3D02

Well I finally delivered the FJ to my brother and picked up the SH after a month or so of waiting. A long 1062 miles towing a trailer to and fro to Tucson but a great trip nontheless.

About the bike. Me likey! Pull it out the garage the next morning for an evaluation. Grungy, in need of good douche. I fire the bike up........:-D Holy crap its loud (has hi-mount Jardine's). Love the sound of the twin. Take it for a spin around the block. Nice, although it stumbled a bit while pulling hard in second gear. Not a peep from the engine in terms of the dreaded CCT's.

So I park the bike. Brother, Dad, and I yammer on about bikes for a few minutes while finishing our coffee then we start tearing into the bike.

Find that the brake pads are gone. Tires are gone too. Pull the spark plugs. Look good for a bike with 21k. Manual states plugs out of gap should be replaced, which is whacked but what the hell. Add that to the list. Put the bike on the new T-Rex stands I bought from eBay for $99. Excellant stands for the price by the way. Comparable to Pit Bull sans price. Anyway, remove wheels and head on down to Cycle Gear to get the new Dunlop 208's I bought in a package deal a few weeks before mounted. I also buy brake pads. Walked across the street to the Honda shop for the plugs.
Get home, reinstall everything, and continue with the evaluation. Left fork tube is wet as wet. Seal long gone. That's added to the "to do" list. Taillight is loose. Fix that. Pull the tank, which is a total joy I might add, and open up the airbox. Great a mod! A half-*** mod at best. The previous owner or the owner before him hacked on the lid of the box doing something which I don't understand. The filter of course was not stock, but rather a piece of Uni Filter foam cut to fit and covered with some piece of plastic grate made to keep rabbits out of a garden I think. This was attached with wood screws no less. The mod was finished off with a 2 inch piece of flexible electrical conduit piped in from the front of the fairing to the intake of the airbox as if if to replicate an air scoop of some kind. Totally useless so it was removed and thrown away. Add correcting the airbox to the "to-do" list.
Still need to go through the bike a little bit more to find out what exactly needs attention but so far nothing major. Can definately tell the bike was used for wheelies and didn't get much attention from the former owner. Hasn't been laid down which is a definite plus. At some point in its life (not from the most recent owner) it got some bling. Hi-mount Jardines, Goodridge lines, Zero Gravity screen, and a steering stabilizer mounted on what appears to be custom manufactured mounting plates. Very nicely done.

My brother and I took the bikes out for a couple of runs. On the road the SH performs well. Thumps right along at 80 mph not even breaking a sweat. Hit a long straight and I signal my brother to come along my side so I can check how the bike pulls against the FJ in sixth gear from 80 mph. Pulls great although the FJ was comin on strong. Get to the next light look over at him....oh its on..... Light goes green and we are off. He eats my fricken lunch! The SH still has stumble in second gear, but that didn't keep the front end from lifting. I pay my brother back in spades when we hit the twisties. The SH excels in the twisties. The only other time I felt that comfortable in riding agressive in the corners was when I rode a Honda 954.

So in conclusion, there may be better bikes out there but I made the right decision. Just the sound alone sets this bike apart from the others. Its a well made bike. Does it have the range to make it a sport tourer? No, but then again it is a torture machine in terms of comfort. Getting back on the FJ made me realize that. Its not the speediest bike either, though how often does a person max a bike out on the street? At my age I'm not a track star nor do I need to compensate for my inadequecies by owning the the biggest, baddest, latest thing. I plan on keeping the SH for a long time.





My daughter and brother on the way up to Mt. Lemon, AZ





Karl

marmaladedad

Sweet!

Hawkrider

Welcome to the club! Do mods. Enjoy.

3D02

Thanks. As you can see from the pics I posted after the fact, the SH has been modded a bit. I did enough to the FJ where it came to the point where putting anymore money into the bike had diminishing returns. I'm just going to go through the SH and make everything right. First on the list is to fix the hemorrhaging front fork seals and change the root beer colored fluids.

I do have a question though. Where do you get the tool to loosen/tighten the odd shaped steering nut? When I brake hard on this bike there is a clicking sound like the stem is loose or the bearings are gone.


Karl

mikstr

thanks for the info. I was wondering how the VTR managed against the FJ in roll-ons (having ridden a few FJ's in the past I knew they were strong in that type of acceleration contest)

cheers
Mikstr

Erion_squid

wow....that actually brought a tear to my eye. oh the joys of popping the SH cherry. LOL

superbling

The clinky head bearings and weeping fork seals are most likey related. :-( Tapered bearings are an upgrade and are cheap.

When you pull the forks, look at the springs. If the windings look evenly spaced for the entire length, you have aftermarket springs (good). If they are progressive (winding spacing changes), then they are stock.

Hawkrider

Are you talking about the two nuts with the tabbed washer between them? You can use a screwdriver and hammer to get them off but tap very lightly when reinstalling. The "right" tool for the job is a spanner wrench.

3D02

Oh yeah they are related. Contrary to what the previous owner told me it was used as a wheelie machine. Easily fixed.

Yep that's what I'm talking about. Without going to the manual, I assume you have to seat the bearings as you would the wheel bearing on a car. Tighten, then back off until it moves freely without being loose, correct?


Karl

Hawkrider

Well, no, not really. If you tighten them too much then you'll dent the races. You want to initially set them so there's just a hint of resistance when turning the steering stem. This whole process has to be done with the front of the bike suspended, and NOT using a front stem stand. The stem stand adds too much friction. One more thing, tighten the upper triple center nut BEFORE you tighten the fork clamps. If you do it backwards then it'll tend to pull the triple clamp assembly up and the bottom bearing will be tight and the upper one loose.