Spannerman
MORE PLASTIC
FANTASTIC
I enjoyed your advice to
Robert Langtree on public
speaking in MT #353. It’s
not something I expected
to see in a technical
advice column, but there
are plenty of things
I find in MT that are
unexpected and which
make the mag all that
more enjoyable.
Keep it up.
In your advice on
cleaning plastic, you
used a one-size-fits-
all approach, but my
experience is that certain
types of plastic require
different cleaning
techniques. Some types
of plastic you can paint
and some you can’t. To
get the best results with
plastics, you need to be
able to identify what
kind it is which might
be a job for a specialist.
The guard on my dirtbike
is ABS which I’m led to
believe is a superior type
of plastic, and I know it’s
ABS because it’s stamped
into the guard.
Maybe you could
consider a longer article
on the different types
of plastics used in
motorcycle components
and how they can be
repaired and cleaned.Murray Shergold
[email protected]See the letter from Stuart
Burlington, Murray. You’re
correct about the variety of
plastics and their different
requirements, but Robert
(MT #353) was primarily
interested in cleaning
rather than repairing and
if you follow the advice I
gave, you’d end up with a
clean ’guard, pretty much
despite what plastic it was
made from.It still wouldn’t look
like a new one, though.
Because enduro and
trailbike ’guards suffer so
regularly, plenty of cheap
replacements are available
so it’s more cost effective to
buy a replacement ’guard
than it is to muck about
with ineffective repairs.
ABS plastic is widely used
in road bike fairings and
instrument panels and is,
indeed, the king of plastics.
It can be glued, repaired,
sanded and then painted to
restore its former glory and
it’s worth doing if an original
ABS guard is pushing $400.
Yo u r idea about a longer
article on plastics is
currently on the office
whiteboard.94 MOTORCYCLE TRADER
SHORT RETORT
I can remember a time when I could
walk into any motorcycle dealer and
be able to throw a leg over most
machines. I recently bought another
bike, but my choice was severely
limited to those bikes with a low-
enough seat.
Is it just me or is the gap from the
top of the rear tyre and the underside
of the seat getting bigger? I presume
it’s to aid sharp handling, but we don’t
all want to be Barry Sheene. Some of
us just like riding a bike to work.
We don’t all want cruisers, either.
I currently have a Triumph Bonneville
T120, which is just right but would
have loved a Husqvarna Vitpilen 701
but it’s just ridiculously tall.
Alvar Scott,
[email protected]I know we published your letter in
MT #353, Alvar, but I just wanted to
add a few things on seat height. All
manufacturers try to keep seat height
as low as possible because every
extra millimetre cuts out thousands of
potential buyers. It’s often a pain in the
arse (literally) for taller riders becauseone way of keeping seat height low is to
reduce the padding.
The compromise the manufacturers
have to make is with cornering
clearance. If the bike is too low, it will
scrape easily in corners and lack of
maneuverability can actually end up
being a safety issue.Manufacturers who can place their
seats behind the engine instead of
on top of it get lots of flexibility. The
low-seat option on BMW’s new R 1250
models is an incredible 760mm, but the
high seat option is 840mm – something
for everyone.
Some manufacturers (BMW, Triumph
and Suzuki, for example) have factory
lowering kits for some of their models,
which give you a low seat height
straight out of the factory and these are
worth considering.
The large gap you commonly see
between the rear wheel and the
rear guard is about giving the bike
acceptable cornering clearance. It looks
ugly, doesn’t it?
I’m working on an MT feature on bike
lowering – look for it in an upcoming
issue.There are
plenty
of things in MT that
are unexpected
and make it even
more enjoyable