Early days but it looks like a win for SharkHide. Finished up the polishing last week and gave all the covers a couple of coats of the stuff, looks great. No problem with the application, just have to make sure all polish is removed with lacquer thinner first. Not the best pics, I'll get some more in better light -
- absolutely night and day to what they looked like before. I also replaced the clutch cable with a brand new Motion Pro cable, and spent a few hours messing about with the adjusters and cable routing - it's much softer now which is bloody marvellous. The old cable was routed in such a way that it was definitely binding - pulling the lever was pretty hard going in traffic after a while.
Now that Rhonda's got snazzy looking engine covers, the tank is crying out for an overhaul. I used a gloss clear coat on my KLR tank which looks great, and I've also figured out a few tricks for preventing rust from forming. So looks like the tank is next on the list - rather than satin clear I'll go gloss 2K.
Took her out over the weekend - I swear the drum brake on the CB works better than the disk on the KLR. Speaking of which, took the KLR out for a ride up north, but didn't factor the wind into the equation. Got on the highway and man it was blowing a gale, had to bank the bike into the gusts and then felt like the whole thing was being lifted off the asphalt. Truth be told the experience was
a little alarming,
quite frightening, frankly fucking terrifying and I couldn't get home soon enough. Really high centre of gravity on this bike, with a bit of wind I'm essentially a human sail on wheels.