Whilst negotiating a narrow and rocky section of Hogden Lane en-route home on Sunday I was forced, due to the terrain, close to the left hand bank where, poking out of the undergrowth, lurked an enormous gnarly tree stump. I knew it was close, but as I went carefully past I was right at the point of breathing a small “phew that was close” sigh of relief when I collected it with the front of my left hand pannier.

Despite only going slightly above walking pace, the contact was enough to dislodge the box from it’s mounting, the rollbag across the seat the only thing saving it from coming off entirely. Stopping a little further down the track it was quickly reattached and we were on our way again, but not before I could give warning to the following bikes and Steve repeated my mistake and clouted his pannier off on the same stump!

Jetwashing the weekends several pounds of hard-earned mud off the GS later in the day revealed a tennis ball sized dent in the pannier and, when I opened the lid, some light deformation of the shape of the box itself which meant that the lid no longer closed properly. Then disaster struck. Whilst attempting to bend it back into shape (using my knee, the perfect tool for the job) the box slipped on the garage floor and SNAP, off came the lid. Arse!

A quick search on Google revealed that BMW fit their “rugged” and phenomenally expensive 1150 GS Adventure aluminium pannier sets with catches and hinges made of a brittle flimsy plastic which is extremely prone to breakages. Mr, or should I say “Herr” BMW also wants GBP33 per hinge for identical replacement parts! Another search revealed Zygology the UK importer for said hinges (from whom BMW buy theirs) who would sell me identical hinges for under GBP12 each. Better. But still not great.

A touch more electronic rummaging on the Zygology site highlighted another set of hinges, same size, same spec and same hole position as “the flimsies” but made of zinc alloy, and even cheaper at under GBP9 per hinge. Better. MUCH better! So I’ve ordered 4 hinges just in case another gnarly tree stump leaps out unexpectedly in front of me at any point in the future.

Now remains the problem of bending the pannier back into shape so the lid fits properly again. In the meantime, I await the postman with my new hinges )

GBP = WordPress will not for some reason
display Pound signs! Grrrrr!

Posted from London, England, United Kingdom.

All sorted and good to go! Yeah!!!

It was great to see Si bonding with his GS 650, I see a love affair blossoming there, illustrated perfectly by Sunday morning’s power slides and mogul jumps. It was also a real pleasure that Paul could join us for this outing. He’ll be sorely missed in the Pyrenees.

I think we all appreciated the opportunity to experience the rough stuff on fully laden bikes – it definitely offers a third dimension to off road riding and some of the trails would have been a real challenge even without the extra luggage!

The conclusion: Five bikes left… five bikes returned. Muddy but all intact I’m happy to report. Evidence that our expedition in 46 days is going to be ten days of sheer awesomeness!

Posted from Mickleham, England, United Kingdom.

…we’re now under 50 days from the biggest adventure of the year, well, by the time I post this screen grab from the blog we will be! Come on!!!

An eventful weekend with regards to getting the bikes prepped and ready to go. J&S accessories had restored my faith in them and Yamaha by agreeing to look at the bike Saturday morning before my planned meet with Rob, the upshot being that there is an issue with the front end. Leaving the Ten with the kindly mechanic I popped over the road for a coffee only to return to find the bike in many more pieces than I’d left it!

With only half an hour remaining before my intended rendez vous with Rob the whole front end now needed re-assembling and it looked like my lower head stock bearing had prematurely corroded. Sean at J&S did a sterling job of cleaning up the tattered bearing and putting the Ten back to some form of rideable state. Getting to the RV with minutes to spare Rob rolled up just after me.

With our knobbly tires strapped to our bikes we headed into town to get them fitted. Rob had an appointment with a knee surgeon in Harley Street (sign off on an old injury) and heading up there managed to nearly spit himself from the back of his GS as it lurched violently from a pot hole. Looks like I wasn’t alone with my front end handling problems. To add to the problem it looks like he’d really clouted his other knee trying to save the fall.

At FWR, after our knobbly tires were fitted, a closer inspection revealed that a dust seal of some description had worked itself loose and was now catching the myriad of wires running around the GS’ dash.

Further to my own problems, Yamaha have kindly offered to complete the work under warranty. Along with a genuine and heart felt apology on Saturday this has gone a massive way toward re-invigorating my love of the brand. I may, just may, even stop daydreaming about a Triumph now.

Its data shows the rainfall measurement in Oxford for April 2012 reached 142mm, compared to a long-term mean of 43.7mm – producing three times more rainfall than usual over the month. April 2012 beat the previous record of April 2000 by about 5mm. Nearly a third of the rain fell in the 48 hours between 0900GMT on April 27 and 0900GMT on April 29 2012.

Let’s just hope it dries up a wee bit before next weekend eh?!

Posted from Leatherhead, England, United Kingdom.

Tool Time

Yesterday’s fettling session was by and large a success. We each managed to complete at least two of the twenty or so jobs we’d intended to do on the bikes including new brake pads and an onboard phone charger for my Tenere. For Rob the list included a new Touratech mud guard (replacing the one broken on our last excursion) and the addition of more lights than Blackpool seafront (also to replace the ones broken on our last excursion) … when it comes to visibility Rob’s GS now joins the Great Wall of China and the Elephant & Castle in being visible from space!

Shockingly my spannering skills are still woefully substandard and it’s a miracle that Rob survived his journey in to work today. All I can say is that it’s a bloody good job that somebody checked that the fork locking nuts were tightened up because I sure as sod it forgot, and that front spindle isn’t gonna hold itself in the wheel!

D’Oh! At least the fire was contained and I didn’t spill a single coffee.

Posted from Naut Aran, Cataluña, Spain.

Continental TKC80 Twinduros

This was the enticing delivery awaiting me when I'd completed my swim home tonight. As capable as a set of Conti TKC80 Twinduros can be I can't help feeling that a set of water wings might be more useful for our Pre-Pyree Shakedown though.

In the post there was also a 'Continental' sticker courtesy of none other than Uncle Havers - what a sweetie, he knows me too well.

Extreme free riding on the streets of Rio de Janeiro

Men do not quit playing because they grow old,
they grow old because they quit playing

This may sound a tad homo-erotic but I can assure you that there is little manlier than two guys sweating over bikes in a confined space whilst covered in grease… hold on, that does sound a little…

Anyway, the objective is to be completely up and running by the Shakedown so that there’s no nasty mechanical surprises when we’re up in the mountains. Sounds straight forward enough but what it usually means for me is that I just cover more of my bike in stickers and swear at all the complicated jobs that are beyond my simple spannering skills.

Worryingly Havers Jnr. has already been on the phone for brake pad advice

Audi + Ducati = ???

The addition of Ducati Motor Holding SpA, the Italian luxury motorbike manufacturer, brings to 11 the number of brands in Volkswagen’s global portfolio (not counting its 49 percent stake in Porsche, which it plans to fully acquire by the end of the year). The German carmaker produces VW, Audi, Seat, Skoda, Bentley, Bugatti and Lamborghini automobiles as well as commercial trucks under the VW, Scania and Man nameplates.

VW Chairman Ferdinand Piech has long had an affection for the company’s luxury sport bikes and missed out on the chance to buy the company a few years ago for half the price. Besides, Audi’s German competitor, BMW, has been building motorcycles for decades. Now Audi can challenge its rival in that segment, too.

So does this mean Audi branded motorcycles in the future? Well, probably not in the short term, but who knows…there’s certainly plenty of what purport to be “Audi concept bikes” kicking around the dark recesses of the internet. Tron-style light cycle anyone?

audi concept motorcycle

When my mood gets too hot and I find myself wandering beyond control I pull out my motor-bike and hurl it top-speed through these unfit roads for hour after hour. My nerves are jaded and gone near dead, so that nothing less than hours of voluntary danger will prick them into life: and the ‘life’ they reach then is a melancholy joy at risking something worth exactly 2/9 a day.

And this gleaming beauty, in a display case at Bovington Tank Museum, is the Brough Superior, Lawrences pride and joy, and an identical machine to that on which he met his untimely end.

Brough Superior

Thank you GS for taking me to some amazing places

Posted from Oxshott, England, United Kingdom.

4 years, blimey, tempus fugit like a mo fo.

Anyway… means I now have options for lightweight touring and mini adventures. Always good to have options. It’s still got to be the Panzer for the Pyrenees trip though… wouldn’t be a challenge otherwise would it?!

Rack 'em up

1080p HD “wearable” video camera plus GPS tracker in one neat package. Tasty!

Check out the feed on the Contour Community for what we put this little beauty through!

Not that I’ve ever done that of course…

Posted from Richmond, England, United Kingdom.

The problem as it turned out was nothing to do with my web-inadequacies, but down to a historical blocking of certain .php scripts relied on by WordPress by my web host NamesCo.

After a brief foray into NamesCo technical support who, to be fair, have been helpful in the past it seemed it was down to me to sort it myself.

Fixes for this issue abound online in various forms (despite protestations from NamesCo clearly I am not alone in my former frustration) but unless you see the world in lines of code like Neo from the Matrix then they don’t make a whole lot of sense.

My salvation came in the form of a blog post from someone having similar issues, and indeed also contained a response from NamesCo themselves admitting the problem is theirs. That aside, there’s essentially 5 lines of simple instructions that, if followed methodically, allow the wonders of WordPress and the shiny glory of iOS to communicate freely.

Check out the fix at www.thebambers.me.uk/wordpress/?p=308

Not all the pics are of my actual bikes as photography hadn’t been invented when I first started

Small, faltering steps…but we’ll get there!