Trip to The Netherlands

Last week, I rode the R1100S to The Netherlands, to have the Rapid Bike fuel injection module set up by Dutch specialist Ruud Fredriks, founder of Tovami. How a sunny and sweet ride it was. I mostly took A roads, but there were areas where the landscape was absolutely beautiful and hopefully where only B roads were available.

Just a few miles before destination, I stopped by a town map to make sure I was where I intended to.

When I arrived, I wasn't really impressed with Ruud's shop. I even thought it was closed. But then that was before I pushed the door ...

Ruud's shop is clean and organised. There was a BMW HP4 on one bench waiting for a new set of clutch plates. The story of this bike is that it's being raced in the Dutch Superbike championship (as well as IDM). Ruud has spent half of the time praising for the HP4 technological advance and build quality. He's prepared the one you see below himself by working on the electronics (making the ECU think the rear wheel is smaller to change the traction control's behaviour, for instance).

I've spent 2 hours with him that felt like 5 minutes. Ruud is a very knowledgeable person who has dozens of racing and riding tales to listen to, like the one about this dyno room he's built himself.

Ruud also builds his own kit like this battery-powered air-fuel ratio tool he once took in an airplane to check if his setup of  the plane's old Bings would work up there. Would ...

Now to the RapidBike fiddling part. He put the R1100S on the dyno, tweaked the map for every rev range and throttle openings and only stopped when he was happy with the result. He managed to build a map that provides a nice flat torque curve (where the standard one has a flat spot around 4500rpm) and helped bringing the power figures up to 101BHP at the rear wheel (compared to 98 standard at the crank).

The ride back home was great. The bike sure pulls stronger. I said that already, but this R1100S came to the point of being the best bike I've had in all these years. Now that it's well set up in the engine department, the major improvements made in the suspension area can really be felt and are definitely to be considered as the bike's best upgrade.

Headstock bearings

Some pics of the headstock bearing change on the triple. A rather easy operation ... well provided you can put a hand on the Triumph special tool to remove the top nut. I would recommend either buying one online or replacing with a hex nut if you're planning to keep your triple for a while.

Old top bearing

Guess ? Yeah, new top bearing

Lower bearing (upper part)

Lower bearing (lower part)

If you're looking back in the archive, you will probably notice that the lower bearing used to be a ball bearing, whereas the one displayed above is a roller bearing. That's because Triumph have supposedly upgraded the roller bearing with a newer designed ball bearing. The problem is that it's harder to fit on the steering stem compared to the "old" ball bearing. Someone in the Triumph community mentioned the All-balls bearing kit as being a quality set, so I ordered one containing a nice and easy to install lower roller bearing.

Ducati 1199 Panigale R Superleggera

Is the name self-explanatory enough or should it be even longer ?

- Hey man ! What's this bike you're riding ?
- It's a Ducati 1199 Panigale R Superleggera [breath]

(Credits Asphalt & Rubber as the picture shows)

Lost map

When I bought the RapidBike for the R11S, Robert Foster from Foster Performance had it initialized with an advanced map that he and his team had been playing with for a bit of time. It didn't work well for my bike - or so I thought - so stuck with the standard map coming with the RapidBike software which was already an improvement over the standard ECU mapping. 

With time I had forgotten there was this advanced map waiting somewhere to be tried again now that the major issues with the fueling (dodgy idling, way too lean AF ratio, impossible cold starts) were cured. But now that I needed it, the map was nowhere to be found again. And indeed, with 2 computer crashes and a one stolen, I lost a fair amount of important files over just a few months and the map was unfortunately one of them ... 

Downhearted by this loss, I made a desperate call on the Pelican Parts forum to seen if anyone had been given the same map with their RapidBike. But there were much less RapidBike users that I thought (more PowerCommander users) and even Robert Foster didn't seem to be able to put a hold on a copy of it. The map was to be considered lost.

Until last week when I was browsing my own blog to discover an old post where I had included a picture of the said map as a graph. I immediately grabbed the RapidBike CD and installed the map manager. It took me 2 hours to rebuild the fueling map from the picture which was harder to read that expected, but finally it's here again. Now let's save it multiple times all around the Internet.

The picture used to rebuild the map

Bar conversion

The SP3 is currently undergoing a handlebar conversion again. It's being reverted to standard handlebar for practicability. The racer version looks cool and draws a lot of attention, but is a real pain to ride in town.

It might seem like an overkill to remove the tank for a simple bars swap, but the SP3 had had the complete Daytona treatment with clip-ons and shorter throttle cables. With the higher and wider handlebar coming back, those have to move away. They will be replaced by brand new Venhill cables.

Shiny new tires

The big S was still equipped with the Metzeler Roadtec Z6 it came with when bought as a damaged repairable motorcycle. Ok, so I bought it in December 2009, almost 4 years from now. It had apparently stayed still in for a year before the purchase and, although these tires had plenty of thread left, given the mileage they certainly started their life on the BMW a year before the crash. Which makes a total of  4 + 1 + 1 = 6 years ... No wonder I'm power sliding at each roundabout exit. It's funny, but utterly useless and a bit ostentatious.

Old Metzeler has had its time

I was decided to finish them and change both front and rear whatever could be their level of wear before winter comes. But then came the rain and what were acceptable tires on hot and dry tarmac proved to be dramatically dangerous on soaked roads. They had become hard and slow to warm up. I loosed the front twice on the road back from work one day and with the bike straight the rear was sliding under acceleration. Time for a change.

I had read nothing else but good reviews about Dunlop Spormax, so ordered a set and had them fitted. It's been a new honey moon since for me and the R1100S. The tires' profile makes the bike feel lighter while offering high level of grip. With these new rubbers and the front Bitubo now up to its best, I can say without being disrespectful to the others that I never had a bike that much precise when approaching a corner and inspiring that much trust while leaned on its ears.

Old tires and new ones are round

Bike is waiting new rubbers for the back ...

... and front as well

Rims with the new Dunlops

Shiny sticky new tires ready for action

Unmovable

I know this is supposed to hold the front tire tight, but to this point it's getting ridiculous ... It took several minutes to get the bike out of its trap, leaving two one meter long trails on the ground.

It's the first time in 2 years this Matthys bike grad gets locked this way. It was last week, been used in and out for the whole week and haven't been able to reproduce again.

Kriega R25

If like me you use your bike as a daily commuter and need a laptop as your main working tool, then you probably have asked yourself what's the best way to carry it from point A to B already. And also doing so without causing any damage to the computer and of course to yourself, while still trying to enjoy the ride to work.

Along the years, I've been mainly using a Bagster kit (tank cover + tank bag), just buying a new tank cover when switching from one bike to another, but in the past 2 years or so I've been changing strategy. The reasons are fairly simple : 

- a tank cover alone still costs to much for what it really is.

- many times you have to give free it with the bike you've just sold. Too few people want them second hand or pay for this extra when buying your bike.

- some recent projects needed paint work and a tank cover has to match your bike's paint scheme.

So with no tank cover matching any of the current projects, I was left with the Bagster backpack which is actually bad as a bag that you carry on your shoulders (what a backpack really is ...).

With a brand new laptop now 2 full kg heavier than the one before and more miles to commute to the new job, I thought it was time for a change. After a bit of reading, I bought a Kriega R25 (pictured above) a couple of weeks ago. It's been really good since with its way of dispatching the weight away from your shoulders down to your back. There's a place where to fit the heavy laptop and still some more to put a pair of shoes plus some extra items. It's much bigger than the Bagster while still having good ergonomics that makes it barely noticeable when riding. I cannot recommend that product more.

A Vyrus and a Kriega ... interesting package

Renthal flat bar

Would Renthal flat bars fit a 955i Speed Triple ? No, the hand commands would hit the tank both sides.

I guess it had to be tried before being a hundred percent sure. These bars were sitting on one side of the garage and the SP3 on the other. At some point they had to meet one day. It would have certainly changed the riding position to something sportier and more suitable to my 6"2 frame.

Too bad as it's a nice item and would have been a nice addition while reverting the SP3 to an upright naked configuration. Let's put back the standard bars then.

Every little detail count

Big sporty german bike gets new turn signals to match already white rears. It would also need a good wash as well, but it gets ridden a lot and hard these days.

Forteen years set these parts appart and given the price it's no real surprise BMW are still making them. Every little euro count ...