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

[texscottyd]

2 hours ago, Wintersdark said:

Huge group rides are definitely *not* my thing. 

Me either.   As the years have moved along, I’ve become more & more of a lone eagle.   I will occasionally ride with one or two very carefully vetted friends, but I just can’t deal with the stress of a large group event.   

[betoney]

1 hour ago, Wintersdark said:

We get going, and it's a nightmare.  About a kilometer long stretch of bikes riding through and around cities simply has to be chaotic.

I will never, ever do that again.  Huge group rides are definitely *not* my thing.

I'm with you on that, a group of 4-5 is fine but large group rides simply aren't fun, under any circumstances, period.

I got talked into organizing and leading a group ride for about 10 riders in the past and it was a nightmare.  Over half of them were strangers to me and everyone had different riding skills and habits as well as bikes with various mechanical condition.  One guys bike didn't make it out of the parking lot where we met.

Some riders would just pull off the back of the pack for a smoke break and not tell anyone, so I ended up backtracking to find them, others interpreted taking a break to mean its time to buy a 6-pack.  We hadn't even ridden 70 miles and a few riders had already deemed it too far and turned around and went home.  It was such a waste of my time, I cut the route short and we rode back, only 4 riders left and we covered as much ground in 1 hour as the full group covered in 3 hours.  Never again, I either ride solo or in a very small group of like minded friends of similar riding ability.

[Clegg78]

2 hours ago, Wintersdark said:

Yesterday, it's 8:30am.  My plans for the day had fallen through, so I popped on to Facebook to see if the local riding groups where doing anything, and found an off-hand comment for a group ride leaving at 10am near me.  They're planning a Calgary -> Canmore via 1A -> Hwy40 -> Longview -> Back to Calgary loop.  418kms, and a really great set of roads.  Hell, I'm in!  No time for questions, so I hop on the bike and go.

Except... It's a big group ride.  Not big-to-me (which is >5 people) but big.  60 bikes big, a charity event for "Fresh Start".  Well, I'm there, and it's for a good charity, and I've never actually been on a big ride before, so... Eh, I'm in.

Not gonna lie, this was worrying.  Also, pretty concerning, given it was almost entirely Harley's - my Tracer, a V-Strom, an R3 and a Striple where the *only* bikes that weren't cruisers.  Of 60 some bikes.  We get going, and it's a nightmare.  About a kilometer long stretch of bikes riding through and around cities simply has to be chaotic.   Most stressed I've ever been on a bike, with the constant fear of any one of the dozens of bikes ahead of me (and all the normal traffic) doing something stupid and causing a horrific multiple vehicle crash.  Then you're getting onto wonderful winding mountain roads... with so very many other bikes all of varying skill levels and a near complete lack of cornering ability.  

Made it to the second stop - Ghost Lake Reservoir, near the start of Hwy 1A, just before it gets all twisty, and I couldn't do it anymore.  Decided to finish the ride by following in front.  As soon as people started heading towards their bikes at a stop, I'd tear off to the next stop.  Much, much better - and I'm deeply thankful I didn't have to ride down my favourite local twisties at depressingly low speeds dodging wallowing cruisers. 

Ended up being a reasonably fun day, and it did benefit a good cause, but damn, I will never, ever do that again.  Huge group rides are definitely *not* my thing. 

 

My best description of big group rides is “an articulating bus piloted by grandmas”    

I don’t like riding with others of any count, but big groups… yikes!

[BBB]

I’ve done three ride outs with our bike club. We’re all advanced motorcyclist instructors, we use a rear sweeper and use a system where we take it in turns to mark junctions.....and I still don’t enjoy them. I ride to enjoy myself, go where I want, stop when I want etc and although our group rides are safe, they’re all the things I don’t like doing. Lone riding is my preference by far.

[dazzler24]

Group rides -

I'm sensing a theme here in the last few posts and I'm in agreeance with you all!  My wife would prefer that I go with others when I ride - and I do, but only very occasionally.

I MUCH prefer the solo thing, which I enjoy so much more.  Go and stop when and where I want, no having to keep an eye on someone else or they on you. etc, etc.

A few outings back I was with a couple of other riders (friends) and one of them managed to rear end me at a stop sign while not paying attention to what was in front of him!  It was fairly inoccuous and there was no damage done but just reinforced my aversion to riding with others.

Think it's the reason you get a bike, isn't it?!  So you can be independent and 'free'..... Reminds me of a song by Chris Cross.  Name that song and it will be your earwig for the rest of the day. 😉

[Acee]

On 7/15/2021 at 9:49 PM, Butrzrulz said:

Installed pullback risers on my '20 900 GT.   Link here.

Installation took all of 10 minutes.  30mm up and 20mm back.  Doesn't sound like much, but good golly miss molly!!  I am now in a full on comfort zone, lol.   I am 5'-7" with a 30" inseam.  The stock position is slightly forward for me, and with these I'm in a much more comfortable upright position.

I installed these (ebay specials) on my 2017 Tracer a couple of weeks ago and it hugely increased the comfort, but I took them off during my first ride with them.  I found that I couldn't feel what the front end was doing in the corners and it kind of ruined one of my favourite features of the bike, the handling (after the engine of course  )  Also, for some reason they seemed to make the front suspension feel a lot harsher.  I've no idea why that would be the case and I'm sure I wasn't imagining it.  Anyway, the risers are now in my spares box.

[texscottyd]

5 hours ago, dazzler24 said:

Reminds me of a song by Chris Cross.  Name that song and it will be your earwig for the rest of the day. 😉

Damn you!  😉

[j-bone]

Gold anodized tail tidy, LED taillight (with signals), and front signal delete/relocation.

 

[fjray]

11 hours ago, Wintersdark said:

Yesterday, it's 8:30am.  My plans for the day had fallen through, so I popped on to Facebook to see if the local riding groups where doing anything, and found an off-hand comment for a group ride leaving at 10am near me.  They're planning a Calgary -> Canmore via 1A -> Hwy40 -> Longview -> Back to Calgary loop.  418kms, and a really great set of roads.  Hell, I'm in!  No time for questions, so I hop on the bike and go.

Except... It's a big group ride.  Not big-to-me (which is >5 people) but big.  60 bikes big, a charity event for "Fresh Start".  Well, I'm there, and it's for a good charity, and I've never actually been on a big ride before, so... Eh, I'm in.

Not gonna lie, this was worrying.  Also, pretty concerning, given it was almost entirely Harley's - my Tracer, a V-Strom, an R3 and a Striple where the *only* bikes that weren't cruisers.  Of 60 some bikes.  We get going, and it's a nightmare.  About a kilometer long stretch of bikes riding through and around cities simply has to be chaotic.   Most stressed I've ever been on a bike, with the constant fear of any one of the dozens of bikes ahead of me (and all the normal traffic) doing something stupid and causing a horrific multiple vehicle crash.  Then you're getting onto wonderful winding mountain roads... with so very many other bikes all of varying skill levels and a near complete lack of cornering ability.  

Made it to the second stop - Ghost Lake Reservoir, near the start of Hwy 1A, just before it gets all twisty, and I couldn't do it anymore.  Decided to finish the ride by following in front.  As soon as people started heading towards their bikes at a stop, I'd tear off to the next stop.  Much, much better - and I'm deeply thankful I didn't have to ride down my favourite local twisties at depressingly low speeds dodging wallowing cruisers. 

Ended up being a reasonably fun day, and it did benefit a good cause, but damn, I will never, ever do that again.  Huge group rides are definitely *not* my thing. 

 

Been to one of those.  Lots of bad riders mostly gunning their engines for no reason and lots of near misses. Never again.

[Yamajank]

 

Let the experimenting begin. No discernable difference at 70-80 which is where I think the improvement could be. I tried to model my cut after what appears to be on the new v4 multistrada.  The little bit of air that  passes through seemed to go pretty much down. Any engineers out there have any ideas?

[phpaul]

Just got back from having a fresh set of Michelin Road 4's installed.  This is the third set of sneakers for my '16 FJ with 18,500 miles on it.  The OEM Dunlops were trashed at 6K miles IIRC, the first set of Michelins lasted 12K and were a MUCH better choice in every respect.  Looking at the new rear vs. the old one, I might have pushed things a bit, mileage wise.

We looked over the chain and rear sprocket (which are the originals) and while they look good visually  with no excessive wear, saw-toothing or play in the side plates of the chain, I'm of the opinion that 18K miles is quite a lot and they don't owe me a thing.  Replacing on mileage vs. observed wear just seems prudent.

Having said that, who do we like (brand and source) for new chain and front and rear sprockets?  I'm perfectly happy with the existing ratio, not looking to change that.

[phpaul]

@Wintersdark - Yup, one of those was plenty for me as well, and for all the same reasons.  Plus most of those Harley's were running REAL rich for some reason and the fumes gave me a headache that lasted for a couple of days.

I don't play well with others on the best days, that was just a freakin' nightmare.

[Wintersdark]

12 hours ago, texscottyd said:

Me either.   As the years have moved along, I’ve become more & more of a lone eagle.   I will occasionally ride with one or two very carefully vetted friends, but I just can’t deal with the stress of a large group event.   

I really love rides with specific people - that is, people who ride in a similar manner to me, who are of at least reasonable experience, and who I can trust with the Basic Rules.

11 hours ago, betoney said:

I'm with you on that, a group of 4-5 is fine but large group rides simply aren't fun, under any circumstances, period.

I got talked into organizing and leading a group ride for about 10 riders in the past and it was a nightmare.  Over half of them were strangers to me and everyone had different riding skills and habits as well as bikes with various mechanical condition.  One guys bike didn't make it out of the parking lot where we met.

Some riders would just pull off the back of the pack for a smoke break and not tell anyone, so I ended up backtracking to find them, others interpreted taking a break to mean its time to buy a 6-pack.  We hadn't even ridden 70 miles and a few riders had already deemed it too far and turned around and went home.  It was such a waste of my time, I cut the route short and we rode back, only 4 riders left and we covered as much ground in 1 hour as the full group covered in 3 hours.  Never again, I either ride solo or in a very small group of like minded friends of similar riding ability.

Exactly.  The people who I regularly ride with (a fairly large number of people actually, but typically <5 people at any given time) all follow the Basic Rules, and the very rare new people coming along have those rules spelled out clearly before the ride, and there's zero tolerance for people not following them.  Because that stuff, it just kills the fun of rides at best and can seriously endanger/kill people otherwise.  

The Basic Rules:

• Ride your own ride.  We're all adults here, responsible for our own actions. It's not a competition, there's no prizes for being first. Don't try to ride beyond your comfort and skill.  We'll stop and wait for people to catch up at intersections, or after stretches of twisties.  We're not going to slow down for you, and you should not speed up to try and keep up. Waiting for someone to catch up who's been doing ~30kph less over a stretch of twisties is quick and harmless; but this isn't license to just pull over at random and have a smoke.  If anyone has to go back looking for you, you damn well better be bleeding in a ditch.
• Don't delay the ride, be ready to go.  Come with a full tank of gas and everything you need.  When we stop, if you're always the last person ready to go and people have to wait for you repeatedly, you're not coming back. 
• Maintain your bike.  We'll help each other with mechanical issues, but you're responsible for your bike being well maintained. 
• Each person is responsible for where their bike goes, what's in front of them.  If you're passing someone, it's 100% on you to do it safely.  You can't expect people to be watching their mirrors; assume they can't see you.  Maintain good minimum following distances at all times, if they need to brake suddenly or stop, no matter why, it's on you to be safe behind them.
• Pass another rider if you want, but do so only when it's safe and they're riding the speed they want to ride; not behind a car (likely looking for a safe place themselves to pass said car). 
• Maintain proper lane position if we're close together to give everyone as much space as possible.  Spread out more in twisties to make use of the whole lane.  

We've pulled over and told someone to F off mid ride once(actually just last Tuesday, in fact) and not invited back people quite a few times for things like @betoney listed above: the guys who suddenly need to stop for gas 100km into a ride, the guys who's bikes are falling apart due to neglect then act all surprised when they end up broken down, people stopping at random, etc.  These days, we're all kind of at zero tolerance even for simple stuff because we're not at all interested in dealing with people's inconsiderate BS, and aren't up to being teachers.  Works out well, though - keeps the rider pool small and only populated with people who are never The Problem Guy.

Basically came to pass after years of always having that one guy in seemingly every ride that ruined things.  Now it practically never happens. 

I'll occasionally join other groups (as per the post above) but I nearly always regret it when I do.  Rarely as much as this one though

[Wintersdark]

1 hour ago, phpaul said:

@Wintersdark - Yup, one of those was plenty for me as well, and for all the same reasons.  Plus most of those Harley's were running REAL rich for some reason and the fumes gave me a headache that lasted for a couple of days.

I don't play well with others on the best days, that was just a freakin' nightmare.

Why do they do this?  I noticed this as well on that ride, constant smell of gas.  Add the ear destroying noise, too, of like 55 Harleys mostly with big open exhausts making a tremendous amount of noise at every intersection.  I've got nothing really against loud bikes, but really, when there's so very many bikes around, there's already quite enough noise, thanks, people don't need to be pointlessly revving their machines as well.  Between the fumes and noise, I don't know how anyone manages to not have a splitting headache.

[phpaul]

2 minutes ago, Wintersdark said:

Why do they do this?  

If I was gonna guess, I'd say they know that straight pipes require re-jetting, but haven't a clue how to do it so they just throw in a couple of sizes larger and call it good.