Bianco2564

Went to a local co-op this afternoon for some milk, 3 people stood at the till, I go to the self serve, swipe, beep, pay, walk out, 3 people still stood at the till... Jus sayin'

Shop assistant probably thought " oh dear, thats the 4th one today stuck in the 1970s" Personally I like self service, very little queuing normally and you don't have to interact with anyone, just pay and go. Same with pay at the pump petrol stations, I hate going in the shop to pay, always someone buying chocolate, fags, milk, lottery.

Can you fit both sets, in a Lambretta stylee?

I think as the current generation grow up and EVs become more mainstream, they will be less exposed to different engine noises and therefore less interested in it. Probably be more interested in their ring tone, they couldn't tell a V-twin from a V12. Unless you are an enthusiast, a car or bike is just transport and there are more important reasons for owning that particular vehicle than the noise it makes. I like the sound many engines make, ones with slightly off beat pulses like a V10, x plane V8, I5 or triple really stand out. Exception I make is a flat 4, I think they sound cr@p. I do also like my 3.2 litre M3 straight 6 at 8000rpm and let's not forget two strokes, which are a bit marmite, that sound of a well set up bike on spannies hitting the power band.....

Personally I think all dogs should be on a lead in a public place. We had another incident with the grandkids, walking to the park, small dog, Jack Russel type appears around a corner of the path unleashed, shoots up to our 2 year old and sticks his snout into our boys face, happened so fast I didn't know if he had nipped him, scared the cr@p out of him.. Owner who saw what went on gave some feeble" he's normally good with children" excuse. We don't and have never owned a dog but have looked after three different ones. The Westie we mostly look after ,is always on a lead when we take him out and dont let him run up to anyone.

I was running across our local park a couple of years ago, very wide open space and there were a couple of women with 3 largish dogs running off the lead. I was a fair way from them heading in a different direction and this red setter came bounding towards me, not barking or aggressive but at the last second it jumped up at me , I hadn't slowed down and it bounced off my chest and he ended up sprawled across the floor. Got a half hearted "oh, sorry " from the owner. Another time, a dog was running free, couldn't see the owner and it ran up to me, jumped and sort of playful nipped my hand, owner who had appeared saw what happened and said "he's only a pup" ah so that's ok then? It's the sense of entitlement a % of dog owners have that their pets can roam freely when they are clearly not under control that annoys me.

Update on my car, changed both thermostats, one for engine coolant, other for egr cooler. Water temp now in normal range, heater works a treat and mpg has gone from 36mpg ave to 43mpg for the same journey. An improvement of almost 20%.

Nothing came up on yt?, even tried mototurismo if my spelling is correct.

Do you have a link to the race series so we can appreciate what your goal is?

A guy at work had a bike with a tennis ball tywrapped to his bars with the top 1/4 cut off and kept a damp sponge tucked in there. On the Kawasaki I used to keep a damp microfiber cloth rammed under the screen, when I stopped at a junction just whip the cloth out, wipe the visor and shove it back.

Similar thing in Rugby, test centre was opposite the town hall, had to ride a figure of 8 pattern around a couple of sides streets and onto a main rd, obligatory emergency stop when he jumped out on you,was probably doing no more than 20mph. After we sat on a park bench and ran through a few Highway code questions and Bob's your uncle, L plates ripped up. Didn't have any formal training prior to the test, just 12 mths riding on my SS50, then 6 mths on my GT250. Was learning to drive at the same time so no doubt that helped.

Passed bike test in Sept 1981 and car test Oct 1981. Cant remember how much the tests were but know a car driving lesson was a fiver, for context that was about 5 hrs pay.

Did some prep to the Kawasaki in readiness for sale, had the fairings and side panels off and gave it a good clean. Removed the heated grips that had stopped working and fitted new grips. Just need to give it a final clean and get the advert pics taken. Took it for a spin around the block, haven't riden a bike since the start of October, muscle memory must take over as it was like I rode it yesterday.

Got my renewal through from Bennetts for my 5 bikes, last year £336, this year with no change of circumstances, £492 a 47% increase. I'm selling the Kawasaki as ive stopped commuting on the bikes, so asked how much for R1,380,RGV & SS without commuting, came back at £332. Asked how much without the R1 as i dont intend to ride it this year and this was a reasonable £168.

The thermostat should control the engine temp irrespective of ambient temp, that's its job. If you have an infrared pyrometer (£10 off ebay), run the engine up from cold and measure the temp at the thermostat housing, should see it rise to 80-85degC or so, stat should then open and start to cool the engine, temp will drop as flow begins. Will take a while to stabilise, then as eng temp increases until the rad fan kicks in, probably somewhere near 100C. All the while, watch what the bike temp guage is doing. If the stat housing only reaches say 50C ,I'd say your thermostat is fubarred. Got this on my car currently, doesn't have a temp guage but I noticed the heater wasn't great, checked it out yesterday and its only reaching 50C after 5 miles of driving.

Don't know anything about the Blackbird in particular but would look at; Air filter Water temp sensor, from what I can see online its on the thermostat housing next to the guage sender. Does it get up to running temp ok, thermostat ok. MAP sensor as you have already suggested. Rubber piping around throttle bodies for perishing. Fuel filter. Fuel pressure. Throttle balance Does it have an eml at all, can you run a diagnostic check? What mpg are you getting, what sort of riding are you doing, town, long distance? Is the bike ok mechanically, tyre pressures, chain condition, brakes not dragging.

Once you have your new rectifier, before you hook up the battery, connect a multimeter with the dial on resistance, positive lead to battery positive (hot) lead and the negative probe to bike earth, if there are any other dead shorts it will show up as no resistance, buzzer will sound if you have that function on the meter. If it does, would be a case of systematically going around the bike disconnecting everything to find the culprit/s ,don't assume there may only be one fault. BTW, when connecting a battery, bolt the positive on first, reason is, if you connect negative first then accidentally ground a spanner when tightening the positive terminal, you'll have fireworks.

If the thread has pulled you need to helicoil it, just sticking it back in with sealant isn't a fix, if it falls out you will wreck the engine and most likely come off as the oil hits the back tyre. Helicoiling in situ is probably possible but its not for the inexperienced , if you don't drill and tap it square, the new sump plug will be on the wonk and won't seal or tighten up correctly.. Drilling and tapping into a crankcase will naturally risk sending some swarf inside, this can be limited by putting grease on the drill and tap. . The tag to wind the coil in, can be snapped off to the outside rather than snapping off inwards. A couple of oil changes afterwards should flush out any swarf that made it inside. Otherwise it's an engine out and dismantle to helicoil it. Like I say, its not a job to take on if you havent done it before, see if any local bike shops can help, old skool type shops are generally a bit more adept at this sort of repair than main dealers

That's a particularly poor illustration of the 4 stroke cycle, valve opening and closing not shown, no form of ignition and it implies only one valve sharing the inlet and exhaust ports.

I owned one when I was 18 in 1982 so very attached to mine. The noise and smell of them does take you back....

Good to see another 380. This is mine, owned since 1996.

I run the Kawasaki on e10 ,did try a couple of tanks of e5, it did seem to improve consumption very marginally maybe 1-2 mpg better,but offset this against the extra cost and I was worse off. Bike didn't run any better or worse. I put e5 in all the classic bikes as they sit around for long periods between runs and as said older plastics and rubbers dislike ethanol. My M3 is designed to run on super unleaded but will happily use e10 as it has knock control, however some in the M community will only put e5 in their cars fearing they will immediately grenade their engine if you put the devils fuel in, and it must be Shell or Tesco super whatever their preference is,nothing else will do.. Lots of tests have been done to show a marginal increase in power using e5 which if you were on a track and using every last hp then it's worth it, but for just trundling around on the road its a waste of money IMO. When you smash through a gallon in less that 30 miles every penny a litre adds up. I've had my M3 for 4.5 years ,done 19k miles almost exclusively on e10 and its been fine

Thought the RRP on the ZX4RR was around £8800?

Started the year buying a new bike ,the Kawasaki 250 ninja, use this only for work and done around 6000 miles on it. Said goodbye to the Silverwing scooter I'd owned for 4 years. Attended a biker workmates funeral on the R1 in April. Decided to garage the R1 this year and run the RGV. Got it mot'd in May and attended the Rugby and Daventry bike shows on it, also went to a couple of bike nights at a local pub and the Long Itch diner. Took it to work twice aswell, not an ideal commuter. To end the year I've had to stop riding and driving for 6 weeks due to an operation.

Just to add to this. 2 strokes can have valves, just different sorts. On the inlet it can be a reed valve or disc valve. This controls the inflow of air and fuel into the crankcase. The exhaust can have a movable valve to influence the port timing, different manufacturers have their own ideas. Yamaha famously the YPVS, a rotating barrel. Suzuki had one which had sliding blades as on my RGV. 2strokes can easily make much more power than an equivalant cc 4 stroke. My RGV250 makes around 60hp at 11500rpm, my Ninja 250 makes around 30hp at a similar speed. RGV can do this with quite radical port tuning only made ride able on the road with the inlet and exhaust valves and exhaust expansion chambers. Downside is it uses twice as much fuel to do this. And they burn expensive oil. And they wear out quicker.