Tuesday, March 29, 2011

She's back...

I got the release from Eddy last week to pick up my bike, he had the racks finished and was sending them out to be powder coated on Monday. We took our time at coffee on Saturday so I knew we weren't going to make it up there at a decent time and decided to go South to Eugene for the day instead. I was looking for trailer wiring for the car so I could rent a trailer in case the weather was unfavorable Sunday and didn't want to ride. Erik wanted to take his bike up to Eddy to see if he could fabricate racks for the Scrambler.

Erik and his bike 'Hilts'

I thought I would trailer his bike up and both our bikes back but the closest wiring harness was in Klamath Falls, 214 miles away and I'm sure UHaul won't release a trailer without the car being wired. Oh well, Sunday was supposed to be the better day for weather so we headed north to pick her up. After running a few errands in Portland and picking up a few things we headed to Eddy's and waited for Erik to arrive.

The racks looked fantastic even sans powder coating. I can only imagine how well they'll look black.



They are designed to lock and unlock on the same mount as my hard bags. I can switch from hard bags to soft bags in under a minute with a turn of a key and two clips per bag.



Eddy does nice work and met the challenge.



I have room on the left side to make an ABS pipe tool tube or two (Wee-Strom style), which I'll mount to the rack itself for quick removal.

No lane splitting for us.

Sure looks nice and I'm happy to have the Tiger back.



Not that the Gladius isn't a great commuter, but it doesn't have the fairing and windscreen the Tiger has to protect me from the rain and wet, grimy road spray.

I did however notice when I hopped on her in Eddy's driveway how hefty she is, after riding the nimble 650 for a couple of weeks the Tiger is a tall bike. It took me a couple of miles to adjust and get familiar again but when we did I was singing in the rain... all the way home.

Somehow I don't think Erik was enjoying the rain as much.


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9 comments:

  1. That looks like a nice setup, and it looks great even without the black powder coat. The soft bag setup looks like it holds a lot more than the hard bags. Do the original hard bags still use their stock mount?

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  2. @Richard - it is a great set up, the soft bags are Nelson-Rigg CL850 and hold 35 litres per side/each.
    I specifically asked him to have them use the stock mounts so I can slide the stock hard bags off and slide the soft bags on. In fact, I could run one stock hard bag and one soft bag at the same time.

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  3. Troubadour:

    those racks look very nice. I would leave them not powdercoated as they look very nice as they are. I guess you're spoiled now and don't wish to give up the Gladius as your commuter

    bob
    Riding the Wet Coast

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  4. Eddy did a nice job with the racks - looks good. Those saddle bags look huge!
    I bet it's good to have your Tiger back

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  5. Well done, looks great, he has done an excellent job, you can cram enough stuff in to do a month long tour now!

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  6. Sweet set up! I agree with Roger, time for a ride!

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  7. He did a great job! Those will come in very handy for when you don't want to wear the hard side cases.

    -Lori

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  8. Pretty soon the bike will be so fancy that you'll be reluctant to take it off road. Pavement Queen, here we come!

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  9. The rain sucks. It seems like it's all anyone is talking about right now. Seems like it's always raining on the weekend. What the hell is that about?

    Brady
    Behind Bars - Motorcycles and Life

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