late August odds and ends
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second bear
I was walking Muffin down the dirt road when a motorcyclist stopped to tell me he’d seen a bear and two cubs. I told him I’d keep an eye out.
She was standing at our usual turnback point so we cut it short and walked back. In this terrible pic she is standing behind a small rise so her lower body and the cubs are hidden. I will say I was on Full Alert for muffins last walk of the evening. It was 11pm and very dark.
flan
I’ve been carrying around a box of Mexican flan mix I got on deep discount. Finally decided to make it and see if it was passable. It was quite good. (details)
scooter
looksee
Since PO installed a nice Malossi exhaust I’m a little worried about lean running at lower elevations. The solution is probably this device that tweaks the signal coming from the O2 sensor. It tricks the ECU into running about 5% richer up to about 6k RPM at which point the ECU stops checking that value anyhow. Not sure why that is so.
At any rate I wanted to see where it would install
- to ensure there wasn’t one already (I was 99% sure there wasn’t or the clueful PO would have mentioned it); and
- to ensure the plug matched the plug shown in the product listing – it does
I started to look for the OBD connector to test out that functionality but couldn’t find it. I’ve seen no specific info on where it is but similar models are reported to have it right rear under the seat, attached to the tubular frame. I tried to get the seat bucket out to get a better view but apparently more body panels, the rear rack, battery, etc, have to come off. I’ll try again when I get a cool day to sit outside in. Extensive disassembly is not my favorite part of the scooter form factor.
testride
My registration packet was finally delivered to the Polk County tax folks. It was supposed to be there 7 days ago. Since it had the original docs (title, bill of sale, money order for ~$200) I was very pleased to have that tracking number. If they dragged their feet much more I’d have to pay a late registration penalty of 5% of the sale price; I’d rather not get dinged an extra $100 because of USPS incompetence.
I took the bike out on a short dirt-road ride to make sure the wiring was put back and seated. I checked battery voltage with a meter before starting and it was 12.8v. Voltage while idling was 14.2v to 14.44v.
The dirt road and the campsites where I turned around are not level, are gravelly, and have many dips that are 6+ inches in depth. On the dips I moved my feet back as far I could on the footboard and stood up; like buttah. Not as upright a stand as you can get on a dualsport but enough to absorb the dip. Travel is only a few inches but it never bottomed out even with my 200# frame on it. The only part that was squirrelly was a section next to the road with inches-deep loose gravel. I don’t think any bike on street tires would have handled it better.
Zero squeaks or noises. I thought I heard a gentle smacking noise while traversing the dips but it turned out to be the keyring flailing around and rapping on the “dash”. :-)
seven year vanniversary
Getting the delivery notification above reminded me of the date: Aug 18. I moved into the camper on Aug 18th, 2018 so this is a vanniversary. I’ll have to think about it but 7 years may be longer than any single “sticks and bricks” house I ever lived in as an adult.
I don’t see an end in sight unless the bear eats me.