27 May - Too wet to ride

Our run of exceptionally fine weather has come to an end with today shaping up to be a dark and damp day. Just as I was thinking that any motorcycle activity was out of the question, the front door bell rang - the postman delivering a set of footboards I had ordered on eBay just a few days ago.

So,  out with the tools and into the garage to figure out how to fit the boards. Getting the pegs out was as simple as removing a split pin and a locking pin and out they came. The front boards fitted with only a little persuasion from the hammer, but getting them adjusted to achieve the most comfortable position and still operate brake and gear levers took a bit of time.

The rear (pillion) pegs were a bit more trouble. The actual stem on the board was slightly too long which meant the mounting holes wouldn't line up. The obvious solution was to grind them down a bit but I was concerned that that would remove the chrome plating and reveal the underlying steel. Still there was no alternative and a fairly tedious grinding session began. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the pegs were not chrome plated but where in fact stainless steel all the way through. Anyway, although the boards weren't exactly 'plug and play' a couple of hours of head scratching and effort and all was well. Took the bike for a run and everything was fine.

As my bike is the 2006 model it did not have any kind of clock, unlike the VT400 and my BMW. Once again eBay came to the rescue with a rather smart handlebar mounted clock which also arrived a few days ago. Fitting that only took a minute or so and I am rather pleased with it.