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I’ve been having an on/off relationship with my Sportster. It’s on the road, and seems to be running ok, but the handlebars have been souring the deal. The pullbacks leant you right back in the seat so made for a really uncomfortable riding position. I changed them for cheap eBay flat bars. They were comfortable but too short. The grips protruded inches over the ends of the bars. I bought the dearer ones from a reputable Harley dealer. These are long enough, but the groove in the bar, where the wiring runs, necessitated a the bars to lean down a bit and the angle of them made pulling the clutch lever in a misery. It really hurts your wrist. I’ve been chugging in the wrong gear to avoid pulling it in. I went out for a spin yesterday to keep the battery charged. By the time I’d got back I’d had enough. I spent several hours looking for a new set. It’s not easy because I specifically need 1″ diameter bars, with the wiring groove. I think the later models (mine’s 1991) have 7/8th” bars and no grooves. I finally tracked down a second hand set of genuine Harley flat handlebars from a 1993. My model ran 91- 95. Only £23! Perfect! Then I saw that was a conversion from dollars as it was from the States. Which was £56 postage. And probably import taxes. I was going to do it. Then I noticed the seller had put up a video of the bike running before they’d stripped it. It looked a perfect position. Then I looked at the bars on their own. They were the same as the ones I have on my bike. Huh? I went out and loosened the bars and moved them to the right position. This meant the controls, because of the wires, were twisted around into an unusable position. I loosened them off and pushed them round. The wire stays in the groove. It must just pull some slack in to work. The bars are now comfy and I can pull the clutch from a natural position. It’s been raining so I’ve not tested it on the road, but I think that’s the biggest bugbear fixed. For free. So that’s a win, but how bloody embarrassing. All that time, all the different ways I tried to get around the problem, and it was just a matter of twisting the controls to the correct position. Another free win came after I worked myself into a frenzy. I was obsessing over a new bike with a fairing for winter commuting. It started with lusting after a Triumph Tiger 660 Sport. It’s a lovely bike, with a fairing, 80bhp (so 16 more than the Bonnie) and it’s a triple which is fun. I’d talked myself into it. It’s Goldilocks. Triumph, not too much power, not slow, all weather, pretty. Unfortunately they’ve only been making them for 3 years so it’s over £5k. I was getting proper fixated. […]

I’ve stopped worrying about the seal on the Bonneville now, I had a bit of a giddy ride and it held up fine. A couple of weeks and a few hundred miles of thrashing and it’s good as gold. Sorted. My other concern of late has been money. I extended our overdraft facility as we were getting low on funds. This is the first time we’ve been overdrawn in many years. It’s surprising how you adjust. For years we were dirt poor. I remember walking around in a pair of jeans with a safety pin in the broken fly because I couldn’t afford a new pair. The last bunch of years I’ve been on high paid lorry driving gigs so we’ve always had a grand or three in the bank. Rich, to me, is seeing a thousand pound pushbike and just buying it. You know you’ve got enough in the bank to cover it, and you’ll soon make the money back. To go from that kind of (relative) wealth to putting off getting an eye test and a new set of glasses (even though there is a small but annoying scratch on this pair) because you’re worried you’ll run out of money is… unpleasant. I wouldn’t say we are breadheads, we give money away (to charities, and family when needed. It’s a good feeling to be able to help out.) and our wants are pretty modest. We’ve not been on holiday in 2 years, Wendy has had the same £4k car since she passed her test. I do have something of a motorbike addiction, but generally I sell them for something like what I paid for them. So it’s not like we are in thrall to more money and constantly better things, but it is a nasty feeling to suddenly have to think about what you can afford to buy, and how much you can afford to give away. Which is a rambling prelude to me saying I’ve stopped worrying about money as well. I’ve gotten 8 out of the last 8 shifts I was available, and they’ve asked me to work 3 other shifts as well. One of them I had a hospital appointment (which I’d booked as a paid holiday) so I couldn’t, but I’ve worked the other two shifts this week. Assuming I get my available days (Thursday, Friday, Saturday this week, Sunday for next week) that means I’m on for a 6 day week this week. This is huge because everything after 48 hours is on overtime rate, so all the 6th shift will be at £30+ p/h. I did a 6 day week on nights and took home £1,336. Took home! If I get the 6 shifts and take home, say, £1,200 that will sort us right out. We’ll go from being overdrawn last week to over a grand in the bank (after weekly expenditure) in a fortnight. Then I can relax and just do 4 on 3 off if I want, we should still […]

The seal on the Bonnie is still holding. It’s been over 100 miles of not showing it any mercy and it’s still bone dry. I’m at the stage now where I’m not worrying about it. I think that if the process can get me a rock solid seal for 100 miles, even if it fails, in principle there is no reason why repeating the process, but with more epoxy putty and more liquid gasket, won’t fix it permanently. As a precaution I dropped some oil and took my time filling it to just over minimum. That should reduce the risk of pressure causing a failed seal. While I was at it I lubed the chain. The drought is supposed to be ending, so I need to be prepared for rain. I’ve done a quick job on the Sportster. After realising the clutch lever position was the same on all my previous bikes as it is on the Harley, I looked in the manual to see if I’d set it wrong. I had. I had it taught, you’re supposed to leave 1.6mm slack between the cable end and the clutch lever block. That sounds like nothing, but it has to be pretty slack to get that gap. It means the first part of the pull of the lever is without resistance. Which is a definite improvement when it’s such a reach and so hard to pull. The cable lube arrived today but I’ve not applied it yet. There are a list of jobs I want to do to it for the aesthetics, but right now the only practical thing is to sort out the handlebar position. Once I’ve done that I’ll have to get appropriate sized front brake line and throttle cables. I also need to fix the bar end mirrors, but that’s probably not a purchase. I can probably do that with washers and silicone sealant. Again, I don’t want to make a permanent fix if I’m going to be changing handlebars. All the jobs are dependent on money, obviously. There is no rush to buy all the bits for the Sporty. The Harley has been running fine, so it is a good backup for work as it is. All the work I want to do on it can wait for the money. Which brings me to work. After the first week of days, where I was fretting because I only got one shift, I’ve worked all but one of the days I’ve been available. 4 days last week. I’ve worked it out, I seem to have paid breaks and and I am on about £20.20 or so an hour. For my 4 days last week (two of which were relatively short, 8.5 and 10 hours) I made £815. That’s £42,380 a year. For a 4 day week. On days. That’s a whole lot of extrapolation from one week’s work, but I have to have tomorrow off for a hospital appointment, and they sent me a shift. That’s 6 of […]

I’ve been thrashing the Bonnie for a week now, back and to to work, and the seal has stayed bone dry. The bolt seems to be secure and holding. Yay! That’s a big weight off my mind. We were out of money, the Bonnie is my work wheels, and the next steps to repair it were looking expensive and time consuming. With the bike off the road. That’s a huge relief. Work have been beasting me. I think it’s mostly psychological. It’s 10, 11, up to 12.5 hour shifts. That isn’t that long for a lorry driver. The thing is, it’s in two runs. You do the first one, you’re out 6 hours, you come back to the yard, have your break, swap vehicles, and start again. The other day I was given a bunch of jobs straight away. I was out all day, but because I didn’t have to go back to the yard it felt loads quicker and easier. I’m just going to have to adjust. At least the driving isn’t freaking me out as much. Or rather, I’ve reached a plateau of freaked outness and I just get on with it. It’s all tough and stressful, but that’s what it is. On the bright side, I got 4 shifts last week, and even with a surprise short shift (yay!) I should be taking home about £630. If I can get that every week it won’t take us long to have a a safety buffer in the bank again. And it saves me from having to get another job. Another thing is the Harley. It’s been weighing on me. It’s been sat in the garden in mute reproach. I decided I didn’t like it and I didn’t want it. This morning (day off) I was woken by a headache and I was lay in bed wording the advert to sell it. I was squirming with remorse because I’ve seen some much better condition Sportsters for sale for what I paid for that 20 year dead rustbucket. I bought it on impulse after seeing what were frankly very flattering pictures of it. Since then I’ve spent thousands on the project. The list of new parts is vast. I’ve got it riding and running right, but as I was wording the advert in my head I couldn’t get away from the fact it’s still old and scruffy. People (who aren’t impulsive idiots) buy Harleys to pose on. Mine is actually a pretty sorted bike (it only had 10,000 miles on it, I’ve replaced all the consumables, and upgraded the engine and loads of the electrical components) but it still looks rough. I was thinking of asking what I paid for it. It would have filled me with shame at wasting all that money, but I couldn’t see another option. I took it out for a final judgement. I was out of over an hour and I really enjoyed it. When I was wheeling it around the front I noticed something. […]

I’ve been working on the split engine casing on the Bonnie. Look at it! I tried squeezing epoxy putty in the gaps between the surfaces and leaving it compressed. That was a big no. As soon as I put the engine cover back on the magnet snatched it out of my hand, jarred the join, and the errant piece fell off. I tried again. This time making a bridge over the snapped off part. Better, but when I screwed the bolt in it lifted off again. My third attempt was a slightly different strategy. I rough sandpapered the paint off of the snapped part and all the surrounding area, to get it as scratched and paint free as possible. Then I degreased it with washing up liquid and dried it with my heat gun. I put some putty between the mating surfaces and pressed it down firmly by hand, rather than mole grips, then built a bridge of epoxy putty over the part. I tried cutting down bolts so I would have less thread going into the hole and potentially forcing it open. In the end I used the original bolt, but I put 3 washers on it to act as spacers, to reduce thread ingress. The only other thing I could think of was to put some high temperature silicon sealant on the bolt. I put the new gasket on, torqued all the other bolts down and tightened that one as much as I dared. It seems to be held firm. I gave it over an hour for the sealant to set then took it for a spin. One junction up the motorway and back, at full-on speeds to stress the seal. I got back and it was bone dry. I am so hoping that is all done. My next stop would have been to ask a local welder if they could do the job with the engine in the frame. If not I’d have had to consider whether it would be easier to strip the whole engine so they could do the weld, or buy an engine (with half the miles, for about £650) and swap it. Neither is a small job. I’ve been stressing over it quite a bit. After the first two attempts failed completely I was having to work out what I could do next. The additional factors are we are running out of money because I was out of work for about 5 weeks, so £650 suddenly becomes a lot. And spending £650, and having to fit a whole new engine because of one split bolt hole would have been infuriating. Also, it’s the Bonnie, my commuter wheels to earn money. I’m in work tomorrow, so that’s a full sized test, but I’m fairly confident if it didn’t blow today it won’t tomorrow. I think one of the reasons I’ve been freaking out about it is because I went for a 20 mile run a week and a half ago. At 10.5 miles I […]