DIY Shoes, Socks and Blood
Posted: Wed Jun 29, 2016 7:29 am
First off, I want to give a HUGE "thank you" to the write-ups in the "how-to" section - could not have done it without you...
[Begin the long part]
I hit 5K miles last week, which just happened to coincide with the arrival of my YSS shocks from Bikerbits and a set of City Grips from Revzilla. Ready for the service, something I was more than willing to pay the pros to take care of for me. I called the dealer I bought the bike from back in October, told them what I wanted.
"You want to drop it off," they asked, "We'll get to it when we can?"
"No sir," I replied, "I haven't driven my car to work in a month, I'll wait for an appointment to limit down time."
"I have one on the 30th..." (That's not so bad) "...of July."
Crap.
I could easily have another thousand or more miles on by then...not the end of the world, but I am pretty hard on my PCX...WoT all the time, most of my riding is in 55 mph zones...oil was looking pretty nasty. I did not want to wait that long...but what was the alternative?
In the words of the immortal Clarkson "How hard can it be?"
My, with my limited wrench-turning abilities, set out to replace all of these things on my own...(with some help from this site).
Took me a big chunk of the weekend, which was a scorcher here in Ohio, but by Sunday night I had the shocks on, the wheels off, and the oil drained. Honestly, the worst part was getting the pet carrier assembly out to get to the top shock bolts - but that was more like removing interior auto trim than bodu work...something I am pretty good at.
Somewhere in time, I'd lost my funnel...so I had the bottle of 10W30 poised over the dip stick hole (sounds dirty for some reason) and almost tipped it in beofre coming to my senses...
I had to get some pro help on the tires, so I headed over to another local place after work on Monday with the stock tired and wheels, and the Michelins.
I also picked up a new funnel.
Yesterday, tires were done. I put them back on, filled up with my nifty newe funnel, and I was off to the proverbial races.
Initial impressions are good. Grip is way up, ride quality is unchanged - but I have yet to adjust the YSSs(ssss).
Just wanted to (again) thank those who wrote the guides (I have a 2016, but the concepts are 94% exactly the same) and show that even a moron with a spanner can service these great machines.
Here's some pics:
[Begin the long part]
I hit 5K miles last week, which just happened to coincide with the arrival of my YSS shocks from Bikerbits and a set of City Grips from Revzilla. Ready for the service, something I was more than willing to pay the pros to take care of for me. I called the dealer I bought the bike from back in October, told them what I wanted.
"You want to drop it off," they asked, "We'll get to it when we can?"
"No sir," I replied, "I haven't driven my car to work in a month, I'll wait for an appointment to limit down time."
"I have one on the 30th..." (That's not so bad) "...of July."
Crap.
I could easily have another thousand or more miles on by then...not the end of the world, but I am pretty hard on my PCX...WoT all the time, most of my riding is in 55 mph zones...oil was looking pretty nasty. I did not want to wait that long...but what was the alternative?
In the words of the immortal Clarkson "How hard can it be?"
My, with my limited wrench-turning abilities, set out to replace all of these things on my own...(with some help from this site).
Took me a big chunk of the weekend, which was a scorcher here in Ohio, but by Sunday night I had the shocks on, the wheels off, and the oil drained. Honestly, the worst part was getting the pet carrier assembly out to get to the top shock bolts - but that was more like removing interior auto trim than bodu work...something I am pretty good at.
Somewhere in time, I'd lost my funnel...so I had the bottle of 10W30 poised over the dip stick hole (sounds dirty for some reason) and almost tipped it in beofre coming to my senses...
I had to get some pro help on the tires, so I headed over to another local place after work on Monday with the stock tired and wheels, and the Michelins.
I also picked up a new funnel.
Yesterday, tires were done. I put them back on, filled up with my nifty newe funnel, and I was off to the proverbial races.
Initial impressions are good. Grip is way up, ride quality is unchanged - but I have yet to adjust the YSSs(ssss).
Just wanted to (again) thank those who wrote the guides (I have a 2016, but the concepts are 94% exactly the same) and show that even a moron with a spanner can service these great machines.
Here's some pics: