Not much of a Ride. But it was a Ride

I just got back from a short trip on my SWing. The temp wasn't bad, around +46 F but the wind was blowing pretty good which made it feel chilly and took some of the enjoyment out of the ride.

Basically all I wanted to do anyway was to see how the new drive belt and 26 Gram Dr. Sliders worked. I didn't put the GPS on the SWing so I don't know if anything changed with the speedo or not.

Whether it was me or wishful thinking it seemed like it has quite a bit more takeoff from a stop. The ride was smooth and the SWing handled great.

The street in front of my house still has a fair amount of water on it but no ice or snow. I did take it easy going through the puddles so as not to splash too much crap up on the SWing. The main streets had a little sand in the middle of the street and on the shoulders but the highway was dry and nice.

I only rode about 10-15 miles due to the wind but I got my mission accomplished and that was to see how the Dr. Sliders and drive belt worked.

All is good to go and tomorrow I'll get out the pressure washer and clean off "today".

Good to hear that spring is getting closer for you northerners. I also had my "new" to me 08 out for a small 200 mile ride today.(81º) I've had the scooter on the road for four weeks and I've put 1,307 miles so far. I have to say I sure like living in Florida. Yes July, August and September can get hot and muggy but I get to ride year round so I can take a little heat for a couple of months.
Dale I think you'll like the 26 gram Dr Pulley sliders. They won't make a big difference in the ride but they will drop your RPMs by about 500.

Hi Dale

I took a ride today too, only managed to get up to about 40 here in northern NJ, but that was good enough for me.

I brought my bike home in January and only put about 3 miles on it the day i trailered it home. Its been nothing but snow up here for the last few weeks and the temps have been in the single digits. So when I saw that the weather was going to cooperate just a little I took advantage too.

I put new tires on her (Diablo's) and a set of 26gm sliders and haven't had the opportunity to check out any of my mods.

Today I put about 20 or so miles on her and its was great, cold but great. Lots of power, very smooth and very easy to ride. I feel more at ease on this bike then my GL1200. The Gold Wing felt pretty light when moving, but at rest it was a lot of bike to maneuver. Starts and stops especially on hills were exciting.

I like the simplicity of the CVT, twist the throttle to go faster, let go to go slower. I hardly have to use the brake except when coming to a complete stop.

Next addition will be the Givi airflow windshield. I didn't get much buffeting, but it was a cold ride, my hands were numb and I had heavy gloves on. There is a lot of wind that gets around the stock Honda windshield and the airflow looks to be the best compromise between wind and visibility.

Really enjoy the forum, thanks for all the helpful info.

Bill

I like my heated gloves - I do a lot of 30's and 40's commuting. With the Givi windshield, a 3 season jacket with liners, and pants with liners, I'm rarely cold - I personally haven't felt the need for a winter-weight set of gear. But I definitely need the liners in the 3 season stuff, and the electric gloves make the ride a lot more fun (it's nice to have relatively thin gloves on for dexterity, too).

My '04 swing also got excercised yesterday. Rode 1/2 tank
of fuel thru the hills of No. East Tn. Temp was near 60 so a
pleasant ride. I try to ride somewhere each month to keep
the tires flexed. Easy 40-50 mph. Ran into some snow
left over from last week's storm.Also some fine chatt on a
road or two. A great afternoon ride.

Up here in Atlantic Canada, winter is still very much here, still. 7 foot snowbanks along every street, making it dangerous for cars at intersections. It is supposed to warm up to 5C on Wednesday. I did see a Harley guy on his bike going by, but I think the shrinks got him before he got too far. Don't tell anyone I saw him, or the shrinks will come after me. I may have hallucinated: when you look at snow too long, you imagine all kinds of shapes and movements and things that never happened. 3 years ago, I rode on March 12, but it is looking more like April 12 this year. I have a thaw to worry about because the snow piles around the house and around everyone else's will probably cause problems in basements. Let's hope it is gradual thaw; and I shouldn't hope to ride until May for that to happen.
All of you guys that complain about it being too hot to ride, get out there and ride one for the snowbound people. Thank you. Jay.

Just a quick update on my ride. I took it out for about a 40 mile ride today and it went great. I won't admit to getting it up to 100 mph just for the heck of it today either. It handled great and ran smooth. Next time out I'm going to have to hook up my GPS and see how close the speedo is to actual mph.

25 miles for me Sunday afternoon, round trip to work and back. It was about 55 degrees or so, still a little chilly for this displaced southern California boy.

The roads were coated with ash, sand and pea gravel, especially at the worst places, on corners, intersections and stop signs!

Sam:)

Sam,

Did you sell the Xciting 500? That's a nice looking machine.

My trip today was to the shed with the mission to remove ice from the front doors and to get in to tell my S'Wing I hadn't forgotten about it. I had been hearing scooter sounds coming from the shed while shoveling snow so often. Shhhh the shrink will be looking for me as well.

Jay,
St John and Moncton really got hammered this winter. The banks on each side of my driveway are 7 feet as well ... just like the 50% normal width street out in front. Sunday River just sent out an email stating they plan to be open into May !! Will Poley and Crabbe be open into May as well? Hmmm? Thay would be fun.

Mike

Dale,

It is good to hear that you got out to ride some. Hopefully the weather will get better where you can ride daily.

The weatherman is talking about mid to upper 60s for tomorrow, Thursday, so I will be out and about. I'm hoping this weather holds too. I missed riding my SWing this past winter. I suppose I could put a nobby on the back and attach a ski to the front and take it out but that's not my idea of fun. I was born and raised in MN and never really liked winter but our summers make up for it. I'm going to get the pressure washer out kind of early and wash the SWing and other two vehicles then go out for a ride after it warms up a bit more.

Dale, Be careful with a pressure washer on the scooter. It can force water (and dirt) into places you don't want it.

Dale one place besides the obvious switches,dash, electronics and vents is the wheel bearings. Water in the bearings will almost guarantee them to rust.

Hi Yo, I'm careful of how close I stand and where I spray the water. Most of it is mainly to "rinse" it off. I wash it pretty good in the fall when I put it away and the spring wash is to clean off the dust that settled on it during the winter in the garage.

I mainly wash it off by hand and the pressure washer is for the "rinse cycle" so to speak.

Mike, it seems the entire Atlantic Canada region will be enjoying winter for a few more weeks this year. We need a good week of fog to eat the snow banks to nothing. I am hoping for a mid-April at the earliest. I have a few things to take care of on my VT 1100 Tourer that I bought late last year. A late start will do me just fine this year.
I will also be replacing the belt on the SWing : it is the original and I want to keep it as a spare as recommended by the forum members. If I can spare the dough, I might spring for DrPulley sliders. The bike is a 2005, and I think just the age alone might be reason enough to swap out the belt.

I understand replacing the belt just because of the age. Both my 07 and my new to me 08 have their original belts and I'm not real comfortable on longer rides. I have 8,700 on the 07 and only 1,300 on the 08 so I do hate replace the belts if they are still good but I'd also hate to break a belt far from home. I may replace the rollers for Dr Pulley sliders and inspect the belts for signs of cracking or dry rot and then decide what I want to do.

My belt had only about 2,000 miles on it when I bought my 08 SWing from my sister last year but it had been sitting under a tarp for two years when I bought it. It's now my spare. It looked and measured "new" but I didn't like the sitting two years part. I changed it along with putting in 26 Gram Dr. Sliders this winter. I've had it out about 4 times so far and like the extra take off from a stop with the sliders. I'm also comfortable taking it on a longer ride now too with the new belt. All is good.

I had a different ride. I took a nice '02 for a 278 mile ride yesterday. A friend of mine found one on Craigslist in Salem, OR about 278 miles North of here. So we went to take a look and he bought it. Now he's another Goldwinger who converted to a Silverwing. It has some mileage in it, 23k, but came with new tires, a Givi windshield and top box. Anyway my friend is a happy new owner of a pretty burgundy Silverwing.

I had a strange ride today. I intended to use my car for my regular 70 mile round trip to hospital (nothing serious).

Instead, I rode my SW, more of a 'call of duty to ride' really! I don't like using the car because this journey takes an age through small towns and villages but with lots of open country roads. Even so, the traffic is usually horrendous.

Once I had got to the open roads and on through the villages I had 'NO TRAFFIC' in front of me, nothing. Even approaching the hospital there was no traffic ahead. I don't think I used the brakes for 90% of the journey. The roads were wet and muddy in places and the temperature was dropping. On the ride home it was getting dark and the 'gritters' had already done their thing, so now I have salt on the road..Aaaagh!

Not much of ride. It was cold but bearable and it was one of those 'full-on' rides and was great fun. Now to clean the bike to get rid of all that crud!

You don't get much of a ride in winter. I was out on the Forza today simply because of blue skies, dry roads, and the incentive of a return visit to a very good lunch place. I wasn’t disappointed with my food, thinking to myself I should definitely make the effort and go there more often.  Plus I had the chance to fill up the Forza with discounted E10 on the way home.

The roads were dry, but the gritters had been out, and there were frozen puddles alongside the road. It was cold too, Next time out I'll either be wearing my Keis heated inner gloves or Hein Gericke lobster claw mitts.

Of course when I got home and parked the Forza up for a wash, the hose had frozen so it was a bucket job. I didn't mind, I just wanted to neutralise any road salt, then got busy with the hot air drier and a few preventative squirts of rust blocker afterwards.

Sorry to hear about the rough weather in England. Here in Colorado we had an unusually warm day on Saturday, must have gotten up to 48 degrees (that would be Fahrenheit over here - about 9 degrees where common sense and logical measurements exist ) so I ventured out for a quick five mile (8 KM?) ride just to blow off some dust and to lay claim to being able to ride in almost every month of the year here on the western side of the Great Plains.

Tonight we're expecting another 6 inches of snow and really cold temps for the foreseeable future, so it will be a few weeks before that's gone and I'm back in the saddle again. Yee-haw!


- Mark