Big things happening on July 13!
Bootstrapping a start-up is hard, expensive work. But when you hear the call, it simply must be done. This was the case with OutspokenNinja. Balancing life and business is sometimes a tricky tight-rope affair. I believe it can only be done with an understanding and supporting partnership with the family. I’m blessed to have such a partnership.
For those embarking on the road to starting up, or even re-inventing your business, having buy-in from your family is critical, for they are the true support system when the road gets bumpy, and it will.
I’m looking forward to sharing more about this experience, once we’ve come out of semi-stealth mode, so I hope you follow me and the team on this new adventure.
Well, it’s a high-strung bike, but over-heating on the street in comfortable temps (70F for example) is just NOT acceptable. I love the bike, but his is major issue. I’ve started work on trying to solve it. Here are some of the research points I’ve found, and lists of things that others have done.
This post will grow over time, and hopefully become a FINDABLE resource on the web, for the next owner of a gorgeous MV Agusta F4 1000R, that needs to solve this problem.
Here is a list of things another owner did, that I piked off of MVAGUSTA.NET:
Modified the shrouds on the MV fans to eliminate the gap between the stock shrouds and the rads. — APR-15: it took me a week to decide how I wanted to attack this. In the end it was much simpler than I’d thought. – read about my experience here
The fan switch circuit. All three fans come on with either the switch circuit or the ECU.
Opened up the bypass holes in the thermostat. 9-MAR. & 15-APR This seems like a simple thing to do to the thermo itself. My original plan t was to purchase a new thermostat to drill. In the end, I just modified the original by doubling the diameter the existing 6 bypass holes, which are extremely small due to the very narrow flange. Sorry, I don’t have any photos of this.
Engine Ice — 15-APR: the instructions implied you need to flus the entire system to use the engine ice. Not knowing if any of these tips were working, I opted to simply use Water Wetter from Redline mixed with existing anti-freeze and distilled water. This seemed to help a bit, but didn’t seem to make a dramatic improvement.
MV impeller
Silicone hoses
Coated the headers – having completed this modification, I’m unsure of how much benefit it really is, but I suspect there is some, considering the pipes are close enough to the cooling components to melt the original fasn! read about my experience, here
I ran the fans continuously below 40 mph. The important thing is to be able to get a jump on the temp before it gets up into the 200’s. It’s much easier to keep it cool than to have to bring it back down and keep it cool. On an average summer day, with the fairings on and the bike idling it would maintain 167F.
Hi-flow Bodywork
Another option found was to get these fairings with big openings to vent out the air. About $300 for the pair, and then of course I’ll need to get them painted too.. BUT it’s an option!
I have wanted to get this done to several bikes, for several reasons. Most of those reasons being cosmetic. With this being one of the suggested factors to help in reducing the bike’s overall running temps, it was a no-brainer to get the pipes coated.
UPDATE: 21-MAR-2014
Pipes are now out for coating. I’ve ordered a custom color for the pipes. Once that arrives and they are coated, baked and returned, I’ll post photos of the final results, and the re-installation process.
UPDATE: 14-APR-2014
Pipes are back from coating!
Pipes returned from coating, and re-installed on the bike following 2 weeks to let the finish curing. Coating shop recommended 5 days, but I ended up waiting 2 weeks due to other projects that needed to be completed. Here is what they looked like when picking them up from coating: New coated MV exhaust
Although they look rather garish on their own, once installed, I think it offers a decent accent:
Pipes installed w/o bodywork:
Pipes with the bodywork installed: Coated pipes with bodywork installed.
Fan Shrouds
To Be Continued…
Cat Delete
I like the sounds of this improvement…
UPDATE: 10-MAR-2014
It looks like this mod requires me to cut the pipe, remove the contents and re-weld. Not impossible, but it’s not a skill that *I* have. This will take some calls to people I know to see who’s willing to do it and at what cost. At $400 for a replacement mid-pipe I think it’s well worth the effort to at least try this myself. If I do that, I’ll be sure to post pics of how I managed to do it.
UPDATE: 20-MAR-2014
The Cat has been dealt with. It was not the simplest task, by far. In fact, if you don’t have a space that can tolerate A LOT of noise, banging and a cloud of toxic dust, you probably want to re-consider this.
Removal was not easy by any stretch, and doing so without any sort of respiration protection is insane, in my opinion.
The ceramic/metallic material the comprises the potato just can’t be good for you to breath. I complete this portion of the project in my shop.
First step was to cut the pipe apart at the red line here. I used a hacksaw to keep the amount of lost material to a minimum. You can use whatever you want, but the more material you remove, the shorter the pipe gets and that’s probably not going to play well for you. MV Agusta Exhaust mid-pipe
After opening the pipe, this is the view you get. From here, it was a matter of drilling out the center (drilled out a 2″ diameter with a 1 1/2 HP hammer drill), then hammering chisels along the sides to break up where it was attached to the inside of the section. The final step was using a 1/2″ drive 30″ extension to ram it out the cut-open end. This last part took a couple of hours, but eventually it was removed.
Final prep was a die grinder and grinding stones to the walls of removed section to clean up any remaining material. Inside there is a really BAD step section on the exit… and that’s something I was just not prepared for, nor did I deal with. It’s NOT ideal. If I’d known that was there I might have considered simply driving a new section of stainless THROUGH the core. But that might rattle, and I know that the way I did it, rattles are not going to happen. Once that was done, a good friend of mine put his TiG welding skills to use for me and sealed it back up.
Finally, the pipes were sent out for ceramic coating. That will be discussed in a separate section.
Wow, what a great morning for exotic cars! The variety was fantastic, from 1960’s vintage GT40 to the latest from McLaren, the 650S!! And plenty of heavy metal in between (including an epic MBZ SLS Black, in red).
Here is a gallery of the pics… ENJOY!!
Devil’s Go-Karts
A line of raging bulls
Other fine Italian machines
848 EVO taken to the pink level
Amazing color on this Gallardo
GT40 in the house!
Getting the kids started on the right foot
2nd time seeing this car in the last 24 hours… Maz’s are really catching my eye!!
Mexico Blue GT3RS with an epic 4.1L custom motor
Ah.. a throw back to my 911 days.
More of that GT40
Maseratti brought some examples of Italian awesome.
100 Octane – event organizer
Again, the Mexico Blue GT3RS
Ferrari 599.. (one of two seen today)
A mega-clean e30 ///M3 so sweet.
Thanks to the organizers, especially Benoit Boningue, fellow car club member and just plane cool dude.
Wednesday, I took in a nice set of the coast’s best back roads, including a lunch at the infamous Alice’s Restaurnt, all with the help of the great people at Club Sportiva.
Being a complete car nut, instead of borrowing one car, I borrowed these 6 examples of driving awesomeness:
#1 The Batmobile
Blessed Mother of Acceleration, that thing is more than the sum of it’s parts. For all that it looks, with it’s massive motor, massive hood and ridiculous (ridiculously awesome!) gull wing doors.. I expected just it to be a muscle-bound pig. OK, so it is musclebound, but it didn’t feel like a pig. Not in the least! And to the company listed below, it was a pure joy to drive. Reasonably loud. When set in AMG manual mode the shifts were crisp but not abrupt (unlike one of the other cars in the list). This was probably tied with car #6 for the easiest of the lot to drive.
I fully expected this thing to scare me. And considering we’d be ascending the Calamari Highway at pace, I was apprehensive. I mean, if I bin the car, it’s going to cost me (or at least to me) a small fortune to repair or replace. And these guys check these things OVER before they hand off a set of keys.
So.. the car. It’s like sitting in a leather coffin. It’s tight inside. It makes a Cessna 152 Aerobat seem, accommodating. The door sills are pretty thick, and rather high compared to most any other car. Getting in and out can be a little amusing for an observer. Having the gull wing door shut, which feels like it’s 2′ thick, really made me feel sealed in cockpit of sorts, and just a tad claustrophobic. However once that lump in front was lit up and grumbling, I forgot about all that.
Suspension just sucked up the ratty road surface so well, It didn’t feel at all like the bumpy road of my youth. But that smooth driving didn’t come at the cost of a wishy-washy ride, like a couple of the cars I drove today.
Overall, this is one really fun car to drive. It’s refined enough to be a daily driver, and rude enough to be what it is; one super car.
#2 Street Legal Go-Kart
Wow.. what a HOOT!! It’s not much in the power category (190 HP) but the weight (1900 lbs) more than makes up for it.
Now, talk about cars with high and thick door sills. This is the patron saint of making men look absurd getting in and out of a street car. If the Benz was like being in a 152, this was like being in a Cub. Getting it started is a little odd. You put the key in, click it forward a few notches, then hunt for the START button (only 1 car today didn’t have a start button) way in the upper left.
For the set of cars today, I thought.. meh… they tossed this in as filler. I can’t say I was really excited about the prospect of driving it.
For the leg of the route I had this car, we made the run across the ridge (Skyline Blvd) to Alice’s. This is one of the sections of road things can really be cracked open. It’s very easy to hold a good 70-80 MPG avg. speed for the section, if you’re balls or wallet are big enough.
I lit it up, listened to the big Benz motor sound (I could not hear the Lotus over the Benz), and we set off. I think it took about 5 seconds for me to start grinning like a complete moron. OOOH BOY, this car is FUN! I want one. It reminds me of my old FZR400. Not much power, but light, and makes you feel sporty when you drive it. Did I mention it’s hilariously FUN!??! Banging up and down in the gears, heel-and-toeing the little thing into the corners and back out again.. it’s fun as snot! I’m going to start checking CL for them!!!
It does have a rather nasty bump-steer on corner exit throttle if you hit some nasty pavement. Of all the cars I drove today, this one scared me the most. You have to be ON your game, or going 25 MPH or it feels like it might dart off into the weeds before you can can finishing crapping your pants. It’s that on edge and that tight. You FEEL the road in that thing, in all the best ways!!! If you haven’t driven one in anger…. DO IT!!
#3 The Barge
Following a great lunch, the next leg was going to be down one of my favorite Nor Cal roads. Highway 84 to the coast. It’s got great sight lines, 100+ sweepers, technical banked (properly banked) turns… through the rain forest and to the coast. It’s a driver’s (or rider’s) road. And I had what I can only guess is made of neutron materials, for a car. :/ Can’t win them all.
Then I started to drive it, really drive it. Once I pushed it out of auto mode in to tiptronic mode and was able to use the downshifting on corner entry instead relying on the brakes, I reeled the Lotus in with ease.
Wait.. no, not a typo.. yes it’s big, yes it’s fat, (yes it’s big and fat) but wow the motor in that thing must have been stolen from an cargo ship. It’s a monster. Not a fire breathing monster, but a torque shooting out your kiester and never wanting to stop monster. Speeds in excess of ….. were easy, on that road, a road that I nearly never ride my bike on that fast. It’s not a sports car, I know that, and it should royally stink but damn.. if I was old, like in my 40’s or something and needed a luxo-barge… this would most likely get the nod!!! The specs say it has almost 500 ft./lb. of torque and yeah.. OH YEAH!! … I say BRING IT!!
So it turned out that this one favorite part of the road, was enjoyed by a really pretty freaking fun car!!!
At the base of Hwy 84, we headed south on 1 to Pescadero State Beach where performed the next swap. Just as we arrived 2 bus loads of local kids were visiting the beach on a science field trip. The boys were going bonkers checking out the cars, taking pictures with their cell phones (these are like 9-11 y.o. kids.. what are they doing with smart phones!??!).
Exchanging Keys at the Beach, Pescadero, CA
We give them some extra revs on the way out and manged to put in some WTO runs down 1 before turning up Pescadaro back to the top of the mountain. This is another fantastic piece of road!!. This time on one of the finest sounding cars of the bunch..
#4 Bond, James Bond.
OK, it’s not a DB9. They sold that one because it was too sloppy feeling. Maybe the DB9 coupe is better but the DB9 vert was supposedly a not mess. And frankly… and this was the biggest disappointment of my day, so was the Vantage. The body didn’t feel especially loose, but the car was nervous, and not in a good way. No matter what I did, what adjustment I made to the nannies, how I brakes and exited corners, I just COULD NOT get this car to handle like I wanted it too. It just felt out of sorts. Now, it could have been the tires, having just been replaced with Hankooks. Most of the cars are on PS2s, except the Bently was on some Continental tire.
Digressing… the sound from this car was FANTSTIC! The exhaust baffles are opened up, so it’s loud, proud and makes an intoxicating sound. And the single clutch computer controlled manual trans (like the BMW SMG) was really fun and responsive, and shifted like a human would shift, not really smooth at all. It had a very nice firm engagement on the up-shift. Maybe my Bimmers clutch is going, or my SMG needs to be re-programmed, but I liked this Aston’s trans a lot.
What I was not so much impressed by was the very obvious lack of power. It really needed the bigger Aston mill with at minimum 500 HP to make this worth the $$$ to me. I have to say.. this car is really making me re-evaluate my desire for an Aston Martin down the road. I was hoping a Vantage would be so much more. Of all the cars today, this is the only one that scared me, really scared me into thinking I could easily bin it, and not because it had too much power! Color me more than a little bummed.
#5 Italian for WT*?!?
Having returned to Alice’s, I jumped in the next car. This is the only one that I could hear over the Benz. Also uncorked a bit, and the only other row-your-own manual trans in the lot, outside the Lotus. I was a little apprehensive about driving this car, after the bitter disappointment with the Aston. I figured a vaunted marque would once again, show it’s flaws.
And I was not far off the mark, it’s flawed. It’s heavy (ish), It’s old-school manual… AND IT’S A BLOODY RIOT!! OHHHH MY GOD. damn damn damn damn DAMN.
Almost any day I’ll take lucky over good. And this time I was putting my butt in one of the hottest cars of the bunch, for a return run on Hwy 35. And, I had nobody holding me up. 😀 We rocketed along the ridgeline at ludicrous speed. Well, maybe more ludicrous noise than speed. Of all the cars today, this one hit every note you want for an exotic.
Looks great
Sounds great
Goes like raped ape
Crude
Rude
Socially unacceptable.
I fell in looooove. She’s not perfect. In fact this car also put me on edge. Much like the Lotus, it’s tight, stiff, had really noticeable bump-steer, real manual trans, NO rear visibility, it’s about 8′ wider at the rear than the front (or so it seems when you’re worried about dinging wheels that cost about as much as I pull down in a month). Aside from a close call with a pair of bambies, the driving experience was exhilarating!!
The car has no practical purpose. None. Zero. There is no place to put anything in the passenger box. The frunk is smaller than the glove-box on my old Miata, and there is NOTHING for storage to the rear, unlike other exotics I’ve examined. It’s just… a car. A small, low, wide, exhilarating Italian car. The thing feels like it has a soul. The soul of Satan but a soul none the less. This car put a serious case of smiles on my face!!!
The motor was super responsive. Re-reving the motor to coax it into a missed gear, was super easy. It was hard to drive, in just about every good way possible. If I’d had to pick from one of these cars.. it would be up there with the SLS and the next one….
#6 Godzilla
Straight up. I’m not a big fan of Japanese anything (wait, I take that back, Yamaha is an exception). I’d read the articles, heard the rumors, listened to Klick-and-Klak blather on about the $1000 it costs just for the transmission fluid. It was the closeout car of the day. It’s quiet, it’s big, it’s not at all flashy. It’s like an appliance.
Like a twin-turbo charged fire breathing video game from hell is more like it. It’s easy to start. It’s really comfortable. It has 4 seats, and a truck that can old more than a 1/2 PB&J sandwich. The array of electronic doo-dads is mind numbing. 5 custom display screens with boost, temps, G’s, TPS. YOU NAME IT!! It’s any 10-year old video gamer’s dream. And it’s FAST AS ****.
I’d been warned. When those turbos really start to spool, things start happening fast. My God, of all the vehicles, only the Benz was close with off-throttle torque awesomeness. Despite being a “little” V6 she just about stole the show!
If you want super-car fun on a budget, and also be able to get kids to school and carry a week’s load of groceries.. and you’re on a “budget”. I don’t know how you could go wrong with this thing. WOOO LORDY!!
Popped the trans in race mode, set the suspension to normal (not comfort or race), selected some house music on the sat radio and set about chasing the Lambo down Hwy 9. OK.. so you just gotta let the statement sink in a bit.
Chasing a Gallardo, down the amazing Hwy9, in a GTR.
That.. for me, was almost as epic as hot-lapping Laguna the weekend before! Chasing a dream car, down a road I grew up learning to drive on, while in a car that would murder the Lambo in a drag race while eating sushi.
Oh my… I must say. That as some of the most grin-inducing 5 hours of driving I’ve every done! My how the world has changed for me since I moved back to CA!! 😀
Conclusion:
I’m going to do this again. Next time I’m taking one of the kids with me. One dad had taken his 11 y.o. out of school to do this today. It was his birthday… talk about a kick-ass BD present. At least I think it was!
I realize most of you have been buried with my non-stop picture posts from today… well, all I can say is…. meh.. I was excited, I love cars. so sue me.. 😀
Oh.. and to answer the question.. if I had to pick one of these cars…. which one would it be?
Well, I did have to pick, because I can only drive one car at a time… so I picked this one. She matches my Ducati nicely, NO? YYYYEEESSSS!!!!
I do have to return it tomorrow…. but the entire family sure had some fun when I got home!! Miranda was the first to take a ride up Hwy9 (which started 1/2 mile from our house.. which.. is sorta nice in itself) with me. Then AJ, and finally Deb went for a ride. Wow.. she had the biggest grin on her face as I ripped that thing up through the gears. WOOOO!!!! I think that if I manage to buy one, she’s not going to complain one freaking bit!!! But.. I don’t see that happening any time soon. Until then, I’ll just keep borrowing them. I think I’m going to grab the SLS next. 😀
A bunch more snapshots
Here are a bunch more snapshots from today!
Exchanging Keys at the Beach, Pescadero, CA
Club Sportivia – Italy vs. Britain
McLaren awesome
McLaren awesome
Lining up the cars for today’s tour
My first car of the day, what a beauty!
Aston Martin – stunning in red
Business viea from the SLS
I’m upside down with joy!
SLS AMG – Jeremy is right, this is a hooning good time!
The little Elise.. what a gem and joy!
The most commonly seen view of the SLS.. from behind!
March didn’t offer us the best weather for car gatherings, but that didn’t stop the gathering of some of the most unique Lamborghini’s in Northern California in Los Gatos.
What made the day truly special, as a visit by Lamborghini’s former test driver Valentino Balboni! What a treat to meet Supercar royalty.
If you ride a motorcycle, and have never been to California, you are truly missing out on one of the best places in the United States to ride a motorcycle. PERIOD.
Here a few photos from various places along a ride I took yesterday from Santa Cruz, CA, to Lucia,CA:
We met up with the remainder of the group in Carmel.
View Larger Map
We gassed up the bikes and prepared ourselves (with more caffeine of course) for what was about to transpire. Rich (on the 916) took the time to model his man-sack for us. I hear it’s last word in manly riding apparel for the Central Coast.
PCH17 – Carmel Meatup
From here on our, it was Ride like the Wind all the way to Lucia. We did stop once to regroup, turn on the video cameras and discuss the awesomeness so far:
PCH Ride – Bixby Bridge Top
The first of many great surprises on this ride, was our lunch destination in Lucia. Ah.. what a view! What a great place to relax after a spirited ride up Hwy 1.
Next stop. Nepenthe in Big Sur. Despite a hair raising incident with an inattentive tourist in a rental car, we made it there without obvious injury. Despite the fact that the highway was the destination and the star of the day, this pulled off a pretty convincing 2nd place.:
What a fantastic ride today. Perfectly organized (or properly disorganized?) group. It’s always a blast to right with these guys and gals. Looking forward to our next epic excursion!!
PS. Video will be added to the blog as soon as I can clear 132 GB of space on a computer, somewhere.
Well, it’s a high-strung bike, but over-heating on the street in comfortable temps (70F for example) is just NOT acceptable. I love the bike, but his is major issue. I’ve started work on trying to solve it. Here are some of the research points I’ve found, and lists of things that others have done.
