New tires from Revzilla

Today, I had my new Heidenau K60 tires installed by a local motorcycle tire guy.  These tires were recommended by my friend Jason, who has been on some epic journeys with his R1200GS.  I think the KLR is ready for some adventure!  We shall see, tomorrow we trek to Anamosa, IA...

Temporary windshield mod

I've read good things about this cheap windshield upgrade over at klr650.net, etc., so I decided to test it out.  As described elsewhere, it's just a face shield visor turned upside down and trimmed on the sides.  I left the top corners straight instead of trying to curve the cuts, for now.  I did it during my half-hour lunch break and will test ride it on the way home tonight.

With a helmet on, it was hard to tell much difference during my commute.  My maximum speed was around 45 mph though.

Installed brake pedal extension

With the IMS pegs installed onto the stock mounts, the brake pedal was way too low.  I adjusted the angle of the pedal, but that was not much help.  I am not sure where I found this idea online, but it is elegantly simple.  It is just a couple of fender washers bent into a U-shape and bolted to the pedal pad.  I found it while searching for foot peg lowering brackets, but cannot find it again at the moment.

Connected dash voltmeter

Since I forgot to check the charging voltage after replacing the stator, I decided to connect the dash-mounted voltmeter to the bike's wiring (it was either that or remove the seat again).  I used the 'city lights' connectors which was very convenient.

The voltage seemed to max at around 13.8V during a short ride

I still need to wire-up the rest of the dash

The decimal does not show up in the pictures, because it is too weak; maybe I will enhance it with a Sharpie

SPARK!

Last night at work, I made a list of everything that I could think of to check.  This morning, while going through that list, I was about to bypass the diode unit with a ground wire when I found a very important mistake.  I had (days earlier) removed the ground jumper and had not installed the diode unit!!

After installing the jumper, the bike fired right up.  A very nice feeling, since it had been down all of February and Spring is almost here (the calendar says that its Spring but it snowed last night and is 25 degrees now).  I installed the diode unit, gas tank and plastic and took it for a ride to the local forest preserve.

It appears as though the pickup coil on the old stator cover was the culprit.

Reinstalled the rotor and stator cover

The new flywheel bolt came today from Eagle, so I carefully installed the flywheel/starter clutch and gears.  I lubed the clutch rollers and secondary gear bearings with molybdenum disulphide grease as instructed by Clymer.  After seating the flywheel and then torquing it to specs, the big starter gear turned one way and not the opposite way (good), and I rotated the crank a couple of times before and after the stator cover was installed. 

I installed the stator cover from the parts bike to hopefully prevent any additional rotor damage.  The old cover had a bent bracket holding the pickup coil wires which seemed to be what the rotor collided with.

Unfortunately, the bike did not start after that and I had to go to work.  Bummer!

The stator coils did not appear to be damaged

Looks like the pickup coil's magnet took a hit, so I installed the spare stator cover

Pulled the rotor

I started a thread asking for advice over at klr650.net, and was advised to go ahead and pull the rotor to check the woodruff key.  I did, and found the key too be intact and seated properly in the crankshaft groove.  I am glad that I had not screwed that up, at least.

Rotor damage

I guess that this explains why I had no spark after "doing the doo"...  The timing nub may have collided with the bracket that holds the pickup wires back, which I may have caused.  Or did it hit the pickup coil?  Hard to say.  Looks like I'm pulling the rotor. 

The wire bracket was bent, possibly causing the rotor damage; There is a nick in it as well

This shows my spare stator cover, with the bracket straight and (maybe) 2mm extra clearance

After carefully removing the burrs

Installed JNS Engineering Skid Plate

In hindsight, this should have been done during the crash bar installation.  I was excited to get the crash bars installed, no big deal though.

The JNS skid plate comes with new front engine mounts, so all three bolts must be removed.  I braced the engine with a jack and a piece of 2x4 lumber, which did not seem necessary because the other engine mounts kept it firmly in place.

I used some cork gasket to cushion the mounting points

I chose this skid plate because of the recessed lower mounts

The skid plate weighs just over 4 lbs

Installed crash bars

Twisted Throttle sent my SW Motech crash bars on Wednesday, and they arrived this morning.  I had to drill out the bushings to fit my 10mm front subframe bolt, but it was an easy job.

With the black tank in place but no shrouds

These tools made the job easy