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August 15, 2014
Motorcycle Maintenance Issues
Motorcycle maintenance on the road:
Maintenance before I left home:
Before I left home, I put 2 new ties on the bike, changed the oil and filter. Bled the rear brakes. Tightened the steering-head bearings (to eliminate the head-shake at 50 mph). Put a new rear view mirror on the bike.
At the east side of Glacier National Park, my battery began to fail. I replaced it with a battery from Wal-Mart in Prince George, B.C. Poured the electrolytes into it in my motel room and charged it over night with a trickle charger. Also replaced my cigarette lighter adapter, as I melted my old one on the heater in the Yoho National Forest. Picked up a new one at the same Wal-Mart. This allows me to run multiple devices off of the alternator, like USB cables to charge the Garmin Montana 600, the iPhone, and the GoPro.
When I first rolled into Fairbanks, Alaska, I replaced both tires, as they were street tires, smooth, and showing the wear bands after 5,000 miles of hard riding. (The ALCAN Highway EATS tires.)
Then, I drove from Fairbanks, to Deadhorse, AK, to Fairbanks, to Anchorage, and then back to Fairbanks.At this point, I replaced chain & sprockets, rear brakes, changed oil, replaced air filter...all at the KTM shop in Fairbanks.
Eventually, I realized that one problem I was experiencing was related to my kick stand. Sam pointed this out to m. (Many thanks, Sam!) The bike is designed not to run if the kickstand is not up. So, in theory, this makes sense. In practice, not so much. There is no "kickstand light" on the instrument cluster, to my knowledge. So, all you know is that the bike is "on", and should start up, but it won't turn over. Or do anything at all. So, pushing the starter does nothing. Unless it's in neutral. Then, it will start, but die as soon as you put it in gear. This is very confusing if you're on the road, and say...the kick stand is about 1mm from being all the way "up". So, thanks to Sam for pointing this out. Whenever I experienced this, I'd just kick the kickstand up a little harder, and ride on.
I blew a front tire on the Sea-to-Sky Highway. This was a harrowing experience. Something that's never happened to me in 30 years of riding. The guy at the KAL Tire store said that it "rubbed a hole in the tube". His assertion was that a grain of sand was left inside the tire, with the tube. It had to be something like this, because the tire was not punctured, and still has plenty of tread on it. Have never heard of this happening before.
Posted by Rob Kiser on August 15, 2014 at 10:57 AM
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