Gear – Page 4 – The ExhaustNotes Blog

ExNotes Product Review: Generic Chinese Starter Relay

By Joe Gresh

There is a Facebook group called The Dull Men’s Club and somehow it ended up on my newsfeed. A few of my FB friends are members of the Dull Men’s Club and scrolling through the page it occurs to me that most of the stuff I write about would be perfect for the club. My life has become an endless series of tiny battles to keep motorcycles running. You may think I tinker with the bikes to have something to write about but no, my clunker motorcycles really are a pain to keep running.

The Husqvarna SMR510 in particular requires 5 or 6 hours of fettling for each hour of riding. You may recall the story I wrote about the bike’s kickstand (classic Dull Men’s Club content) and how the bike wouldn’t start. I took the bodywork off and tightened connections, I unplugged and cleaned multi-pin connectors and gave the headlight wiring a re-org to gain a little room behind that crowded area. The bike was starting ok after the work I did.

I took the Husky on a test ride through the mountains stopping frequently and it started fine at least seven times. I figured I had the problem licked and when I got home after a few hundred miles I tried the starter one last time. The Husky wouldn’t start. It wouldn’t start after I let it cool down. It wouldn’t start the next day. Again, I jumped the battery positive directly to the starter terminal and the bike roared into life. I knew the battery was okay so I did what I normally do when I don’t know what the problem is: I bought parts.

The starter relay on the Husky is an odd one to me but apparently the part is used on a lot of ATV’s, small engines and Chinese motorcycles. I looked on a Husqvarna parts site and the relay was $43, plus shipping. On Amazon a duplicate Chinese relay was $7, shipping included. If you’ve followed my moto-journo career at all I imagine there is not a lot of suspense as to which relay I bought.

Even to my naturally cheap psyche the $7 relay seemed too good to be true. So I bought two of them just in case the first one didn’t live up to expectations. Kind of like the old “We’re gonna need a bigger truck” punch line but with relays. The clone relay looked exactly the same as the Husky part except the molded, rubber band mounting bushing was clocked 90 degrees off. I pulled the rubber from the original part and it fit onto the clone perfectly. Things were looking good.

This relay is sort of nifty as it has a main fuse and a spare fuse piggybacked onto the starter relay making for a nice, lightweight, compact…thing. The stock Husky relay had a 20-amp main fuse. The generic unit came with a 30-amp fuse. I pulled on the 30-amp fuse to replace it. And I pulled. I pulled harder. I grabbed the fuse with a pair of Leatherman pliers and gave the fuse a mighty tug.

The relay flew apart; parts went everywhere as the plastic bit holding the main fuse broke away from the body of the relay. The tangs of the 30-amp fuse were still embedded in the fuse holder. I gathered the bits and tried to reassemble the relay but it was too far gone. Good thing I bought a second generic relay.

The fuse in the second relay was as tight as the first one so I decided to use the opportunity to upgrade the Husqvarna’s power supply by 10 amps and left the 30-amp fuse in place. It may never blow without melting the wiring harness. I’ll deal with that situation when it arises.

A: Plunger, B: Plunger spring, C: coil, D: start contacts, E: spark shield, F: coil bracket

I took the broken relay apart to see what was in the little black box and it was just like a normal starter relay but in reduced dimensions. I suspect the plunger contact on the OEM relay is not making good contact but there is no easy way to dismantle the relay without destroying the thing.

It’s been five days and I’ve started the Husky each day without a problem. Of course, this proves nothing and I’ll have to bang the bike on some trails to see if the starting issue has really been fixed. One positive outcome from all this jerking around is that I understand the relay wiring now and if it won’t start again I plan to bypass the stock Husky starter circuit and install an entirely new, stand-alone starter circuit/ main fuse with a second push button and relay. It will be a perfect story for The Dull Men’s Club.

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A Drought While Surrounded By Water

By Mike Huber

This year I decided to expand my hobbies while traveling across the United States by motorcycle. I enjoyed camping and riding but felt with the long summer days I needed something to do once I arrived in camp (other than drink beer around a beautiful campfire, which will still happen no matter how many hobbies I take up). Fishing seemed to be a perfect way to spend early evenings once my campsite was set up. I was going to become a successful motorcycle fisherman.

OK, well the successful part ended rather quickly. I started off just crushing it and catching fish almost every time I went camping. I was fishing lakes around Arizona and thought that once I was in California it would only improve. It didn’t. In fact, I didn’t catch a single fish from July to the end of August. In my own defense, I was fishing rivers where most were fly fishing and not using lures or worms. But still, to be skunked day after day for a few months was demoralizing, especially one day when fishing in Lassen National Park. There was a couple next to me, literally right next to me, using the exact same power bait and reeling in bass after bass. As soon as he landed a fish his wife would clean and cook them on the spot. Meanwhile, I wasn’t even getting a bite. I may have cried that night in my tent a little (or a lot). I kept a positive outlook, as I was just starting my trip and had so many states to visit that my luck would surely turn around.

My luck did not turn around. It got to where the fish were mocking me jumping all around my lures. Even when I changed from power bait to spinners to gummy worms every 30 minutes or so, it just wasn’t happening. This is where my friend said to me “That’s why they call it fishing, not catching.” Ugh. I clearly need better friends.

As my travels (and my fishing drought) continued, I camped and fished in 14 states without a bite (AZ, CA, OR, WA, ID, MN, PA, NY, VT, NH, ME, NJ, VA and MD). Talk about a drought. This was awful. I think what made it worse was my BMW GS1200 was so loaded down that I had the pole visible on the bike held by ROK Straps which invited people to come up and talk with me about my fishing success and comment “oh, you will definitely catch something here…I’ve never been skunked there.” Well, I didn’t and I was skunked. Repeatedly.

On November 1^st my BMW was stolen. The steering column was cracked open like a lobster and it was pushed into an alley where the thieves pried open my panniers and took only a few items. One of them happened to be my trusty $40 Walmart collapsible fishing pole. This was the ultimate insult to wrap up an unsuccessful fishing year.

Not being one to give up, the first thing I bought after the BMW was recovered was another fishing pole. Over the winter months my plans are to start watching YouTube videos and reading how to improve my chances on the waters I travel along next spring throughout this great country. 2024 is my year to catch fish!

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ExNotes Product Review: Harbor Freight 30-Inch, 5-Drawer Mechanic’s Cart

By Joe Gresh

The Harbor Freight/US General 5-drawer tool cart has been on my radar for many years. It always seemed like a pretty good deal at $189 and if you bought the thing when it wasn’t on sale (every few weeks) the price would go up to $269. Paying full price at Harbor Freight is to be avoided at all costs and HF’s unrelenting cycle of blowouts, parking lot sales and clearances has trained their customers to wait them out. This particular mechanic’s cart sale was a Black Friday thing and I debated picking one up but managed to tamp down the urge.

I thought I was in the clear until HF declared an extension to Black Friday, at which point I gave in and went down to their store to pick up one of the damn things. This wasn’t a spur of the moment deal. I have a homemade rollaway box full of tools I rarely use but can’t get rid of and another really cheap top and bottom combination setup also filled with odd bits and lathe tools.

My previous mechanic’s cart is a cut down rolling file cabinet, the type used in offices by the type of secretary born sometime in the 1950s. The file cabinet thing was never great, but it made a good workbench to repair the Husqvarna’s transmission. After that transmission job the cart slowly became covered in tools making it hard to dig through the junk to find a 10mm socket. It became a poorly organized catchall.

The US General 5-drawer cart comes to you mostly assembled. You have to put together the wheels and the lower shelf, along with the uprights and some corners for the top box. The instructions are good enough except for the part about lifting the box up onto the legs. The manual says to not attempt this alone. I’m always alone and the box was heavy and too bulky. I got the thing off the ground but accuracy was suffering and I was worried about scratching the paint or pinching my fingers.

Taking the drawers out to lighten the box was one option. Plan B was to lay the box on its side and slide the frame into position as the frame weighed much less than the box. Now I had the cart on the ground, so I lifted the thing upright pivoting on the wheels. It was still a strain but easier than lifting the entire box. You get a lot of steel for $189 at HF. After the thing was upright, I tightened all the bolts that hold it together.

The 5-drawer box is really nice. The paint (five colors to choose from; I got KTM orange) looks thick and applied well. The box comes with drawer liners in each drawer and in the bottom shelf.

The wheels appear heavy duty and are probably overkill. HF included a nice, extra-mile feature by providing the swivel casters with grease fittings for the ball bearings in the swivel part. Also included on the two casters are brakes so if you’re working on an incline the box won’t roll away.

The drawers use two methods to secure them from sliding open under transport. The first is a latch on the front of each drawer that you must slide to the side in order to open the drawer. I’m not sure I like these latches. I want the drawers to open without the added finger motions. I may disable these latches.

The second method of drawer retention includes two, spring-loaded lock bars that slide down onto the backside of the drawers when the top of the box is closed. The box comes with four round-Coke-machine type keys so you can lock your stuff if you work in a shop full of shifty characters.

For such a low price the 5-drawer box doesn’t seem cheap at all. I think it’s Harbor Freight’s best toolbox value. Two gas charged struts are used to hold the top in the open position and the unit came with a handy side shelf to store your unguents and the various toxic chemicals that mechanics use in their daily course of events.

My particular 5-drawer had a slight flaw: one of the drawer slides was not in its track correctly and was binding. I had to remove the drawer and slot the slide into the track after which the drawer worked fine. I’m not sure that I didn’t cause the problem when I set the box on the side and lifted the cart upright with all the bolts loose. Maybe it flexed and popped out. With everything tight the box feels sturdy without any wobble.

I give the US General 5-drawer mechanic’s cart high marks and can recommend it if its size suits your needs. Now I’ve got to sort out that mess of jumbled tools and organize my new toolbox, a process that has already begun.

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ExNotes Moto-mods: Kawasaki ZRX1100 Petcock

By Joe Gresh

I should have listened to the guys who knew. They told me the vacuum operated fuel petcock on the ZRX1100 was a source of problems and that I should convert it to a standard on-off-reserve manually operated type. In my defense the new vacuum petcock lasted six months or so before the ZRX became hard to start after sitting idle for longish periods of time.

The vacuum petcock stopped sealing and the ZRX’s last line of defense was the float needle in the carburetors. In an ideal world these needles should stop the flow of gas and you wouldn’t even need a fuel shut off valve. We don’t live in an ideal world, however.

I tested my bad-petcock theory by removing the fuel line. A steady stream of fuel poured out of the hose. There is no “Off” position on the standard Kawasaki petcock so I drained the gas tank and set about converting the petcock to manual.

In practical terms the bike was starting hard because it was flooded. Constant velocity carbs, like the ones fitted to the ZRX, are a little harder to clear a flooded condition. Normally you’d hold the throttle wide open to get a lot of air flowing through the cylinder, thus blowing out the excess fuel. With CV type carbs opening the throttle only opens a set of butterfly valves. The actual throttle slides are independent of the twist grip and require engine vacuum to operate. Add low-vacuum cranking speed that struggles to raise the throttle slides and a flooded engine that doesn’t want to start and you’ve got a sticky wicket.

I bought this generic fuel petcock on Amazon for around $10 and figured if it didn’t work I wasn’t out much money. The hole centers lined up and the valve bolted into the Kawasaki tank without issue.

The new petcock came with these tiny plastic fuel filters fitted to the main tank standpipe and the reserve opening at the bottom of the tank. I got rid of these as they looked sort of restrictive and I planned on installing an inline filter on the bike to simplify the hose connections.

The original style vacuum petcock had a 3/8” hose barb that mated to a 5/16” barb on the carburetors. This mismatch required the factory to specify an unusual molded hose that was 3/8” on one end and 5/16” on the other. The new, manual petcock had a ¼” hose barb. These universal inline filters have both ¼” and 5/16” barbs to fit a wider range of machines. I trimmed off the 1/4″ barb on one side of the filter and had a nifty filter that fit both the petcock size and the carburetor size.

I know what you’re thinking, which is that the new petcock at ¼” won’t pass enough fuel. Maybe you’d be right if I drag raced or rode extended periods at high speed. At 50 miles per gallon the thrifty ZRX1100 gets plenty of fuel through the smaller line. I did a few full-throttle passes at an undisclosed test location and the bike did not want for fuel.

The new petcock hose barb exited 90 degrees rearward compared to the stock petcock, which exited down. This orientation required the fuel hose to run straight back and over the carburetor before turning down and routing under the bank of four carbs. The extra length made for kind of a loose hose so I used a couple rubber-covered clamps to secure the hose and tuck it in out of the way.

The new petcock makes starting easier but the Kawasaki ZRX is still reluctant to cold start. Which is odd because the bike always started on the first push. Maybe it’s just the fact that winter is here at the ranch and I’m starting the ex-Florida bike colder than usual. This is the first New Mexico winter for the ZRX and it takes three or four pushes on the button to get the bike to light off, a great improvement over the 25 or so with the old, leaky petcock. I never got around to adjusting the ZRX carbs; I just cleaned them and stuck them back on the bike as I had a long trip planned and wanted to get some shakedown miles on the bike. Maybe a carb sync is in order.

I’ll try adjusting my starting ritual to see if I can come up with a protocol that will save some wear and tear on the Kawasaki starter motor. Keep your eyes glued to ExhaustNotes.us for important updates as they become available.

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A .223 Browning Micro Medallion A-Bolt

By Joe Berk

I recently posted a blog about a couple of accuracy loads for the 6.5 Creedmoor Browning X-Bolt. This blog focuses on a different Browning: A .223 Browning Micro Medallion A-Bolt. It’s the rifle you see here.

I bought the A-Bolt new from a local gun shop in southern California about 35 years ago. I paid $339 for it. It doesn’t have fancy walnut but when I saw it on the rack I asked to see it. I soon as I held it I wanted it. It just felt right. I fancied it as a walking around varmint rifle suitable for rabbits and coyotes, although I’ve never taken this rifle anywhere but the West End Gun Club 100-yard rifle range. I still make gun purchase decisions based on the kind of hunting and shooting I did 50 years ago in Texas. Someday I may get out and chase jack rabbits and coyotes with this rifle again. I can dream.

Browning offered their A-Bolt Medallion series, which were full-sized rifles, and their A-Bolt Micro Medallions, which have a shorter barrel and a shorter stock. The Browning Medallions and Micro Medallions were discontinued a few years ago when Browning shifted to the X-Bolt rifle, but you can still find the Micro Medallion A-Bolt rifle on the used gun racks and on the gun auction boards. A recent check showed that they go for around $650.

The rifle you see here is Browning’s Micro Medallion. I like the smaller size. It’s a lighter rifle and the shorter stock fits me well. I don’t like the gloss finish, but at the time it was all Browning offered (they later offered a satin finished rifle). What’s nice about the gloss finish, though, is that it has held up well. It and the deep bluing make this firearm look brand new. I like the rifle’s cut checkering and the darker fore end pistol grip tips, too. Browning made a big deal about their rifle’s short bolt angle in their advertising back in the 1980s and 1990s (bolt angle is the angle the bolt turns through to allow extraction, ejection, and loading). I like it, but if the rifle had a c0nventional bolt throw it wouldn’t have bothered me. It’s something different, but it’s not necessary. It is cool.

Fairly plain, gloss finished walnut. The Browning’s bolt throw is a short 60 degrees, much less than a conventional bolt action rifle’s 90 degrees. The rifle’s bluing is amazing.

A nice rifle. I use the notepad to keep track of which load I fire at which target.

Cut checkering on the Browning. These rifles were manufactured in Japan. They did a nice job.

The fore end tip and the pistol grip have rosewood caps. They look good.

Shortly after I bought the rifle, I mounted an inexpensive 4X Tasco scope on it. That worked okay for a couple of years and then the scope called it quits, so I bought another inexpensive 4X scope (a Nikko this time). The Nikko has held up well.

You might wonder: Why a nonvariable 4X scope? Why not the more popular 3-9X you see on most rifles? In my opinion, the 4X is a lot more useable in the field. I don’t get dramatically better groups with higher magnification scopes, and I like the lightness and the much larger field of view a 4X offers. Unfortunately, not too many companies offer fixed power 4X scopes these days. The scope companies’ marketing has convinced everyone they need variable scopes with high magnification.

The Nikko 4X scope was inexpensive. It has parallax and focus adjustments. Not the roll engraving on the receiver.

In my recent blog about the Browning maple Medallion 6.5 Creedmoor X-Bolt, I described a couple of accuracy loads I developed for that rifle. This time, my objectives were different. I wasn’t shooting the .223 Micro Medallion for accuracy. I was harvesting brass.

Bulk Remington .223 ammunition. It comes in a big plastic bag. I counted out 100 rounds for this range session.

A macro shot of the bulk Remington .223 ammo. Note the crimp applied to each round. I generally find that uncrimped ammo is more accurate with this cartridge. I think the crimping induces a bit of tilt in the bullet.

Several years ago I scoured the Internet looking for Remington brass. I’ve always had good luck with Remington brass (it lasts longer and it provides better accuracy, in my opinion). At that time and to my surprise, loaded Remington bulk ammo was cheaper than unprimed brass. For me it was a no brainer: I ordered a thousand rounds of loaded .223 Remington bulk ammo. When I need .223 brass, I’ll shoot up a bunch of the bulk ammo to get the brass.

The bulk Remington ammo was notoriously inaccurate in my Ruger Mini 14, which is the only rifle I had previously used with this ammunition. I wanted to see how the ammo would shoot in the Browning. I knew the Browning was accurate based on previous range testing at 100 yards (some of my reloads would shoot into a quarter of an inch in the Browning; I’ll give you those loads at the end of this blog).

The Remington ammo did well enough in the Browning. It held loads right around a minute and a half of angle at 100 yards, and it printed about where the scope was zeroed. Take a look:

Cheap ammo, but results that weren’t too shabby. I could hunt with this load.

This accuracy is good enough for minute of jackrabbit or coyote. The Browning Micro Medallion rifle is fun to shoot, too. It has negligible recoil, the shorter Micro Medallion barrel helps to keep the weight down, and it connects well at 100 yards.

About the accuracy loads I mentioned above: In a previous load development effort I tested .223 loads in several rifles, including two Remington 700 varmint guns with bull barrels and big scopes. To my surprise, the Micro Medallion and its 4X scope had no problem running with the big guns and their much heavier barrels and much higher magnifications. Here’s how the Micro Medallion and three other .223 rifles grouped a few years ago at 100 yards:

The Browning Micro Medallion shot half-inch groups with ARComp propellant (and it was basically a minute-of-angle rifle with nearly all other loads). I’ll reload the brass harvested from this range session with the Hornady V-Max bullet and ARComp propellant. This is great performance, especially considering the lightweight barrel and the 4X scope. It’s a great rifle.

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Two Browning 6.5 Creedmoor Loads

By Joe Berk

The creek is dry and getting to the West End Gun Club is a lot easier these days, so I reloaded some 6.5 Creedmoor ammo in the brass good buddy Johnnie G sent to me. I wanted to try a couple of new loads in my maple-stocked X-Bolt.

A right side view of the Browning 6.5 Creedmoor rifle. Note the muzzle brake on the end of the barrel.

I bought the X-bolt when I saw the wood, and it had a cross-country ride and a half to get to me. I saw it in a shop in Lamar, Colorado, and I knew I had to own the Browning as soon as I saw it. You don’t see many rifles with wood of this caliber.

There was a problem, though. The Colorado shop owner wouldn’t ship it to California. There’s an extra hoop or two a dealer has to jump through to ship a gun to California and I guess folks in Colorado aren’t basketball players. Here’s where capitalism came to the rescue. There’s a guy in Virginia who makes a living off of these kinds of situations, so I had the Colorado dealer ship it to the Virginia dealer, who then shipped it to my dealer in California. None of these dealers did so for free (going to Colorado-to-Virginia-to-California route wrapped the Browning in another $100 bill, and you can guess who had to pay up). But that’s okay. I wanted the rifle and now I have it. It really is an exquisite firearm. And it is exquisitely accurate. I’ll get to that in a minute.

I mounted a 4×12 Vortex scope on the Browning 6.5 Creedmoor. Check out the roll engraving on the receiver.

Another view of the 6.5 Creedmoor Vortex scope. The scope includes a parallax adjustment on the objective lens.

A macro shot of the receiver’s roll engraving. It’s a nice touch.

The stock has a darker wood fore end tip. It’s a classy rifle. The action is glass bedded from the factory.

The X-Bolt has a muzzle brake. The bluing is fine; that’s powder residue you see on it. I can feel a light puff a fraction of a second after the bullet leaves the barrel.

I used the Hornady 140-grain full metal jacket boat tail bullet for two loads I wanted to test; one with IMR 4350 propellant and the other with XBR 8208 propellant.

Reloaded 6.5 Creedmoor ammo with Winchester brass and the 140-grain jacketed hollow point boat tail bullet. It’s good looking ammo.

The business end of the 140-grain Hornady bullets.

The loads showed no signs of excess pressure after firing. The bolt opened easily and the primers were not flattened.

Winchester brass, and unflattened Winchester large rifle primers.

I full length resized the 6.5 Creedmoor brass because I have two rifles chambered in 6.5 Creedmoor (see our earlier story, A Tale of Two Creedmoors). The alternative approach is to neck size the brass only (which can theoretically offer improved accuracy), but when you neck size the brass the reloaded ammo will only fit into the rifle in which the brass was previously fired. I didn’t want to try to keep my ammo segregated by rifle, and as it turns out, I don’t need to. The full length resized 6.5 Creedmoor brass provided great 100-yard results in the Browning X-Bolt rifle with both the XBR 8208 and IMR 4350 loads.

The first shot of the day at the upper left target was low and to the left, which is a common occurrence when shooting from a clean and lightly oiled barrel. The next three grouped tightly into the orange target (I could see the bullet holes with the rifle’s 12X scope). I let the barrel cool for a few minutes, and then I fired another three rounds at the upper right target. I was pleased; the load returned an even tighter three shot group in about the same spot as the first group. Both groups, when measured later, were a satisfyingly tight half minute of angle.

I let the barrel cool again, and then I moved on to the IMR 4350 loads. Wow, talk about consistent. Both shot to the same part of the target, and both were exactly the same group size: 0.829 inches.

Two great 6.5 Creedmoor powders: IMR 4350 and XBR 8208.

My old RCBS powder trickler still works well.

I had read that IMR 4350 was a “go to” powder for 6.5 Creedmoor accuracy, and my results confirmed that. I had not found much information about XBR 8208 accuracy in this chambering, but it sure seemed to get the job done for me. As the above target shows, the XBR 8208 performed even better than the IMR 4350 loads. Here’s a bit more on info on these two loads:

- Both had the Hornady 140-grain bullets seated to an overall cartridge length of 2.800 inches.
- I did not crimp the bullets in place.
- I did not trim the brass for either load.
- The powder charges for both loads were weighed for every cartridge. I used my powder dispenser to drop a little bit lower charge, and then trickled in the last few grains.
- I used 31.5 grains of XBR 8208.
- I used 39.0 grains of IMR 4350.
- I used Winchester brass with Winchester large rifle primers.

So there you have it: Two great 6.5 Creedmoor loads for the Browning maple Medallion.

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Getting Your Kicks: ExNotes Motorcycle Mods

By Joe Gresh

I bought the 2008 Husqvarna SMR510 in 2009. I forget the exact mileage on the bike but it was around 800-ish, I think. The Husky was essentially a new motorcycle and the bike sat very tall for a guy with stubby legs. The seat height wasn’t my biggest problem though, the real issue was the diabolical kickstand the manufacturer cursed the Husky with.

The stand was both too short and angled wrong so that when deployed its contact point was only a few inches left of the centerline of the motorcycle. On the stand, the bike would lean way over, unloading the rear suspension to the point the rear wheel was nearly off the ground. This meant the bike fell over a lot. The slightest breeze would pivot the bike onto the stand and knock the Husky onto its left side.

That’s not all that was wrong with the Husky’s kickstand. The foot of the stand was only a millimeter or two wider than the 7/8-inch steel tube the stand was made from. Parking the Husqvarna on anything other than solid concrete was an iffy proposition. If the bike was on sand or dirt the stand would punch through the ground and the bike would fall over. I learned that in the dirt you had to lean the thing against a tree if you wanted to park.

One of the first things I did to the bike was add a gigantic chunk of steel to the bottom of the stand in order to spread the load a bit on soft terrain. I angled the new foot outboard, effectively moving the contact point an inch further from the centerline. The new foot also moved the contact point forward a bit to help even out the fore-aft balance. It kind of worked. The bike fell over less but it still fell over.

The SMR510’s high seat was a pain to climb onto so I decided to raise the rear shock bolt about ½-inch which lowered the back of the bike a full inch. Now I could reach both feet to the ground on tippy-toes or one foot flat. The lowering also improved the kickstand angle and stability although it caused trickle-down issues.

The Husky is blessed with an ultra plush rear suspension. The bike is a Cadillac on rough dirt trails. With the shortened ride height the bike leaned less on the stand in fact it was almost too vertical. Now when I got on the bike the rear would sag pushing against the stand causing the bike to lean hard right. To get the stand folded up I had to lean the bike much further to the right like a 45-degree angle so that the arc of the stand-swing would clear the ground. Even if I wasn’t sitting on the Husky to fold the stand up I had to hold the bike well over center. I dropped it a few more times.

Things stayed like this for many years. My method of mounting the SMR510 was to first fold the stand up then swing my leg over the back of the seat, scratching the rear fender with my boot and settle down into the saddle as the suspension sagged and my feet hit the ground. It was an ok system when I was younger and more flexible.

Unfortunately frailty creeps up on all of us over time. The last few years it became harder to swing my leg high up over the rear of the Husky. The pack I keep strapped to the rear fender made the situation worse. I had to change my methodology and begin a more right-angle frontal assault, high-kicking my leg over the seat like a hurdler or John Cleese at the Ministry of Funny Walks.

You can guess how well that worked: to get on the Husky I had to flip the stand up, hold the bars with one hand, step back far enough to give my leg clearance and kick as high as I could while stepping forward into the bike. Most of the time it worked but if you didn’t get your foot high enough it would smack into the seat and push the bike over. The Husky falls well and all, but still. Getting off the bike was no easy feat either. In fact, I dropped the Husky more dismounting the motorcycle than mounting, although it was a close run thing, percentage-wise.

It got to where I didn’t want to ride the Husqvarna because I dreaded getting on or off of the bike. It all came to a head a few weeks ago when the Mud Chuckers and I did a 140-mile pavement loop with a 40-mile dirt section in the middle. We pulled into the café at Mayhill for a lunch stop but the place looked closed. Neither of us actually checked the door because we didn’t want to go through the trouble of climbing off our bikes.

The parking lot at the Mayhill Café has a slight slope to it and I rolled the bike backwards to leave. The Husky wouldn’t start. Nothing. No clicking. The instrument panel and fuel pump energized so I figured something was wrong with the starter motor circuit. I made the fatal error of positioning the kickstand side downhill. I slid my butt off the seat and started to drag my tired leg over the top of the seat Normally not a big problem. The added distance created by the parking lot falling away meant my leg needed to go even higher to clear the seat and the bike began to topple over onto me. I was bunny hopping with the one leg on the ground and the other leg still not clear of the seat. Events rapidly overtook my hop-speed and the bike fell over. Luckily I was still wearing my helmet because when I fell backwards I smacked my new helmet on the asphalt pretty hard. I think I would have cracked my head open otherwise.

As I was lying on the ground with the Husky on my leg I cursed a torrent of bad words, some of them even I didn’t know the meaning of. It was like I was speaking in foul-tongues except the Holy Spirit was not the one doing the talking. We got the bike off of me and picked it up. I told Mike, “I’m not riding that @#@ing motorcycle again until I fix that #$@@-%ing kickstand.” We push started the bike and I rode home. So I guess I did ride it again after all.

The starting problem turned out to be a loose connection at the start relay but to be sure I took all the bodywork off and disconnected all the multi-pin plugs on the wiring harness and gave them each a shot of silicone. I relocated the horn to gain a bit more wiring room behind the headlight and changed the old, crumbling air filter for a new one. The Husqvarna was running fine. Except for that diabolical kickstand.

The main problem with the kickstand is that when deployed it is too close to the centerline of the wheels. The reason for this is the kickstand-mounting lug on the frame is angled wrong. Instead of the stand swinging out it sort of swings down. All of the Husky’s kickstand issues stem from this one critical design flaw.

I don’t want to mess with the Husky’s frame so I decided to hacksaw a wedge out of the stand (below the return spring mount) and closed the wedge so that the stand would project about 4 inches further outboard. I welded the join as best I could not being able to see the weld or the seam.

Moving the foot outboard made the bike lean over too far so I borrowed a few inches of tubing from an old Yamaha handlebar to extend the length of the stand.

I made a plug to insert into the tubing where the old stand and the handlebar piece join, a couple holes drilled into the tubing allowed me to butt-weld the insert and weld the thin tubing together without burning through.

I made a new, lighter foot and cut a new angle on the end of the stand to suit

And it is wonderful. Parking the bike is so easy when it doesn’t fall over from the slightest breeze. My new mounting technique (with the stand in the down position) is to put my left foot on the peg, grab the bars, stand on the foot peg, swing my leg easily over the rear pack, settle down into the seat and with my left foot, swing the stand up. Easy-Peasy. It sounds like I should have been able to do this all along but the geometry just didn’t work that way.

Putting up with the old kickstand for 14 years shows how a bad idea can keep loyal followers. It took that hard fall In Mayhill to jar me into action. There is no free lunch, however. The new stand angle awkwardly juts out from the side of the bike and will most likely break when I crash on that side. I’m hoping my shoddy welding will be like a fuse and it will break at the join before something important breaks.

The kickstand mod has made me fall in love with the Husqvarna again. It’s such a light, powerful bike you feel like there’s not much you can’t do with it. Now that I can easily get on and off the bike those feelings of dread are distant memories.

I’ll see you on the trails.

More motoliterature from Dos Joes? You bet!

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Physical Security

By Mike Huber

Okay, so having served in the United States Army I am always aware of my surroundings, my gear, and most importantly physical security of these items. This is even more true nowadays as a fulltime traveler on my motorcycle. This involves not leaving sensitive items on the motorcycle overnight and parking it near me (usually line of sight) or in a garage. These habits have kept my gear safe over the past six years of traveling, not just in the United States but across the globe.

Upon waking up in Baltimore on November 2^nd and looking out the window from my bedside I instantly was shocked to see that my BMW GS1250 was not in the parking spot where I had left it the day prior. My heart sank. Not only was the bike gone but so was a lot of my gear. Non-sensitive items thankfully were inside my friend’s house where I was staying. I combed the parking spot to see if I could find any pieces from the bike or any type of clue as to what happened. There was nothing. The bike was just gone.

I was devastated to say the least. The GS1250 still had its temporary tags on it; that’s how new it was. What hurt me even more was the panniers with dozens of stickers identifying where I had traveled. They were gone along with some sentimental items from the Army that were kept locked in them.

Within five minutes of calling the Baltimore police, three officers showed up, took the report, and fully understood my pain. They issued an alert for the missing motorcycle, which was my home.

It only took two hours and my phone rang. They had found the BMW two blocks away. I quickly ran down to meet the officer and was anxious to view what was left of the bike (if anything) and my gear. The bike had a few thousand dollars in damage, mostly from whoever took it snapping the steering lock to push it into this dark alley. Amazingly, most of my gear was intact, but the panniers were destroyed from the thieves prying them open with a crowbar (I’m assuming). Some of the gear was still hanging off the panniers and some of it was thrown all over the alley. Fortunately, my losses only included my raingear, air mattress, tool kit, and my fishing pole. I asked the officer to alert the Coast Guard as obviously the thieves were going to blow up the air mattress and go fishing in Chesapeake Bay. Even in times of darkness I find humor to lighten the mood, if for nothing else but my own sanity.

So the police found my bike, but it wouldn’t start due to the steering lock being destroyed. That began a painful day of finding a local BMW dealer, calling a tow truck, and beginning the paperwork for the insurance claim. I was still extremely distraught and depressed over the whole incident, and rightfully so. Over the years my mindset has changed from the “woe is me” negative thinking to a more positive one of “maybe this is meant to be and had the bike not been taken I possibly could have been injured or killed in a wreck that day.” It sounds cheesy, but I do believe this. Having a positive outlook helps take a bit of the pain away, even if momentarily.

Luckily for me I have incredible friends pretty much all over the world. The decision to rent a car was a no brainer. It would be a fun way to kill a couple of weeks and Kia Kamp while the bike was being repaired. I could continue the “Mike Huber friends and family tour.” This would not only occupy my time but reassure me that even though I was going through a difficult time, being surrounded by beautiful friends would provide the inspiration and confidence to move forward. This is not to say that a few times a day I don’t feel an emptiness in my gut. Having traveled so much of the world and especially doing so by motorcycle where I am so exposed has provided much more good than bad throughout the years. If you get off your couch and go live sometimes bad things happen, but more often than not you meet wonderful people and build relationships with new friends for life.

Lessons Learned

Sadly, this isn’t the first time I had a motorcycle stolen. I had a brand new Suzuki GSXR750 stolen when I was in college at Boston University. That moto was never recovered, but I immediately bought a caliper lock for my next motorcycle. This provided comfort, but it would not stop three or four big guys from simply picking the bike up and throwing it in the back of a truck. I stopped using the caliper lock when I bought my first BMW GS (in hindsight, this was not a good move). I didn’t think stolen BMWs were in as much demand as the Japanese motos.

There are motion alarms, airtags, and a ton of other security devices out there that I am sure I will be writing about in the near future. For now the bike is back and the panniers have a clean canvas to start over and begin adding new stickers. My travels will continue after a brief hiatus as we await BMW parts from the Motherland.

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ExNotes Product Review: Continental Twinduro TKC-80 Motorcycle Tire

By Joe Gresh

I’m probably the worst person to review a motorcycle tire. Round and black are my two major criteria for tire performance. If the tire meets those benchmarks it’s okay by me. I’m not sensitive enough and I don’t ride fast enough to push any tire to its limits and I couldn’t tell you if brand A is better than brand B on the street if my life depended on it. Which is why the Continental TKC-80 is such a revelation on the Husqvarna SMR510.

It’s not easy to find a decent 17-inch front tire for the dirt. The front tires I had been running on the SMR510 were those hokey, 70%-street/30%-dirt or 80%-street/20%-dirt tires that are all really just street tires with a few extra adventure-grooves cut into the tread pattern. The street-based tires worked well on the street (see my criteria above) but were horrible on the dirt. The Husky’s front end would push through corners completely devoid of grip or feedback. I had to sort of square off turns: enter straight, come to a near stop, change direction and exit under throttle.

I don’t need the Husky for street duty now that the Kawasaki ZRX1100 is running. Long time ExhaustNotes readers may recall my failed efforts to convert the Husky’s tiny, 17-inch front wheel to a more dirt appropriate 21-inch size. That was a real debacle that cost me hundreds of dollars resulting in the 17-inch wheel going back on the front of the motorcycle.

Having wasted so much blood and treasure on the front wheel conversion and coming up empty I decided to try the tire everyone told me to get in the first place: Continental’s mostly off-road TKC-80. Originally made for giant, 600-pound ADV bikes I figured the TKC-80 should hold up well on the lightweight Husqvarna.

The improvement is so dramatic even I can tell something good happened between the Husqvarna’s handle grips and the ground. The Husky actually steers in the dirt now. It goes in the general direction you point the handlebars. I can take a corner in the dirt leaning the bike over like I’m on pavement and the front end feels planted. It’s like I have a whole ‘nother end of the motorcycle to work where there was nothing but push before. Soft sand is no problem, graded roads with a thin layer of dust and pebbles feel almost grippy. I haven’t been in the mud yet but the 80 has to be better than the slick tires I was running.

Needless to say I’m sold on the TKC-80, so naturally there is some confusion (on my part) about the future availability of the 80 series. Apparently, there was a recall on a bunch of Continental tires including the 80 series due to tread cracking. The best I can sort out from the Internet is that TKC tires built between January 2019 and April 2022 are affected by the recall. I’m not even going to look at the date code on my tire because I’m not taking it off. One of my moto-insider buddies says Continental is discontinuing the TKC-80 series. I haven’t found confirmation on that but as of today you can still buy them. I have noticed that TKC-80s online have gone up quite a bit since I bought mine at $120 a copy.

If you own one of the Super Motard type bikes with 17-inch rims and want to play around in the dirt without having to convert your front wheel to 21-inch, the TKC-80 is your tire. There is no cheaper or easier way to improve the front end of your motorcycle. I can’t speak to the TKC- 80’s longevity as I only have around 500 miles on mine and it shows little wear. If the thing lasts 2000-3000 miles it’s well worth it for the offroad performance. Hopefully I’ll be able to buy another one in the future because it’s about the only option for a 17-inch knobby that will fit the Husky’s wide rims.

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SIG’s M18 versus the S&W Shield

I had a chance to fire the new SIG M18 9mm handgun, which was recently added to the California Department of Justice roster of approved handguns here in the People’s Republik. I was impressed with the M18’s accuracy, grouping, comfort level, feel, and sights. I love the desert tan colors. I was not impressed with the trigger (more on that in a bit).

It was a good day on my local indoor pistol range, and as I was leaving, my good buddy Shannon asked where I’ve been (I hadn’t been there in a few weeks). “Overseas,” I told her. She then pointed to the new M18 SIGs they had in the display case and asked if I’d like to try one. That reminded me of the old joke about the guy with the wooden eye. I responded with an affirmative and rhetorical, “Would I?”

The venerable 1911. It’s chambered in .45 ACP. All steel and with a Parkerized finish, as God intended. In my opinion, you can’t improve on perfection, but the Army had other ideas.

A bit of background: The US Army and I have something in common: We change handguns on a regular basis. The Army had been using the venerable .45 ACP 1911 since about, well, 1911. It served the Army well (and still serves well in certain special ops units), but the Army decided it wanted something better. That led to adoption of the 9mm Beretta 92 (designated as the M9 for the military) in 1985. I never cared for the Beretta, so I’ve never owned one and I can’t tell you anything about how it shoots or feels. The M9 had pushed out my beloved 1911, so I didn’t like it. Period. No handling or testing required.

The Army wanted a smaller pistol cartridge, and it settled on the Beretta M9. The M9 has an aluminum frame. Bob likes it.

The Army quickly decided it didn’t much like the Beretta, either. But the Army is big and it moves slowly when it’s not lobbying for more funding from Congress, and it wasn’t until 2017 that they decided to go with a militarized version of the 9mm SIG P320. There are two versions of the new military handgun: The M17, which has a 4.7-inch barrel, and the M18, with a 3.9-inch barrel. Both are full sized handguns with magazines carrying a gazillion rounds, and until recently, neither was available to lowly and untrustworthy civilians here in the People’s Republik of Kalifornia. Nah, scratch that. Lowly or not, trustworthy or not, no California civilians could purchase either of the new SIGS, although weirdly, we could purchase the civilian gun from which it was derived, the SIG P320. Go figure.

The SIG P320, the gun the M17 and M18 handguns are based on. All three guns (the P320, the M17, and the M18) have a polymer gripframe. You can tell they’re swell (I’m not going to explain that comment; you have to be old enough to get it).

The 9mm SIG M17. Note the longer barrel length.

The SIG M18 recently appeared on the California Department of Justice approved handguns roster. That’s just a bit on the weird side, too, because the M18 is the version with the shorter (i.e., slightly more concealable) barrel. You’d think in their wholesome attempts to keep us pure our legislators would have approved the longer-barreled M17. Maybe they will in the future.

The Rock Island Compact 1911. This is a short barreled, shorter grip frame 1911 chambered in .45 ACP.

My Smith and Wesson Shield. It has a very short barrel compared to either the SIG M17 or M18, which makes my shooting with it a bit less accurate.

I had fun on the range. I shot a box of .45 ammo in my Compact 1911, and then two boxes of ammo in my Smith and Wesson Shield. I was doing pretty good with both, too. It’s a pleasant way to spend an afternoon. As I was leaving the range, Shannon told me about the new M18s they had in stock and offered a trial run, so I put a box of 50 rounds through one of them.

I used a 6:00 hold on the orange bullseye on both targets, and I fired 50 rounds at each. The Shield target is on the left; the SIG target is on the right. Both guns are good enough; the M18 is surprisingly accurate.

As I said above, I didn’t care for the M18 trigger (the M18 is a striker-fired handgun; give me a hammer-fired gun any day). But the thing was accurate, even with the Joe Biden trigger (it was clumsy and creepy). I put nearly all 50 rounds through a single jagged hole at my point of aim 10 yards downrange, and then I started hitting low with the last few rounds. The few that dropped a bit below the orange bullseye were entirely due to me being tired and shaky (it wasn’t the gun; I was coming up on 200 rounds in that range session and I’m an old man). The bottom line: I like the new M18. A lot. I may buy one somewhere down the road, unless the M17 gets approved in California first.

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