Pedro

Smokes?

It’s better, but would be better if you moved it to the back of the bike. The more backwards it is, the more you’ll like it. I have never heard someone saying having no front wheel feel at all is a good thing! More so if it feels like barley, drink proper coffee!

Dude gets tanned from going riding in a tshirt and suddenly he thinks he’s a descendant of Shaka Zulu!

I don’t take it the wrong way, there’s no wrong way to take it. My mum and dad were both white but we are Portuguese, Portugal is quite old and historically diverse so there is probably ancient Arab and Magreb blood, Jewish or sub saharan too, who knows. Being Northern Portuguese, if we look back enough I probably have Celtic too. Why would I be bothered by any of that? You definitely have Idiot in yours though, you do know black people also get sun burnt?!

Not in the slightest, Spain, France, all the countries with the Alps, Norway, Russia and maybe the Balcans all have way higher mountains than Portugal. I did enjoy very much riding through Wales, though. It was a Saturday or Sunday too, so bikes were out in force!

I rode through Wales already. I liked the roads, but wouldn’t call them “mountain” by any stretch of the imagination. I am going to be missing Scotland, yes, but the point of this trip is West Ireland.

By bike on a ferry, but I’m sailing from Bilbau to Rosslare. Will be staying around southern Ireland mostly.

I have been looking at oil. The Castrol 5w40 I have always used on the GS has changed last year or something like that. It might or might not have helped the bike get a little bit of oil consumption. So, over the next few days it'll have Liqui Moly 5w40 Street Race put in, it's a highly detergent oil. Then in September I'll be going to Ireland to visit a few friends. Sometime in October or November or December I shall go to Morocco so probably need to change before that. That oil change will probably see Ravenol 5w40 put in, Ester based. We'll see how that goes, I'm hoping for some improvement. Worst case scenario is it stays the same.

Back to the workshop, or back to you?

Consider putting the camera back on the bike, like on top of a pannier or sideways to the topbox. The farther back you get it, the more speed sensation you get.

For the wind noise, just put a little bit of tape over the microphone.

I do, Zurich premium recovery. Ever since the 1150 broke down in Morocco, they were very good. Here in Portugal, I was told it’s the same few companies that manage recovery for all insurance companies so it should be the same. I still keep being with Zurich on the bikes.

As a tip, @Marcel, the farther back on the bike you fit it, the more speed sensation you will get on the video. If you fit it up front showing nothing of the bike the video will feel very slow. Try a rear panier or the side of the topcase, facing towards the front of the bike.

Good stuff!

There was some words about being able to switching to 10w50 synthetic but that was supposed to be mainly because there was a shortage of the synthetic 5w40 on several markets due to supply chain issues.

Yes, but these watercooled ones don’t use oil. The amount of oil is acceptable, so I’ll just keep an eye on it.

Mine has never used a drop of oil until now, it has started to do so about 10k ago, and is using about 400/500 ml per 6 or 7000 km. We plan to take it apart at around 200.000km and rebuild it, unless it gets substantially worse.

147 or 149 km. It hasn’t been used much over the last few months. But that’ll change in September and November. I would expect your engine to last longer than the GS’s, though.

It’s only a baby, but nice that it’s fresh!

You’re right, I voted for Saul

I can’t decide who to vote for between those two sex symbols

You’re doing quite the going over the whole engine. Nice!