CBT (passed!) and a new (second hand) bike.

[Spudly]

Hi all.

I've spent the time since my last post waiting for my provisional licence to arrive, which it finally did on Friday.

Not wanting to let any grass grow under my feet, I went into Newcastle (oh aye, the toon) to sit on a couple of bikes and get a helmet, gloves and a pair of boots.

Accordingly, I had a sit on a Suzuki GZ125 and a YBR125 and I gotta say, I was pleasantly surprised by both of them.

I was going to have a sit on a TW125 as well, but as i was picking it up off the stand, it and its neighbouring bike bit me.

Turns out the neighbouring bike had previously lost a wing mirror and had a screw placed in just the right place to gouge y middle finger between it and the grip when I lifted it.

I can't remember bleeding that much before, dripping blood all over Westgate Hill, the guys in The Trading Post (who were awesome, made me and my 6 year old both welcome and comfortable) found some napkins to mop it all up and try to stop the bleeding before selling me a Box BX1 helmet and a pair of gloves for £65.

Really, if you are in the toon for some reason, drop into The Trading Post, the guys in there are dead friendly and encouraging. Before I left, they made me have a sit on an Yamaha 1100 Dragstar, which I fell pretty completely in love with.

Making a short story long here, but helmet, gloves and sone sturdy safety boots set me back £100 of your english pounds.

Now have CBT tomorrow and on Tuesday, I can go pick up the shiny second hand 2006 Suzuki GZ125 from Darlington - found it on eBay, 6500 miles on the click, £1100. Not a bad deal for both buyer and seller I think.

Now, to ensure I don't fuck up the CBT.

[radilist]

goodluck

[Bred2shred]

Nice one mate, sounds like your well on your way. Good luck with your cbt and let us all know how you get on.
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I'm not as think as you drunk I am.

[Spudly]

Thanks guys!

All passed and without incident, happily.

That said though, I have a lot of things to work on - biggest things are my slow riding and my clutch control.

I think my major problem is that I spent ten years driving cars for a living and I'm still mentally doing that. Time to break myself from those habits I reckon.

Gotta pick my GZ125 up tomorrow, looking forward to that!

I'm giving myself 3 months tooling around on my CBT, then I'll book my Mod 1 and bang on from there.
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The Old Apprentice

[superleeds76]

good luck just enjoy it fuck any nerves and you will be fine
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do as i say not as i do!

[Andy_Pagin]

Slow riding and clutch control are amongst the hardest skills to master, below about 5mph the laws of physics that keep a bike upright suddenly decide they can't be arsed with helping you.
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They're coming to take me away, ho-ho, hee-hee, ha-haaa, hey-hey,
the men in white coats are coming to take me away.
Yamaha Vity -> YBR125 -> FZS600 Fazer -> FZ1-S Fazer

[Spudly]

[Derivative]

[alexknight200...]

Hi,

How are you getting on with the GZ125?

I;m due to take my CBT on Thursday and have been practicing on my GZ125, (private roads of course).

So far it is an experience, not been on a bike for years and it was on my 'bucket list' so have bitten the bullet.

Just getting used to the gears as have driven an auto car for years.

My slow control is getting better, just need to master the smooth stops and remembering to turn off the indicators!!!

Alex

[Spudly]

[alexknight200...]

Hi,

Well done on passing your cbt.

You can adjust the gear and rear brake levers up or down to adjust to your style, not hard to do either.

regards

Alex

[Nick 50]

hello awrowe,

must of missed your original post till now.

I'm in Sunderland and have a GZ125 too. I've had it for 4 months now and had it pretty much stripped at one point or another.

Any problems just give me a shout, by the map thingy on your profile your pretty close.

I like my wee GZ125 except when it's windy. If you plan to do your test, the first few times on a normal 500 will seem strange as hell
Completely agree about the back brake. To be honest it's pretty pants anyway so you aint missing much with it.
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Current Bikes: ZX7r 97 (Black Beauty), VFR400 NC24 (The banana)
Previous Bikes: Aprilia Tuono 03 (The Beast), CBR600f (97)
First bike: A GZ125 Lemon.......

[Spudly]

Alex, cheers! I'll have a look at that changing those pedal angles, the bike is sadly off the road till the weekend, unless I work some sort of magic in the next couple of days.

Nick, Sunderland eh? I'm in Corbridge, near Hexham, bot that far off at all. Got the A68 heading north almost at the front door - I've had a lot of fun driving a car up and down there and I see a lot of bikers heading up there as well, I suspect it will be fun even on a slowpoke like our GZs. Any weekend you fancy a ride out somewhere in the northeast, give me a shout, if the bike is running, I'll likely be up for it, weather and wife permitting.

At the moment, I'm trying to puzzle out a problem I have with the bike. I was riding home last night when suddenly the damn thing started spluttering and farting till eventually it just stopped.

I only got the bike last week and it came with a nearly full tank, so I thought I would run it out, then fill it right up and try to gauge its economy.

Last night, it was starting to look like it was nearly empty, so my initial thoughts were that it was empty and that was the problem.

So, I switched to the reserve tank and tried it, but had no success. I could start it, but moving the throttle made the engine die.

Best I could figure, that made it either fuel or air. Too much if one or the other. I don't think it's air, because nothing has changed, so I think its fuel.

The bike had been sitting for 'a while' before I got it, so further thought (which I had a lot of time for standing on the side of the road with my 18 piece Aldi motorcycle toolkit) made me think that perhaps it was a load of crap at the bottom of the tank causing a blockage.

Sure enough, when I took the fuel pipe between the tank and the carb off the carb, a load of rusty red globules of stuff fell out of the carb and the drippage from the tank left a rusty red shade to the concrete after it dried away.

So, I think I need to do a couple of things. 1) drain the tank and clean all the crap out of it somehow, I know not how.

2) I need to pull the carb out and give it a damn good dose of looking at. That bit is the bit I have the least confidence with, but I have a feeling that is where the problem lies. I think there is some crap in the jet stopping it from revving.

Dunno though. I have a mate coming to help on the weekend, but I really want to understand what is hapoening rather than standing around like a spare dick at an orgy while he fixes it for me.

Meant to put this in Workshop, but I guess its a new biker thing as well.
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The Old Apprentice

[Nick 50]

I would definitely copy and paste the issue part above and post it in the workshop. You will get great advice and it's very "noob" friendly for the likes of us.

If it has been standing for a good while, then yep everything will need a good cleaning out. Fuel lines, tank, carb etc etc.
I have a haynes manual and have tomorrow spare if you want a hand poking around yourself??
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Current Bikes: ZX7r 97 (Black Beauty), VFR400 NC24 (The banana)
Previous Bikes: Aprilia Tuono 03 (The Beast), CBR600f (97)
First bike: A GZ125 Lemon.......

[Spudly]

[Nick 50]

To be honest the manual covers the GS, GN, DR 125's as well as the GZ. The GZ is probably the least covered by the manual too.
I have a 2006 model and it seems pretty much the same, well apart from the bleeding swing-arm bushes are the other way round which took me hours to realise

Let me know how you get on, though i'm sure once the gunk is all cleared out, it will be fine.
____________________
Current Bikes: ZX7r 97 (Black Beauty), VFR400 NC24 (The banana)
Previous Bikes: Aprilia Tuono 03 (The Beast), CBR600f (97)
First bike: A GZ125 Lemon.......

[Carl_steveo]

Well done on the cbt mate oh and I'm not far from you either another Sunderland lad so just up the road.
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Current: Honda Nsr 125
Live: Sunderland
Luke "cant be arsed to read your post, but suck my balls anyway."

[alexknight200...]

Hi,

Passed my CBT today so all good.

Your bike problems definitely point to crap in the fuel line.

Not sure if the GZ you have have has fuel injection though??

Cleaning the carb should not be that difficult, just use petrol and a rag with some WD40. (wd40 fixes a lot of things).

Then run it on some Shell ultimate along with a fuel additive, that will give it a clean put along with a good run when it starts.

Hoping to get a few miles under my belt and then go for Mod 1 and Mod 2.

regards

Alex

[Nick 50]

[Spudly]

[Nick 50]

Great bike for longer rides for a 125. As long as the weather is nice, its comfy as an armchair.
____________________
Current Bikes: ZX7r 97 (Black Beauty), VFR400 NC24 (The banana)
Previous Bikes: Aprilia Tuono 03 (The Beast), CBR600f (97)
First bike: A GZ125 Lemon.......

[alexknight200...]

I have now racked up about 200 miles, and each journey gives me more confidence.

Just as well as there are a lot of numnuts out there just dieing to knock you off your bike

Funny thing is, today on the way to taunton I could get 65mph, on the way back could only touch 55mph. No mechanical problem, just a head wind

Alex

[Spudly]

Right the, managed to get my bike fixed today - a mate of mine who used to race 125s way back in the day came over and helped me pull the carb apart.

Quite an amazing amount of red shit came out of what I thought was the breather tube and when we had the carb in bits (and with my mate telling me what all the bits were) I tried to blow through the main jet and just about blew my eyeballs out it was that blocked.

Few minutes with some spray on carb cleaner and Bob's the bloke who married your auntie.

Gave the whole carb a damn good going over with the carb cleaner, tweaked nipples and wibbled flaps till everything looked the way it should and put it all back together.

Couple of things I learnt.

The airbox seems to be designed not to come out of the frame. I suspect it will eventually, but it'll be a proper bugger to get out.

When removing stuff from the bike, its a good idea to put stuff removed into an orderly, progressive pile. I'm fairly sure I have bolts where screws were and vice versa.

It's very satisfying to start a bike up and have it work properly again.

I took it for a little run around afterwards (as you do) and managed to smash out a new top speed of a mahoosive 52mph.

As my mate said, "you fat twat, it'd go faster if it was carrying less."
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The Old Apprentice

[alexknight200...]

Well the fatter you are the faster you will go down hills

Glad you got the bike fixed, have fun.

When I get time I also intend to tweek a few nipples.

Alex

[U_W v2.0]

agreed about starting it up after repairs.

i had to remove my air filter box (also designed to go in but not out) and carb and when it fired up first time properly and idled happily at 1.5k i was very pleased with myself, even if i did forget it had fuel inside it and got covered in it! haha (no it didnt stop me sparking up a ciggy)
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