So for all of us that are broken down somewhere. How often has this happened to you?

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http://specialneedsdonkey.blogspot.com

Usual, if I have some technical problem, I can fix it good enough to get home (or where ever I want to go) but on a trip to Luxembourg, the wiring of my BMW F650GS started smoking (a bad habbit) and after a BMW dealer in Luxembourg could not fix it, I had the bike shipped home.
At the local bikeshop here in the Netherlands, "Motorservice Ossendrecht", the problem was solved in a few hours.


You can read the whole (unfortunately short) trip report on http://jkrijt.home.xs4all.nl/trips/lux2009/index.shtml

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Jan Krijtenburg

My bikes are a Honda GoldWing GL1200 and a BMW R1200GS

My personal homepage with trip reports: https://www.krijtenburg.nl/
YouTube channel (that I do together with one of my sons): motormobilist.nl

Hi Dunch

stuck in Iquique with a broken ignition coil....

It's not the first time, i break down quite often with my other vehicles in Europe. That's why i have the international (read: european) bring-me-home-insurance, as being stuck in Europe is expensive.

Although, my travel bike has never failed this seriously up to now!

cheers
karin

Ive had the engine in and out of my XR600R road legal beast 4 times in last 3 weeks.......everthing from a broken cam chain tensioner, and she skipped a few teeth and yes they do only go one way and yes you can fix em with infinite patient and use of many swear words, if you can swear in more than one language then it feels much better, i swear in english and spanish!then the CDI went on me.......

next irritation was coil HT wire snapped inside next to coil, cut end off with bandsaw screwed a brass screw into and, ground the end sharp spent a euro on copper core HT lead, running again,

next time engine out was a bolt had come loose from cam sprocket and thrown timing, that was a LONG push home.

3rd time was oil leak, found only 3 of clutch cover bolts werent stripped so endine out and helicoiled them, engine back in, then head cover started to leak so i checked tightness of bolts and 5 of the 12 stripped when i put a little more pressure on them........

.engine out again and helicoiled the shit out of everything,,,,,,,,bastard wont leak now!

now i have swingarm and rear suspension apart as fitting an all balls rebuild kit as the XR's ass shook like a teenager at a disco, then im fitting a new set of trailwings, and a chain n sprocket set........and i swear, if it breaks down again i have a lighter and a rag in my pocket!

9/10ths of the problem of being broken down is having the wrong machine. I've ridden all over South America, even up in the jungle and in the boonies and have never been 'stuck' anywhere. There are 3 secrets:

(1) Know your bike backwards and forwards. Here you are heading off into the unknown... why should the workings of your steed be another unknown!

(2) Ride something that has parts everywhere you ride or can be fixed with a welder and a hammer (I once reconditioned my clutch in the mountain jungle with only a flat screwdriver and a rock!).

(3) Carry tie-down straps. If you come up against something you can't fix where you are, hail down a truck, load 'er up and travel that way until a place where there is help/parts...


Sorry that it's that simple... but we are the ones that set ourselves up for problems...

Cheers, Toby

PS: Didn't do the poll 'cause none of the answers were true for me...

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http://www.aroundtheblockmotoadventures.com/
'We build the bike (in Peru) for your Epic Ride of South America.'