rodeo, although I do my best to stay well clear now. I do however frequently get the gossip from the HR girls at my company, and this sort of thing is still very common. 

31 minutes ago, bonio said:

Same here, loathe it.

I've managed my "career" by finding the bottom rung of the ladder and refusing to let go. So I get to do real work and mainly stay out of all that stuff. 

The short of it for me is my company is slashing the work force in half. Down to a small “high performance” team. I’m not at risk apparently, but I’ve gone after a much bigger role elsewhere in the company. 

This is causing trouble for me, namely suggestions some will try to block this if I’m successful. But I’ve recently sat through meetings where protocol has been thrown out the window, or high level leadership have spun things to make it the fault of others, to absurd levels. One literally passed the buck on an issue they readily admitted to being aware of for weeks, and was their job to manage the department that caused the f**k up. And the big boss said nothing, no challenge. I was going nuclear and reached out to that staff member afterwards. And it’s this way on most projects, those who have had their own agenda, or deviated from company strategy and its blown up in their face are now playing dirty. 

Good evening,

Bracing for a difficult chat with my manager, got some stuff going on at work at the moment, and every move I'm making is very carefully measured. I absolutely despise office politics, the games people play and the agendas. They don't mix well with me, who historically deals with these situations very bluntly. 

Good afternoon, from blustery Manchester

On 12/11/2023 at 11:36, Bender said:

Morning

 

Wedding went well, unfortunately the pub/wedding venue had the arrangement and coordination of a stick.

 

Best man's speech was soo inappropriate, literally head in hands great for the non family attendees.

Best one I've ever heard was at someone's wedding for their second marriage. Which was less than 3 years apart from his first wedding day. So a lot of people attending were there at the first. Best man rattled off a few, but the best was:

"It's no secret this is Bry's second go at life long happiness. But I'm sure the previous woman in his life is happy for him, it was all amicable in the end, and is with us here today in spirit rooting for him... Oh, she's not dead, but a couple of the lads are going out with her mates, and they've had more cameras on this thing than the FBI has on my search history, and I doubt it's for their own collection"

There was a mix of stifled laughs, gasps, and the sudden darting of heads around the room with a few of the girls dropping their phones down. I nearly came out of my seat laughing. 

Good evening,

I'm just finishing work, been another long one. Clocked on until 9pm a few times this week, and it has been almost pure maths, and throwing figures into fancy looking forms I've made for grid operators. Turned out the solar team at my company has been paying about £10k a project for external companies to do studies that are mostly desktop based. I'll have made a tool with Excel that spits out an answer with some easy data entry, and notes on where to go/who to ask for the data needed by the end of next week that saves that cost on I reckon about 19 in every 20 jobs. 

Not really a pat on the back moment though, as my company didn't even bother asking if we had the competency to do this in house, so it's more a massive fail than win. As this has been going on years.

2 hours ago, Grumpy Old Git said:

Gut Moaning Folkets (and those who identify as They)

 

As a meat popsicle I find this language exclusionary and offensive.

I'm just trying to fit in with the kids. Good morning!

I've got the V5 for the other frame now, so will swap the engine details and new colour (Blue) onto it. The blue models were actually the least sold colour, but they are also really popular now when they come up on eBay... So will see if this gambit boosts value. 

I agree with it having a patina, as long as it's not deep scratches, I'll have it! I'll be doing as much as I can to restore the other components on the bike. Swingarm is a bugger, if the bushings are knackered they aren't replaceable. You need to buy a new swingarm! It's only £150 but bushings would have been what, £15?  

Nice, it's only 30 miles north of me. Nice little ride out in better weather. I've ordered a good few things from them over the years, and coming up to doing  a gear refresh, so will probably pop in to try stuff on. 

My office is only 7 miles away, and on 30-40 mile roads, so I really just need kevlar lined hoodies/cargos with some well placed armour that doesn't appear too bulky when I'm at work. Be a lot easier to go in dressed casual, than kit up and kit down on each end. The time it takes I may as well have gone in the car. 

Forgot to mention, how do you make a written off bike... Not a written off bike? 

You buy a clean frame that comes with a V5. It feels a bit dodgy to do this, so my justification is that the bike and all its mechanical components will see attention that will hopefully leave it in the top 2% of condition against its age and mileage. I will be riding it for some time after the MOT to check there's no teething issues, or any ongoing problems before it is sold. 

With my Kawasaki project in its last few bits to be road worthy, I need to raise capital for the next phase of those works where I convert it into a scrambler. I probably shouldn't have bought this, but I was slightly inebriated during a break at a Hans Zimmer concert in Manchester, and thought I was getting a cracking deal. I'll probably make back what I put into it, even with restoring it back to stock. 

I've so far sourced an old new stock fuel tank (still in the Honda original packaging), a tail fairing, and two trim fairings. I only spent £150 for all of that, and some mechanical bits, so the bike only owes me £800 currently, and arguably some of the biggest bits are out of the way. 

The source of the rattle was easily solved. Just the cam chain tensioner, a £17 fix. But when I dropped the oil, it was just below the low mark, and it's quite obvious an unsympathetic teen owned this last. So I'm going to crack open the engine and have a look. I can live with the top end being worn, but if the crank is gone in addition it will get pricey and stall the job for a while. 

Fuel tank came off easy enough, a single bolt, 4 hoses and a fuel sensor connector were dealt with easily.

Platform lifts are ace for shifting engines out. I'll be stripping the bike down to bare parts and throwing out what I don't need going on. I destroyed the main cable for the starter though, it wouldn't come off the post. So I zapped it with the gun, and it took the nut off... Also twisted and frayed the cable. I will probably just make another length up, and better insulate the new one. 

Took me a few hours to get to this point, good thing engines are light. I'll be stripping it down in the week sometime and taking the required measurements. As I've bought all major bearings for the engine, if this engine is a bad egg, I'll try to buy good bits from other engines first. I'm definitely stripping the paint and repainting this engine on the rebuild. Fresh clips/hoses as well.

14 hours ago, fastbob said:

So you finished it then . Looks great . I've still got mine . Just can't get round to selling it . Somewhere in the back of my mind lurks the crazy notion to go touring the outer Hebrides on it because I don't fancy the idea of taking the precious Harley on the ferries . There's a lot of back to basics fun to be had coaxing the maximum performance from a smaller bike . 

If that new water pump seal and gasket does the trick, then that's it for the basic resto. Will get an MOT and ride it for a bit. 

I will be converting it into a scrambler though I think. I will ride around on it for a bit, and get my 125 project out the door. then come back to it. I'll need the proceeds from the 125 selling as the next phase of work can be eye wateringly expensive (custom seat unit/repainted tank and plastics). Always wanted to do a proper full build. 

I want to say good afternoon as it's 6, but it's dark outside... I wish they'd scrap daylight saving. 

Working a bit late, and doing some prep work, as I'm sticking my head in the door of another job with an interview. I don't expect to get it, I just want to see how well I fit with the role as it would be a big shift. 

5 hours ago, skyrider said:

that looks good now,  ps im into that RD400  

It's getting there, I just need it reliable and riding for a bit so I can begin the scrambler conversion. The RD400 was a barn find my Dad bought and did up, it has a slight patina, but it is absolutely mint mechanically. Soon to get electronic ignition as well. I had a small ride on it over the weekend, and it's a little rocket... Brakes a bit weak mind

2 hours ago, JRH said:

The joys of the Kawasaki twin pot sliding callipers. Looks to be the same as used on my GPX750. That was a strip down each year and clean to keep them working smoothly.

2 hours ago, RideWithStyles said:

At least they aint the kawasaki tokico 6pots!  They cost more, needed more work , nearly impossible to bleed properly, still half as powerful of a single pot for a cbf125.

I had a set of 6 pots apart earlier this year from a Ninja (might even be in this thread somewhere as I've posted other jobs) and they are evil. I've got the 4 pots on the SV650 and they aren't much better, they'll be stripped down this winter and refreshed. 

1 hour ago, RideWithStyles said:

Was it only on one lobe? If it was poor lubricant it would have done scratches and scars moving with the rolation of the cam to pretty much most or all but they look more like pitting and chips and many so close together and in the particular direction likely a floating metal particle or who ever got in there before hand chipped them some how and not that long ago.. prized the cam off or left in a box and shit got thrown on top like at a scrappers yard? One of many possibilities.

That whole camshaft was particularly badly pitted. The bike had stood for a while, so I'm guessing repeated dry starts across its life have chipped away at them, or as you say floating chips of metal in the oil. As I took the engine down to bits and split the cases, it became clear that the engine is a Frankenstein of multiple engines. The head on it in particular is a bit battered, and might be beyond what a skim can sort, so there will be a new engine in this bikes future. But for now, it is running using a camshaft I bought from our resident ER5 specialist: @fastbob

Been a while since I updated this, after a string of little jobs that I didn't pap, I got the bike running. The bike idled very well, revved up ok, but under any load it struggled. It was running very lean due to the new stainless exhaust system, and spotting the GPZ500 carb setup, I moved the ER's towards it as that bike too has a more free flowing exhaust. It worked, and I've been running the bike up tarmac trails that wind up a local hill. I gave it its first hard pull the other day, and it is very smooth up to 8000rpm where it splutters, but from the overrun pops, it's now too rich. So this will be easily tweaked out. 

There was also a little bit of white gunk in the oil, and a sign of coolant escaping near the water pump. A quick research later, and it looks like the mechanical seal has let go, and some in the ER groups report these gaskets are a pain, so I'll be using a very small bead of high temp gasket in combination with a fresh gasket. If it turns out the head gasket isn't sealing, I'll drop the engine and bring it home where I'm nearer shops that can skim the head, and I'll paint the engine. 

In the meantime, I've cracked on with small jobs. This weekend I refreshed the front brake with all new rubbers, seals, pistons, and a new stainless brake line. 

Corroded, worn, partially seized.

This is why I use my dads workshop... Compressed air. Still took over an hour to get one piston out. It needed a rubber mallet to tease it out. 

Toast... And the slider was seized as the rubbers had broken, letting the elements in. 

Before - New equipment - After. I used a dremel with various steel wire brushes to clean the exterior and all the grime. And a brass wire wheel to clean out the slots for the seals. 

As it was a recent topic. Big can. Tiny amount needed. You just need enough to shine up the seals all over. Same for the pistons, but just their outer sides, not the back face that slots into the bore. The kit came with a small sachet, but I have my own tin. 

When installed and back together, no excess grease, all went together firmly but smoothly. 

The slider has red rubber grease on the metal pins that sit inside the rubber boots. And multi-purpose grease where there's metal to metal sliders. In the pic below you can see where I put a blob as the pad pin was very seized. All loose paint is off too now, I quite like the rustic look... But I'll paint them at a later date. If I don't upgrade to an ER6 brake system. 

Learnt one too many times, check the length before you install the new line... Saves a lot of swearing.

And now it starts, goes quite well, and stops exactly as it should. I've got a new rear drum brake ready to go on. But the current one feels ok, so will get some use out of it first. 

Hopefully ready for an MOT in a couple of weeks if I can get back over. But all hinges on the new mechanical seal working. 

Good evening,

On the road and did 300 miles today up to Sunderland and back to Manchester. Was good to do some proper practical stuff, measuring up large kit to fit into a room that is way too small. Going to have to mix some of the old school methods with the new, a rare bit of what I feel is "real" engineering today. Less and less of that as of late. 

Good morning

Is it Friday yet? I'm feeling fairly done with this week already 

Girlfriend is going up Snowden this Saturday with my mum and sister, and it dawned on her that while I've had a lot of 1 on 1 time with her family over the nearly 5 years we've been together, she's never been left alone with my mum and sister, so she's now more nervous of that than the hike itself. Which I find odd given what could go wrong with the hike, vs what could go wrong socially. I'm debating if I need to be local in case someone sprains/cracks something and needs carrying back down. 

Good afternoon

Got a lot of things going on at the moment that are causing a lot of stress (all of them work related). But I'm hoping to get a weekend away soon where I can resume working on my Kawasaki project. Thing is running and riding, but I've been bad at updating. 

Spent the weekend in the gym, seeing my brother for a takeaway, and unfortunately studying up on regulatory codes for large scale solar installations. 

Looks like you're down to the last bits, and you've got a fully operational Aprilia Tuono for next to no investment. It's a lottery win for a biker!

Can't say I'm not jealous, but I bet half of people will be congratulating you through gritted teeth  

3 hours ago, Tiggie said:

Got to love my local butcher.....

 

I went in to ask on the off chance if he ever got any rabbit in. I've never actually had any and fancy trying some. He said he doesn't keep any in shop as there isn't enough demand. Can get me one easy enough but in his own words its expensive for what it is. £5 each.

 

I told him that sounds fine to me and to order me one. He said if I'd known you were happy to pay that for something that's running around freely in the fields I'd of charged you £10   

Every time I've had it, I've found the meat a bit bland, same with pheasant. But some people love the "gamey" taste. I'd season it well, and cook it with a sauce (few recipes online). That will probably get the most out of it. 

Possibly hypocritically, I've kept rabbits as pets a few times during my life so far, but I always justify it as they are very different from the farmed variety, which I assume are very different breeds. Not much of an excuse though

I was going to make a comment on this along the lines of feedback I'd give if I was the lead engineer, but it's easier to sum up this bike with the following.

"Design rejected - It appears to be off the shelf items put together, with multiple unknowns for their use in this application, and housed in bodywork that requires redesign"

It's a good effort, but the charge time could be 2-3 hours on a 230V mains supply without getting anywhere near stressing the battery. I'd have a fast and slow charge method, so that battery life can be extended through slow charging. I think the design was limited to the off the shelf inverter/charger they used, if like the monitor it's a Renogy model. Unclear whether those components are up to being used on the road, as they are more often found in motorhomes, and off grid structures. And that headlight cowl is just going to sap range through poor aero. 

I want to see one that has been ridden for a few months in all conditions, as I'm dubious on the IP rating of some bits...