GazW

So the north west rideout section seems a bit dead, it was certainly a lot more lively this time last year. Could do with something to look forward to so just as the weather should be getting a little milder, is anyone up for planning some rideouts? Don't mind avoiding motorways and going at a leisurely pace if any 125 riders want to get involved. I'm located near Bolton, a stones throw from Rivington barn (challenge 100 location last year)

If you can stretch to powder coating, I'd get that done. It's baked in an oven and becomes like a hard plastic coating. Much more durable.

Have you tried putting the seal on the piston a bit further down than where it would sit normally , then inserting the piston into the caliper body? You may find this will help as the inside circumference of the seal will be tensioned over the outside circumference of the piston.

Anything with an abundance of jalepenos and chilli sauce. It's all fun and games till the following morning.

Clean the caliper, piston, new rubber seals and refit. Fill with brake fluid, bleed them then your away. It's a job that should be done periodically, your unfortunate that it's fallen on you, but for the price of a it of brake fluid and a seal kit your done. If there's no warranty and you've bought sold as seen there's not a lot you can do.

What bike are you attempting your test on? If it's a 125, try and carry more corner speed into the swerve and emergency stop, it's notoriously hard to get up to speed if you are going too slow by the time you get out of the bend. As for the slow speed stuff, control it on your back brake, you'll get the engine speed higher, be less likely to stall, but be able to maintain much better control of your speed.

I'd start simple and replace the flasher relay, if that doesn't cure it then I would start looking elsewhere.

Pictures might help. As would the occasional full stop.

'97 cg125 R54 HNA I was 17 so it was only 8 years ago.

The BT45's are horrific. I've heard people rave about them, mine squared off, I used to spin the rear in the wet and they were never confidence inspiring in the dry.. It's crazy to think that the whole feel of a multi thousand pound machine can be ruined by saving a few £'s on tyres.

It's only the late gen 2 that had twin discs, 2007 onwards. You'll find tyre choice a b******, you can only get cross ply tyres and not radial for the standard kwak wheel sizes on both generation of wheels. Limits tyre choice drastically, I didn't get on with the Bridgestone bt45's either, wore very unevenly and used to spin up in the wet whilest being gentle with the throttle.. Eventually settled on Dunlop arrowmax's.. Other link viewtopic.php?f=27&t=43244

I was always struggled to come up with a screen name, I'm not for having gaz1879658 or whatever obscure number comes up as an offer of Gaz not being available. So yeah, August Burns Red are a band, I saw them before they had a real following in the uk, in some dingy venue In Manchester called the road house, it's tiny and normally used for amateur bands. There must have been around a hundred people there, I'm a huge fan of intimate gigs, and this was the best of the lot of them. It was like seeing a band in a pub aside from I had two of their albums at home. Some people may recognise the band name, but most just see a random jumble of words. The name itself gives me images of a summers evening with the whole sky lit up red, which is probably the best ending to a day I can imagine. When I had my bike I was all for riding to obscure places and admiring scenery and just watching the world go by. So yeah it's kind of two fold.

Have a look on ex500.com, there's a guy on there who used to run a team who raced these things, if you google fog's airbox mod there's meant to be a hole you can drill in the airbox that increases performance. I think he's basically saying gpz's are choked up on standard jetting. I never did it to mine, I couldn't tell you if it works or not, it will make for an interesting read if nothing else. Here you go http://www.ex-500.com/wiki/index.php?ti ... Airbox_Mod

I work in a restaraunt, a guy tried to sue us because he fell over, drunk, in the snow. Even though we gritted and he decided to venture off the gritted path, into said snow and fall flat on his arse. It's our fault apparently.

It's terrible what's happened and my thoughts go out to the family of the soldier.. Here's my two penny's Woolwich barracks was the old Royal Artillery HQ, I know it's now inhabited by the kings troop royal horse artillery (ceremonial duties, not an actual combat battalion) and the soldier killed has been named as a drummer, he won't have seen a tour or killed anyone. I'm currently waiting out a 12 month medical deferral for a broken bone, I had an intake date available and when the bone is healed (fully) I will be able to bypass the army selection, and take up from where I left off, as ADSC selection grade lasts 2 years. My brother in law is a signaller, my best friend is in 2 lancs and currently deployed in Afghanistan, as much as they aren't fighting for a country where things like this can happen, they most definatley aren't fighting for some of the racist imbeciles that seem to have taken this as an opportunity to vent their venom towards Muslims across social networking sites over the past 30 or so hours. The murderer who was ranting on the footage broadcast on the news, used the term 'women have to see this in our countries' followed by 'bring our troops home' he was British through and through. I am not, and I speak for my aforementioned friends and family here, joining up and fighting for this country or for David Cameron, or Tony Blair. I am joining the army because the military offers a great career with amazing prospects, lots of financial benifits, a chance to travel and see the world and a chance to make a bunch of friends that will become like brothers, I know how my friend in the duke of Lancasters regiment speaks of his friends he has made. I guarantee you that's the only thing he cares about over there, none of this crap. Keeping himself and his friends safe. He is fighting in a situation where he can't actively engage the enemy, they can only be enagaged when they are fired upon. I've seen both extremes of the argument over the past few days, and our lads aren't slaughtering afghani nationals (it's a counter insurgency, we aren't even at war with Afghanistan, we are fighting the Taliban and trying to remove them from Afghanistan) and the actions of two idiotic British nationals, albeit with a few jihadist statements thrown in should not instigate religious hatred. Islam is a peaceful religion by principle and anyone claiming slaughter in the name of Allah is dillusional and acting in the name of a religion they aren't following the ideals to. I don't mean to patronise anyone on here, I know your all intelligent individuals, I just feel like venting about the idiotic EDL and mosque attacks in retaliation. I have deleted several people I held in reasonable regard, and considered to be intelligent people since this has happened for their racist and bigoted remarks. May I finish by saying no good ever came from a sentence started 'I'm not racist, but.....'

Cam chain tensioner is probably seized.. Its self adjusting but after 45k it could very well have seized. That would be my first point of call, if I remember correctly from when I had one it's between the downpipes. It would explain your lack of power if your cams are out then your valves are opening and closing at the wrong time so your engine isn't working efficiently. For future reference mechanical issues are normally posted in the pitstop area of the forum

And http://bit.ly/ZT2ttW

Right, confused as anything here, what did you change when this problem started? Or did it just start? What gasket are you on about? There's no gasket anywhere near the carb on a CG, the intake is directly jubilee clipped to the airbox (the fat side on the picture) and the side with the rubber o-ring meets the inlet manifold.. (Second picture) the manifold should be bolted straight onto the cylinder head.. I would put a lot of money on your homemade gasket being the problem seeing as how it has no place at any point between the airbox and the cylinder. Where are you located? Someone local might be able to help, although I would at least buy a second hand carb from a breakers before selling the bike..

Hit a pheasant, I was taking my sister on the back for the first time so I was going steady.. There's a back road that goes from Rivington to Chorley I was coming from Chorley.. It's the one that goes from the mini roundabout just before the lock and quay near Botany Bay, past "view point" and comes out on the road near the blue lagoon for anyone who knows the area, what with Rivington barn being a big biker hangout some of you may know it. Anyway, there's a long winding uphill section, then a small chicane type corner, then the road rises towards a small crest, with a little tummy turning drop on the crest (if your going quick enough, which I wasn't; see earlier statement about sibling on pillion) as I come over the crest of this hill I see a massive fat gormless pheasant flying directly across my path. The thing came from my left hand side and hit my right hand shoulder, hard impact considering my speed. It hurt like hell, I pulled over with the intention of putting the thing out its misery if needed be (my grandads a farmer, it gets forced into you from an early age, by early age I mean being forced to shoot my rabbit at 10 years old because it had an abcess bigger than its head, numerous other pets have recieved the same treatment because a shotgun cartridge is a hell of a lot cheaper than a vet) and the thing had vanished.. No sign of it.. It was obviously a 'hard' pheasant. I hope it didnt suffer, and went back home with its story's of how it got in a fight with a human and won, impressed all the females and lived its days out as a stud. Didnt half hurt though, massive bruise on my shoulder for about three weeks after that, all kinds of purple. Ohh and there was that time I felt something hit my neck, about 5 minutes later and no other signs it had all but vanished to the back of my mind and I'm in Halfords looking at bulbs, I hear the unmistakable buzzing of a wasp. Too close for comfort, I start flapping and dancing about like I'm on some combination of mind bending drugs whilest simultaneously being wired up to the mains. Then I feel a sharp stinging sensation right under my chin in the soft spot of skin at the join of my jaw and throat.. Turns out the wasp had got tangled up in my buff neckwarmer, decided revenge was in fact a dish best served cold, and decided making me flail around like a pillock, and squeal like a girl on a Saturday afternoon in full view of the general public, in a Halfords that was busier than any other time I've ever experienced was the best course of action. Touché wasp, pain and embarrasment all in one go, the battle was won, but when I saw the little bast*rd fall to the ground and quickly ended its existence with a size 10, I won the war.

When I was a carpet fitting apprentice one of the lads I had to go on site with would text and drive. Got to the point I refused to work with him. It was the most frightened I've ever been by someone's driving skills (or lack of them) sure Ive had idiots pull out on me, but this was prolonged and on a motorway, he used to laugh when confronted about it.

The adult in me would buy a decent sized house, with a largeish plot of land out the way somewhere, with an even more decent garage. Fullll set of snap-on everything's and have bits of bikes everywhere. Proper mig welding set up, presses, bench drills, lathes the lot. The kid in me would build a half pipe in the back garden and skate the crap out of it. An excavator and a fleet of crossers, enduros, quads and buggies like those ones they had on top gear with a CBR engine in.

And that's my point, I have never been aware of a bike where that should be the case. So should the exhaust come off to adjust the chain tension? You need access to the nut for that. Seems like a pretty bad design flaw, a routine job like adjusting the chain, which would take 5 minutes, is turned into a 45 minute job by removing the exhaust every time. I'd say its more likely the op's friend had neither the correct tools or know how to take the wheel off, hence the advice not to let him near it again. Op the exhaust gasket goes in the opening on the barrel, check the old gasket is out first, then the exhaust goes against the gasket, if you look at the end of the exhaust it will have a collar on it. The collets then go against the collar, with the split either side of the exhaust bolts, then the flange on top. You'll wish you had three hands. You'll see when you start the bike if you've done it right, no exhaust fumes should leak from the exhaust.

I think the exhausts on cheap 125's will all be one piece, like on the CG. Even if they did take the silencer off why would they have lost the flange that fixes the exhaust to the cylinder head? My CG was tight but I found a ring spanner would slip on the wheel axle nut. Then I could tighten it from the other side, and nip the final bit up.

You still shouldn't have to take the exhaust off to take the rear wheel off. The swinging arm, and therefore the rear wheel moves with the suspension, and the exhaust is fixed to the bike. The general movement of the suspension would snap your exhaust clean off, if it were attached to the rear wheel/swinging arm in anyway. I seriously suggest not letting people who think the exhaust has to come off to take the rear wheel off near your bike again.

Why did they lose parts off the exhaust trying to change a flat tyre? Anyway, gasket-exhaust-collets-flange-studs.