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Hyperpro
Steering Damper.
Fitted August 2002
After having the forks rebuilt
(Aug 02) while doing the rebuild it
seems the forks are now working a little more efficiently than they
were before the accident. "excellent"
I hear you cry, well yes and no, in reality.
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Having
heard all the rumours from various sources of front wheel instability
on Blades with the 16 inch front
wheel and thought 'what' instability ??
I've now changed my mind slightly as the front now definitely feels
a bit loose, this is after I've had the geometry checked, since
the rebuild in August 2002 and it being
in spec, and having checked the head bearings for tightness and
everything being ok.
So I've taken the advice imparted by other Blade owners and fitted
a steering damper I got a Hyperpro re-active damper second hand
from the Fireblade Shop (see links page) for £180, which is
considerably less than a new one, re-active or speed sensitive as
you can leave it on a low-ish setting and then when the steering
gets a bit lively it stiffens up to counter act any tank slappers,
It is a little marked and the click stop's are a little, Umm...
how shall I put this, hard to find on the first two setting's, but
the damping isn't affected any so I'm pretty happy with my purchase.
I can now look forward to my rides again with no nasty slap happy
moment's. Happy !! me, Oh yes.
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| Sep/Oct
2002. |
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A Fireblade
out for a hoon
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Somewhere
near Devil's Dyke.
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Devil's
Dyke again.
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Some
bloke posing by a Fireblade.
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March
2003.
Having fitted these Hein Gericke mini indicators, I thought it was
about time I posted a picture of them here, actually fitted. |
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Suspension
Setting's Update.
March 2003. Performance
Bikes RRV Setting's.
Having
now got the bike back on the road and MOT'd, I thought it was
about time to try the Performance Bikes Magazine recommended
setting's for the RRV, rather than the RRW setting's I've been
using previously, these can be found on the
Set-up
Guides page.
I'm using
these slightly modded as I'm a bit of a light weight
(so I
keep being told) at about 10 stone 7 lbs.
I'm running the front with 2 lines of preload (instead
of one line) and on the rear preload using position 5 (instead
of 6) and the tyre pressure set to 35 psi front
and 40
psi rear.
The fork
height through the yokes, set to 10mm.
After
running with these setting's for a few week's, they seem pretty
OK, if a little firm on uneven roads, but if you can live with
that give them a try.
April 2003
Since the last update the rear shock has now seen far better
day's, and I have now replaced it, at great expense with an
Õhlins unit. Which has been fitted as it came, with no
mod's to the setting's and has made an enormous difference to
the handling and feel from the back end.
Also this month fitted some Bridgestone BT -012 tyres, and these
are phenomenally grippy when warmed up, It's been a bit of an
expensive month, but the end result has been well worth it,
My RRV is now handling, like never before.
(full report on both these, can
be found on the Product Reviews Page 2)
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May
2003
Since fitting the Õhlins rear shock, I've also fitted some
Õhlins front fork spring's these are 10% stiffer than standard
Honda spring's and have made yet further improvement to the handling
of RRV.
I've now
set the front suspension setting's back to standard Honda setting's
with a couple of small changes which are listed below.
Front
Preload: 3 Lines showing
Compression: 1 full turn out from max.
Rebound: 1 full turn out from max.
Fork Height 10mm further up through the yokes.
Fork oil changed to Õhlins 5 weight (std 10w) oil with a
114mm air gap, after advice from an Õhlin's
technician.
Tyre Pressure 36 psi (std)
Rear
Standard Ohlins setting's out of the box. + 2mm of extra ride height.
Tyre Pressure 42 psi (std)
(full
report on these, can be found on the Product Reviews Page 2)
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France
2003.
Le Grande Hoonabout May
2003.
If you do
one thing.......in your life. You have to go to the South of France
on a biking 'JOLLY' with a few mates.
Having just come back
from there after spending what can only be described as a totally
brilliant week hooning around some of the best biking roads known
to man, I can highly recommend, no in fact I insist,, You MUST go
there, you too will fall in love with France, and being a bit of
a Francofile it wasn't that hard to do to be honest.
These roads are quite
simply stunning, with thousand meter shear drop's, rolling hill's
and valley's and twisty double back hairpin's. These roads are used
by the bike magazines to test their bikes as anyone who's seen the
original Fast Bikes video's filmed and ridden by Schiller, Frosty,
Jimarillo & Da Hammer will know, and to which I can justify
are simply awesome roads to ride.
The Col de Tende (E204/N74) and surrounding roads around Sospel
and Menton. The D558 Le Garde Freinet, also the coast road between
Cannes and St Tropez, and the N98 which goes towards Toulon, from
St Tropez where we stayed in an extremely motorcycle welcoming and
cheap (for the S of F) hotel Le Tour Blanche, something you wouldn't
get if 4 or 5 of you turned up on bikes in the UK, I doubt.
It's the first time I've been to France on a bike, only having been
there a few times for work before a few years ago, and found the
French people to be very welcoming towards motorcycles, moving over
on motorways to let you blast past, waiting to pull out not just
slapping on an indicator and pulling into your path as so often
happens by myopic car driver's in the U.K.
French biker's are also very friendly sticking out a leg in greeting
as they blast past at well into three figures most of the time.
One in particular who we had a bit of a blast with on a Suzuki GSX
1400, who warned us of impending Police activity, before blatting
off again at warp speed, with us loon's in hot pursuit, Oh yes highly
enjoyable.
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The
bikes sunbathing in Cannes, before the blast
back along the coast road. |
The
infamous Col de Tende,
All this way and it's
starting to rain.
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| At the top
of the 'Col' and we're in Italy. |
The
road towards Menton & Sospel,
quite simply stunning views.
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Half
way up the Col de Tende
what a view. |
The
view from the top
of the Menton road.
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The
road to Menton
simply awesome view's
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Just
hanging around,
petrol's cheap too.
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New
Hotel Tour Blanche - Toulon, South of France.
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As
someone quite famous once said, I'll be back........
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