Rod’s 2021 rides

[ColoradoRod]

I got off work this morning at about 10:00 and decided it was too hot to stay at home so I headed for the hills. I went up I-70 to Hwy 40 to Winter Park and then continued on to Grand Lake. I’m just finishing a late lunch at the Sagebrush Grill and am now headed towards Trail Ridge Road. If conditions are acceptable, I’ll end up going through Estes Park. Stay tuned for an update later this evening!

 

[ColoradoRod]

Made it over Trail Ridge, through Estes Park, and I’m now sitting in my brother’s office in Loveland waiting for him to finish his business so we can go watch his wife play tennis.

 

[Phil Tarman]

Is the pass system working at the west gate?

 

[ColoradoRod]

A reservation is required to enter the park between 9am and 3pm. I entered after 3pm so I didn’t have a problem. The first 8 miles or so out of Grand Lake showed definite signs of the fire from last summer.

 

[Phil Tarman]

If I get a chance before I leave for Provo, I want to go in the east gate that is open before 9AM and after 5PM, ride over Willow Creek Pass to Walden and then come back on CO-14 over Cameron Pass and Ft Collins. I don't know if I'll get that chance or not. I might ride up 14, and then go to Laramie and come home on US-287. I might or might not get that chance either. The guy who's been the chaplain at Banner Hospice of Northern Colorado for 16 years, quit week before last and I'm having to work more than I have since I've been here (April of 16 was my start date). If you can go on short notice, I'd be glad to give you a call the night before. Ken Malone, who lives in Berthoud, might be able to join me. I leave for Provo on the 17th, so I probably won't be riding after the 14th.

 

[ColoradoRod]

I've got Tuesday and Wednesday off this week and then I work every day until the 29th. Tomorrow is out because I kinda need to catch up from being gone the last few days. If Wednesday works for you, let me know. I'd be up for a ride. You'd probably need to go slow for me because I definitely don't have your experience.

My brother's wife lost the tennis match this evening, but it was still nice to catch up with my brother and watch a little live tennis. Looking through my pictures from today, it looks like this is the only one of any significance that I haven't posted. I took the 2011 today. Including today's 260 mile ride, it's my high miles bike with a total of just shy of 8900 miles on the odometer. I'll take the 2010 out for a spin as soon as I can get the new PR5's installed.

 

[ColoradoRod]

I was able to get away again yesterday for a quick trip to the mountains. I'm trying to buy a vacation condo up there, but things are selling so quickly that my rides end up being nothing more than a good ride in the mountains. My brother is a real estate agent and has been for 30 years so he'll represent me, but he's crazy busy right now so his schedule and my schedule don't always line up. I've started going up whenever I can--even if solo--just to check out the places before he rearranges his schedule to go with me for an official "showing."

I flew up to Granby on Sunday morning to look at a place. It went under contract and was gone by Sunday evening. I found a different place in Fraser so I headed up there yesterday on the motorcycle for a look-see. My brother called me just as I was pulling into the parking lot for the condo unit to say that it was under contract as of about 30 minutes prior to my arrival.

This hot real estate market is tough when it comes to actually buying a place, but I am sure enjoying the hunt with my newly found NT700 as the mode of transportation. So far, I've hardly ridden my red NT because the black one came along within the first week of ownership and was ready to roll. It had new tires and was current on its maintenance so I've been riding it.

The red one needed new tires so I've been working on that. I've fallen into a "while you're here" mode and am doing a pretty complete servicing in addition to just replacing the tires. I was surprised at how dirty the final drive oil was. I had planned to just check quantity and top off as necessary, but it looked pretty dirty so I went ahead and replaced the fluid. Oil is cheap insurance so I've always been one to just do it when it's in doubt. I also changed out the brake fluid because the old stuff was slightly dark. Might as well get started on the right foot.

It'll be interesting to experience the subtle differences between the red one and the black one. As we all know, red is faster so there's that... The black one has ABS, but I've never activated ABS on a bike so I'm not sure that'll matter. The black one has ROX bar-backs/risers and the red one is stock. It'll be interesting to see which one fits me better. I had them on my NC700 and I tend to like the more upright position, so I'm expecting to miss them on the red one. Other than that, the red one will have brand new Michelin PR5's and the black one has 2 year old Bridgestone Battleax tires with 2500 miles on them. I just checked prices and the Bridgestones and Michelins are within a few bucks of each other in pricing. I wonder which ones I prefer. I'm not an aggressive rider at all, so my opinion will be mostly on comfort, I'm sure.

 

[ColoradoRod]

Here's a pic of the final drive oil being drained from my red NT. It only has 6xxx miles on it. I thought it looked pretty dark so I just replaced it. 4.4oz of oil is pretty cheap insurance. The rear wheel is all mounted and reinstalled on the bike and I've been procrastinating on doing the front wheel. It looks significantly easier than the rear wheel process, so I think I'll tackle that this evening. I'm off tomorrow until late evening, so it'd be nice to take the red one for its first real ride tomorrow.

 

[mikesim]

Rod, your fluid doesn't look bad at all. I wouldn't give it another thought.

Mike

 

[ColoradoRod]

Rod, your fluid doesn't look bad at all. I wouldn't give it another thought.

Thanks for the input. I don't have anything to compare it to and I'm not wise to the ways of shaft drives, so I guess I just errored on the side of just replacing it. I'll know the next time I take a look, I guess. I wish I could say the early change of fluid was the most expensive mistake I made this week!

 

[seagrass]

The factory fluid (looks like the factory fluid from the photo) has molybdenum added which makes it darker and in the correct light you can see what looks like very fine metal particles which I believe is the molybdenum.

The added molebdenum should have done its job after 6,000 miles and I am sure the final drive will appreciate the new fluid.

Seagrass

 

[ColoradoRod]

Thanks for the advice on the factory final drive fluid. I'm generally pretty handy and work on a bunch of things, but it seems that everything I do has a bit of tribal knowledge involved. If not for some helpful hints here and there a person could spend an eternity Googling every little thing.

I was able to get out of town again yesterday for what is becoming my standard ride to the mountains. I live northeast of the Denver metro area, so I have to pass through most of Denver to get to the mountains these days. Even then, the only real route to Winter Park from where I'm at takes me on a bunch of interstate or big highway driving. I continue to be amazed at how smooth the NT is. You'd think the thing would be terrible at 5000+ rpm, but it just sings along without a complaint. It's no K1600GTL from a power standpoint, but it's also not a K1600GTL from a reliability and cost of maintenance standpoint!

Yesterday's ride took me a little over 200 miles round trip. I again went I70 to Hwy 40 to Granby through Winter Park, Fraser, Tabernash, etc. and then back. I'm looking for a vacation property and I've taken to scouting the area solo on the motorcycle before I drag my brother, the real estate agent, to the hills for an official showing.

It was pretty cloudy around the Denver area yesterday, but the clouds parted to reveal beautiful blue skies by the time I exited I-70 onto Hwy 40. I used a recently-purchased set of Shure SE215 bluetooth earphones for the first time yesterday. They fit nicely under my helmet and served the dual purpose of blocking a fair bit of road and wind noise as well as providing GPS voice guidance when necessary and some music here and there. The next step in the process will be finding some way to integrate some in-ear earphones with a microphone for 2-way phone conversations. I've got the Sena 10 bluetooth setup in my Bell 3/4 helmet, but the speakers aren't nearly loud enough when I wear earplugs and it's way too noisy to NOT wear earplugs.

The journey continues...

 

[karl]

I swap the diff oil at every oil change. I also got "remarks/compliments" on my gray plastic and the "flames" scrapes on the saddlebag at the last local meet. other than the screen it looks great from my seat...

 

[ColoradoRod]

I slipped out of town for another mountain ride yesterday. I ended up taking a slightly different path this time with my ultimate destination being Steamboat Springs, Colorado. I live near the Denver airport and took I-70 to Silverthorne (through the Eisenhower Tunnel). From Silverthorne, I went north to Steamboat to look at a few condos. I had a late lunch before leaving town. Instead of re-tracing my arrival route, I went through Walden and over Cameron Pass and took the Poudre Canyon (Hwy 14) through Fort Collins and Loveland before making my way home from there via I-25.

I stopped by my Mom's house in Loveland for a few minutes and ended up meeting my brother and his wife for a late Taco Tuesday dinner before heading home at around 10pm. All-in-all, a good day with mild temps and only a few small rain showers here and there. A total of 412 miles and about 12 hours total away from home. I have to work from the 1st to the 5th, so I doubt I'll get any significant riding in between now and this time next week. I'm still very happy with the NT700.

 

[ColoradoRod]

All the folks in the Denver area can thank me for the moisture we received late yesterday afternoon. I have once again verified my rain-dance-like abilities in making an impromptu quick trip to Lowes to pick up $5 worth of stuff to finish a project. I jumped on the bike because I hadn't ridden in a couple of days and didn't bother with any gear at all. I could hear the thunder and rain as I nearly ran through Lowes to complete my purchase. By the time I made it home, I was soaked through to my skivvies. Looked like I jumped into a pool with my clothes on!

But my unirrigated lawn is still pretty green!

 

[Phil Tarman]

We only got a few drops as we were coming home to Greeley from Joanne's daughter's house in Loveland, but we saw two of the brightest rainbows I've seen in a while. Thanks for that!

 

[ColoradoRod]

Hit a small milestone today on the black NT.

 

[Phil Tarman]

Rod, when you get to a 50,000 (or 100,000 or 150,000), you're entitled to a semi-coveted mileage sticker. They go by the bike's mileage, not your mileage on the bike.

 

[ColoradoRod]

I figured I'd necro-post to my own thread because it's certainly not worth starting a new thread...

Some will remember that I ended up with 2 NT700's purchased within about 10 days of each other back in June. I was going to keep one for my brother to ride and/or keep one up in the mountains so I could fly to a mountain airport and then start/end rides up there to avoid the big interstate trek to get to the mountains from my house that's a bit east of Denver.

Well, the good news is that I was able to buy a condo up in the mountains in mid-August. The bad news is that the condo's storage space is too small for an NT700. The good news is that my brother is wildly busy in the real estate business, but the corresponding bad news is that he has no time to ride motorcycles with his mostly-lazy older brother (that'd be me).

So I ended up with an extra NT700. I have the red 2010 as shown in my avatar and I *had* a really nice black 2011 with ABS as purchased from a forum member from the Omaha area. I put about 2600 miles on the black bike since the first week in June. I've barely ridden the red 2010. I sold the 2011 today for $4500 to a nice guy who lives on the western edge of the Denver metro area. He retired about 2 weeks ago and I think he's going to ride the wheels off the bike. I'll encourage him to join the forum.

The black 2011 had 10,600 miles on it when I sold it this afternoon. It had bar-backs, ABS, Deauville lids, new-ish tires, and an aftermarket windshield, but was otherwise stock. It was in really nice condition. Phil's seen it and I think he'd agree with my assessment. I kept the 2010 because, other than not having ABS, IT'S EVEN NICER!!

Just figured I'd post an update. I went ahead and shared the sales price so that potential buyers/sellers can get a feel for the market. Things are a bit crazy and I think the Denver area is as crazy as any. I paid less than this for this bike, but I paid more than this for the red 2010. I figure it all comes out in the end. To use a term from my eTrade account, my Average Cost Basis is now down to something I can live with!

My riding season is probably mostly over for this year. I'm pretty much a wuss so I don't ride in wet and I don't ride when it's cold! I froze my fanny off on a nighttime ride to Steamboat a couple of weeks ago and it'll be a while before I make that mistake again! I'll have the red one all gussied up and ready to roll for springtime!

 

[Phil Tarman]

Rod's '11 black NT was truly a beautiful bike. The guy who bought got a great deal!