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As a follow up to last month’s piece: to reproof breathable materials use Grainger’s Extreme Superpruf (about £8.50 a can which will do a complete suit) a far better alternative to buying a new riding suit as they do not come cheap.
To proof or reproof leather (and vinyl it says) Feibings Mink Oil is superb (£4.88 a tub). However it does involve cruelty to minks (something I discovered after buying two tubs of the stuff) so that might sway your opinion. I work on the basis the mink had already suffered and it should not be in vain.
To be honest I am not too sure about this cruelty thing. In the army I used to use Deer Tallow made from reindeer horns on my blisters. Worked a treat but was made illegal in 1980. So I bought three tubes and am now down to the last remnants of the third. Fortunately I do not go running in boots anymore. My point is I never found a synthetic application that was half as good. Can anyone recommend a synthetic leather-waterproofing agent? If not Mink Oil will make previously blotting paper like leather totally waterproof andan application lasts several years.
Had an interesting fault on my lil’Breva. The engine kept cutting out when put in gear and occasionally on the run. I checked the side stand and it appeared loose so obviously not always hitting the cut-out switch so I made sure I positioned the stand carefully before setting off.
Two days later on a fine Saturday morning I went to tighten up said bolt. At first I thought it was snapped in two as the head and nut were disconnected, then realised the switch is a rotary device that should have been held in place by an M6 x 20mm socket head screw into the end of the side stand bolt, which had vibrated out. This was why the bolt appeared to be floppy. Get a replacement plus washer from my baking tray of stainless steel bolts etc. and all was sorted in thirty minutes. Always good to fix a fault, brings a glow to the inner man, but chagrined to realise that I had spent two days of careful positioning of the side stand to absolutely no avail. Pure luck had decided that I got to work and back.
The tray of surplus bolts etc. came from my stint temping in a dairy in 1990-92. I swept up at the end of the first day and had a dustpan full of stainless steel socket head metric nuts, bolts (mostly dome), screws and washers. I asked an engineer where he wanted them and he said, “throw ‘em away”.
I mentioned they would fit on my bike and he said fine “any sizes you don’t find let us know and we’ll order them”.
Unfortunately jobs like that don’t exist anymore. I wonder why.
R6 Girl doesn’t need to worry. According to the definition of a biker her colleagues use I have never been a biker. You won’t see me crying in my beer over it.
Liked the piece from Graham Pierce, the Traffic Cop. I have always got on with them and found them intelligent and sensible. That means I have been pulled over for speeding at least half
a dozen times but never been booked. Long may that continue.
Though one time I should have been reported when I was doing 45 mph in a 30. I spotted a police car in my mirrors with the blues going so pulled over. I took my helmet off and answered the inevitable question as going on leave to Bristol.
“In the army are you? Well show me your licence.” Handed it over, he opened it, closed it and then saluted me with an, “On your way sir”. Got in his car and drove off.
I looked at the licence for a while and then spotted it: Ian Dunmore, CO 40 Field Regt., Colchester.
The CO stood for ‘care of’, not Commanding Officer. He must have thought I was the youngest colonel in a peacetime army he would ever meet.
Ride Safe
An ancient Guzzisti
Ian Dunmore
