Motors Motorcycle Mayhem

think the forum might have had a oopsie, my reply to krikkit seem to happen before he post

 

How queer, I'm sure I posted it as I copied it over to another forum after.
Well in that case, and subscribing to William of Ockham's philosophy, I can only assume and must accept I was just stupid and didn't press 'post reply'

 

That was me pushing "post reply" too soon, realising my mistake and deleting it without refreshing the thread

 

ahhh gotcha

 

Oh well, keeps me out of trouble
PXL_20240526_120314050-EDIT by MrLongbeard, on Flickr

 

I'd thought about using an Apple Airtag as a tracker on my Bike but now that I've had a look I'm struggling to find a non-obvious place to put it. Getting deep inside the underseat area means removing a substantial amount of wiring as well as the tank and a plastic cover plate that requires a lot of things to be unbolted before I can remove it and is something I'm reluctant to do.

I'm now thinking of taping an Airtag under the seat or maybe in the Top Box as an obvious one to find and then another inside the airbox although I haven't removed the lid yet to see whether that's practical. One of the Airtags is in a waterproof enclosure. The batteries would need to be replaced after around 10-12 months. I did think of hiding one in the toolkit box spanner (kept under the seat) but apart from being relatively easy to find I thought the tools might provide a Faraday cage effect and block the signal.

I've normally put one in one of the rear covers but the previous owner stripped the threads and although I've tapped them the rear rack uses the bolts to hold it in place and I don't want to tempt fate by taking them out again.

Can anyone come up with suggestions for alternative locations?

 

Not a great idea, how long does a non associated tag have to travel with you before it sends you a stalker warning? because that's how long it'll take the thieving scum bag to find out there is one present

 

Not just that, but Airtags don't have any kind of independent data transmission - they rely on nearby Apple devices (any devices, no matter who owns it) to send their location signal back to Apple. That works fine in more built-up areas where there are plenty of Apple devices within range, but out in the sticks it's far less useful - all you'd see is the last known position.

Personally I'd say it's a question of how much you'd want to get the bike back if it was nicked. If it's worth that much to you, financially or sentimentally, it's worth investing in a "proper" tracker that can transmit its location without the aid of a nearby iPhone.

 

I did look at tracking systems a couple of years ago when I was planning on buying a new bike but after I'd bought the used KTM and had the cancer diagnosis I put everything on hold so I'm not up to date on them but all the decent ones had a subscription and would have been well worth paying for the bike I intended buying.

I'm still not using the KTM much as I seem to either be developing problems possibly related to the Chemo and Radiotherapy or maybe just coincidence but both hips and elbows are causing serious problems with pain and movement and something 'popped' in my knee a few weeks ago and the pain in that is getting worse. At the moment it's not worth the pain and effort to ride it.

I have a cheapie disc lock that I'm upgrading to a Thatcham approved one (in the post) plus a ground anchor and heavy duty chain with an Abus padlock which I think is also Thatcham approved plus another chain type cable and padlock all of which are used when it's in the garage. I installed additional security bolts on the garage door over 20 years ago which would delay attempts to break in and would be noisy to break as well.

I have no concerns financially or sentimentally if it gets nicked and the locks used in the garage are pretty basic to either delay or put off people attempting to break in. I thought Airtags would at least be an attempt to find the bike if it does get stolen.

Unless a decent tracker would substantially reduce my insurance costs (£160 at last renewal) then I don't think it's cost effective to consider one.

 

https://monimoto.com/uk/
These are the ones that I know other folk trust to do a decent job, not too spendy and the esim subscription is only 3 quid a month

 

Got my friendly local tyre fitter to come and put new boots on the bike earlier. When he was done I was curious as to what had actually gone in there.



....ouch. No wonder I couldn't budge it, the damn thing is two and a half inches long!





And while he was down there he spotted some lovely rust on the exhaust:



That's the coupling between the downpipe and the link pipe, and it looks like the entire lot is corroded. Meaning everything except the cans needs to be replaced...

This is on top of the existing corrosion problems that the front forks have... I love this bike, but corrosion is going to continue to be a problem.

 

I have dry skin, deal with it

(To be fair you are looking at a close-up macro shot with all sorts of iPhone post-processing and lighting that isn’t exactly ideal - it’s not as bad as it looks!)

 

My first thought on viewing that photo, too

 

Apparently, Mr Dunlop set a new record 27th TT trophy yesterday, one more than his uncle.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/motorsport/articles/crggjd0ljrdo

 

Dunlop is absolutely incredible - I was at our local Honda dealer a few weeks ago (Bill Smith Chester) for their new showroom opening and John McGuiness was there talking through one of his TT laps which was really interesting, at various points he was pointing out where Dunlop is either flat out or close where others lift and/or brake, and saying he just isn't brave enough to do what he does.

 

That means you're relatively near me. I live near Chester.
In other news, a work colleague is out there watching Mr Dunlop's "lectures" live every day. It's been his annual holiday for years

 

Yeah, one of my colleagues is out there too.

The mobile tyre fitter I had round yesterday was slammed when I first contacted him a couple of weeks ago, and the Honda dealer that does all the work on my bike has a 3 week wait at this time of year. If it isn't the summer-only riders dusting their bikes off after winter hibernation, it's people getting their bikes ready for a trip to the TT. May/June is a terrible time to need an annual service & MOT!

 

Oh cool, I'm very close to Capenhurst if you know of it, 10 minutes from Queensferry which is ideal.

 

Handy for Costco, then! I'm just the other side of Queensferry.