OP
OP
And for something completely interesting again.... posted in my South African FB ST site
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SOME Trips are the ones, like my recent one from Johannesburg to Capetown and back (±2.000miles) in a week type of “fun” trips.
In October of 2020 after the Covid19 pandemic subsided a little, I set out for a journey to CapeTown from Johannesburg to do some work for a customer in Atlantis.
Before I left I decided to go with ST1300 #2, as she had yet to trip the 200,000km mark and No3 had already done so… I had a small maintenance issue with a oil leak out of the inspection hole showing that the oil seal on the water pump was “tired”. So I decided to refurbish the whole unit with a new mechanical seal, oil seal and bearing. I also saw that the right hand side fork was leaking so I had this repaired at the local Biking Brakpan shop.
After this job was completed I felt that it was safe to set out on the voyage. All was great on that Sunday until i had done about a 1,000kms. I fuelled up in Beaufort West and left for the last 500 plus kilometre part of the journey. It was already after 1:30 in the afternoon when after only about 19kms the re was am amazing red cloud of (thought blood at first) coolant water spraying around me. I stopped very quickly and then looked at the damage…..
The main water “T’ piece had blown apart. A kind policeman stopped and helped me. He called for help from Attie from Beaufort West, who came out and towed me back we stripped the bike and he made another “T’ piece. We fitted it and all seemed ok. I left again at around 6:30pm. I didn’t get far at the temp gauge shot over themas mark before i had even left town… Then we looked for the real culprit…
The thermostat was broken so it didn’t open and caused pressure and the water temp rose too high very quickly… Attie “jippoed” (made a plan) and jammed the thermostat slightly open. I slept over and set out very early to get to Capetown and my customer to do the work I needed to do.
I travelled via a shorter route shown by my iPhone’s GMaps and went through Ceres and Malemsbury. I have to go back to ride it again, but slower with no rust to be somewhere.
Now just for the interested, my fuel consumption was very high because the bike was running so cold, with the thermostat jammed open … My mate, whom we’ve discussed earlier, John Peel’s son Mike (whom had taken over his father’s ST1300, after john passed on), had asked me to stop over when I passed that way. When I told him of the problem, he made a plan to get me a new thermostat from Honda CT, and on the Friday he collected it from his place in Wellington. What a friend! We meet up and rode to his place together. He was riding a Bajaj 200cc motorcycle. More about that bike later…
On the Saturday morning we stripped the bike down and fitted the new thermostat. PS while in CT , and where I met Mike, I visited a bike stop that had many old Pan Europeans.. I bought a secondhand tappet cover for the RHS cylinder bank (It was damaged in my 2012 Taxi accident and I had patched it with Partly Putty for all these years. So I decided to also change it. Simple job.
While we had the covers and fairings off, Mike noticed something that I have never seen: there were cracks on the “down arms” of the frame that hold the motor in place. I had most likely ridden over 100,000kms with the frame arms totally broken off…….GOD LOVES ME!!!!
I am going to leave out one of the best exciting rides of my life for the want of space...
There was one or two more twists in this tail. When I had re-fitted the side fairing I got the wiring crossed up and almost set the bike alight when, on the Sunday I switched on the lights and phone’s USB connection, and was about to leave. Another half hour later I had thing sorted to a point that I could leave… But as they say in the ads…”that’s not all folks!”
A little while later I filled up the bike and found that there was oil all over the right hand side of the bike… It seems that I may have forgotten to tighten the oil filler cap when I put the tapped cover on… Haha
Anyways got home and stripped and prepped the bike for the welding of the “down Arms”. It was slow going trying to grind in the small restricted areas. After about 3~ 4 days I found one could just pull to the broken pieces and grind them clean very easily, Duh!!!.
Then Dillion welded the frame…. And found more cracks and just welded them as well…..
At Last ready to go -
She passed all the tests (±200kph, wiggles and shakes) and somehow I find the bike seems to be more SOLID than it's been for a loooong time…
I wonder why…???
A big shout out and THANKS to all involved win this FUN trip.
You always seem to remember the hard trips........
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SOME Trips are the ones, like my recent one from Johannesburg to Capetown and back (±2.000miles) in a week type of “fun” trips.
In October of 2020 after the Covid19 pandemic subsided a little, I set out for a journey to CapeTown from Johannesburg to do some work for a customer in Atlantis.
Before I left I decided to go with ST1300 #2, as she had yet to trip the 200,000km mark and No3 had already done so… I had a small maintenance issue with a oil leak out of the inspection hole showing that the oil seal on the water pump was “tired”. So I decided to refurbish the whole unit with a new mechanical seal, oil seal and bearing. I also saw that the right hand side fork was leaking so I had this repaired at the local Biking Brakpan shop.
After this job was completed I felt that it was safe to set out on the voyage. All was great on that Sunday until i had done about a 1,000kms. I fuelled up in Beaufort West and left for the last 500 plus kilometre part of the journey. It was already after 1:30 in the afternoon when after only about 19kms the re was am amazing red cloud of (thought blood at first) coolant water spraying around me. I stopped very quickly and then looked at the damage…..
The main water “T’ piece had blown apart. A kind policeman stopped and helped me. He called for help from Attie from Beaufort West, who came out and towed me back we stripped the bike and he made another “T’ piece. We fitted it and all seemed ok. I left again at around 6:30pm. I didn’t get far at the temp gauge shot over themas mark before i had even left town… Then we looked for the real culprit…
The thermostat was broken so it didn’t open and caused pressure and the water temp rose too high very quickly… Attie “jippoed” (made a plan) and jammed the thermostat slightly open. I slept over and set out very early to get to Capetown and my customer to do the work I needed to do.
I travelled via a shorter route shown by my iPhone’s GMaps and went through Ceres and Malemsbury. I have to go back to ride it again, but slower with no rust to be somewhere.
Now just for the interested, my fuel consumption was very high because the bike was running so cold, with the thermostat jammed open … My mate, whom we’ve discussed earlier, John Peel’s son Mike (whom had taken over his father’s ST1300, after john passed on), had asked me to stop over when I passed that way. When I told him of the problem, he made a plan to get me a new thermostat from Honda CT, and on the Friday he collected it from his place in Wellington. What a friend! We meet up and rode to his place together. He was riding a Bajaj 200cc motorcycle. More about that bike later…
On the Saturday morning we stripped the bike down and fitted the new thermostat. PS while in CT , and where I met Mike, I visited a bike stop that had many old Pan Europeans.. I bought a secondhand tappet cover for the RHS cylinder bank (It was damaged in my 2012 Taxi accident and I had patched it with Partly Putty for all these years. So I decided to also change it. Simple job.
While we had the covers and fairings off, Mike noticed something that I have never seen: there were cracks on the “down arms” of the frame that hold the motor in place. I had most likely ridden over 100,000kms with the frame arms totally broken off…….GOD LOVES ME!!!!
I am going to leave out one of the best exciting rides of my life for the want of space...
There was one or two more twists in this tail. When I had re-fitted the side fairing I got the wiring crossed up and almost set the bike alight when, on the Sunday I switched on the lights and phone’s USB connection, and was about to leave. Another half hour later I had thing sorted to a point that I could leave… But as they say in the ads…”that’s not all folks!”
A little while later I filled up the bike and found that there was oil all over the right hand side of the bike… It seems that I may have forgotten to tighten the oil filler cap when I put the tapped cover on… Haha
Anyways got home and stripped and prepped the bike for the welding of the “down Arms”. It was slow going trying to grind in the small restricted areas. After about 3~ 4 days I found one could just pull to the broken pieces and grind them clean very easily, Duh!!!.
Then Dillion welded the frame…. And found more cracks and just welded them as well…..
At Last ready to go -
She passed all the tests (±200kph, wiggles and shakes) and somehow I find the bike seems to be more SOLID than it's been for a loooong time…
I wonder why…???
A big shout out and THANKS to all involved win this FUN trip.
You always seem to remember the hard trips........
