Dinkoman.com

I’ve been ill for much for the past week now and am starting to get better. This means that I haven’t really got anything to say apart from stomach infections and alcohol do not mix very well – as you might have gathered. There is one thing that I can talk about however and that is plans! There should be a variety of things happening over the next year which should make everything better; these involve moving to a different part of the country, holidays or vacations and other “economical” changes. I don’t really want to go into too much detail at the risk of some things not getting off of the ground but those above are a certain. So I guess I can’t really talk about plans too much either. Well this turned out to be a bit of a disaster haha.

I should be getting my Honda Hornet within the next two weeks so that is something to look forward to and hopefully the weather will pick up so I can start going for weekend rides again rather than sticking to the boring old commute (it has been snowing again this past week where I live). I did get a Motorcycle backpack for my birthday which I am actually really impressed with at first sight, I’ll probably do a review in a few months when it has covered a few thousand miles. As well as this I got some Scotch, a glass and some motorcycle socks and shirts, plus varying degrees of money. Money is good.

I’ll probably write something else when in the next day or so as this post was pretty much an epic failure, until then see you and ride safe!

Just an update here. I’ve been ill the past few days so haven’t posted anything. I was going to write a bigger update here but I just can’t think of anything to say haha. My mind has been killed off by the illness. I’m becoming better now so should be back to normal updating the next few days.

P.S. It’s my birthday next week.

How To Get Rust Off Of Chrome Or A Motorcycle – Before reading this I must stress that this technique may only work on chrome! I would imagine it works well on other metals but DO NOT try on paint. Unless you are an idiot.

Well it’s that time of year again where the motorcycles are becoming a more prominent form on transport on Britain’s roads. People are relishing the tropical climate of 8C (55F) and are grabbing their wash cloths to break out their summer toys. For those of us who ride through the Winter months your bike is probably coated in salt, sludge and rust is most likely to be creeping in the corners – at least that is the case for mine. Over the past year I have owned a cruiser, which may be leaving my back open to sniggers, but I bet that I could most likely toast any summer “sports” rider that thinks he has me. Anyway enough of this childish gloating!

Nevertheless my motorcycle, as with most, has started to get rusty, particularly on the rims. How can I possibly keep up with this relentless onslaught of orange? The answer is simple. Aluminium foil! It may sound rather stupid but Aluminium foil is the best rust curer I know. Grab a small sheet, roll it into a small ball about an inch in diameter and scrub those rust patches. You will be simply amazed at the results. After the rust has been removed then coat the surface with wax or even oil (careful not to get any on the tyres).

It won’t take long for the rust to clear and it isn’t even hard work either. It is particularly useful to me as I will (most likely) be getting yet another motorcycle next month and in its former state the retail value would have been seriously affected. That’ll be three bikes in three years so I guess that’s pretty good going.

I was going to take some pictures but the rust never came back haha. Here are the step by step instructions:

1: Tear some 5 inch X 5 inch sheets of regular kitchen Aluminium foil off and roll them into a small ball.

2: Find the rust spot and scrub away. It may be a better idea to wash the motorcycle first as this will avoid rubbing dirt and scratching the chrome. Also do not rub wet chrome, it will still work but will look messy as the rust will turn into an orange watery substance and it will need more cleaning afterwards.

3: Rub as soft or as hard as is needed. That’s what she said. KCHING!

4: Get a towel or paper towel and just rub the orange powder off.

5: Lather with wax or oil. I find that regular car wax/polish works best.

6: Repeat the process if all the rust cannot be removed in one go.

There are so many double entendres in here it is awesome!

This morning I was setting off to face the morning commute and about 1 minute into my journey I was travelling down hill as I normally do. I noticed that a bus was blocking the road with its hazard lights on and the road looked wet. Which was strange as it hasn’t rained in a while for once. I shoulder checked to overtake the bus and braked. Almost instantly the front wheel locked up on me and jacked me up into the air nearly flinging me over the handlebars. My foot flew off of the peg and hit the road which enabled me to pretty much keep the bike upright and come to a stop. Excuse me but HOLY SHIT! What a way to wake you up in the morning haha. This is the Street View link to where it happened if you’re interested.

As I had waxed my bike the day before I thought that I might have spilt some on the tyres at first and I carried on my journey with my heart in my mouth haha. It wasn’t until I arrived at my destination that I realised; Broken down Bus + Slick looking surface behind it = oil spilt on the road. Thanks for giving me a warning sign! It wouldn’t have really mattered anyway as I would have claimed a fortune in damages off of the bus company for all the shit that I had to put up with from them when I was younger and vehicless (I know) haha. Yet the principle still annoys me. What if another biker had come a minute after me and wasn’t able to put his foot down? What if I had been flung into traffic? The principle annoys me as there is a general lack of manners on British roads. Everywhere you go you see ignorant drivers, show-offs or just plain morons and I’m sick of it! Never mind the complete disregard for road conditions. This wasn’t actually the councils fault… this time. But I very much doubt that the oil will have been cleaned up for tomorrow morning.

Oh well, what doesn’t kill me only makes me stronger I guess. There’s also the bonus of giving me something funny to write on the site haha. I will press on! A while back a similar event happened to me when I was riding home at around 9pm in complete darkness on a road in the middle of nowhere from a friends house. I had the rear tyre slide out and nearly high sided when a humongous drain cover had frosted over on the corner to a bridge. The scene is here on street view.

On another totally unrelated story I parked next to this the other day:

It’s a 1962 BSA A65 to my knowledge (correct me if I’m wrong). Quite a sight to see someone commute on nowadays. When I left I saw the owner and got talking to him, he said he had owned the bike since it was built and that he used to commute 40 miles a day on it. It had obviously seen better days but he told me he was restoring it so all was well.

Anyway, tomorrow I’ll be uploading an article on how to get rust off of chrome. Yes I know… awesome. I’ve written the article already but am just waiting to take some pictures. It feels clichéd but appropriate for this article… ride safe!

Not much happening in the world of Dinkoman this week sadly. I do however have a few interesting stories I can tell. The first of which happened today; you probably won’t find this funny at all and neither do I but the question of my luck is quite a humorous topic in itself. I’ve been meaning to put some air in my tyres for a couple of days now and I decided to do it at the petrol (gas) station instead of on my driveway this time. Most petrol stations have free air services for you to do this, so by logic they must be quite simple to do. Not for a self-diagnosed retard however! I was struggling for a good 5 minutes trying to fathom out what to do with the bloody machine – even though there is only one button. Well after figuring out how to work the machine it turned out that the bloody nozzle didn’t fit between the disc brake so I couldn’t reach the valve anyway! Mission failure!

On a lighter note me and a couple of friends once again got together on a SUNDAY NIGHT (yes Martin… yes) to have a fun filled night of poker, debating and Gin. A good time was had by all; we played poker for 5 hours straight while pretending to talk like Romans and referring to each other as Baccus, Spurius and Martinius. Yes children, alcohol does make you look cool. Ask Martinius, the guy who fell in the bush on the way home. Nevertheless we all had a good time and nobody got ridiculously drunk (as I have stated before I hardly ever drink); I do however have one tip for anyone who is going to consume a ¼ bottle of Gin in a few hours, don’t accompany this with 4 packets of Cheesy snacks (Mini Cheddars to be precise). You will wake up with possibly the worst smelling breath known to man-kind (and I did brush my teeth and mouthwash thank you). Yes ladies, how are you feeling about this possible date now?

It was -6C last night and my poor little princess – Betty – had trouble starting this morning (I’m talking about my bike by the way, I don’t go out with an 80 year old woman, much to my annoyance). I think the spark plugs didn’t like the cold as I left her/it (?) for a moment and then back to normal. I have ploughed on through Winter in snow, -10C and whatever nature decides to push my way and have never had issues with the cold so I was rather confused when this happened this morning. Oh well, all is solved now.

Not much else really, you probably just wasted about 3 minutes of your life reading this and for that I am truly sorry. Death smiles at us all; all we can do is smile back. EPIC GLADIATOR QUOTE FOR THE WIN! Alright I’m gone…

P.S. One more thing, is it only me that finds the answer to this question a little strange? This is a help guru for God’s sake! I draw your attention to the last two lines and don’t ask how i “came” across this hahahaha. It had to be done. Sorry. By the way i also thought her name was Jedi at first, that would have been awesome. Read the rest of this entry »