Useful Bits of Kit for Motorcycle Touring

For the last 30+ years I have headed to the south of France for my " Col du something" fix with the odd excursion to Austria, Germany, Switzerland and Italy....

Basically "Col" means pass... a route over a high point.... Narrow roads..... shear drops..... wandering animals.... my kind of motorcycling heaven.... and not something like the Stelvio with its straight, hairpin, straight, hairpin format but the out of the way ones where the map looks like someones dropped spaghetti on it..... Anybody can hang to the throttle in a straight line but, personally, I find that boring....

Straight roads and motorways are just a means to get to where the real riding starts.

So.... Useful bits of kit....

The usual items.... spare bulbs, fuses, relays, leatherman, roll of electrical tape and tools relevant to the bike ie screw, torx, allen, other drivers/ sockets to remove fairing panels etc.

Laser 4929 1/4" Drive Swivel Head Ratchet (they do make a 3/8" version to)
http://lasertools.co.uk/item.aspx?cat=1287&item=5393

Love this little ratchet.... use it as a ratchet... use it as a "T" bar.... use it as a screwdriver... and its a lot stronger than it looks... couple of sockets, an extension to take driver "bits" and your sorted.

Electric air pump and a tyre plugger kit.....
Punctures are not optional for any wheeled vehicle and there is so much less stress if you know you have a good chance of getting moving again rather than siting by the roadside waiting for recovery.... or a friend to run the wheel to the nearest garage (a certain CBR600 owner might remember this).....

You did bring the tools to remove the wheel...... NO!..... Me neither as, these days, I get breakdown cover for anything that's not a quick fix...

Used the cylinders before but after buying a pump similar to this....

http://www.adventurebikewarehouse.com/MotoPressor-Tyre-Pump-Compact-Light-Weight

There's just no contest in usability.....

http://www.stopngo.com/pocket-tire-plugger-for-all-tubeless-tires/

Love my "plugger" no glue... no mess... and got a puncture in a 500 mile old tire that I used for another 10,000 miles before changing...

Still with the plug in.... and the only pressure loss was the usual odd pound over time/ standing and that always happens....

Check out this link for info on the gas cartridges and pressure loss.....

http://www.bikeforums.net/bicycle-mechanics/154847-co2-cartridge-info.html

One of these might me a more compact option for a "plugger" tool....
http://www.dynaplug.com/products.html

And the best pump choice seems to be this...
http://www.bestrestproducts.com/c-10-cyclepump-ez-gauge.aspx    

But make your own mind up on this and choose you own method.... cylinders or pump... but do carry a kit

Micro Start Jump start.....
http://www.zenoverland.com/electrical/antigravity-micro-start-pps-xp-1.html

This has been my best buy to date.... its SO damn flexible.... it has  19, 12 and 5 volt outlets so it will run your laptop...runs all your  12v camping lights etc... and anything USB powered .... how useful is that...

We are all used to the huge jump start boxes you see at the auto parts shop.....

So when this tiny 6x3x1 inch "thing" arrives my first thoughts were  "Yea Right..... No Way in Hell"  Well I re-watched the video and still thought the same.... but as I had been mug enough to buy it.... its time for a my "real world" test...

As I have an old Honda HRV.... (just for winter you understand...) I pulled of the battery earth lead and connected up the microstart...

10 TIMES it started the car and still had all FIVE lights showing.....

As this was all in the works car park one lunchtime, with several people watching,  a workmate says give it a go on my diesel Nissan pick up.....

Removed the earth lead again.. connected the microstart and started the pick up TWICE.... before the little unit dropped ONE light...

So that's 12 starts on the trot and it still had enough charge left to run my Asus N550 laptop for a couple of hours..... impressed.... Mega impressed and lets just say that one or three people watching went bought one....

There are now lots of cheaper versions/ copies of this unit about ,and at half the price, but my XP-1 has started a few cars and vans over the winter.... been used for a few camping holidays.... My neighbour borrowed it when he had  a charging problem on his Yam trike.... its been dropped a few times... and kicked across the floor once.... so bashed and trashed but still works like new....

And something you might not think off...

Pouches... The little rectangular rubberised case that comes with some Logitech mice etc or the zipper pouch from a cordless beard trimmer are well useful for carrying your tools about rather than "solid" plastic cases..

I keep all my driver bits, inc security type, in one pouch with the 1/4 drive ratchet n extension and the tire plugger stuff in another..... makes it much easier to fit a little nook on the bike to store it. Several little bags are far more flexible to pack than one large one.

Another little trick....
Memory Foam.....

On the Ulysses there is a small space either side of my seat catch mechanism, by the rear light.....

So I  got a, thick, scrap piece of memory foam from a local bed warehouse and cut it to a snug fit for each space...... in one I cut out the centre, from one end, to make a space for a headlight bulb, cutting off  a little square of the removed piece to make a "plug"... so the bulb is totally protected by the foam.... in the other, from the top, I cut out cubes (like in a camera case)  and stored spare fuses, other bulbs and a relay (the Buell has 4 but there all the same type).

This does work very well as they have been on the Buell for over three years now and are still protecting there contents....(Memory foam seems to work better than ordinary foam as just seems to last longer and does not break up/ go crumbly etc...)

RECOVERY INSURANCE
I have travelled without it.. but then again I was on a  Honda VFR750FJ... arguably the best all round bike ever built... it was certainly the most over engineered (the right hand centre stand bolt is a left hand thread) and Honda lost money on every one of these they sold.... sort of like the Bugatti Veyron of its day... shame it only had 100hp not 1000.... might have been more tricky to ride though on its skinny little tires...

But the Buell Ulysses is a different story..... not so much a case of if.... just when its going to break down.... still love it though... character by the bucket load...

So.... Travel/ Recovery insurance... used a few... been stung by some.... but since I was recommended these people....       https://www.eurorescue.co.uk/      I have always used them.

When my friends Aprilia broke down in the Dordonge they were brilliant and when it turned out that the locals did not have the right box of tricks to fix it... cars were arranged..both to carry on the holiday and get back to Calais and the car to get home from Dover, with the bike being shipped back a couple of weeks later. All simply done by phone and they called back at the times they said they would....

They even rung the ferry and altered the ticket details for him as he decided not to hotel it for the last night but just carry on homeward...

You never know whats going to happen and as YOU can always get home by one form of transport or the other... the BIKE is a different story.... So unless your on an old hack you don't mind walking away from.... get insurance...

And one VERY IMPORTANT last thing.....

Which is to do with walking away from a dead bike..... ALWAYS carry water and food (carry"sports" power bars myself)  so you can walk away to find help/ phone signal.. might be less important these days with all the new towns springing up everywhere.... but like meeting, head on, the only car you've seen on the tightest/ worse possible bend on that road the chances are you will have your problem at the remotest of places...

Gangsters in Dinner Suits

A very good friend of mine, once, coined the phrase "gangsters in dinner suits" during a conversation about the hierarchy of HA and who you should worry about more... The "face" that you see or the people behind the scenes who actually run it all.... probable a mute point though as upsetting either will end badly...

With all this facebook twittering going on lately about the election's lost and misprinted ballot forms I feel that the term more than applies to the present "system".

Were there more errors than with previous elections is the first question to ask and, I suppose, who gained the most from those lost/ spoilt papers is the second....

My days at the Corn Exchange in the early 80's brought me into contact with local council members regularly and it never ceased to amaze me how much info they left laying around after a meeting.... Rejected ideas/ plans in the waste bins and they rarely removed the used flip board pages.

I do remember some eye opening info about the Ipswich airport.... plans and strategies.... and even, once, a stack of files left on a meeting desk that had 316 Clapgate lane on it.... which is the house I grew up in...  So wanted to look but who knows if they were left there as a test or what the repercussions would have been if I was found reading them...

Did you know that Crown pools should have had a separate high diving pool at the back.... but funding "changed" (read that how you will) and it was not built.....

The really interesting bit is that one of the guys building the pools asked a councillor where the toilets were..... this was about two weeks before the official pools opening...... There wasn't any.... they were all in the high diving area...... which was not longer being build..... talk about headless chickens.....

Anyone who knows the pools knows then toilets are a bit oddly shaped..... that's because they were originally designed as storage rooms... The beer cellar ended up in the pump room... bit warm in there...

Anyway as to the title of the blog...

Is it, now, what you see you should be worried about.... for whoever appears to be running the country its only a guideline for a perceived direction... The underlying big brother (or should that be big business) strategy is far more dangerous to the freedom we think we have.

The people behind the scene, the advisers, those with "invested" interests or those who crave power are the ones you should worry about as while there's a profit to be made at someone elses expense then all is good but when the plan fails, or the countries broke, they will be the first to leave without so much  as a backward glance or care..... not my fault....

As we are so far down this line now all any government can do is rob Peter to pay Paul..... at every level....

If you go back to when the photo card part of the driving license was issued.... There was lots of noise about your driving licence being, and always will be, free...
               when they brought in the photo card.....
                                      that only lasted 10 years....
                                                         and then you pay for the renewal....
This was, so little, mentioned at the time that 10 years later there's a lot of people driving about without a valid card..... Que the governments usual comment... you should have know this...

And now were going to lose the "paper" part altogether... so the driving licence is no longer "free"....  something that's not mentioned at all now....

Car tax disc's.... people do have short memories but its always been the case that if the seller kept/ refunded the tax then the new owner had to tax back to the beginning of the month.... so that's months tax was paid twice....

Now its a mainstream event everybody going "hang on a minute"... Apparently the government has gotten really nasty on this one with instant fine letters going out for hundreds of pounds and a huge rise in clamping for , so called, untaxed vehicles..... even when the fault has been caused by the DVLA itself....

You're not telling me that they can send out an instant refund or fine and can't work out how to refund tax on a daily (not monthly) basis.... I can understand a monthly basis for the paper disc but as the new electronic system has a button refunds by month.... how hard can it be to refund by day..... after all its just a number.... x of 12 used or x of 365 used..... "she canne handle it capan....."

The statement that the money is used to pay for the speedy refund process... well how much does a cheque and postage actually cost the government... I would doubt if 2% of the new revenues total (read tax on tax) was used in the refund process

I will say, and stand by it, if everyone refused to pay car tax..... will they fine the lot of us... NO

Car tax has been become a tool to persuade people to buy new cars but ,hay, if you want to ride round in that old gas guzzler we'll charge you for it....

Stick the tax on fuel....the more miles you do, or the less mpg the vehicle does, the more you pay.... simples.... and you then don't need the staff who sort out the tax/ sorn etc so government jobs gone that don't affect services, hospitals and elderly care......

God this is turning into a rant......

So.....

VAT call it what it is... a blanket tax........   a state tax......

The government slimmed down the public sector staff recently and let go a lot of sorely needed staff... Why didn't they drop the VAT to, say, 8% and no one can claim it back....

And then you could have sacked most of the VAT staff that everybody hates anyway..... business's could sack the highly paid people who work out how not to pay tax.... the government has more money...everyone, effectively, has more money in the bank to spend..... its a win win scenario.... 

Never happen though as again the "gangsters in dinner suits" want more than you have...
                                           (and yes I have written that right)