wordsmith

Thanks for confirming, Trambo. I am only 187lbs (85kg) fully-kitted, never carry a pillion, only rarely fully-loaded panniers, so the non-GTs should be fine for me. Appreciate your input - enjoy the mountains!

I do not want to start another tyre - or even tire - thread, but... are Pilot Road GT's the better choice than the non-GT PRs? I have read elsewhere that the GTs are for heavier bikes than ours. I'll be ordering new rubber next week and am tossing-up between Pirelli Angels and the newer Michelin Road 5s. But the Pirellis are about $100 cheaper...

Sent to me today by a mate living in Japan... Niken costs 1750000-1850000 Japanese Yen.My BMW 2012 Roadster was 1850000 base price.For a Japanese bike, it's not cheap.For comparison, a new Yamaha MT-09 with ABS & ATC is only a mere 940000-1160000 Yen.So, almost half the Niken 850 pricetag.Niken looks like a full on sports bike orpossibly Hooligan machine. A serious contraption.Tri City 125cc 3-wheel is popular here and I see a lot of them. It's a smaller scale, lighter duty version.Price is also affordable.420000-460000 YenBusiness men in suits. College kids.Daily commuters. Younger weekend couples.

Lookin' great!

Could someone pls give me the Mazda oil-drain plug part number that replaces the taller OE item? And does the Mazda plug require a new crush-washer from them too? Many thanks..

Which begs the obvious question - is the OE oil-pan aluminium, or steel?

Those Pennsylvania Vacuum Cup tires (tyres) look as if they're made of left-over octopus arms and legs! I'd love to be able to read the copy in that ad!!

Many thanks for this realistic appraisal, DeepSix. Gives me food for thought! Frankly, my preference is to paint (rattle-can approach) the centre part of each pannier lid, as I did pretty satisfactorily with my last Tracer. Then, I matched the dished panel on each lid with the gunmetal paintwork of the tank and put some thin gold pinstripe around the edge of the panel (see pic) - the bike's body colour was dark blue. I was lucky enough to be able to find a household paint that was a near-perfect match, given that the panniers were feet away from the tank, so even as a pretty fussy guy I was satisfied with the result. The issue this time is that I have so far been unable to find the colour in a can that will give me a near-exact (at worse) match to my Lava Red - and near enough won't be good enough. The lids have been dressed-up a little with some pinstripe, but I'd still like to go that extra step, whatever it's gonna be.

Quack!😁 Intuitively, you'd have to believe that the beak's fairly flat and reasonably large surface area and that angle of attack would definitely have a downward effect, but how much...???

Ditto that, in spades. Good article thus far, not too much gushing... I'm sure, open1mind, that I'm not alone in hoping that you will alert us to future follow-ups on this article: thanks!

Thanks a lot nick - I'd be very happy to let you trial the product and process! Please update us all here. Meantime, I'll have a trial with what leftover carbon-look vinyI I have and see what happens. Will post-up results. Just gotta get hold of a heat-gun...

Looking more closely at the OE pannier lids, they are quite deeply dished - i.e. somewhat concave in shape around the middle area. I wonder if heat-shrinking the PVC will make it adhere to this shape? Any views on this? The pic below shows what I mean, the wobbly line highlighting the dished area. Memo to myself: must stop regarding alcohol as one of the main five food groups.

I've become a bit intrigued by this! Thinking of attempting a carbon-look vinyl-wrap of my OE pannier lids. Is the cheap-as-chips vinyl sheeting as found on E Bay Motors good enough/ suitable for this type of job? If not, what should I purchase? Given that the bike is indoors/ out of the sun for most of its life would I get reasonable fade-free life from the application? Any tips, hints, do's, don't's will be greatly appreciated. I have some scrap carbon-look vinyl pieces here and might have a little attempt on something that can be thrown away if necessary...

Indeed, the very best of reasons!

Good lookin' job that! I have never got to know just what's involved in this 'wrap' approach - to the best of my knowledge it's either unknown or at least very uncommon here. Could you please give some more details of the materials used and the process. I wouldn't mind trying it on my pannier lids... TIA.

Ditto...

Black hole is right! Working on my bike around that area in recent weeks on various minor jobs I have dropped a plastic knurled securing knob for my GPS holder: several nuts and bolts: and at least one Allen key! Never does anything dropped appear again - it deffo is form of black hole, from which not even light can escape! Now when working in that area I arrange a small towel on and around the opening to catch dropped stuff before it too gets gobbled up!

Looks neat and clearly works, 2linby! My solution only suits bikes with the OE pannier carrier, a very chunky structure specifically designed to cut into tender palms and fingers! With this installed, my solution was to cut a length of clear poly tube lengthwise, and slip it onto the underside of the pannier mount, secure with electrical tape, et violin. Not especially neat, but does the job much more comfortably.

AirZound - Bike Air Horn REDIRECT.VIGLINK.COM Review of the 115DB Airzound bicycle air horn, with information on how to fit and use it, where to buy your AirZound and more! Perfect for all cyclists!

tplz, koth - we also are required by law to have a headlight on all the time, but let's be honest, the Tracer's is somewhat feeble, especially perhaps in bright sunlight. Hence my use of DRLs and my interest in whether fitted or not in these near-miss situations! Not - as with the horn - that they are any guarantee: my own (and only) near-miss, which wasn't really all that near occurred on my BMW R1200 R. This bike has sort-of traditional styling, with a large single round headlight (albeit not very bright) but was, as usual with me, fitted with a pair of brighter-than-a-thousand-suns LEDs at the font. Riding at modest/ legal speed along a local Motorway some time ago I was quite gradually coming up behind a small van pulling a small tradesman's trailer, which was in an adjacent lane. When I was some distance behind it began to ever-so gently drift into my (marked) lane. I proceeded, as it was well in front of me, and it too proceeded to drift, until I blipped the horn. A startled-looking face appeared out of the driver's window with a look that he must have thought that a yellow submarine had come up behind him! More amusing than anything else, but LEDs and all, he clearly wasn't looking into his mirrors.

Same question as before - is your bike fitted with DRLs? I ask only because of the 'she just flat didn't see me' comment. Whatever - glad you got away with it.

A home-made DIY rad guard on each of my two previous Tracers, and now on the current one, has been securely held in-place with zip-ties over several thousand kilometres. Hard to see, though, as both ties and guard are black.

Michelin Road 5 = AUD$495 fitted. Pirelli Angel GT = $AUD395 fitted.

They have moved - now at North Tivoli... Thanks.

Would you care to share your cost, John (fitted, balanced, etc) - and where bought? Ta.