Yeah, I’m A Bad Bike Owner
I’ve never tried to hide the fact that I’m a bad motorcycle owner. By that I mean that I do a lousy job of maintenance. Over the weekend I proved to myself once again that I probably rate a D in this category.
When I had been out on my Honda CB750 recently I had had the impression that perhaps my front tire was low on air. I made a note to check it sometime soon. Also, my mechanic, Joel, tells me the reason it pumps out blue smoke when I start it up is because the valves need to be adjusted and that they are allowing oil to seep into the cylinders. Then I start it up and this oil gets burned out. I’ve wondered more than once what any of my neighbors who were observing this might be thinking.
It’s good to have this air compressor in my car at all times.
More pressing, though, was the thought that I ought to check the oil. With all this oil burning away, how low might I be on oil?
So with somewhat warmer weather on Sunday I rolled the bike out to do some maintenance. First thing I noticed was that one of the four zip-ties that hold the bag on the back of the sissy bar was broken so I replaced that. Following the procedure in the shop manual, I set the bike up on the center stand and fired it up to warm the fluids and circulate the oil. Then I shut it down and gave it a few minutes for the fluids to settle.
Of course, when I started the bike it smoked like crazy. When I pulled the dipstick, cleaned it and put it back in, it came out not showing any oil at all on the end of the stick. Yep, low. So I added some oil and tested again. Nothing on the dip stick. I added more; still nothing. I didn’t have a lot of oil so I just poured the rest in. Still nothing showing on the dip stick. Yeah, I guess I was low.
Then I measured the tire pressure. Both tires are supposed to have 41 pounds of pressure. I have a good, digital-read-out pressure gauge and I used it twice. Both times it said 7 pounds of pressure. OK. That would sure explain why I had the impression it was low. Fortunately I have this multi-tool thing my parents gave me many years ago to keep in my car that includes an air compressor. I hooked it up, set it to put in 41 pounds, and let it run. It took almost 15 minutes to bring this baby up to proper level. Normally if you just need to add a few pounds it can take a minute or at most two. Not this time.
I figure all of this tells us two things. First, I’m a lousy owner. I rarely wash my bikes, I go too long between oil changes, and I don’t do routine maintenance as I should. Rap my knuckles with a hickory stick.
Second, the engineers that design these machines do a great job. Their machines continue to run year after year despite such utter neglect from idiots like me. Thanks guys, you do good work and I definitely appreciate you.
Biker Quote for Today
The next time your neighbors tell you that your bike is too loud, organize a bike rally at your house.
