Out and About on your Laverda

Finally got Laverda out for some rides in the last few weeks. A late start due to very wet spring here in Western Canada followed by an aborted trip to the Canadian Rockies due to forest fires. And all at the same time a dose of Covid and some health issues effecting my joints and muscles making riding painful and unsteady when getting on or off the bike. Hopefully on the mend now, at least the drugs are masking the pain.

Warm start to fall so hopefully I can get a few more rides in before the weather gets too cold.

Pic on the Red River at the Lockport Dam and Locks near my house. There is no more commercial boat traffic to Lake Winnipeg to serve the remote communities. Locks only used by pleasure boats now and as a backdrop for Laverda pictures.
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henrywillms said:
Finally got Laverda out for some rides in the last few weeks. A late start due to very wet spring here in Western Canada followed by an aborted trip to the Canadian Rockies due to forest fires. And all at the same time a dose of Covid and some health issues effecting my joints and muscles making riding painful and unsteady when getting on or off the bike. Hopefully on the mend now, at least the drugs are masking the pain.

Warm start to fall so hopefully I can get a few more rides in before the weather gets too cold.

Pic on the Red River at the Lockport Dam and Locks near my house. There is no more commercial boat traffic to Lake Winnipeg to serve the remote communities. Locks only used by pleasure boats now and as a backdrop for Laverda pictures.
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Execucorsa!(y)
 
Despite it being Friday the 13th (I'm not superstitious), the crap weather forecast and the offer of a ride in a warm dry vehicle to The Island to watch the Redax beast demolish the opposition, I chose to ride the SFQ via the twisty backroads I've been discovering east of Melbourne. On top of damp roads and rain I managed to get a tad lost, which I realised at the same moment I notice my little Eclipse voltmeter light flashing two reds ... equals zero charge, low battery!

Out in BFN and lost - Friday the 13th. Fark!! How long would total loss last on an 18AH AGM? Lights off, gonna need to refuel, don't stall the bike, I can't push start it!! 120km to get to Walkerville for night #1 stay. Just ride and pray - amazingly still running fine in Leongatha and a servo on a hill ... get away with filling up with the motor running and make it all the way to the house in Walkerville. Once there I can turn off the motor. Test start and amazingly it's still got enough to turn slowly but still start ... so glad I haven't got the LiFePo fitted. Too late, cold and wet to look for the no-charge cause, assuming a broken belt or a dud rec-reg in the ND alternator. Chances of starting again on a freezing cold morning aren't good, but by then I have my mate Walky and the car as backup ... no jumper leads and no battery charger. Need to make it to Phillip Island on the battery.

Come out in the morning, off with the starter cover - belt's perfect, all good. Seat off and immediately see a lonely wire out in the breeze (pic). It's the exciter feed to the alternator from the fuse box. Fucken Narva female spade terminals - I knew they were too soft. squash the connector sides and refit. Problem solved - gear up and miraculously the bike starts. the rest of my riding to ther Island and then home are all in hail, wind, rain or at best on damp roads. 600km and home safely. Tried the back way home but the rain was getting worse and bailed in Drouin and hit the freeway.

In hindsight I could have avoided all that stress if i'd pulled the sidecover and the seat with the bike idling in BFN - but I was convinced I had a more serious problem ... Friday 13th ... I'm not superstitious :cool:

That's Maurizio in the pic with the Laverda factory racing hoodie with TTW - was it cold enough??!! :eek:

Friday 13th electrical problem.jpgPI - Arctic Sunshine.jpg
 
Reminds me of a Putty ride once, my bike started banging a fluffing up near the Truckys Memorial. Pulled over removed the plastic side cover and immediately found an earth connection off the electronic fuse, it's a core balance-like gadget that kills spark and then resets if a fault occurs and the missing nut rattling beside the battery. It's now loctited.
 
piranha-bro2 said:
Despite it being Friday the 13th (I'm not superstitious), the crap weather forecast and the offer of a ride in a warm dry vehicle to The Island to watch the Redax beast demolish the opposition, I chose to ride the SFQ via the twisty backroads I've been discovering east of Melbourne. On top of damp roads and rain I managed to get a tad lost, which I realised at the same moment I notice my little Eclipse voltmeter light flashing two reds ... equals zero charge, low battery!

Out in BFN and lost - Friday the 13th. Fark!! How long would total loss last on an 18AH AGM? Lights off, gonna need to refuel, don't stall the bike, I can't push start it!! 120km to get to Walkerville for night #1 stay. Just ride and pray - amazingly still running fine in Leongatha and a servo on a hill ... get away with filling up with the motor running and make it all the way to the house in Walkerville. Once there I can turn off the motor. Test start and amazingly it's still got enough to turn slowly but still start ... so glad I haven't got the LiFePo fitted. Too late, cold and wet to look for the no-charge cause, assuming a broken belt or a dud rec-reg in the ND alternator. Chances of starting again on a freezing cold morning aren't good, but by then I have my mate Walky and the car as backup ... no jumper leads and no battery charger. Need to make it to Phillip Island on the battery.

Come out in the morning, off with the starter cover - belt's perfect, all good. Seat off and immediately see a lonely wire out in the breeze (pic). It's the exciter feed to the alternator from the fuse box. Fucken Narva female spade terminals - I knew they were too soft. squash the connector sides and refit. Problem solved - gear up and miraculously the bike starts. the rest of my riding to ther Island and then home are all in hail, wind, rain or at best on damp roads. 600km and home safely. Tried the back way home but the rain was getting worse and bailed in Drouin and hit the freeway.

In hindsight I could have avoided all that stress if i'd pulled the sidecover and the seat with the bike idling in BFN - but I was convinced I had a more serious problem ... Friday 13th ... I'm not superstitious :cool:

That's Maurizio in the pic with the Laverda factory racing hoodie with TTW - was it cold enough??!!
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These are the stories that life sometimes writes Quentin. It's good that it was just a loose cable due to a weak clamp. And also good that you saw it straight away, guess it can be much more nasty.

I've just returned from a 7-day trip to the French Alps, my mate had problems from day 2 with a complete sheered-off manifold on the exhaust flange on his S4R Monster - we could fix that with lock-wire, it worked the whole trip!

Hello (to late) to Maurizio, yes, looks cold enough!
:cool:

Cheers,
Jo
 
As it is just over 40 years since my first race on the TT Course, I thought, with the current spell of fine weather, I better mark the occasion with a lap on one of my 500s, given that I rode one in qualifying pending the repairs to an electrically challenged Superbike Mag Monty.
You may recall I had a few issues switching wheels between the 350 and 500 due to brake caliper issues, but with that resolved, the otherwise reliable 500 seemed like a good choice for the task.
All kitted up, I set off in the mid-afternoon sunshine looking forward to my journey around the island. I decided rather than head into Douglas to start the lap, I would join the course at the Creg, head round the course and finish back at the Creg. All went well for the first part, with several drivers pulling over to allow the noisey, orange mini-beast to pass so they could get an even better earful! ;)
The bike seemed to be running fine along the Creg-ny-Baa back road, and down from the Creg, through the 'new' sweeping bend at Brandish and up through Hillberry and around Cronk-ny-Mona. However, as I slowed for the 30mph limit at Signpost Corner the bike started to become less than happy and by the time I got to Signpost it had cut out. Coasting to a halt, I parked up at the side of the road for a quick check over and to look for any obvious signs of an issue. Seeing nothing, I tried to start it, bearing in mind it had started really easily in the morning, when I did a couple of test starts and in the afternoon for the actual ride. It turned over quick enough and coughed and spluttered a bit and briefly fired on or about the second or third attempt. Another few attempts, with various choke settings managed to again get a brief start up and a quick stall.
Without any tools, I decided there was only one course of action - the recovery van.
The bike is now back in the garage awaiting some fairly stern talking too as I was planning to use the bike for the VMCC run on Sunday. Hopefully it is something minor, like blocked jets or some such issue....:confused:
 

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Alzero said:
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Right back at you! He’s right, I am a convert, anyone wants trade an SF2 for an RGS Executive?
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Ha ha, good luck with the trade.
Nice to meet you and Beth, Michael, hope you enjoy the rest of your travels in Aus and beyond.
(Hope you have a good night in Marlborough, definitely will be different to Port Douglas or Hamilton Island🤣)
(Sorry had to edit a couple of times. A bit late on a Saturday night.........)
 
As a footnote to my post above, I finally completed my lap today, but not entirely incident free, on my ‘should have been a Jota’.
I absentmindedly forgot to screw the oil filler cap on properly after I topped up the oil and tried filling my r/h boot and coating my rear tyre with oil. Fortunately, I stopped for fuel just a handful of miles from home and easily spotted my oversight before I crashed or blew up...🙁
Eagle eyed viewers may have also spotted that 40 years ago, a bit like this year, it was bit ‘damp’ during the MGP. The only difference between now and then was rain didn’t stop play.....
 
Shajota said:
Ha ha, good luck with the trade.
Nice to meet you and Beth, Michael, hope you enjoy the rest of your travels in Aus and beyond.
(Hope you have a good night in Marlborough, definitely will be different to Port Douglas or Hamilton Island🤣)
(Sorry had to edit a couple of times. A bit late on a Saturday night.........)
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Marlborough was great! Apparently there is both a Hotel and a Motel in town, we first went to the rather rough and ready Hotel in the town, but there was no record of our booking. Then we drove over to the Motel and caravan park on the far side of the Bruce Hwy and found our room. It was really nice with a view, room service dinner! and was spotlessly clean.
There were even geese, ducks and brush turkeys wandering around the grounds, all in all one of the nicest so far.

It was especially welcome since I didn’t get out of the clinic until after 12 noon so was pretty tired by the time we stopped. I must have gotten some grit in my eye on our ride that I washed out the next morning as the MD couldn’t find anything in there. It was simply irritated and is much better already. The lesson is to wear goggles and not just sunglasses with an open face helmet, it’s been so long since I wore one of them that I forgot!
 
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Alzero said:
Marlborough was great! Apparently there is both a Hotel and a Motel in town, we first went to the rather rough and ready Hotel in the town, but there was no record of our booking. Then we drove over to the Motel and caravan park on the far side of the Bruce Hwy and found our room. It was really nice with a view, room service dinner! and was spotlessly clean.
There were even geese, ducks and brush turkeys wandering around the grounds, all in all one of the nicest so far.

It was especially welcome since I didn’t get out of the clinic until after 12 noon so was pretty tired by the time we stopped. I must have gotten some grit in my eye on our ride that I washed out the next morning as the MD couldn’t find anything in there. It was simply irritated and is much better already. The lesson is to wear goggles and not just sunglasses with an open face helmet, it’s been so long since I wore one of them that I forgot!
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Ah, right. The motel / caravan park on the highway is certainly a different kettle of fish to staying in the actual town at the pub:)
I've never stayed there, good to hear a good report.
Good to hear your eye was fine. (Good thing also, getting away late, that it's only a short trip to get there)
 
Yet another footnote to the tale above, I got the 500 running again, a bit of crap in the jets, mostly in the l/h main jet, and this time a bit more fuel, and had a fairly good run around the south of the island on a local VMCC ride out, before completing all bar the mountain section of the TT course - some ruddy car wallahs having monopoly of the road this afternoon!!🤬 TBC....
 
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A final (well maybe) footnote. As the weather is definitely going to get worse rather than better over the next few days, I dragged the 500 out again this afternoon to attempt the final bit of the lap, Ramsey Parliament Sq back to the grandstand. Hooray, I made it. 😁🕺🕺
Whilst it was relatively bright when I set off, and along the coast road to Ramsey, by the time I got past Guthrie’s it was becoming decidedly murky. However, I was feeling a sense of deja vu, as I wiped the condensing mist from my suitably chosen dark visor, as conditions weren’t much different to several practice sessions 40 years ago.
I mostly had a traffic free ride, but I was held up a bit around the Veranda, the 33rd and the final run down to Hillberry.
The bike ran fine, although it’s wobbling a bit in the fast corners, but nothing too unnerving. The only thing is it will take a few days for my hearing to recover, even with ear plugs it is still deafening....🤯
 

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Andy J said:
A final (well maybe) footnote. As the weather is definitely going to get worse rather than better over the next few days, I dragged the 500 out again this afternoon to attempt the final bit of the lap, Ramsey Parliament Sq back to the grandstand. Hooray, I made it. 😁🕺🕺
Whilst it was relatively bright when I set off, and along the coast road to Ramsey, by the time I got past Guthrie’s it was becoming decidedly murky. However, I was feeling a sense of deja vu, as I wiped the condensing mist from my suitably chosen dark visor, as conditions weren’t much different to several practice sessions 40 years ago.
I mostly had a traffic free ride, but I was held up a bit around the Veranda, the 33rd and the final run down to Hillberry.
The bike ran fine, although it’s wobbling a bit in the fast corners, but nothing too unnerving. The only thing is it will take a few days for my hearing to recover, even with ear plugs it is still deafening....🤯
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Re living the dream, Bravo Andy!
And scaring the locals shitless 🤣🤣
 
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