- Joined
- Dec 3, 2009
- Messages
- 9,232
- Reaction score
- 262
- Location
- Duncanville, Texas
- My Bike Models
- 1981 GL1100 Innerstate("The Turd")SOLD!!, 1996 GL1500 Innerstate
from my widdle mishap last week. I just realized I never said what happened, so here it is...
We have "HOV(high occupancy vehicle)" lanes around here, and I use the one on the way home. These lanes are defined by semi-flexible poles, mounted on non-flexible mounds fastened to the pavement. At specific intervals, there are openings in these lanes to allow entry/exit, and there is one of those openings just beyond where I get up onto the freeway, so I usually have time/space to maneuver over to the hov lane. That day, I apparently dint.
As I was attempting to go from the far right lane over to the far left(hov) lane, and there was a truck in the lane to the left of me, and I had to slow a bit to let him by, and zip over into the hov lane. Problem was, I was farther down the road than I thought, and when I zipped over to the left behind the truck, I ran right into the dang lane poles, and bounced over the hard divider mounds. Broke both side driving lights off, beat the crap outta the fairing, and bent the right hiway peg back like a pretzel. Fortunately, the bounce took my foot off the peg, or it would have prolly been mashed. I had to just keep goin, as there was another car coming down the hov lane....I couldn't stop, otherwise I'da got runned over by that car. I was lucky enough that it dint lay over, or bang up against the cement divider.
When this happened, the top shelter lids both flopped open, and stuff was flyin everywhere. I managed to grab my ziplock baggie with my 6oz bottle of atf between my left elbow and hip. At the same time, I'm tryin to keep the bike straight, hold onto the atf, and try to pick the stereo up off the steering head, since the brackets for it had also broken. Of course, with the stereo floppin, my radar defector was also in danger of flying off and hitting the ground....a $300 hit if it did. It was a friggin mess. :shock:
Once I got down to the end of the HOV lane(aboot 10 miles), I was able to pull off and asses the damage, and try to get everything back in place so it would be semi-safe to finish the ride home, which I did.
So....I got some new driving lights, and installed them Saturday. They came with a complete harness w/switch, all already pre-assembled. The lights also have multi-colored LED lights in them so I can have different colored clearance lamps when the driving lamps are off. Not sure I really like that, but, that's what was available at the time, so that's what I got.
Sunday, I tackled re-installing the stereo....that's where the real fun started. Once I got the stereo off, I found massive internal damage to the fairing. Major cracks everywhere. So.....I spent most of the day welding, and Quick Bond-ing the faring back together, on top of fabricating new bracketry to hold the stereo. Started working on it around 9am...finished(er...got tired) around 5pm. Happy to say the new brackets for the stereo hold it solidly to the fairing....no more bouncing/flexing around. Driving lights apparently work well enough for a Dallas cop that I was behind to flash HIS lights at me in an effort to get me to turn them off.... :blush: :hihihi:
I took a few pics of the fairing damage....I'll post them this evening. I think this winter I'm gunna hafta take the fairing off and do a lot of repairs to it....it's got a lot of cracks, and some missing plastic in places.... :builder:
We have "HOV(high occupancy vehicle)" lanes around here, and I use the one on the way home. These lanes are defined by semi-flexible poles, mounted on non-flexible mounds fastened to the pavement. At specific intervals, there are openings in these lanes to allow entry/exit, and there is one of those openings just beyond where I get up onto the freeway, so I usually have time/space to maneuver over to the hov lane. That day, I apparently dint.
As I was attempting to go from the far right lane over to the far left(hov) lane, and there was a truck in the lane to the left of me, and I had to slow a bit to let him by, and zip over into the hov lane. Problem was, I was farther down the road than I thought, and when I zipped over to the left behind the truck, I ran right into the dang lane poles, and bounced over the hard divider mounds. Broke both side driving lights off, beat the crap outta the fairing, and bent the right hiway peg back like a pretzel. Fortunately, the bounce took my foot off the peg, or it would have prolly been mashed. I had to just keep goin, as there was another car coming down the hov lane....I couldn't stop, otherwise I'da got runned over by that car. I was lucky enough that it dint lay over, or bang up against the cement divider.
When this happened, the top shelter lids both flopped open, and stuff was flyin everywhere. I managed to grab my ziplock baggie with my 6oz bottle of atf between my left elbow and hip. At the same time, I'm tryin to keep the bike straight, hold onto the atf, and try to pick the stereo up off the steering head, since the brackets for it had also broken. Of course, with the stereo floppin, my radar defector was also in danger of flying off and hitting the ground....a $300 hit if it did. It was a friggin mess. :shock:
Once I got down to the end of the HOV lane(aboot 10 miles), I was able to pull off and asses the damage, and try to get everything back in place so it would be semi-safe to finish the ride home, which I did.
So....I got some new driving lights, and installed them Saturday. They came with a complete harness w/switch, all already pre-assembled. The lights also have multi-colored LED lights in them so I can have different colored clearance lamps when the driving lamps are off. Not sure I really like that, but, that's what was available at the time, so that's what I got.
Sunday, I tackled re-installing the stereo....that's where the real fun started. Once I got the stereo off, I found massive internal damage to the fairing. Major cracks everywhere. So.....I spent most of the day welding, and Quick Bond-ing the faring back together, on top of fabricating new bracketry to hold the stereo. Started working on it around 9am...finished(er...got tired) around 5pm. Happy to say the new brackets for the stereo hold it solidly to the fairing....no more bouncing/flexing around. Driving lights apparently work well enough for a Dallas cop that I was behind to flash HIS lights at me in an effort to get me to turn them off.... :blush: :hihihi:
I took a few pics of the fairing damage....I'll post them this evening. I think this winter I'm gunna hafta take the fairing off and do a lot of repairs to it....it's got a lot of cracks, and some missing plastic in places.... :builder:
