| Author | Message | ||
     Light_keeper |
I just replaced my Avon due to wear. the center was very flat. I kept it at the recomended pressure 30 lbs. My daily ride includes a mix of rideing conditions. Dont spend hardly any time on the highway. No time doing burnouts. I did notice that as the milage built up, If I was say agressively passing or quickly accelerating I would hear a churp from the rear at each gear.  | ||
| Ezblast |
Those supermoto bikes are lighter, but if your comfortable throwing her around then fine, but its not the recommended way to ride on pavement - lol - yes, most rear tires - unless just used for playing with backroads like my black bike - get flat in the middle and you get that response from them when its about time to change them - lol GT - JBOTDS! EZ  | ||
| Naustin |
I'm no where near used up on that Avon. It only has about 1,000 miles on it. I looked at it closely when I went home for lunch. It is worn more in the middle, but there is plenty of rubber and the shape isn't that bad. It looks like the vibration or chatter I'm getting is just due to the tread pattern at that particular lean angle. | ||
| Jprovo |
The question is, however, did I do that corner right, or should I have been able to avoid the little tail slide resulting from the early downshift? I like to avoid downshifting to slow the bike down. I'm not saying that I don't use engine breaking now and then, but generally speaking, I use the brakes to slow the bike down. If it was me, I wouldn't have let the rear slide around. Anytime that that happens on the street for me, I view it as a chance that I could have crashed the bike. A sliding rear end that suddenly hooks up can cause a highside as the bike stands up from the sudden shock to the chassis. Just in time the rear hooked up - It's thoughts like that that have led me to the conclusion that I need to slow down on the street, and take hard riding to the track. Just be carefull. The Supermoto racers are a ton lighter and have much better stopping power compared to the Blast. Most of these guys are actually stepping the bike with power, kinda like a flattracker does. It's much different than what you experienced, and a lot easier to control. I'd be much more inclined to toss one of those bikes around on the track with no potholes! The chatter in the rear tire can be caused by a lot of things, but I'd try to shift your weight to the rear, you're probably unloading the rear end too much, and the rear tire has very little weight on it. The one great lesson from the mighty buell blast was how unstable that bike was while turning. If I could shift weight to the rear tire, stability would return. The challenge was to see just how early I could get on the gas and develop the drive through and out of the turn. The other point in this idea is that under braking the opportunity to low side at the center of the turn is really high. Taken From http://ducatitech.com/bbs/viewtopic.php?t=2798&highlight=keith+blast+weight&sid= 9ae3f2626c11a1ae244d0e577baef7f8#top I took Kieth's advice, (heck, he rode a virtually stock Blast for a season at Willow) and it is helping me with getting the drive out of turns, and the bike feels much more stable. James | ||
| Naustin |
Once i get those Banke's on my bike, hopefully my CG will shift toward the rear of the bike. I guess the moral of the story is that was only marginally in control, huh? It didn't feel like I was out of control.... It felt as natural as if I were on my mountain bike, ya know? I mean, when I said, "just in time" I didn't mean to convey a sense of urgency. The whole time (all of about 10-15 seconds start to finish) the bike felt totally stable and true, even with the rear end peaking out a little on that down shift. I need to get on a track with some coaching. | ||
| Jprovo |
SRB - Two things - 1. Sorry to hear that you had a crappy experience, I hope it gets better. 2. It may be in your best intrest to get a lawyer to help you.... James | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
check that your tire pressure isnt too high. Its an easy way to make a tire go from stick to slick! | ||
| Ezblast |
I would never buy a Rider's Edge bike - just looking for trouble - especially the early year ones - people have been warned about them often enough and still they sell and the majority of owners have no problems, however, stuff like this is bound to happen on one. My red 2000 bike had 5 previous owners, and has had its share of problems, however, warrentee covered the majority and I fixed the rest, however, I asked for a beater - cheap, and they delivered - so I never complained about that. You on the other hand, should probably have figured such a bike might have early problems and opted for extended warrentee as well or no sale, or accept what the fates toss - not my way of dealing with life. Did you call Buell Customer Service? The number is posted in several places on this sight. If everything is getting fixed under warrentee though - what the problem seems to be is dealership related - could the warrentee travel to another dealership? Legal matters are not what this Board is about - we could perhaps help in advice in fixing/mainteniance, joys and learning curve of ownership, even support for dealership woes, but the rest is really leagal matters and has no place here - sorry but true. I really hope you can get this resolved, but I've always said a Rider's Edge bike was not a safe bet - lol Got Thump?! Just Blasting on the Dark side! EZ | ||
| Ezblast |
Also - I'd like to point out that those other two sites you have listed as links are authored by the same person and have been around forever, and that only just recently did he correct his spelling errors - what makes them comical is the things they didn't do with their bikes (proper maint. and ownership duties) and that one person obviously authored all those letters - lol - I wouldn't group myself with them if I wanted to be taken seriously by Buell. GT - JBOTDS! EZ | ||
| Naustin |
Was removing stock pulley guard and stripped bottom front Torx bolt. Was able to remove with an allen head that I hammered into it. The top Torx also stripped. I used the same procedure and forced an allen head into the torx and backed it out about 1/2" and then it sheared off! Farggin locktite. So, tonight I'm going to try and drill it and use and extractor to back it out. I'm worried that the locktite will prove a greater match for the extractor too, and It will also break off. Any tips? | ||
| Ezblast |
Take your time - you should be alright. GT - JBOTDS! EZ | ||
| Swampy |
Put some heat on it, how much you ask? It depends, if you can't put a torch or some small flame on it try a heavy duty soldering iron. I assume the plastic cover is still in place? see if you can't fit some vise grips on it and work it back and forth. | ||
| Jugallo94 |
I have used needle nose pliers when the torx head is stripped out. But with the loctite your best bet would be to heat it up if possible. | ||
| Naustin |
The head of the bolt sheared off below the surface of the transmission case. The Cover is off, but location is too close to other components to heat with a torch. I don't have a soldering iron unfortunatly. If the extractor breaks off inside the bolt, its game over. The extractor is hardened steel and would be very, very difficult to drill out. It was moving, very stubbornly, but it was moving before it sheared off. As I said, I had it out about 1/2". The bike was slightly warm, so I worried that maybe that was my mistake and I should have let it sit over night before I tried to remove anything...  | ||
| Ezblast |
Sears extractors work the best, take your time though and you'll be alright. Best advice is to seat the extractor in then withdraw the extractor and bolt by hand with a vicegrips - this prevents any tight spots from breaking the extractor. GT - JBOTDS! EZ | ||
| Naustin |
I'll let you know how it goes. I did 170 miles on Sunday. Tagged along on a HOG ride. It was pretty fun. 30 miles into the ride, however, a guy I know went in the ditch, flipped his bike 5 times, and they landed a helicopter on the highway to take him to the hospital, so that was a bummer. Haven't heard yet if the guy lived or not. The ride continued on after about an hour's delay. The first scheduled fuel stop was at 100 miles. But, I was in the front group and we rode 10 miles on after the accident before we knew it happened, then doubled back, and then did those miles again. I was 130 miles on my trip clock coming into the fuel stop, and frankly shocked that I hadn't hit reserve yet. We ran a steady 55-60, but every time we took off from a stop sign, we would drag up to 65-75 to catch up to the leaders and reform the pack. At one point I even toped 90 just trying to catch up. So I figured I was only getting average mileage in the wash. Pulled up to the pump, filled up and she only took 1.7 gallons for 135 miles! That's 76.5 mpg!! For the most part it was cruising at 55, but there were plenty of full throttle runs though the gears too, so I was super impressed. There was a 20mph wind that day too, but for every mile that it was behind me, we did a mile straight into it and the rest was a cross wind. All those big HOG riders thought the blast was pretty cool. None of them thought it would be comfortable or fit them very well, but they sure grinned when they saw me ripping along right with them. The owner of the harley Shop said my bike was "radical - cafe syle." All and all it was a good time. | ||
| Jprovo |
Congrats - Sounds like you had a good time, hope that your buddy makes it through allright. I'll second the Sears EZ-outs, they work real well. Just take your time, and use lots of penetrating oil if you can't get heat to it. James | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
Bolt shear: On the plus side if you actually have to drill the bolt out it wont take much effort (soft bolts)and you'll have plenty of thread left on the inside of the case if you screw up. A 1/16 drill bit will go right through and you can increase in size till it can be removed or buy a reverse drill bit and it'll back out. I'd chance an off drilled hole rather than break an ez-out (been there done that-sucks bad!!!!!). | ||
| Fasterblaster |
Nick..is that a picture of my Bike...?!  | ||
| Naustin |
Faster - Yeah, it is actually..  Drilled a hole in the bolt; it was actually centered as well as could possibly be expected. Stuck in the ex-out and twisted it off inside the bolt. (I knew that was going to happen). Drilled out the ez-out, and then got pissed and drilled out the whole bolt. Unfortunately my hole got off center in the "Busted Ez-Out Fiasco" - soon to become a feature film, and resulted in all kinds of problems. Long story short, I got the Banke's installed, and the bolt in question is seated, but I'm sure as hell not going to try to torque it because there isn't a whole lot of anything in there to hold on to. Was up until 1:00 and I'm exhausted... Still need to adjust the shifter length and do something with the drain lines. I'm also planning to use the stock passenger pegs, so maybe tonight I'll go at them with the saws-all. I suppose I'll have to go buy a grinder. I still need to torque everything too... Wow - I'm just a Zombie this morning....  | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
Been there-done that! Glad you got the ez-out out. Loctite makes a thread repair product and since the bolt in question doesnt hold all the weight you should be fine. | ||
| Naustin |
 The funny thing is, I just knew it would happen... Something like that always happens. Yeah, that bolt isn't mission critical, and I'm just happy that it happened on that one and not on the primary case - which would have been catastrophic. I'll lock-tite the crap out of it once I'm done painting and re-installing the passenger pegs. Once I get those back on my wife probably won't even notice the rear-sets.  | ||
| Ezblast |
I want pics! GT - JBOTDS! EZ | ||
| Naustin |
I want to get some details finished up and the passenger pegs on before I post a new picture... This one will have to hold you over...  PS) Just found out that kid who crashed broke his back in 4 places and will have to be in a body cast for the next 8 weeks, at least. (Message edited by naustin on October 04, 2005) | ||
| Ezblast |
Ouch! But the bike looks great! Can't wait to see the latest changes! GT - JBOTDS! EZ (Message edited by ezblast on October 04, 2005) | ||
| Swampy |
Loctite makes some really magical products other than just red and blue! | ||
| Sphere79 |
I hit a deer with the Blast on the way to work yesterday... Luckily it was a small doe and I slowed enough so that it just slammed into the front right side of the bike. The only damage appears to be a busted reflector ($2.25 for two and I already had extras), some hair stuck between the rim and tire and on the right light and I think the headlight alignment is off a little. I didn't stop as I was running late and thought the deer was probably alright. This happened near my parents place and when I talked to my father yesterday afternoon he said the poor thing died.... I must say that when considering a Buell I immediately came across mybuell.com and luckily did some research on actual user sites like this one and decided to go for it. I'm glad I did, it's been a great bike, easy to maintain, inexpensive parts and unique to boot. Add to it hitting a (baby) deer hard enough to kill the poor thing and having nearly no damage. I'm keeping the Blast (Pro series exhaust, intake, re-jetted carb and hand-adjustable mixture screw) but will be looking for an '03/'04 Lightning next season as well. One of these winters the Blast may get a bolt-on bore kit if the finances allow it. But I know with 8,000 miles on it (I got it with 2,100 the end of last years riding season) and accessories I'll never get what it's worth and I love her too much to let her go anyways..... (Message edited by sphere79 on October 05, 2005) | ||
| Dustyjacket |
glad you are OK. You must have been keeping aware and did just the right thing. | ||
| Jprovo |
Sphere, Glad you're OK. The few people that I know that have hit deer have not been so lucky. Glad you're keeping the Blast, they're great little bikes. James |
