The RC46 story

Plug it and go play Having spent some more time away from the bike I was left thinking: Sealing the exhaust up hadn't stopped it popping so what was causing it? "Well popping is caused by air getting to the exhaust so either you did a crap job of tightening up the header pipe or it's the PAIR system" I thought to myself. The PAIR valve allows fresh air into the exhaust system to continue the burn of the exhaust gasses on their departure to lower the emissions. This should create no problems with the standard end can but put a straight through can on it and you might get popping and banging on the overrun.  Maybe I needed a step back from the bike to see this but I thought what harm can it do to try? as it happens the task is quite reversible and doesn't cost anything to simply block the system and if it works I might go ahead and remove it completely. PAIR valve isolation With the aid of the Haynes manual and this guide from VFR discussions  I got to ...

One of the first tasks I normally perform on a new (to me) bike is to balance the carburettors. This is one of those jobs that never seems to get done as you need specialist tools but can make quite a difference in the day to day running of the bike.  "But wait Gavin, that's an injected motorcycle" I hear you cry. Well this is true but you can still balance the throttle bodies and mine are all over the place.  When I first purchased this bike, the tick over was up at 3.5k rpm when warm. I bottomed out the idle screw and had to also wind back the whole throttle body plate in order to get it near to the 1.5rpm correct idle. Now this might have had something to do with the bike massively over compensating for having a mouse house in the airbox  but with that small obstruction removed I knew the throttle body balance would be out after my fiddling. The first thing obstructing me from doing this right in the first place was that I had lent my carb gauges to a...

Imagine making yourself a nice place to live. It's roomy, with a springy floor and you fill it with soft bedding to make it into the most comfy nest to get your head down after a long hard day working. One day you are woken by what feels like an earth quake as your room is jolted about. In the darkness you hear a distant jangle and click followed by a brief scream that emanates from below, stopping as fast as it starts. All goes quiet for a moment before your world is turned upside down. A brief rhythmic cranking noise is followed by a tremendous roar. Air rushes past you and apparently into the floor like breath.The roar builds and falls sucking bits of bedding into the creases of the floor. You jolt into action and run  for the entrance, feeling the wind tear at you as you flee. What was once a cold, neglected, man made maze is now rapidly heating into a furnace as you hop and jump your way to the floor only to see what was once your house, bellow off into the distance ap...