FreyZI

BTW, @Lucky Phil, your repair on that side cover looks great.

Gotta choose my battles, Phil. This one, I'd rather pay someone to git er done. If there's a critical mass of us that want these, maybe we can get the price per unit to a reasonable number. If it's prohibitively expensive, then yes, I'll give it a shot. Or, repair and matte clear, per your suggestion, above. Thanks!

Correct -- just the pillion cover. I have far too little time and comparatively more disposable income to start messing around with this as a DIY job. Incidentally, maybe this hump is due for v11lemans.com nomenclature. @docc: Yeah, that supposed windshield/flyscreen on ebay is clearly the seat lid. For a mere $200, you also get the sticker of Manneken Pis.

In honor of St. Patrick's Day, I took out the Green Goose today! Rode into Amish country, avoiding horse puckey on the road, took a mountain (well, what passes for a mountain in central PA) pass (lots of gravel and salt -- I almost walked around the 10mph hairpin switchbacks), and got back into town following a magnificent sunset. Stupidly, I didn't think to get a pic until too late, but I snapped this image after before it was lost completely: Look at that!!! Where is the "jaw on the floor" emoji? What a beautiful piece of machine art. You can walk around these V11 for hours trying to find the best angle to look at them from. And riding it is just as special. I can't make claim to being a great rider, I don't have any idea how to dial-in suspension settings, and I've haven't ridden scores of bikes for comparison purposes. What I do know is that the grin on the face sets in just after rolling out of the driveway. Literally. One moment it's a hooligan; another (around the ton) it's stirring milk tea. Pretty great combination, that. Cheers, Frey

So, I "need" a seat cowl, too. My Tenni came to me very well appointed in CF: front mudguard, gauges mount, fuel tank chin rest, alternator cover, side panels, hugger, and seat cowl. The only problem is that every piece of the CF is matte finish EXCEPT the seat cowl, which is high gloss. This bothers me immensely. Also bothersome, one of the POs turned the bolts too tight and cracked the cowl a bit; and there's a few other chips in the clear. I would like to source a matte CF cowl, but I'm guessing that's unobtainium. How many of us do yinz suppose it would take to make it affordable to get some made up for us? Seems a pretty easy job (for someone with the knowledge, skills, and tools, that is) -- one small piece, no corners, two holes. May have to start a new thread on this.... Thoughts?

Can't explain it, but I've always thought a tank cover would be cool ugly chic? Got one you aren't using? @docc? Color should be appropriate to champagne (if I were to order one new, I'd think about the steel grey). Cheers, Frey

Add Pennsylvania to intent. Timing is far from ideal for me, but gonna make every effort....

Geauga County is 3.5 hours away, so not an unreasonable ride, and I have fam in Cook Forest on the way there. I'll keep a lookout for NE Ohio MG activity. Cheers, @guzziart. Frey

Is that mood lighting, Docc?

Bought one-way flight from Pennsylvania to Colorado in June. Thinking I'll ride around CO visiting friends for 5 days and then spend another 5 days on a joy ride home. I'll need to buy a bike out there of course. If I love it, I'll keep it when I get home. Otherwise, I'll sell it. Trumpet Sprint STs seem to be pretty affordable and well-liked, plus many come with factory cases. Seems a number of forum members have owned or ridden one at some point. Virtues of this bike?

Interesting idea. Incidentally, the Tenni exploding clutch/flywheel problem was resolved by POx1. Bubbles just sounds a bit clanky. Seems that switching the brackets L to R resolved the fairing problem.

Yep, that did the trick. PO missed that when installing the fairing after the first crash. I always knew one cylinder was forward and one aft, but never knew they were no on longitudinal center.

Okay, I have the decent tune up bookmarked. @Scud, what to look for?

I did notice a bit of a stumble on acceleration, too. Maybe engine vacuum leak from the throttle-body base gasket?

The most encouraging thing is that I didn't have any parts left over after it went back together. Thanks for the nice pic, Docc. Per instructions, grounded wire and got neutral light. Filed connector, put on some dielectric grease. Neutral light all good.

I got Bubbles put back together. I started with the rear, as I swapped out the badly peeling anodized-looking red pork chops for a pair of dark silver-ish pork chops that came with the bike from PO. Though I had considered a "one side at a time" approach to pork chop replacement (i.e., take as little apart as possible), I ultimately decided to just take everything apart. Now that I've had the rear apart, the good news is that most of it seems pretty serviceable. I did not break into the rear drive, but oil looked fine and magnetic plug looked fine, too. All the joints in the drive train looked good enough. Known problems: Shock eye at swingarm has some play Torsion bar rubber jobbies are shot Right muffler mount bent Torsion bar has been eroded at the connection to frame (I suspect one of the frame tabs was bent inward at some point and it since ate slowly away at the torsion bar where it's pinched Also, the most rearward part of the fairing (above the cylinder heads) is not a tight fit to the fuel tank. I suspect that, in the fall on the right, one or more mounting brackets were bent, and then bent back, but not quite to original shape. I have a half inch or so of daylight. In the outdoor light, it sure seemed to me that the fairing was a different color (a bit less gold) that the tank and the seat surround. I suspect that the fairing had either been replaced or repainted at some point; and that there was a second accident in which the fairing got a little minor road rash. Yes, I think this bike has been down a couple times. Moving on to the front: I took Bubbles down from laundry room suspension and wheeled it outside. Started right up. Runs a little rough. A bit more (valve train?) noise than the Tenni. I let it warm up a couple minutes; did not ride it. Began leaking fuel from the right throttle body. I noticed this after I shut it down, so I don't know if it was leaking while running. Also after shut down, I noticed that the right muffler only smoked for a while. This is where I will be most happy for your thoughts. One other gremlin to note: Neutral light does not come on and dropping the kickstand in neutral results in engine cut-off. It's a good thing I'm having fun wrenching and learning about V11s, because I'm feeling like I made a pretty poor, sight unseen, Covid Times, boredom purchase. This may end up being the rat bike I always wanted.

Bolt is straight. Just seems a little sloppy, like the swivel bearing of the shock is a little enlarged.

Unfortunately, I have no idea what they might have come off of. I have been calling them silver, but they aren't really. More of a gun metal color, but not so dark.

Y'all are saying 19mm and 22mm. My caliper says 19.9 mm and 21.8 mm. I would call the smaller one a nominal 20 mm. Confirm that the locking nut is chromed on the smaller and stainless on the larger. Not to worry, @Scud, I just hadn't taken the tape off that drain plug washer seat. The paint (VHT Wrinkle Plus) does not need to be baked: take your pick, let dry or cure. Instructions say that baking may make the crinckles smaller. 200F for an hour. I baked.

Wrapped up a work marathon early this afternoon and treated myself to an evening with Bubbles. What did I do to my v11 today? Started putting the back end back together. I picked up this slovenly V11LM earlier this year and have started cleaning, checking, and (the reason for taking the back end apart) replacing the very badly peeling pork chops with a pair of silver chops PO threw in. So, I'm putting the swing arm back on and I'm having the damnedest (sp.?) time getting the swingarm pivots to seat in the swingarm bearings. Got the flashligh, lined up the holes, tried again and again, switched sides, flashlight line-up, tried and tried again. Now, I read a post recently (sorry, I can't attribute this at the moment); poster said grind a little bevel around the edge of the pin so it goes into the bearing easier. Well that sounds like a pain in the arse. Anyway, long story short, I'm thinking -- it can't be this hard. Well, you've heard the expression you can't put a square peg in a round hole. Also, you can't put a round peg in a round hole when the peg is of a significantly larger diameter than the hole. Even a hammer would not have helped. Who would have guessed that the spare pork chops take a different diameter pivot? The other project for the day was painting the final drive case. I had some advice (thanks, folks), which I ignored, and went with the crinkle paint. I did buy a rattle can of a semi-gloss, too, and shot a test piece of both. Crinkle was a good match to original, so I went with that, knowing: 1) it doesn't look as good as smooth, 2) it's a PITA to clean. What can I say? Turned out pretty well. Far from perfect, but perfect on this hard-used bike would be like lipstick on a pig. Anyway, a couple of questions (apparently I don't know how to search on this forum, because I can only get zero results of 4,000 results): 1) Torque on swingarm pivot caps? 2) How much play is acceptable in the eye of the shock mount at the swingarm? Cheers, Frey

Amen

Returning from thread drift>>> I posed a question about Grisos in another thread that garnered no attention. Will try again here. I seem to remember when Griso leftovers were around. My search on cycletrader.com today had just 2 Grisos listed -- an '07 and a '17 (the prior with reasonable miles and great condition for under $4K). Are these ending up in the hands of people who appreciate them? Anyway, question is this: would you buy an '07? On paper, seems like the 8V is the way to go.

I've prescribed myself a ride in the old stompin' grounds of Colorado this summer. Heading out for a wedding end of June near Vail. I bought a one-way ticket to Denver and have left the way back itinerary-less. I'll either rent a bike for a week or.... If I find the right bike, turn it into a fly-and-ride. I'll have a lot of miles to cover in the fly-over states. I've made many trips across I-80 between the front range and PA (by car), but never taken the more southerly route. After a few days of riding in the mountains, I could strike out across the plains, try some different BBQ, see the Arch, then into the Monogahela. A couple months too early to start looking at bikes in CO for the end of June, but why should that stop me? Ideally, the bike would be something with wind protection and cases (or at least mounts). I did see this thing of interest: https://fortcollins.craigslist.org/mcy/d/fort-collins-2007-motto-guzzi-grizo-1100/7445282042.html. '07 Griso, low miles, adult-owned, with screen and cases, aftermarket seat, for $5,400. I know there are lots of threads out there on the 4V vs. 8V and rollerization, which I'd have to look at if we were closer to June. Would you buy an early Griso?

200 miles would put it damn near the PA border. If I hadn't bought Bubbles (an '02 V11LM) a couple weeks ago, I'd be making a call.