{"id":4482,"date":"2013-11-04T12:20:43","date_gmt":"2013-11-04T19:20:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/?p=4482"},"modified":"2013-11-03T14:21:22","modified_gmt":"2013-11-03T21:21:22","slug":"winterizing-the-motorcycles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/winterizing-the-motorcycles\/","title":{"rendered":"Winterizing the Motorcycles"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"My<\/a>

My three motorcycles lined up in the driveway. This is the first time I've gotten some shots of them all together.<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n

No, this is not a piece about getting your bikes ready to put them away for the winter. I never do that. There’s not a single month that goes by that I don’t ride every bike I own.<\/p>\n

Nope, winterizing in this case is getting my bikes prepared for getting through the winter and being ready to run any time we have a nice day. That was my main objective on Sunday.<\/p>\n

The first thing I figured I needed to do was make sure each bike had a full tank of gas, with fuel stabilizer in it. That meant running the Kawi and the Honda over to get gas and adding the stabilizer. Of course I then had to go for a short ride on each of them, After all, it’s November, a new month, so each needed a chance to run and keep that battery charged.<\/p>\n

The Suzuki didn’t need gas as I had just filled it the last time I was out on it, but I put in some stabilizer and went for a ride. What an incredibly gorgeous day! Temps were at least in the high 60s and I saw one clock that said it was 73 degree. This is why we love Colorado.<\/p>\n

The next thing I do is make sure to put each bike on the trickle charger periodically. Getting the seat off the Honda to get to the battery is a bear so I had a pig-tail connected to it. For the other two it’s easy to pop the seat off and access the battery. I only have one trickle charger but I figure if I rotate it around the bikes regularly that will be fine. There’s nothing worse than having a fabulous, warm day in February and not being able to get your bike started! Your battery will live longer, too, if it doesn’t just sit for long periods.<\/p>\n

And make no mistake, they do sit for long periods. In the middle of winter it’s cold and I don’t ride as much. (You, too? Who’d a thunk?) And even though I ride each bike every month, I just rode all three on Nov. 3 and in theory at least it could be Dec. 31 before I ride again and that will still meet the criteria. That’s not generally how it happens but there have been a few times over the years when it did. Sometimes the weather is not a friend.<\/p>\n

The next part is winterizing myself. I have an electric vest, with pig-tails for it on the Honda and Kawi but I don’t yet have a pig-tail for the Suzuki. That is on the top of my priority list and I just have to remember to do it.<\/p>\n

I also have battery-powered electric gloves and for them it has been the opposite. That is, I’ve periodically charged them over the summer because I don’t want those batteries to die any sooner than I can avoid. I really don’t want those batteries to die because they would cost almost as much to replace as the gloves themselves. So I try to keep them charged, and of course during the weather when I wear them they go back on the charger immediately after each use.<\/p>\n

I also have some fleece-lined chaps<\/a> and they’re cozy in cold weather. They don’t keep you warm the way electric gear does but they’re way better than just going out in jeans.<\/p>\n

So OK, I’m about ready. Just need to get that pig-tail for the Suzuki. Then eventually it’s going to be spring again and I’ll need to do a bunch of other things. The Honda is going to need new tires next year and the Kawi will need a new back tire. And the Suzuki still needs highway pegs and . . . <\/p>\n

It never ends, does it?<\/p>\n

Recent from National Motorcycle Examiner<\/strong>
\nColorado rider training program ailing badly<\/a><\/p>\n

Biker Quote for Today<\/h3>\n

You’re a biker wannabe if you’ve never had to replace a worn out tire.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

No, this is not a piece about getting your bikes ready to put them away for the winter. I never do that. There’s not a single month that goes by that I don’t ride every bike I own. Nope, winterizing in this case is getting my bikes prepared for getting through the winter and being […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[564],"class_list":["post-4482","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gear","tag-winterizing-motorcycle"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4482"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4482\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4490,"href":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4482\/revisions\/4490"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}