Mississippi Bullfrog

Did you charge the new battery before fitting it?

I have always been wary of protected no claims - my experience was that they protected the no claim discount but increased the premium after a no fault claim. So in effect the amount I paid still went up by the same amount as if I'd lost a year's NCD. Just another con for the unwary. But if you lose 5 years no claims it would go up and you wouldn't have any discount They usually drop a year per claim rather than the whole NCD. At least when I've had to claim that's been the case - that's with cars rather than bikes as so far I've never claimed on bike insurance. What I hadn't bargained on was that I still kept my NCD in terms of percentage, but after the premium had been hiked I still ended up paying more for my insurance. So paying the extra for protected NCD plus the extra premium outweighed what I would have saved by keeping one year's NCD in the long run.

Probably less if you have protected no claims as they don't take it all off you. Sometimes they take nothing on a first claim sometimes up to 3 years it depends on the policy. I have always been wary of protected no claims - my experience was that they protected the no claim discount but increased the premium after a no fault claim. So in effect the amount I paid still went up by the same amount as if I'd lost a year's NCD. Just another con for the unwary.

How far is your commute?

One thing to be wary of it how companies count their maximum NCD. I switched insurers taking 10+ years no claims with me. A couple of years later I switched again, still claiming 10+ years NCD. Unfortunately I hadn't spotted that the company I'd first switched to counted their max NCD as 5 years, so the second time I switched the new insurers only gave me 5 years NCD as that was what was showing on the last renewal. Losing 5+ years NCD simply by switching insurers did not make me happy.

Ring stuff is crap so I wouldn't draw any conclusions from those bulbs failing. Most likely due to vibration.

But we are all looking forward to summer What month is that please Summer will occur on 12th June between 14.03 and 14.05 hours this year.

I think we're probably talking about slightly different things. Toyota focused on their production protocols, Sony were taking a wider perspective on how Japanese products were seen in a global perspective. Their objective was to transform the global image of Japanese products. That's the aspect peculiar to them.

Are you getting these quotes via an internet source or have you gone into a brokers and spoken face to face with someone?

Is it things like lack of secure storage that's pushing the basic premium up so high?

You're talking about Toyoda I presume. It was a bit more than wanting to "be the best", they created a whole manufacturing quality methodology around it -TPS. Something Chinese manufacturing haven't really bothered with much yet. Fun fact: in the 90s when they were floundering, Toyota gave Porche full access their facilities and knowledge because they didn't consider Porsche any sort of rival in terms of quality or manufacturing. Porsche pinched TPS methods (lean, 6 sigma etc.) and German Technik was born. The seed of the philosophy actually began with Sony. Other Japanese manufacturers, Toyota included, picked it up and made it work. I have had two Toyotas and they were brilliant cars. Both were versions of the Yaris made in Japan and France. Same part, same engines, same everything. But you tell the difference between a Japanese built car and a French one instantly.

I'd avoid the eBay cheapo one. Knowing how they can fail I wouldn't go for a used one unless it was less than 25% the cost of a new one. Hope you can get back on the road soon.

Back in the 50's everyone regarded Japanese stuff in much the same way as they view Chinese stuff today. Japanese = cheap and shoddy. An aspiring electronics company set themselves the target of making the world see Japanese made products as the world leader. That was their single objective. So for sheer balls without whom the Japanese motorcycle manufacturers would have got nowhere I'd give Sony a mention.

That sounds ok, but check that the voltage doesn't keep going up at higher rpm. Hopefully just a dud bulb.

Yes. The last one that went for me worked fine all morning. Then middle of the afternoon - totally dead. No warning at all.

Several manufacturers of chargers for bikes do remote connection leads with LEDs that tell you exactly how much the battery is charged. I have the CTEK ones on both bikes and fitted to my spare battery. If the bike is just run to charge the battery it will flash green for about a week before dropping to the yellow light. It still starts fine when on yellow. You don't need the battery to be 100% charged to start the engine. If I use a charger the battery will stay green for a month before dropping to yellow. Glad it's sorted but still worth getting yourself a charger to maintain your battery for longer life.

I keep looking at a lift table, I'm getting too old to be crawling about on the floor. But they aren't cheap!

I understand the advice on battery tenders / chargers, but why won't the bike's own charging system fully charge the battery ? My understanding is that most bike's charging systems have a fairly large spare capacity. It's to do with how they are regulated. Ye olde dynamo charging systems would fully charge a flat battery but modern systems don't. They whack in a healthy charge more quickly but then tail off before the battery is at max charge. In the days when you could get into batteries I used to measure the specific gravity of the electrolyte to determine the state of charge and most healthy batteries were rarely above 70% of full capacity. They still worked ok. But if a battery is totally flattened it's good practice to bring it back to max charge using a charger. The bike's system will then maintain it at a higher level of charge than just running the engine to put some charge into it. Looked after properly they last longer. My car battery is 20 years old which isn't too shabby.

With a lot of sound dubbing going on. Either that or the Ferrari handles in a manner that explains Vettel's driving last year. I suspect it was a Ford Fiesta filmed that.

Bear in mind that if you jump start it and ride it for quite a long way it will only partially recharge the battery. Modern charging systems do not fully recharge flat batteries. So it's worth investing in a decent charger suitable for bike batteries, ie one capable of charging at low amps. A car battery charger is too powerful to use on bike batteries regularly.

Why not try charging it first? You need a charger anyway so worth trying that and if the battery takes a charge you're sorted. It's possibly only flat due to lack of use then repeated starts without going anywhere.

A flat battery can still show 12+volts. Just because the voltage is showing as 12v doesn't mean it's holding any charge. Have you had the battery on charge?

Your battery is flat. The clicking noise is the solenoid.

It would be worth giving the DVLA a call to ask how you register that a stolen bike that isn't recovered and that you are not going through insurance for can be taken out of your name. There must be a way, but as you say neither their website or the V5 make it clear.

I think that's good advice. And really sorry to hear of what you're going through. That's a grim experience. But given the excess and the likely value of the bike from the insurers you would probably be better off in the long run to not make an insurance claim. I've had to deal with two incidents this year without involving the insurance because in the long run it just wasn't worth it. Neither our fault - which makes it even more annoying. One bit to add though - has the bike been recovered? If you've got the bike back then you can scrap it and pass the V5 to the scrap company that destroys the bike. That way the link between you and the bike is terminated. But if it is still out there just be careful that if it is still on your insurance or registered in your name and someone riding it has an accident it can come back to haunt you. As said above, report the theft to the police and keep a record of that report. But the bit I would check on is what you do with the V5 if you don't make an insurance claim (ie the V5 doesn't go to the insurers) and you can't scrap the bike (ie you can't process the V5 as the bike being dismantled). You don't want a V5 in your name for a bike you no longer have.