RichMaund

Very nice design and execution of the pieces!

They are right handed conventional threads. They are quite tight as well as sealed with an O-ring. Use a good hex bit driver made for a 3/8" or 1/2" ratchet. Put a 18" breaker bar and 6" extension on it and carefully apply torque until it breaks free. Make sure your hex bit is in good shape and a good fit in the hex hole or you risk rounding it out. All you can do then is to drill it through and use a large easy-Out to remove it. You'd have to get a new one after that. Use penetrating fluid. Good luck!

I got your e-mail and tried to reply. But AOL keeps shitting my mail back saying my server is on their spam list or something to that effect. I tried to private message you but I can't find a list of members to address it to you! I can't waste more time on this, so here goes. In reply to your asking what my thoughts were about trading a Lemans for a V11S: >>All Guzzi's seem to suffer corroded connections after a few years. Best to go thru them, clean them and pack them with dielectric grease to keep the corrosion at bay. Bad connectors will cause all sorts of heck and headaches. I think the Lemans has too much fairing for it's riding position. Leaves weight on your wrists. The old style adjustable clip ons on the original V11S coupled with the no fairing or small bugswatter fairing are much more comfortable for me. Wind pressure balances you on the bike and no pain in the wrists! Notice that few V11S owners want to change handlebars. Almost all Lemans owner want to though! I don't care for the Leman's slowed down handling, crummy finish on the drivetrain, blacked out frame and cheesy plastic frame covers. Looked like a K-Mart custom job to me! Yech! The V11S had the red frame to show it off and just looks more honest to me. The Lemans does nothing for me by comparison. Maintenance on a V11S is very easy. Good access to everything. Longest job is servicing the forks. That's a half day job on all of these bikes though. The only real problems with the original V11S were the crummy relays and cheap alloy oil cooler brackets that quickly cracked. Both problems easily fixed. Technically, you'd be getting the lesser end of the trade as the V11S is older and worth less money. But I follow my heart in deals like this. It all depends on which bike you like better. Very soon the Lemans will be older and worth less too! The V11S simply grabbed me and works very well for me. It really pulled alot of my heart strings. Few other bikes have grabbed me like that. When I first saw a Lemans I thought "Aw gawd, what have they done?". I thought they did the bike badly and on the cheap! I love the fairing design, but not coupled with the low bars. Raise the bars to sit up straighter and you have less weight over the front wheel. That affects handling. Everything has to work together as a balanced whole. The V11S was superb that way for me. I would not consider owing a Lemans. If you do get the V11S, DO fix the corroded chassis pieces! Corrosion leads to stress cracking and failure! Blasting and powdercoating is very reasonable these days and it's tough and corrosion resistant too. Hope this helps! Not trying to insult Lemans owners. But to my tastes, they finished the bikes with an ugly stick. Your opinion may vary. Sorry that due to AOL I had to send this on an open frequency!

It did not sell on EBay. 1862 people looked at the auction and not one bid! But it is still for sale. I have a friend who is interested but can't do anything about it until late next month. I am not actively advertising it anywhere since it's the off season now. But if someone wants it for $7500 including the $3K worth of custom accessories, luggage and performance work in it I will accept a deal on it at that price. So if anyone wants a premo-running V11S that is fully serviced and ready to sport tour, feel free to contact me. If you wish to fly here and ride home I will even pick you up at the airport. You can always have the work stand and stock parts shipped home via UPS. (All stock parts except the stock mufflers will be included in the sale. I have a copy of Guzzi's tech/service manual for it as well.) I love the bike. But my bad disk in my neck keeps me in constant pain. Full face helmets aggravate that. I haven't ridden further than 100 miles a day since June! My body has been well worn and beaten with work and injuries over the years. I have many little signs telling me it's time to stop two wheeling. Soon, I'll just be another disabled guy on a sidecar rig. But I have had a ball overall owning this bike for the last 2 1/2 years I've had it. It's a real adrenalin squeeze every time I ride it! Still under 13k miles. Just well broken in and in need of a more adventurous owner! Feel free to contact me if interested in it!

I have pushed my bike pretty hard around some of our better exit/entrance ramps. (That's all we have for curves in this area!) Perhaps it is my weight working FOR me vice against me, but I have never felt the front end feel insecure. I weigh 250 pounds geared up and have a 52" chest. Perhaps being built like a gorilla allows me to place more weight over the front end when I'm leaned forwards? The new secret to good handling on a V11S, work out hard for years and then let yourself run to fat! Off topic; My wife and I are on the cover of the city paper today on our Ural rig. Nice story about our business inside on page 6 as well. All the Guzzi pictures didn't make it into the paper! I suppose the editor liked the Ural best. Now I get to bask in my 15 minutes of fame!

I have to agree with the 10k mile break-in estimate. My last three Guzzi's took that long to limber up and became much better runners than they were new.

Eugene I build seats for a living. The V11S/Lemans seat is VERY different from the long and narrow V7 Sport seats. I'm not sue that reshaping a V11 seat into that form will give you the results you want. The V11 seat is very wide! Here's a link to page 1 of my seat pics on Yahoo. http://f1.pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/rgmaund/l...ts!&.view=t You can access the rest from there. Well over 100 seat photos there now. This represents much of my last three year's of seat work since we got the digi camera. Hopefully they'll give you some ideas! I still have my custom gel padded V11 Lemans solo seat on EBay right now. It ends late this afternoon. I can reshape a seat for you in any way that is possible. But you'll have to be sure that that shape is the one that will work for you as well. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions at rmaund@pinn.net

I thought there were three Dealers in western Pa. as well as Eish's in Salinesvulle OH.? Are none of them still open? The one in NW Pa. has only been there a few years. Westmoreland and the other go way back with Guzzi's. If you want to live in a "no dealer zone', move to my area! I have a good dealer 240 miles to the north and another 300 miles to the SW! Most Guzzi's owners around here rely on me for service or tips to straighten out their bikes. All we have locally is the support of a few club members!

There's an adjuster hidden under the rubber boot on the cable assembly where it exits the trottle assembly. My cables were too slack when new. That adjuster made short work of it.

I agree with Gthyny. I figured out the ratio for the rear end and put that much moly in my gear box. It has been working great that way for almost two years and the bike has almost 13k miles on it now. I have never had to replace a return spring yet either! (Knock on wood!) It's Fall and I need to flush the hydraulics and change fluids in the gear box and rear drive. (I have been averaging 6k per year, so I do the gear box and drive box annually. Engine oil gets done every 3k miles though.) When I do the job, I'll let y'all know if I find anything abnormal. If you don't hear from me about it, consider it good news. My bike is still for sale, though I am not actively advertising it. I plan to put it back on EBay come Spring. Great bike, beat up owner! The weather is turning and I can feel it in my joints. I never look forward to Winter! I have been working my butt off lately on outdoor projects to get them done before my arthritis shuts me down! I got a pressure washer a couple weeks ago! Very cool tool! My wife's cedar garden shed and our front porch deck (22' x 10'.) now look like new again! I put a 5 year clear water proofing treatment on all the bare wood two days ago. Looks great! Blasted all the bricks on our almost 30 year old house clean too. Doesn't damage the brick's finish or the mortar either! I'll keep it away from drive chains, electronics and bearings (No bike cleaning with it!) But on the house and out-building's, it's awesome! "Cleanliness is next to finishing the Honey-Do List!".

Pop the Power Commander CD into your drive and look at the vidoes that show you how to do everything! Great refreshers there and easy to follow.

I'm running an alloy frame to hold a K&N air filter in the stock box. No lid to restrict it. Just get one from FBF if you want one. Very reasonable price. I have the stock cross over and Mistral Guzzi alloy pipes. I have a PCIII from Todd! I'm running the map made for a V11S with Mistrals and stock everything else. That map worked well but seemed a bit on the rich side. I was slowly fouling plugs over a couple thousand miles running it that way. The K&N and no air box lid leaned it out nicely. I wouldn't cut a hole in your lid. Cheaper in the long run to buy a frame to eliminate the lid. Or, trace the lid and make your own frame like I did. My bike runs awesome. Another 70 miles on it today. Strong mid range, nice top rush and no driveability issues! I can highly recommend Todd's work on these!

Al's right on my set up. Riding to school today just keeps convincing me of how well it works. I like the side panels and didn't want to eliminate them with the airbox. (It'd be alot of fussy work to build my own frame to keep the side panels and use the individual K&N's!) Perhaps this winter I'll start a custom sheet steel gas tank for the bike to make better use of some of the open space where the lid used to be! I figure leaving 1.5" above it free will be cool for intake flow. May get an honest 6 gallon tank when I'm done! Anyone have drawings to construct an English Wheel? I can do the machining and welding, but it's always good to have a good print to work from!

I have my 2000 V11S set up with a set of alloy Mistral cans, stock cross over, K&N filter with no airbox lid and a PCIII from Todd Egan running the map for the "mistral cans and stock intake and cross over" map. Dyno'd at 83 rwhp and 65 ft.lbs torque locally at the Triumph Dealer. It idles flawlessly at 1000 rpm. Drivability is excellent. Mid range is fat and linear and it still has a nice top end punch. 41mpg hiway and 33 city. You can cruise it at 3000 rpm, 4k or 5k. It's smooth all over the place! It runs so well now that I am almost afraid to mess with it anymore.

I find my V11S outstanding as a sport touring bike. With the Stuchi "Bugswatter" fairing on it and my Givi hard kuggage set up, it is just right! Cruising along between 50 and 90 mph there is a just right amount of airflow to hold you up and keep pressure from your wrists. Above 90, I find myself pulling myself down into the fairing's bubble though. I do personally have alot of "sail" area. But the airflow around me is smooth and turbulance free. That little fairing is all the bike needs. 500 mile days on the bike seem just right to fill a long summer's day! I haven't been able to do shit for touring this summer. Either working or having natural disasters kick my butt! (We are STILL without power from the hurricane! 9th day now!) But my 40 mile round trip to welding class today was nice and reminded me what a competent and enjoyable bike the V11S is! I've always thought the new Lemans has too much fairing for it's sporty riding position. It leaves you with much weight on your wrists! You don't hear of too many V11S owners wanting to change away from the stock clip-ons, which are excellent IMHO. But I can see advantages for folks running a superbike bar above the triple tree. Especially good around town. Glad to see a factory bike with that now!

I used heavy SS lockwire on mine. Almost disappears under the liquid vinyl!

Looks much like the one I made for myself! But I didn't like the white PVC fittings showing, so I dabbed black liquid vinyl over them. Mine cracked above the coils as well. Any chance the coils produce ozone or something to rot the hose out?

OK, I was thinking wrong on this. Sorry for that. The hub needs to be a light press fit into the wheel. No movement wanted there. The plate that engages therubbers needs to be able to move on the hub though and you did grease that area. Good! I got confused remembering it since I had to completely disassemble my wheels way beyond just servicing the cush drive in order to get the wheels powdercoated. Taking that plate off and lubing the rubbers with silicone dielectric grease and using #2 lithium grease on the hub to plate contact area is all that is needed to make the cush drive do it's job well!

Joe's a CNC machinist and a real artist at it too! If you look up his website, there's a photo there of my V11S proudly wearing a set of his head gaurds! I highly recommend him and his products!

Folks Getting the plate off with the two screw driver trick works to get into the rubbers. Often, if the rubbers are assembled dry, as they usually are, that plate will stick. Just keep patiently working at it to get it free of the rubber blocks. But you must drive out the hub from the wheel to apply grease to that area. There is even a spiral groove machined in to hold the grease there. I found Guzzi assembled mine dry. Unless that area is greased, it can lock up and then no relative motion is allowed to occur between the wheel and hub. "Usually", you can drive it back from the large circlip side with a hardwood dowel and a mallet. Block up the wheel to allow it come back through the other side as you pound on it. If yours is a sticky bastard, as mine was, you're better off putting it under a large hydraulic press. Feel free to use liberal amounts of your favorite penetrating fluid. ZEP makes a professional grade one that is excellent. Good luck on it. It's worth doing.

I have a set of PIAA knockoffs from Harbor Freight that ran only $12.99 on sale. 35 watts each. I believe the system will carry one light. Just make an "L" bracket and attach the light to the oil cooler bracket mount. You may need longer fasteners, but SS metric pan head Phillips Head screws are easy to find. I was going to mount just one on the right side to fill in a little better on the curbside when going around corners at night. Just haven't gotten around to it yet.

Actually, I'd have been happy to use copper, but it fit's too loosely inside the hose. If you have a conduit bender, you could make a very nice hose with the bends in it and just use a pair of rubber hose sections to join it to the fittings on the frame and engine. Not being an electrician, I haven't needed to bend much conduit over the years. But the benders are so inexpensive, I'm considering it. Great fodder for custom plumbing like this!

I used 45 degree white pvc fittings. They fit into the hose nicely. Then I used heavy lockwire in leiu of bulky hose clamps. You can even dab some black liquid vinyl over the joints to make them even less obtrusive.

I replaced mine with 3/4" ID heater hose. You'll have to add in a couple plumbing 45 degree elbows for the bends. The stock Guzzi hose is cheap vinyl. They breakdown ususally in two years or less in use. The rubber heater hose lasts much longer!

Pit Bull I subscribe to Moto Euro magazine. Their last issue had an excellent article featuring a v11S project bike with FBF's performance mods poured into it. Wasn't it up to over 90 rear wheel horse power and still had great torque and drivability? Damned impressive work and great photos of the bike as well! You could get permission to run the text of it here. You'd have a bunch of guys drooling to get to FBF's shop after that. I know I was that way afer reading it. I think it'd be pretty cool to do a Guzzi performance shoot out. Get a bike prepped by FBF against a Todd Egan modified bike (With Mike Rich heads?) and then have some qualified club racer guys like Snuffy Smith and others do a comparo. Throw a stock bike in th emix as well. Publish the performance numbers, but more importantly have the riders write down their impressions of the bikes "feel" and crispness and handling. Numbers lie, but impressions can be shared by all. Drivability and feel count for more in my book than just peak HP. For the last year I have been wishing I could afford a trip to FBF for their pistons and then a tuning link dyno session to personalize the mapping. If I don't have to use a credit card to get through Christmas like I did last year I may just be able to swing that in early Spring! If I do, I'd volunteer my bike for the comparo. By the way, I spent a few hours on the phone with Todd Egan, a.k.a. Racer X, discussing PCIII's before I bought mine from him. After all the great info I got from him, as well as his sending me a PCIII pre-mapped for my bike's specific equipment, the $300 price of the item seemed pretty darned reasonable for what I got! The PCIII has been on the bike almost a year and works great. It's the single best performance accessory on the bike to date. The bike runs so much better now than it did new, it's not even funny. Todd really knows his stuff! Aww.... to be wealthy and be better able to care for my toys! I think it's great having a rep. from FBF as well as Todd on this board. Great resources!