Spent the day working on the bike today.
My new tire (Bridgestone BT-003) arrived Tuesday. I spent Tuesday and Wednesday finishing off the original BT-090. It is smoked at 3500 miles.
Mounted the new tire with just two tire sppons, some cut up milk jugs (free rim savers
) and some baby powder for the tube. Took a little bit of wrestling, but nothing serious.
While I waited for parts to arrive I tore the whole rear suspension off, swingarm and all. Cleaned it all and re greased
everything. I'm hoping that the OEM grease was originally dark to start because that stuff was pretty dark now. Needle bearings are fun.
Really though, stuff some grease in there and then place them all in and they stay just fine.
By removing the swingarm I was able to remove the OEM chain in one piece. Once everything was cleaned I put it all back together while I waited for new chain, front sprocket, and rear sprocket bolts to arrive. Rear sprocket is a Kush sprocket (http://www.kushsprockets.com). I like the idea of adding some shock absorption between the transmission and the wheel, and this does that to some degree.
New chain and sprockets went on easy enough. Torque specs for the rear sprocket are 25 lbs/ft, which seemed really low to me, especially when I hear of peoples bolts coming loose all the time. I added a drop of loctite to each bolt, torqued to 25 lbs/ft, and then added a little extra to each one by hand. Between the nyloc nuts, loctite, and a good torquing they should stay put.
Dynabeads... Love the idea. Hate the install. One ounce for the front and two ounces for the rear. That's what's recommended and that's what I installed. It must have taken an hour just to get all the beads in...
The damn things like to jam up going through the valve stem when you go faster than the slowest trickle. C'est la vie...
Test ride went well. The new slightly lower final ratio provided by the 14/47 sprockets has noticeably affected the speedo. Speedohealer is next on the list; too many cops around here... Why 14 up front you ask? After reading the posts about eaten swingarms I'll take all the clearance I can get. Speaking of which, yes you have to dremel off the lib of the front sprocket cover thingy to get it in there over the 14t. Why not an even lower ratio? I honestly didn't have much of an issue with the OEM gearing.
Ride was smooth too, save the wind...
Grip from the BT-003 is disappointing currently, BUT it's only got maybe 20 miles on it. I took it to a parking lot and did figure 8's around the islands. I was able to do power slides out of the corners which was pretty fun. Sliding is nice and predictable too, which is lots of fun.
I am hoping for more grip when on the sides though. Hopefully it's due to the newness of the tire combined with the slick pavement (coated in that liquid tar crap). Time will tell. Chain has stretched a decent bit. I'll have to adjust before the next ride.
Anyways, that's my day. I enjoyed it.
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