megaross

Yeah those mirrors scream "I like wearing ladies underwear and dancing to aswad in the mirror, don't tell my wife" I think you should swap them mate, before the wife finds out

Not far off, always good banter though. Finally got the gaskets done today, and I only cut myself on the Stanley blade 3 times. Do I get a sticker?

Got one of the old knackered clutch cables on there to get me by, and a spare in the topbox with them tools to swap. Hopefully venhill sort me out, had to dismantle my printer to clean to print head so I could print the label. It's not really going my way this week, told work "f**k this, I'm off" about 3 o'clock. They already pissed me off adding me to a 3 hour meeting I did not need to be in but with clients so I couldn't tell them to piss off and put it in an email like I normally would. Had every other job piled on me by my mum and all today "Can you fix these computer speakers, oh can you look at this drill charger, I got them free off gumtree" there's a reason they're free, they're f**ked, not particularly valuable and not worth fixing. But obviously it's my mum so I'm not allowed to say no. Must find strength to visit my Nan and crawl to the local for a very well needed pint(s). Can bore the landlord with my incessant bitching and have the old boys give the old "You're lucky! Back in my day we went on to the production line, got beaten savagely, burnt, poisoned and sworn at for 37 hours a day. IF WE WERE LUCKY"

Got on my bike last night, I pulled the clutch lever and snap... Venhill cable less than 6 months old, though I imagine it's a blip, I'll see if they replace it. More annoying was I had to get to a hospital appointment I've been waiting months for so it was a mad dash to get a taxi and arrive looking like a total mess. The kind of thing that missing it or risking it being late was not an option, sods law. Funnily enough the last few rides the clutch cable loosened loads and earlier in the day I thought "Is it snapping? No, can't be, it's nearly new. Imagine if it went on the way to the hospital later? Ha" So the job for today is throw the old stretched one on it temporarily and give venhill a bell. Also got to replace the gaskets I tore when I inspected my shift linkage the other day.

Because most people work from home these days as a result of dinosaurs updating their ways after covid forced the change. I did before covid to be fair, I do now - office is a boiling hot shithole with piss coffee full of noisy ***** who just sit there nattering while I'm trying to work, and people with no proper social life. But I digress... I rather like these vests they're meant to be the bollocks in an off. But the reality is I wouldn't wear one every ride, if your rides are exclusively for pleasure then I reckon it's a sound bet. If like me you use your bike for everything you aren't going to piss about with a vest realistically. I'd like one I could retrofit to my jacket (or that came as part of a decent leather jacket) and that works on gyro rather than pullcord.

Love new parts, love freebies more. Used to be into computers years ago and one of the parts suppliers used to send 10p bags of haribo with the order. It was the best. I mean it's a 10p bag of sweets but I have child brain, see them and go "ooh sweeties!" The amount of lanyards, pens and mugs I've had from dealers over the years for free, never even bought through a dealer. Not to mention the amount of White Dalton neck tubes I've got from the stall at bike events. And the handful of pens I nick from the MOT place every year that keeps me in stationary for work.

Yeah for battery terminals and the like those cheap eBay boys do the business. Obviously too big for normal wiring but for making big f**k off chonk cables to upgrade wiring they're brilliant.

Seems legit

Fair enough, be a job for crimp your own then I imagine. Worth keeping on the todo list mind

The way you generally torque bolts on those is you get the inch and a half ugga dugga, the type fanny craddock used to keep for Saturday nights with Johnny. And you put it on the swingarm bolt, lifting the bike as you do so. You then spin the bike rapidly until it F**ks off into the heart of the sun never to be seen again, and go buy something worth putting time and money into.

I use cheap ratchet crimpers with interchangeable jaws (and hydraulic crimpers for battery terminals, to be a technical dick) with unsheathed crimps, I then solder and heatshrink the connector and smear in a bit of dielectric grease for good measure. Unless of course waterproofing is required, in which case I use either the crimp and slide type you pick up from electronics suppliers or else straight solder and shrink johnny if I don't care about the disconnect.

£700 on lines? Try £100 for a set of venhills, if that. Single most significant upgrade you can do for brakes - you could spend £1000 on the latest discs, pads and butler to squeeze the lever and barely notice but replace old rubber lines with braided and my f**k will you ever notice. Make sure you get the brass beard maker on that mating surface btw. And clean your shorts young man, do 15 situps, stop giving me the finger etc.

Just curious what you mean by this? If your fluid is low it's usually going to mean your pads are low - pistons further out = fluid sat further down the system. It's pretty rare fluid leaks without you noticing immediately that there's something wrong. If it's +2 years old then it's due changing anyway, fit the new discs and pads first though. That's where the level at max should be. Discs is always a pricy one. Not worth skimping though. Anything worth fitting will set you back a hazy weekend in Amsterdam if not a week in a four star all inclusive. Worth considering if you don't already have braided lines whether the rubbers are due replacement - 5 years is about what you get from a rubber line before they start degrading and most manuals specify them as a service item based on time. Usually your disc change is a good time to inspect and evaluate your brake system and whether anything else is getting worn out.

Season never ends for me, I'll be riding all winter - always have done. Though this is the first year we've done camping on bikes to extend the riding. Only got in a couple of bigger ones mind - Brecons and Elan Valley to Devils Bridge stopping for a camp in Penrhiw (highly recommended) and back up then Elan Valley/ through north wales. Then last month Yorkshire dales with an overnight and very hungry camp in the north after discovering the place I thought was a pub was a hotel that stopped serving food before we arrived (though thankfully they let us have a lot of beer and crisps, though in hindsight 7 pints in under 2 hours was a mistake ). Back down through the north york moors with a stop in Yorkshire. That was a couple of hard 12 hour days in the saddle on windy b roads taking in spectacular views, took my arse 3 days to recover. Great ride though, such good roads up there. The rest of the (for pleasure) rides have been 150-200 mile Saturday/Sunday bimbles round the Cotswolds or through wales, or down the south coast. Stopping off at scenic points to drink coffee and chill or check out weird and wonderful museums. Probably going to go down to Dartmoor next month, I enjoy a winter camp anyway. Just sling the trekking sack on the bike, go exploring, park up and I'll go find somewhere to go kip down and eat beans. Don't see why not really.

Trouble with means testing is it relies on the assumption that wealthy parents are better parents. Which isn't really universally true - crazy how many entitled fucktard children there are about these days. The big issue is that we live in a country that once had a welfare state to be proud of and it worked well, for a time. It helped provide social mobility and lessen the wealth divide. Then over generations funding has been cut, twats who spend their lives in meetings instead of just getting stuff done started complicating hierachies and introducing stupid rules. And we're now in the position where social care can't cope, the school system is doubly hit because they've no money and increasing numbers of mouth breathing ar*ehole children because the social has failed, the short numbered police are wasting time rounding up a bunch of fuckhead teenagers dealing coke and nicking bikes because the children turn into criminal scum. Constant wage erosion, increasing wealth divide, crumbling roads with our kerplunk economy being held up by false promises by the 15th prime minister they've elected. I can't help but feel the solution is not to start means testing parents but sorting out the w**kers in parliament that let it happen. I'm not saying we should start hanging political leaders from lamp posts but if a certain group began to hang these corrupt greedy bast*rds - would it really be the worst thing? Accountability is a wonderful thing. Just saying. Anyway. Teaching really isn't in the dark ages these days - TA's, special needs support, technology utilisation and all the new methods that come with it. The problem is school governance is in the dark ages, the schools are made to reach artificial standards by some chin jiggling etonite cock juggler who has never set foot in a classroom, do that or they lose a chunk of funding or go into special measures. Anyway, what I'm saying is we're all going to die one day so hop on your bike and go get a coffee and a fry up. f**k this

To be honest the issue predates covid by all accounts but that's in a school in a poor area so I would imagine the occurrence of kids f**ked up by their parents before they've had a chance is much higher. I reckon this is just the slow decline of a civilisation, end of an era that frankly never was great - alright or shit is about what we can do. Watch it burn and toast marshmallows on the flames, very tasty.

To quote Agatha Trunchbull, who, to my mind represents the gold standard of quality teaching. "The apple never rots far from the tree"

I tell you what would develop early skills, parents could stop hooking them up to an iPad at age 3 and spend some time with them helping the kid naturally learn stuff. Before I started school my gramp had taught me all sorts, when other kids were reading those small picture books they give to children I was like "Can I not just read this Roald Dahl book I brought in?" I've got a few mates who teach primary and they're all saying the same thing - kids coming into their class who have the language skill of a baby, kids who aren't even toilet trained, parents blaming the teachers because their kid is a dickhead etc.

Found the problem There any flashing lights that show the button press is being registered on the fob? Seems suspect one button works but the other doesn't and suspicion therefore points at the fob. You got a spare?

Most blokes wives all wish they had a bigger chopper but yeah, 3 hours is enough for anyone. Serious note, v85tt is actually a nice bit of kit in my opinion. Test one out first, not for everyone. I wouldn't touch a Chinese bike with a barge pole - One they're crap quality, it's built down to a price and the knowledge for repairs is limited at best. Two? depreciation. You'll take a mammoth hit in depreciation if you buy new so your losses are huge. If you buy on pcp your monthly payments will be more because depreciation is so high. If you buy used Chinese you're buying a bike built to a price a few years down the line when it's had a chance to rust and decay. Three? Never seen a comparison in any reputable bike publication side with the chinese option on test. They're not as shit as they were but they're still a shit proposition. If I was buying a long distance adventure style two up tourer I'd be looking at a last gen multistrada, personally.

If my mum bought me a wera toolkit I'd be over the moon, wera gear is nice. I've had a great time abusing their screwdrivers over the past 12 years, no flatheads left but my phillips, torx and allen ones are all spot on. My underseat toolkit is a mix of cheap soy sauce brand crap and random old tools I had a few of all wrapped in a chunk of an old canvas bag and tied up with a chunk of an old leather belt I had in the scrap bin. The usual - sockets/ ratchet 8-13, extension, mole grips, needly nozzers, allen keys, phillips screwdriver (thanks phillip), fuses, wire, bailing wire, zip ties, rohypnol, electrical tape. Plus my aforementioned tyre repair supplies. In 7-8 years I've only needed tools at the roadside maybe 4 times total. Invaluable having them when you do I think that's the thing about bike toolkits - it might be all nice to buy a nice little oxford pouch full of crap you'll never use. But you're best off having one you put together that has just what you need. Even better if the sack is cobbled out of stuff the missus told you that you were never going to use.

I can't speak from experience as I do all my own work, couldn't afford to hire trades if I wanted and I don't trust them not to balls it up anyway. Whenever I've done work for mates I insist on buying materials or send them what to get/ from where. The trouble with letting average joe source materials is he'll go to B&Q where a lot of stuff is overpriced and crap quality. And the job then takes twice as long and looks half as good (can't polish a turd) and costs them more. Anyway "Materials up front" seems suspicious because most trades will have accounts with suppliers. Interim payments not uncommon for big jobs but up front seems odd and you'd be right to question that - it may be what you're having done has a material shortage and the guy has other large jobs on account so ordering well in advance without payment is a problem. But also they could be a cowboy unable to give you an answer. If the guy says no to you sourcing materials I completely understand.

That's not a bad little shout, quite like the idea of building a bike dolly that pivots. Mind you, cost of ply these days I might as well go without and go stay at a five star greek hotel for 2 weeks.

Another for goretex military overproofs, get the ones that have side zips so they go on over boots. I ride year round in a 7 year old richa leather jacket and rev'it axis overtrousers. Only additions are a jumper if it's cold or waterproof overs if it's pissing down. Cheap and highly effective, like white ace. Tools constantly in use when I'm working on bikes - magnetic parts tray, T handle 6 and 5mm allen keys, T handle 8/10,12/13mm 6 siders, oxford english dictionary (dirty words mostly) In terms of gear to carry get a worm kit and one of those airman bike inflators to keep under the seat. That's the difference between a 5 minute repair and 4 hours waiting for the AA wondering if you should move your bike away from the front of that porn and sex toy warehouse you just visited. For motocamping? Tarp, tarp tarp tarp. Tie to bike, tie to tent. Oh look a nice shelter to sit under drinking tea while it pisses with rain Also worth carrying a little towel if you've got a topbox - dry your helmet before you put it in there and wet weather riding becomes much less a ballache. No one likes a soggy lid. I just have a 50p teatowel

I can't speak for aprilia but triumph did me one off the VIN. But I did need the V5C The dealer claimed they couldn't, I'd heard rumblings so I rang the head office and they confirmed they could do it so I asked the dealer again so they found out how and eventually after about 6 weeks I got a new key for £30 odd. Worth asking