MISCELLANEOUS
Miscellaneous : Can I find a Fazer manual online?
This link might help with this one
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Miscellaneous : What about FOC-U Calling Cards?
One here (Moff's)
And another here (mine)
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Miscellaneous : Difficulties in getting it onto the mainstand
You don't need to be big, or strong, to do this - there's a knack to it, brain over brawn.
First of all, pick your spot carefully. Remember, you're going to have to get it off the stand
later, and you don't want to drop it in the process. You want to be on flat, firm ground - into
which the stand won't sink - with no slope either way in the direction the bike is facing, and
preferably none across the line of the bike (if there is - eg camber on the road).
If you have to do this where there is much of a camber, ensure you're standing downhill of the
bike when you're doing it).
It's probably a good idea the first few times you practice to get someone to stand the other side
to stop the bike from falling. They don't have to be super-strong - there's not much weight there
as long as they catch it early before it falls too far.
To put their mind at rest about what kind of weight they're likely to need to hold, sit on the bike
(that way you should be better able to stop it falling too far), and lean it towards them a bit -
far enough, say, for the petrol cap to have moved about 3 to 4 inches to one side. That's about as
far as you want it to go before they catch it, and they should find it's not too hard to hold up
when leant over that far. Tell them if it goes that far, then it's their job to ensure it goes no
further.
Having done that, you can start.
Best to start off with the bike on the sidestand.
Take hold of the bike by the handlebars - hold the front brake on (stops unwanted movement), and
lift it off the sidestand to an inch or two your side of the vertical.
Now push down on the foot bar on the centre stand with the ball of your right foot until the nearest
foot of the stand touches the floor. Hold the bar firmly down, with a fair bit of your weight.
Having got the stand touching the floor, let go of the handlebar with your right hand, and grab
hold of the hand hold thingy that extends from the pillion hanger under the seat unit. The bike
should still be leaning towards you at this point, so you're taking most of the weight.
Now carry on lifting the bike away from you up to the vertical, keeping quite a bit of downward
pressure on the bar with your right foot, until you feel the other foot of the stand touch down.
You should now have the bike touching the ground with both tyres, and both feet of the stand. The
next bit is to 'roll' the bike backwards, up onto the stand.
Transfer your weight from your left foot to your right (think digging the garden with a spade),
pushing down on the foot bar on the stand at the same time as pulling the bike backwards (and
slightly up) on the handle.
You want to be pushing down on the stand, while helping to rotate it underneath the bike with the
backwards motion on the handhold. A little pull backwards on the handlebars helps, but this
should be small in comparison with the lift on the handhold and the pressure on the stand - most
of your effort should be through your foot to lever the centre stand down, as opposed to
trying to pull the bike back onto the stand with your arms).
It should go, but if it doesn't then it's at this point you and your assistant need to be ready
to catch it.
(One other thing that I have found can help - you'll find that if you push down on the stand at
the point where you've got the two feet of the stand touching the ground, the bike will go up a
little way - taking up the sag in the suspension - and then stop. If you now let it go, BUT KEEP
PRESSURE ON THE FOOTBAR, you'll find it'll compress the suspension again, and go back down.
By pushing and releasing the footbar, you can get the bike to rock backwards and forwards -
it sometimes helps to get the thing up on the stand if you 'rock' it in this way a couple of
times, before giving it the big push down on the bar the third time.
(On July 29th, 2003, having never even held a motorcycle up before, Mrs Lum put my Fazer on the
mainstand at the first attempt after two 'rocks')
Give it a few goes; you should find it's 90% technique.
I got used to doing it with the Yamaha rack on my Fazer (which has nice handholds on), and found
it bloody difficult at first after I took the rack off. But now, I can often do it without using
the handhold at all - just by a combination of the handlebar and pressure down on the stand.
And when you get the knack, you'll wonder how you found it so hard.
But the important thing is - the first few times, at least - to have that person stood the other
side who can take the weight to prevent it overbalancing away from you - which is when it gets
heavy and difficult/impossible to hold.
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Miscellaneous : What is the weight of and maximum load for the Fazer?
Basic weight of the bike is 210 kg (463 lb) with oil and full fuel tank.
Max load is 187kg (29st 6lb), which includes rider, passenger, cargo, and accessories.
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Miscellaneous : Taking Kids as Pillions
Someone asked a while back:
"Dear All
My daughter is 8 and is dying for a shot on the bike, but I'm apprehensive to say the least.
Those of you who have kids, what age did you let them ride as pillion, what gear did you
have for them, how far/fast did you go etc.
Generally any advice on those first nervy moments with your pride and joy on your pride and
joy much appreciated.
Thanks
...................
This generated a good few replies, which I've tried to distil into the following:
(With hanks to JakeTheCatUK, Purple plaything, misshornet600, Eastriding2002,
E fazerhead, Benj53, JP, Urbanswine for your comments)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Ages - well there's a couple of 8 year-olds regularly going out on bikes, one as young as 5 years
old; legally, as long as they can reach the pegs comfortably they should be OK, but there's more to
it than that. It's your kid - make sure you're happy they're safe.
Clothing - Few people are prepared to take their little ones on their bikes without the proper gear
(lid (obviously), jacket, trousers, boots, gloves, neck roll - that kind of thing).
It can be worth trying to borrow some kit for them to try first (you never know - they may hate it).
When the time comes to buy stuff, buy it carefully and from the right shop.
Firms like Baby Biker (www.babybiker.co.uk) and Biker Kids (www.bikerkids.co.uk) will give you trade
ins and discount on the next set when they grow out of them. And they know their stuff too - it should
go without saying that you want to take as much, if not more care over the fit as you do when buying
your own, and my experience of both of these shops is that they'll help you to do just that. You'll
find them at a lot of the major bike shows.
Hein Gericke do a range of kids bike clothing with zips in so you can make the arms and legs longer when
needed.
The downside to all this clothing for kids is the heat. You know how hot you get on a hot day in all that
gear, well kids feel it worse. So sometimes it's best to leave them at home.
When it comes to getting out on the road, a popular concern expressed was over pulling away and overtaking
- you worry about them falling off the back.
A simple way around that one which many have taken is to fit a top box, which makes a very handy backrest.
There are other alternatives, of course.
We've got someone who uses a child seat which came from Hein Gericke, and one other has a harness that
attaches the child to them (although to be honest - and I'm allowed to be, as this is my page - I'm not sure
I'd want to do that one. Pros and cons, of course).
A very popular option here is the Pillion Pal/Love Handles - the belts with handles for pillions to hold
onto. And it's not just the holding on that they help with - a few people have devised quite elaborate
signalling systems involving pulling on the handles (such as once on the left, once on the right, both
together, both together twice), to tell the rider to slow down/speed up/stop immediately/stop when it's
convenient, that kind of thing.
Of course when it comes to communication, there's also the intercom route. And it doesn't have to be
expensive - I got an Oxford BikeMike 3 for 50 quid from J&S recently (August 2003) and this works perfectly
well at all the speeds I'm likely to take my son out at. Well worth the money.
And I'm told the non-electonic ones (work on tubes) are also pretty effective, too.
Getting back to the riding itself - well points made included:
- introduce them slowly and easily - you can make or break a future pillion in the first few miles.
- Keep the early rides short, and build up to longer distances.
- At the start, go just a few hundred yards, then stop and check they're ok.
- If you have an intercom, you won't need to do this. Just keep talking to them, making sure they're ok.
- But don't forget that it isn't always possible to speak when you're petrified; silence doesn't
necessarily mean they're happy.
There's other things not to forget, too.
Like you're more used to the speed than they will be; to a kid, even 40mph on the back of the bike will feel
like they're flying.
And they won't have the forward observation skills (or abilities) even of a cyclist. Sharp, sudden braking
will take them by surprise, and very probably frighten the crap out of them. Your observation and anticipation
need to be bang on the game.
And don't be surprised when they do what to you is something daft, cos they won't know any better.
They'll wiggle about, and they'll try to see the clocks to find out how fast you're going. It's probably
worth spending a bit of time beforehand thinking like a kid (some of us find it easier than others) and
trying to work out what else yours might do, so you can warn them not to.
And the daftest thing of all that they can do - they sometimes get so relaxed on the back, that they fall
asleep. The first thing one of our riders knew of this was the feeling of his son's helmet sliding across
his back, and he had to shake him awake before he could stop.
So be prepared to stop often to give them time to refresh. And consider the return journey time when you're
thinking of going out.
That's almost it for now, except to say be careful, and take this lot for what it is - just a load of stuff
that some people said and do. That little fella/fella-ess is your pride and joy; when all's said and done,
you have to do what you think is right for yours.
Having read it all, you may prefer to leave it a couple of years, in which case I say "good on you".
Just be safe, whatever you do.
Hope it's been useful, and if you have anything you think's worth sharing, let me know.
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Miscellaneous : On the Message board, where do those little nicknames next to the posts come from?
There's three different sources for these things.
First of all, there's the preprogrammed set of nicknames, which change with your post count, as follows:
For your first 24 posts, you're a 'Cager in Training'
From 25 up to 50, you're a 'CBT Wobbler'
51 to 100 gets you 'DAS Born Again'
101 to 250 is 'Weekend Warrior'
251 to 500 is 'Club Racer'
501 to 1000 is WSB Pack Hound'
and from there onwards you're a 'GP Hero'
That's the basic set.
Then there's the two other ways you can get one.
The first of these is to do something daft - this'll usually get you your own nickname as a result - there's a few of these knocking around, if you look carefully enough.
And finally, if you've been around around a while and you make a donation to the 'community chest', you may be able to buy one.
And that's how it works
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Miscellaneous : So why's it called HOT POOP?
After spending quite a bit of time putting this together, I decided one day that it was ready to
be unleashed upon the FOC-U masses. And that gave me a bit of a problem. Because as an acronym,
I happen to think that FOC-U is pretty damned good, so I felt duty bound to come up with a
monicker of similar quality for this.
And it soon became obvious that 'The Fazer Reference Info Page', which it started life as, wasn't
that monicker. Apart from it being a bit starchy, it was also pointed out to me in no time at all
that this made it 'The Fazer RIP' which wasn't really the kind of image I was looking for.
And so began the search for something upbeat. And as it turned out, it wasn't much of a search - after
what seemed like no time at all, the words 'HOT POOP - Heaps Of Tips Put On One Page' had formed
in my head. 'Hot Poop' is a term I've come across for things that are - well, shit hot - and
though this probably isn't quite shit hot, it still summed up quite well how I felt about it.
So 'Hot Poop' it became.
Of course, in the days since then, it's expanded a bit, so it's not on one page any more, which
initially gave me a bit of a problem. But after a bit of thought, the alternatives - 'Hot Polop'
(Put On Lots Of Pages), 'Hot Poep' (Put On Eleven Pages), and the like didn't have quite the same
ring to them. And anyway, everyone knows it as 'Hot Poop' now, so I can hardly change it, can
I?
So Hot Poop it is, and Hot Poop it'll stay until someone comes up with what I think is a better
idea.
And given that 'Hot Poop' was my idea in the first place, it'll be a cold day in Hell when that
happens, won't it?
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