Lucky Phil

10 psi on the bike and 15 on the cars that also have plastic reservoirs. The secret to perfect brakes on bikes is to remove the master from the bars and tip it up so the hose connections are lower than the reservoir and gently work the lever so you only move the piston a fraction (with the master off the bars you can't really apply any pressure anyway) This shakes loose air bubbles trapped at the master fitting and observe the air bubbles come back into the reservoir. I would do this procedure at least 6 or 8 times during the bleeding process along with tapping the hoses as well a lot. Patience is the key. I spent at least 45 min filling and bleeding the front brakes to get the best possible lever. Fluid replacement is quick and easy, air bleed from dry time consuming. Phil

I've said it a million times, you need to give brand new designs time to mature. People still don't believe it though. The new V100 Mandello is a case in point, lots of small but niggly detail faults ( and one major safety one) all so far connected to production issues but the design issues always take longer to make themselves apparent. People still seem to think engine designers have got it 100% nailed but nothing could be further from the truth. I recently spent a lot of time in researching issues with the new cars I was considering buying and there are a ton of serious problems with LOTS of major brands that require major mechanical invasion work thats never a good thing when you consider the skill of the average dealer mechanic these days. Here's just a few that come to mind. Mazda 2.5L turbo with the cylinder on demand system, that fails catastrophically. Recall for new head. Same model without COD and cracked heads around the exhaust port header mount. Replacement head. B58 BMW inline 6 oil pump failures and recall to replace the ( new) plastic pump gears. People are generally non technical these days so are totally unaware of these common problems, until it happens to them that is. I could be here all day on this subject but it's a fact. Buy a clean sheet design at your peril. Patience is the key and let the designe mature. It's been the case for nearly 100 years and is just the same today. Phil

Joe makes replacement steel gears for the crank, jackshaft and oil pump and also new pumps. I've been waiting for my third set of gears and pump for 3 years now and he informs me he's found a new gear maker so I should have them by the end of the year. Get an order in now if you want some. The alloy gears are rubbish but if your engine has low miles and isn't likely to accumulate too many then you should be ok. Phil

Here's what I used to bleed the front brakes from completely dry. It will get you 90% there from that point and the rest is the usual process. It will do 100% bleed for fluid changes etc. Cheap as chips and worth every penny. With my home made reservoir adaptor. Phil

If I was serious buyer I'd just message him on ebay with my mobile number and get him to give you a call or visa versa. Phil

Not entirely sure but I've been making my own braided lines for nearly 40 years on road bikes and never had an issue even in NSW where a yearly rego check was required. The benefit of having checks done by the local garage mechanic that rarely knows anything about motorcycles. Making your own for a road bike certainly isn't legal but in this case they were done professionally and are ADR compliant so I guess the answer is yes they can replace rubber hoses. It's not German regs here yet Mick thank god, but the way things go it probably will be eventually. Phil

Others have mentioned this but it's better in real life and if I was an expert in photo shopping so I could see what the variations would be I might consider it. The green is such a vivid and stand out colour though that it's easy to have too much of it I think. Anyone that knows how to photoshop really well I would welcome showing me versions with the fairing/and front guard in green and combinations of both. Maybe just the front guard green. Phil

The V11 has braided lines as standard Mick. Phil

A few more pieces to the never ending puzzle. Rebuilt 43mm Marzocchi forks. New seals bushes and sliders re chromed and ground. Brembo P4 34/34 calipers, later canted tripple clamps and clipons, clock re located, Ohlins steering damper, Titanium rear axle and nut, bevel housing shroud removed, new PVM 17 X 5.5 and 17 X 3.5 rims and 180 rear tyre, lightened rear brake calliper carrier, new brake lines to suit callipers. Next is to move the mufflers forward 35mm and make some new end caps that are not so long.

Motorcycle gearboxes don't need a hypoid oil either and an engine oil will suffice for lubrication. Even automotive gearboxes can use a non hypoid oil. We used to run ATF in Holden manual gearboxes 40 years ago without issues. After all auto gearboxes are full of gears as well. The Guzzi's just use it "because they can" but Japanese and Ducati gearbox gears aren't any bigger in dimension or quality than Guzzi gears and engine oil is fine for them as a lubricant. The main issue with Guzzi and BMW gearboxes and bevel boxes is the gears run IN an oil bath as opposed to simple splash lube like a Ducati or Japanese bike gearbox so they need an oil that resists foaming better than an engine oil. Engine oils can handle the lubrication requirements but probably not the foaming issue generated by gears running in an oil bath. Phil

Thanks Pete I'll let you know if I need it. I'm collecting the seals and bearings at the moment. I have some seals already. I will need to make up a dummy pinion bearing so I can set the gear backlash and position as well. Should be no problem. Phil

I use Molybond Formula 2.5 available in a 60gram tube. The gearbox doesn't need it because it uses constant mesh straight cut gears and has far less of the sliding action meshing of the rear bevel box hypoid gears. In reality you could probably use a high quality full synthetic gear oil these days just fine. I'm rebuilding a bevel box at the moment and just waiting on a new input shaft input bearing. You now the combined needle and split ball one you need to mortgage your house to buy. Phil

As a general rule I don't fly in anything that weighs less than I do. Phil

Sorry I don't have a code for you but I wonder why people actually need a code for a basic colour. It looks like a non metallic black is that right? I'm no expert in colour matching and I guess for a complicated colour like the v11 green with metallic components and multiple base layers it's going to be a whole lot easier as a starting point but even then you cant just mix a colour to "code" and use it to do a repair. It will still need to be "colour matched" because of fade and the discrepancy between a bulk mixed colour at production level and a tiny amount of paint mixed at those quantities. The error factor is much greater at the tiny mix quantities from a paint shop compared to the hundreds of litres mixed in a batch at the factory. So essentially even with a code you still need to do the colour matching anyway and with a basic colour a paint specialist can colour match without any codes. Here is the paint on my bikes frame parts colour matched to original 20 year old frame paint. It was done by a guy at the local paint supplier for me and I applied the paint,2K. I thought he had a special Spectro analyser to do this but no, he grabbed a 250ml can of base stock and mixed it by eye and it's perfect. I'm as pedantic as hell and it's perfect. No codes or anything like that just experience and talent for such things. Compare the pork chop and front frame member to the original lower frame support. The only difference is the level of gloss on my sprayed part.

As with most things the answer is somewhere in the middle. Phil

Wrong approach docc. That will accelerate overheating. The greater air/fuel burn and friction outstrips the increased oil flow which is of zero utility anyway because there is no way for the oil to shed the heat without airflow even at slightly elevated flow. So when you are not moving there is no airflow to extract the heat from the cooling fins, or over the crankcases OR via the oil cooler either. Elevating the rpm just exacerbates the issue. All you are doing is heating oil that has no way to shed the extra heat anyway. If you want a V11 to overheat another way ride it around at 3-5000rpm in first gear for a few miles in warm weather. That will do it as well. At those rpm in first gear there isn't enough airflow to keep it properly cool. If you ever watch Police escorts on old Harleys and Guzzis escorting a slow moving cavalcade it's always at the lowest rpm possible. If you want to keep a V11 engine cooler in those conditions you need fans on the oil cooler. I suggest a pair of 12V computer cooling fans. Compact light cheap and can be IPX rated as well. Phil

I see you got it flying Chuck, congrats. I'd never get in it to go flying of course but finishing a project of any sort is always nice achievement. Phil

If you are talking about front loading rear seats first it's commonly done here as they often load by aisle blocks from the rear which can cause the weight imbalance I talked about in my first post. I'm not talking about in flight weight and balance. If you are talking about rear entry loading then it's common here.

Yes I thought we were talking about loading pax the a/c so on the ground how it's loaded with regards to passengers boarding can be an issue and it's often overlooked by everyone to some extent except the engineer on the ground as if he's on the ball he'll see the floating nosewheel issue. Loading a freighter is a different story and just about everyone involved is highly aware of tipping the a/c although accidents still happen. Most heavy freighters use a tail steady during loading. In flight you can walk around at will, no real issue. The autopilot is continually trimming the pitch anyway. Phil