This was sent to me the other day. Might be off interest if you fancy a new SV on 0% finance

SUZUKI MIDDLEWEIGHTS JOIN 0% APR FINANCE OFFER

At last early signs of Spring are making their presence felt. The last few days have been quite warm and sunny even if they do start with some frost. Ideal days for a ride on the SV except that mine is in bits in the garage being restored and serviced.  I'll update my SV restorers article once all the work is done, probably in the next week or so.

The start of the year nearly always turns your attention to plans that you might make for the coming year, probably why you see so many holiday adverts in January. Last year was pretty packed event wise for myself, and this year is looking a bit thin. The Annual Rideout also comes to the fore for the same reasons. I plan to attend as I missed last years, as long as no disasters strike. It's hard and worrying work organising an event like this. I did the 2006 AR and  last year I was the main planner for our local football tournament, that was enough to age me by 10 years. Imagine having 30 teams turn up and no refs, happened to me!  So please support Fizz and the organisers of AR2008 and place your bookings early, so the team can have early sight of attendance numbers.

I've been a bit slow updating this page, but then I only had Dave's article below to post. The days of getting snowed under with emails seem to have well and truly passed. In fact this page is starting to look like my personal blog.

Hopefully I'll be back on two wheels in the next week or so and the weather would have improved even more.

John

Greetings,

Despite our strange weather…………...we have been having far too much rain for a SA summer, we managed to take a 200 km plus ride in cloudy weather this last Friday into the Valley of a 1000 Hills which is not far from Durban.

The valley is full of “twistys” and usually does not have any traffic being as it is in a rural area. However, there was a river canoe race on, the annual ‘Dusi Canoe race. This race attracts thousands of paddlers who paddle down the river from Pietermaritzburg to Durban over a 4 day period and we stopped at the side of the road to watch the paddlers for a while.

Regards,

Dave Loubser

Not been using the bike a whole lot recently, mainly down to the weather and the fact that the battery was knackered, so going for an impulse ride was out of the question. I've since fixed that problem and bought a new battery. We've had the odd mild day over the Xmas period, so I took the opportunity to go for a short spin.

As usual I started off at a fairly sedate manner and got progressively more aggressive (in a nice way). I soon reeled my enthusiasm back in after having a couple of close calls with Plod. I was spotted doing 76 down the A5 by a copper going the other way (60 limit). Not excessive or dangerous but obviously too much for a copper to miss, so I turned off and cut through some back roads to Attingham. I thought at this point I might practise a few wheelies. I'd been reading an article in TWO magazine about this and thought I'd give their technique a try. I'm usually crap at wheelies, the only time I can do them any good is when I don't intend to, such as a quick launch away from the lights, where I give it bags of revs and let the clutch a little slower than normal.  The article in TWO mentions that most people use the clutch too much, a gentle touch just to get a bit of slip along with a blip on the throttle is usually enough. So I tried a bit of that with mixed success. Trying to get the combination of clutch, throttle and road speed just right is the key I think. By this time I was at Cross Houses, I turned right onto the A488 changed to second, flicked the clutch with a handful of revs and up came the front, nice and gentle and then down again, just as another police car came over the brow of the road, luckily he saw nothing except me bimbling along in a 30 zone.  More practise required I think.

Anyhow this completely irresponsible behaviour and I shouldn't be seen to promote it, but it made me smile for the rest of the day. Bikes have a knack of making you feel alive, the trick is to stay alive.

Good Luck and best wishes for 2008.

John

Hi
All just a quick message to wish all of you and your families a Merry Xmas. Go easy on the sherry and turkey and don't hog the kids toys on Christmas day.

I'd like to thank all the Mods on the Forum for their help and assistance this year, especially Fizzwheel, as he's had a few messes to clear up this year (it's not easy being a mod)

I'd also like to thanks TSM for his technical wizardry and support.

Cheers!

John

Finally got my act together and have placed my NEC shots here

Greetings from a very wet Durban,

The weatherman has turned against us !! We are having a very very wet spring this year with very few dry days. Not a good start to our riding season. [sounds just like our summer]

Two weeks ago I replaced the front brake lines on my SV, see attached pictures. One thing that was not included in the kit was a brake line bracket to hold the front right line away from the fork tube. I have made up a temporary guide with some stainless steel welding wire and have ordered a bracket from a K2 SV which will fit. [yep that splitter on the original brake pipe is not an elegant solution. The only thing I'd say about using Suzuki OEM clips is that they do rust terrible. I bought a batch of stainless steel P clips at some bike show years ago and they do the job perfect]

I was also forced to change rear tyres as I had two punctures within a short time with the Dunlop D220 and seeing as I was keen to do some long rides I decided that I needed a new tyre. I opted for the Bridgestone BT 021 which Bridgestone punt as a replacement for the D220. I was a little worried about having a Dunlop up front and a Bridgestone at the rear but this has proved to be groundless. On last Monday I did an (illegal) high speed run on the way to work and saw 160 easily with no weaving or any strange movement of the chassis. The long ride we did on this Friday also proved the fears to be groundless. The Bridgestone seems to be a nicer tyre, it certainly corners better that the Dunlop. [I don't anyone who perfers the original Dunlop once they've tried something else on the SV]

On Friday we went for another longish ride…440 Kms. We started with eight riders but one guy dropped out half way as he had a call from home and he had to attend to something or other. The rest of us rode on to our destination, a small B&B place about 20 Km north of Greytown. The weather looked dicey all the way but we did not have any rain. Pictures attached.

Regards,

Dave Loubser

Greetings,

As a regular commuter I also end up riding to work in the dark in winter [I mentioned in a previous editorial that I hate commuting in the dark especially when it's wet]. Our roads are full of “taxis”…these are usually Toyota Hi Ace minivans packed to beyond normal capacity and the owner/drivers drive like maniacs. They will switch lanes from the fast to slow instantly if they see a potential customer on the side of the road. Driving down the “emergency lane ” is standard operating procedure and they love to race up behind cars and bikes and flash their lights.

So, I went to a local industrial safety shop and bought a slip on safety vest to ensure they see me. It doesn’t look glamorous but so far so good..…[yep I wear one too, for commuting, not stylish but it does seem to work]

Regards,

Dave Loubser

1st December 2007 - NEC

So here I am switching pages from Autumn to Winter. Not as straight forward as it sounds as I've just had a hard disc problem and I've had to do a full install of XP. Not a big problem in itself but a load of time and effort trying to put everything back where it was, find licence keys and debug problems. Still gave me a chance to put in a bigger HD and a faster one at that too.

Ed, Daryl and I visited the NEC for the annual bike show. Quite enjoyed it this year it fact it was the latest we had ever left. I took my son James along as well. Once he twigged that he was allowed to jump on the bikes there was no stopping him. I couldn't persuade him to go on the Honda 'my first licence' stand. I know deep down he wanted to do it, but his self consciousness held him back.

Can't say I spent a lot of time on the Suzuki stand. I went to look at what next years SV would look like and I was disappointed. I think Suzuki have lost the plot on the SV, I can only hope there's something new in the pipeline for next year. I was so under whelmed that I forgot to see if they've got around to offering ABS next year.  I liked the graphite grey colour on the naked. I hated the red seat on the Sport. Where was the half faired 'S'?  Some of us like to see the engine!  Some like the unique frame shape, so why coat it in matt black paint?

I did treat myself to a nice pair of Sidi Black Rain boots though. I don't really go for brighlty coloured boots, black seems more functional.

I also missed seeing John and Sarah on the Banditmania stand and I also missed the Aprillia Shiver.  Now why would I be interested in the Shiva?

Meanwhile it's back to schoolboy football and decorating for me.

Keep safe

John

In case you're wondering about the cover photo goto http://www.canyonchasers.net/blog/archives/161-Military-SV-mostly-Done!.html