What did you do to your FJ-tracer-gt today?

[PhotoAl]

On 2/18/2021 at 1:53 PM, 2and3cylinders said:

 Inquiring minds want to know I feel for anybody going through that and in some countries it's like that all the time so everything is relative

 I mentioned global warming El nino And micro climates But like wintersdark said,  We have codes to protect people whether there fully adhered to or not is another thing but freezeups for example are huge problem here, as our roof collapses. The ice dams like we are having now are is bad as I've seen in 30 years. People die here by the hundreds In sub 0 weather, whether they are street people, the sick or elderly or just unlucky.   I don't know if it made the national news but a guy suffocated Yesterday here, they say he was crushed by an awning that collapsed on him due to the snow.

Texas is a huge state and they do things their own way in a big way and when shit happens it happens in a big way

 The Texas coast Is a funnel for bad weather But still redundancy and preparedness and systematic control of infrastructure seems to be lacking there

 I could make a political statement but I won't But fingerpointing is coming from within the Parties responsible for it Except they're pointing them in the opposite direction

Tom Fanning CEO of Souther Company did an excellent interview on CNBC talking about the power problems in Texas.  Thy are an island with not a lot of ties to the rest of the electrical grid which limits their ability to import power.  

Southern Company CEO on the Texas energy crisis

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Millions of Texas residents remain in the dark and cold as another...

That coupled with the way their power system is managed is very different than Southern Company.  Southern is an integrated systems with integrated resource planning where they have coordination with the types of generating assets.  I used to work in the groups he talks about.  I remember over the years Southern Company fighting hard to retain control of an integrated system and generally they have been successful in that.  Texas is not an integrated system.  Lots of rock being thrown from the renewable likes and dislikers but everyone is at fault IMO.  An illustration of a fuel problem that can occur is if a gas fired generator wants to be able to generate at all times they need to have firm gas contracts and firm pipeline contracts.  When demand is light there is spot pipeline capacity and spot gas available.  When extreme weather events occur then the spot gas may disappear and the spot pipeline capacity may disappear - gas demand will skyrocket when everyone turn their heat on!  Electricity demand also skyrockets as everyone is turning on their space heaters.  Spot gas and spot pipeline capacity disappears and the generator can't generate due to lack of fuel.  Think Texas also had problem with electricity supply to natural gas compressors which took out even the folks with firm delivery.  Thats a bad place because not even natural gas home backup generators will run.  Only gasoline, diesel or propane generators.  As mentioned there are standards which generating plants are designed to and extreme weather conditions can exceed those.  For example where I live we will have a day or two a year in the low teens (F) rarely does it get down into the single digits and very rarely below 0F.  What do you design for?  -20F most likely not but certainly down to 3 or 4.  If done properly will probably not have too much trouble making 0F.    Another problem is you don't know what you don't know.  Plants that have been designed to a standard but have never experienced that design point may or may not make it.  Doesn't take much missing insulation or a heat trace circuit not done properly to have a sensing line freeze.

Personally I don't care for wind turbines but do think solar panels are a better way forward.  If every roof in the country had solar panels it would be a very different energy system but still needs a lot of other resources.   I bought an EV last month because I like it not because I'm trying to save the universe.  Fascinating listening to different perspectives, on everyones mind is charging stations and how fas can it be charged.  LOL I can only imagine Texas with hundreds of thousands of EVs.  However imagine Texas with hundreds of thousands of EVs connected to the power grid so that in an emergency they could feed back into the gird and take some of the burden off.  

Longwinded response, I'm tired of the cold!!! I want to get on my Tracer GT and ride!  Next week looks nice so I'm going to forget about about COVID, cold and politics and go ride my Tracer GT!

[2and3cylinders]

We look to be warming up next week too and are forecast to get above 32 for the first time in 3 weeks.  We also broke our record for consecutive days of snow.  We got 43 inches in that period.  Still we did not break the record of 43 days below freezing set in 1979.  We've been averaging 10 when our daytime average should be 34.

If our utilities were allowed to operate like TX and they failed like them, their fat cat execs would literally be strung up from their own utility poles!

[2and3cylinders]

13 hours ago, nhchris said:

Hey @betoney,  nice work.

 But don’t  forget to index those spark plugs!  

Hey, is that crack directed at me?!

Hey Betoney, what about the cooling system, brake fluid & pads, chain & sprockets, plugs?  LOL

[2and3cylinders]

9 hours ago, roadwarrior said:

I don't particularly enjoy riding in the rain. If there is a strong chance of rain, I'll take the car (commute) or find some other activity to participate in that day. Of course there are exceptions if there is a planned trip or some such.

I do enjoy a bike that 'looks' cool to me and the cancerous fender extension that hangs off the back of every new bike is the first to go.

My bike is generally spotless. That is part of the experience that brings me joy. I don't see why one has to be dismissive over the matter.

Dismissive?  You can't see the tail or a beak for example while riding.  So if it reduces or doesn't add to performance and/or costs time & money without improving functionality, I don't see the need. I clean my bikes often as part of routine maintenance and safety checks to catch potential issues early.  If I cared about looks I'd be riding a Ducati Multistrada or MV Agusta Veloci or whatever.

Each to there own but I'd rather be riding then worrying about how I look.

[2and3cylinders]

9 hours ago, micah2074 said:

In my experience the stock thing  was no better than the eliminator. So I got better looks with the same performance. I ride a lot in the rain. My aerostich likes getting dirty

How can you believe that!  Any appendage that's larger and down low closer to the tire has to block more water. Its like a goalie coming out of the net on a breakaway.

And I have an original 2 piece Stitch I bought about 30 years ago and a 4 year old Transit 2 suit, and neither like getting dirty, as they know they'll last longer staying clean...

[micah2074]

23 minutes ago, 2and3cylinders said:

How can you believe that!  Any appendage that's larger and down low closer to the tire has to block more water. Its like a goalie coming out of the net on a breakaway.

And I have an original 2 piece Stitch I bought about 30 years ago and a 4 year old Transit 2 suit, and neither like getting dirty, as they know they'll last longer staying clean...

Because I ride in the rain, fog, damp, etc. a lot and in my experience  it’s true.

The stock signal bracket thingy does practically nothing to keep road spray off the back of the bike or me. We get just as dirty as we did before I replaced it with what in my opinion is a much better looking piece

As far as the stitch goes, it’s more fun to get it dirty. 

[3sum]

3 minutes ago, micah2074 said:

As far as the stitch goes, it’s more fun to get it dirty. 

Lord, ain’t that the truth! You should see my old red one-piece Roadcrafter and my slightly less old red Darien. The Roadcrafter looks just like you’d expect with all the miles it’s ridden. 

[betoney]

1 hour ago, 2and3cylinders said:

Hey, is that crack directed at me?!

Hey Betoney, what about the cooling system, brake fluid & pads, chain & sprockets, plugs?  LOL

Yep, ALL good to go.  Unless I have some unforeseen mechanical failure... 🙄

[piotrek]

3 hours ago, 2and3cylinders said:

Hey, is that crack directed at me?!

LOL... perhaps not, but let me feed the argument a little. There is little if any value in indexing the plugs, according to NGK. How do YOU determine how to index them, and how can you tell that it is making a difference? Honest question. Probably something for a different thread, but since we're here...

Gapping and Indexing | NGK Spark Plugs

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...

 

Edited February 20, 2021 by piotrek

[2and3cylinders]

59 minutes ago, piotrek said:

LOL... perhaps not, but let me feed the argument a little. There is little if any value in indexing the plugs, according to NGK. How do YOU determine how to index them, and how can you tell that it is making a difference? Honest question. Probably something for a different thread, but since we're here...

Gapping and Indexing | NGK Spark Plugs

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...

 Let me 1st preface that I'm not an expert but I do know enough to be dangerous

 Many moons ago in the very early seventies I was a second year engineering student at SDSU 

I went there to study hands-on industrial arts & technology as per my plan, the of 5 years. And then, as was my little red book 5 year plan, was employed at GD Convair in San Diego..  Motorcycling nirvana, as I had the opportunity to utilise everything the engineering departments had available including power systems, on bikes, ultralight and 21 ft front engine drag cars.

 We also studied fluid power mechanics, and flow dynamics.

We had a lot of fun firing up every conceivable type of engine and powering hydraulic and pneumatic power transfer systems and digitize data in Fortran and Basic.

We were able to watch combustion inside gasoline powered reciprocating piston engines

Cutting edge technology today was being developed back then

What collectively we determined is that you can tailor intake and exhaust with a 4 valve head to transfer in combination with swirl towards intake or exhaust. There were those who found it better to reverse the flow with valve timing.

So we found indexing could improve combustion or at least the cleanliness of the spark plug,  And rule of thumb was you had a 90 % chance to have the open side of the plug towards the intake +/- 45°.   If it was more than that then you shouldn't bother.

Now if I had two spark plug holes, I could verify to a high probability using a scope in the inspection hole whether I was correct or not.

Great fun.

 Can you dig it

 

 

[angrygirafe]

13 hours ago, micah2074 said:

Because I ride in the rain, fog, damp, etc. a lot and in my experience  it’s true.

The stock signal bracket thingy does practically nothing to keep road spray off the back of the bike or me. We get just as dirty as we did before I replaced it with what in my opinion is a much better looking piece

As far as the stitch goes, it’s more fun to get it dirty. 

That was my experience as well. If it’s legitimately wet and you ride more than 100 yards, there’s going to be crap everywhere, no matter what you have back there

Edited February 21, 2021 by angrygirafe

[PhotoAl]

Every long trip I've done has had at least one day in the rain.  Last June was in Moab Utah.  First there was the dust storm and then the rain storm to wash all the accumulated dust off - or wash it down into harder to clean places.  

[duhg]

Today I patted the seat and whispered, "Fifty-three degrees next Wednesday."  I hope that forecast comes true.

[nhchris]

23 hours ago, 2and3cylinders said:

Hey, is that crack directed at me?!

Ummmm, sort of I guess.  

I am always amazed at how far some of our really skilled wrenches on this board will go to eke out a tiny bit more HP from our noble steeds.

I had never heard of indexing  but after watching a few YouTube videos am now in the know.  Thanks for that educational moment!!  (You can buy copper washers of different thickness to rotate the plug a fixed amount. Amazing!)

I've got my hands full managing my FJ's non-indexed HP.  One percent more might put me over the top!

Keep those great snd informative posts coming!  Always something new to learn.

Edited February 21, 2021 by nhchris

[piotrek]

23 hours ago, 2and3cylinders said:

...rule of thumb was you had a 90 % chance to have the open side of the plug towards the intake +/- 45°.   If it was more than that then you shouldn't bother.

In other words... based on your experimentation (must have been fun indeed), there is a good chance the gap side of the plug will land somewhat "correct/preferred" anyway, but if it doesn't... then in practical terms it makes no real difference. I think this is the assertion that the NGK note is making. Just wanted to see if you actually use indexing washers, considering that OE plugs have integrated crush washers. I am guessing not. Plug reach into the chamber is also something to watch.

Edited February 21, 2021 by piotrek