Winter Motorcycle Care: Put them away or leave them out to play?

WEBVTT

00:00:00.404 --> 00:00:02.954
With colder weather in most of the northern hemisphere.

00:00:02.954 --> 00:00:06.253
Now, do you put your bikes away or leave them out to play?

00:00:26.495 --> 00:00:42.786
Welcome to the Throttle and Roast podcast. I'm your host, Niels Meersschaert. In this episode, we'll try not to ignore the snowman in the room and talk about what you should be doing with your bike in the cooler temperatures. Do you put them away or keep them out to play?

00:00:39.036 --> 00:00:55.223
You want to ensure that you're preparing your bike and yourself for either approach. We're going to cover tips for putting your bike away, keeping the bike as healthy as possible for next season. And if you do decide to leave your bike out to play.

00:00:52.374 --> 00:01:19.097
We'll also look at how you can make the most of the colder weather and still enjoy your rides. Now, today I've got my Coffee Brothers espresso roast that I prepared in a Bialetti Moka Pot. It's not quite an espresso strength that you're going to get because the process is not exactly the same, but it sort of blends the difference between, let's say, a typical drip coffee versus an espresso.

00:01:19.097 --> 00:01:30.858
It's kind of in that middle point and still a wonderful, wonderful flavor. So that's what I'm enjoying today. It is a bit of a dismal December day as I'm looking out today. Very overcast.

00:01:30.858 --> 00:01:40.158
It's been raining the past few days. So this is really, I think, the perfect weather to be thinking about this particular topic of what do you do in the cold weather?

00:01:43.689 --> 00:02:56.200
Now, look, I've got five bikes, so I actually end up straddling both sides of the debate on whether you're hiding your bikes or riding them. And essentially my bikes that don't have wind protection or significant electrical systems are put away each year. So that means that my sport bike, which is a BMW S1000R and my classic bike with its cable actuated drum brakes a 1972 BMW R75/5 are put away for the winter. They're just not of the capability, both from a wind protection as well as augmenting with heated gear, for example, to really do the most cold temperatures. So generally, once it gets below 40 degrees, both of those bikes are going to be put away. So that leaves my R18 Classic, my GSA and my Vespa, which are adapted to winter months and still put on a number of miles. And looking at the 2024 calendar year across those three bikes, about two thirds of the miles have been in the spring or summer months, and about one third are in the fall or winter months. Now, mind you, at the time I'm recording this, I still have about three weeks left in the year. So there may be a few more winter and fall miles adding into that.

00:02:56.604 --> 00:03:19.824
Let's dive into if you're going to put your bike away, what are the key things that you want to do? Well, the first and most important thing is you need to prepare your bike for this long slumber. And there's a few things that are critical to ensuring the most survival that you're going to have for your bike to just set it up for the best chance of success of starting cleanly in the new Year when you get it ready in the spring.

00:03:20.153 --> 00:03:28.193
So the first thing is your fuel. You want to make sure that you have a full fuel tank.

00:03:23.574 --> 00:04:32.004
And the reason for this is that it reduces the amount of air that can actually get into there, because air typically will contain some moisture. And the more moisture that is in your tank, the more likelihood that you could have rust, especially if it is a metal tank. And that also is going to interact with the fuel and start to you know, people will talk about it being like bad fuel. This is one of the things that can happen if you have a lot of air in your tank. The second thing you want to do is make sure that you're using a fuel stabilizer. This will help if there is any. And there's always going to be a little bit of air. You're never going to be perfectly topped up to the top. But that little bit of fuel stabilizer does help to maintain and keep that fuel lasting as long as possible. And if you are on an older bike, I mentioned that my R75/5 is one of the bikes that I do put away for the winter months. It is being such an old bike. It is a carbureted bike. So I do drain the carburetors. This is going to ensure that the needles don't get gummed up with any fuel that was left in there and sitting for long periods of time.

00:04:32.012 --> 00:05:01.742
Let's move on to your battery with the battery, especially in cooler temps. And if you're storing your bike outside or you're storing it in a cold garage, the battery is likely going to lose some of its power because of that cold temperature. And the best thing that you can do to maintain your battery is to put it on a tender of some sort. And this doesn't have to be a Battery Tender brand, although they certainly do make some good chargers. And I've used them for many years.

00:05:02.161 --> 00:05:20.141
The ones I tend to use today are actually Optimate I've just found that they were able to even resurrect a battery that had been discharged a little too far. They were able to bring it back, whereas my Battery Tenders had not done so. But any of them is going to do a great job of keeping that battery topped off.

00:05:20.682 --> 00:05:36.552
Now, depending upon where you're storing your bike, it may be impractical for you to put your charger out if it's stored outside. So then what you want to do is you want to remove the battery from the bike, bring it inside into a warmer area where you can put it on to the charger.

00:05:33.521 --> 00:05:51.670
And in that case you can use just the alligator clips to mount directly on to the terminals of the battery. If it is in your motorcycle, there's a couple of options. The first one would be to use a pigtail that you would run off the side and that will typically go to an SAE plug.

00:05:55.031 --> 00:06:23.341
And this next one, there's a little bit of a debate of whether this is being a little too cantankerous and maybe too willful of wanting to maintain every last bullet. But this is really to your oil and your coin. And what I like to do is actually, as the season has run down, is I like to drain and refill with fresh oil reason for this is that your oil is meant to clean up any contaminants that you may have in your engine.

00:06:23.612 --> 00:07:21.286
So this is going to be any sort of emissions exhaust material that has gotten into the oil, any sort of metallic bits as just normal wear and tear. But also, there's going to be a bit of moisture because when you do start your engine, it's bringing in air from outside. There will be a little bit of moisture content and that moisture is now going to get and be contained within the oil. And this is the main reason why I like to change the oil is that if I leave it for three, six months, however long it's being stored, all of that moisture is now being exposed on to the engine components through the oil and has a chance to oxidize. So if you drain and refill your engine with fresh oil, you remove that contaminant and thus you are more likely to have an engine that will last longer because you don't have that oxidation going on. Now, the next one also fits into the same idea of that we're dealing with moisture.

00:07:21.286 --> 00:08:05.252
That moisture is the enemy of your motorcycle and this comes in to brake fluid. Now, brake fluid specifically is hygroscopic. And what that means is that it attracts water. So any water that is in the air is going to now get into the brake fluid. And as a consequence, that brake fluid will not perform as effectively as it would otherwise do so. So by refreshing your brake fluid, you now have a chance to put in clean fluid that does not have as much moisture. use your judgment as to when the right time is for you to do this. If you're not using the bike, having spongy brakes doesn't really make a huge difference.

00:08:01.389 --> 00:08:15.812
I'd like to get it ready to go for the next season, so I may not do this at the beginning of the cold season. I may do it towards the end, so maybe a month or two before the bike is going to be taken out of storage.

00:08:16.081 --> 00:09:07.471
I'm going to change that brake fluid Now, another thing that you can do with your bike when you're in that downtime delayed maintenance. So maybe there's something that you needed to do on the bike you've been wanting to do for a long time and you've been holding off because you didn't want to take the bike out of circulation during the riding season. Well, this is the perfect time to do that. Now, I did that a couple of years ago on my R75/5. The bike was at the time 50 years old, so it had been going for quite a while and the starter on it was really, really tired. It just didn't want to go. As soon as you used it, it barely turned over. It sucked a huge amount of current out of the batteries that would drain the battery in a couple of tries. So it really was due for it. So I took the engine apart.

00:09:03.181 --> 00:09:28.130
I put in a new starter in the winter season and it was a great way to just take advantage of that downtime and make sure that the bike was prepped and ready to go for the next season. This is also when you can do any sort of upgrades to your bike You've got this downtime, so do it now while the bike is not being used so that when you get into the spring and you're ready to go, you've got a perfect opportunity.

00:09:28.239 --> 00:09:43.928
The last thing that you want to do is you want to add on a cover. Now, this is for a few reasons. Number one is, especially if you have a beautiful paint job on your bike, you may want to keep it protected from any sort of dust or debris that may be in wherever you're storing the bike.

00:09:44.229 --> 00:10:52.863
So the cover will help that. The other thing is that you want to make sure that you're using a cover that still allows it to breathe. Remember, we spoke about before that moisture is the enemy of motorcycles. So if your cover cannot breathe, then all the moisture that gets into there is going to now be stuck against the bike and potentially oxidizing things. So my motorcycles, I do keep them inside of a garage in the winter months. So it's semi heated in there. It will probably be a good 50 degrees most of the time, 50 to 60 degrees. I also do have a dehumidifier in the garage so that any excess moisture that's in the air is being removed. So I'm trying everything I can to keep moisture out of the equation. So a cover is really critical. If you're outside, you do want to have a cover that is going to protect you from the elements, but still allow for that breathing. So you can think of how Gore-Tex works in that it will prevent water from coming in, but it will allow the water vapor to escape. These are the type of covers that you want to do. There's a number of different brands that make them that are quite good. Dowco makes some very good covers. There's also some ones that are made by Oxford that are quite good.

00:10:52.873 --> 00:11:01.395
That's the ones that I actually end up using. They're not very expensive. But with five bikes, I've got a bunch of covers, so I like to have decent covers that will work for it.

00:11:01.673 --> 00:11:55.658
Okay, so your bike is prepped. You've got all the things that you wanted to do for the bike ready to go. But maybe there's a few things that you still need to prepare. Maybe some upgrades for both the bike and for you as the rider and new gear is always good to get. And the beauty of doing this in the off season is that there are a tremendous number of deals to be had as you get to the end of the riding season before the new season of gear comes out. So right now, this time of year, the end of the year into the early part of next year, this is when you can find some amazing, amazing deals. Gear does take a bit of a beating as you're riding it over and over and over again and over time, the gear, even with proper care, will wear out and you may need to replace it. So this is a great time to take advantage of that. The other one to look at is helmets.

00:11:55.812 --> 00:12:38.226
Now, remember, helmets should be replaced every five years. I know there's people who will say, Oh, that's just a thing from the manufacturers to make money. But the reality is that this is a piece of safety gear. The EPS, which is the material that is used to actually absorb the shocks, does deteriorate over time. So it is important that you make sure that you refresh that helmet And if you have like what I do is I actually have a few helmets and they're not in the exact same cycle of when I replace them. So I'm not having to replace three or four or five different helmets every single five years. I'm doing like one every other year kind of bit. So it can make it a little bit more tenable for you if you have to replace a few different helmets.

00:12:41.553 --> 00:12:50.768
The other thing that you can do when you're in the off season is start to think about what are maybe some trips that you want to do in the next year.

00:12:47.043 --> 00:13:19.873
couple of years ago I actually did one of the backcountry discovery routes. I was going down for the BMW MOA rally down in Virginia. I'm in New York. I was riding down to the Virginia anyway, and the start of the Backcountry discovery route for the mid-Atlantic section just began in southern Virginia. So just on the Tennessee border. So all I did is when I finished with the rally, I just rode down to Tennessee, camped down in northern Tennessee, and then I began coming back up north through the mid Atlantic BDR.

00:13:20.173 --> 00:14:01.150
Now a backcountry discovery route or a BDR, is really intended for adventure or dual sport bikes. And what it is is you are going over public roads And many of them will also not be paved roads, which is why it's targeted more towards adventure bikes. Now there are some sections that will be more of a seasonally maintained road versus a perfectly manicured dirt road. So you want to use your judgment as to whether you feel comfortable in it. But the mid-Atlantic tends to be one of the easier BDRs. I've done some of the routes that were in the Northeast, BDR, and also some of the bit that's in BDR-X, which is in central Pennsylvania.

00:13:58.780 --> 00:14:06.278
There are some bits that become a little bit more of a hero section, especially if you're riding on a big adventure bike.

00:14:03.219 --> 00:14:41.676
But it can be an amazing experience. I took ten days, I camped out every single night and it was just amazing to see everything that your beautiful scenery that you were able to enjoy some great, great roads, both paved and unpaved along the journey Backcountry discovery routes, if you're an ADV rider, is definitely one of the things to look at on your your list of things to do. And the beauty is certainly in the United States, they have routes that cover pretty much every area. So as I said, the mid-Atlantic is covering from roughly Virginia, southern Virginia, up to New York. The Northeast BDR runs from New York up to Maine.

00:14:42.336 --> 00:14:57.216
There's plenty out on the West Coast. You've got Colorado, you've got California, you've got New Mexico, Arizona. There's a huge number that are out there and they keep adding in more and more routes every single year.

00:14:53.135 --> 00:15:01.235
So take a look at them. They're an amazing, amazing resource.

00:14:57.216 --> 00:16:26.246
Now, if you don't have an ADV bike, that's totally fine. You can still find some amazing trips to do and get inspired by what's out there. And one of the resources that I really like to use is Butler Maps. Now, Butler Maps is a company based in Colorado, and what they do is they have all sorts of scouts looking out on roads all around the country and finding the roads that are the curviest, the most elevations change the most scenery and they're rating those roads. And when you get a butler map, you'll see that these sections of road are highlighted in different colors to signify whether it's a amazing, a great or a good or a nice road in different levels. And it's it's a really wonderful, wonderful resource. And if you look at a map in the big picture, you can start to find areas where there tends to be a clustering of a lot of really good roads, and that tends to be a little bit more in the boonies, a little bit more in the in the, you know, elevated mountainous areas where you're going to find some really wonderful roads. But it's a good resource to look at and see where you might want to pick and choose to go for your next adventure. If you are a Rever subscriber to their pro program, the Butler maps are fully integrated into there, so you will actually be able to display in the maps in Rever all of those highlighted routes all throughout the entire experience.

00:16:26.267 --> 00:16:29.027
I use Rever all the time. I think it is a wonderful resource.

00:16:29.027 --> 00:16:42.988
The pro product is something like I think, $50 every single year, so it's not a huge amount of money, but having the access at your fingertips to be able to find all these amazing roads, absolutely, absolutely worth it.

00:16:38.998 --> 00:16:47.427
So think about what you might want to do for the upcoming season, and this is where you can start to plan it out.

00:16:50.950 --> 00:17:08.121
Now, I do want to offer a congratulations to you if you already ride year round or you'd like to know how you can make it viable. And the key thing to leaving your bikes out to play in the cooler temperatures is that there's two issues that you need to address.

00:17:08.165 --> 00:17:31.894
And I'm going to start with road contamination. Now, when people think of winter, the two most obvious concerns are snow and ice. And these make a lot of sense. And if you've got a big full dress, Harley, 800, 900 pounds, you would not feel very comfortable if you're riding and sliding down on a bit of ice. But here's the thing.

00:17:27.449 --> 00:18:18.479
While everyone considers that snow and ice are a common occurrence in winter, it does not mean that the roads are covered in snow and ice every single day of the winter. In fact, you're going to usually end up having a snowstorm and then after a few days, it's going to get cleared. You know, they're probably going to have something plowed. They'll be able to put some salt or some sand down and they're going to be able to clear most of the roads. So even if the road has been cleared of snow and ice, you do need to keep an eye out for two other road contaminants, which is basically road salt and sand. But in many cases, within a week or so, most of the salt or the sand has basically been cleared off of the road by other vehicles riding along onto it.

00:18:18.778 --> 00:19:01.030
And if you've had perhaps even rain that was able to wash away most of the salt, the roads themselves will oftentimes be clear. Even if there is snow on the sides of the road. Now, the other one that you have to be cautious for when you are riding in the colder temperatures is even rain can still create situations for black ice. So I have a bit of a rule of thumb that I've just used over the many years, which is if it's below 40 degrees Fahrenheit and there's wet roads and this could be either that it had just rained earlier, it is currently raining. If it's either of those situations, then I won't ride.

00:19:01.240 --> 00:20:10.498
And the reason is at 40 degrees Fahrenheit and wet, it's going to pretty much be okay. But I'm going to always be going through an area. I might get into a place where the temperatures may be different than when or where it was when I started. It could be you go into a bit of shade and now the temperature is even lower and you could get into a situation where that wetness is going to create a black ice situation. So in those situations, that's where I personally choose not to ride, is if it's below 40 and wet. I don't care if it's wet and above 40 and I don't care if it's below 40, but just not the combo of those two. that's the road contamination and the ones that you need to worry about. Now, if you look at a large swath of most places around the world, even in the winter months, as I said, you don't have snow year round. But there are some places where you won't ever have enough melt or lack of snow to ride safely. A good example of this is Mt. Washington in New Hampshire. Now, the summit road is typically closed for the winter months. the reason for it is that the conditions there can actually be quite significant.

00:20:07.498 --> 00:20:22.377
And I'm actually looking at the summit conditions as I'm recording this. And right now, it's 30 degrees Fahrenheit at the summit with wind speed of 31 miles an hour, giving it a wind chill of 15 degrees Fahrenheit.

00:20:22.827 --> 00:20:53.515
So it's quite chilly up at the top. And mind you, that those sustained wind and cold temperatures can keep any snow that is fallen on there from fully melting. So this is one of the situations that you have to be careful of, is there will be areas of the world where you cannot do that. Now, remember, elevation typically is where you have lower temperatures. So if you're starting off in a valley, you say, oh, it's a nice day out, it's perfect fine temperatures.

00:20:50.045 --> 00:21:00.557
As you climb up into the mountains in the winter months, there can still be ice and snow on the roads in the mountains.

00:20:57.654 --> 00:21:04.958
So Now, if you're already in the mountains and it's clear where it is and you're heading towards the valley, you're probably going to be in perfect shape.

00:21:04.968 --> 00:22:10.291
You don't have to worry about that, The other one to watch for is at the bottom of mountains, the roads. And the reason for this is that even if the temperatures have warmed up a little bit, the runoff can start to make the roads wet. And now we get back into that situation that I mentioned of the below 40 and wet, you could have some frozen spots even in the warmer temperatures above freezing because of that runoff. So there are some places where you're not going to be able to ride year round just because the snow and ice just really never functionally go away. certainly, you know, when you think of this, of whether it is the common case, you know, when I was younger, the winters did seem to be much more severe and there would be a large number of storms. It would be weeks before the snow would clear out. And what I've been noticing the past several years is that it's been less and less the case. We have a snow. It comes in, it melts in a couple of days, and then it's clear. In fact, here we actually have already had a snowstorm. You know, about a week ago we had it.

00:22:06.422 --> 00:22:13.799
It wasn't a lot. It was maybe an inch or two of snow, but the roads were clear the next day.

00:22:13.809 --> 00:22:34.950
So, yes, it snowed, but the roads were totally fine. And I was back out on the bike. It didn't matter for it. But you do want to always use your own judgment to see if the roads are clear enough for you to navigate safely. So that really wraps up the road contamination part that you need to think of if you're leaving your bike out to play in the cold weather months.

00:22:35.349 --> 00:22:42.519
The second one is temperature and the good news with temperature is that it is something that you can address.

00:22:43.487 --> 00:23:58.073
And we're going to talk about this in three categories, blocking wind, insulating and adding heat. So let's start with blocking wind. Well, the biggest thing that you can do to help you in the winter months is have a windshield on your bike. This will automatically remove a huge amount of the air that is running in and hitting you. And as we spoke about with Mount Washington, the windchill is 15 degrees Fahrenheit as I'm recording this. But the temperatures 30, it will be quite cold just from the air moving around you. Now you're on the motorcycle. You have not just wind that's coming toward you, but the apparent wind from the bike moving. So the more that you can block that wind, the more that it will allow you to stay warmer on the bike. And oftentimes what you can do is even with a windshield, you can add on a little bit of a lip to the top of the windshield. So if your windshield is good, but there's still just a little bit more airflow, you can add on an extension lip to just give a little bit more protection. The second one that you're going to want to look at would be hand guards. Your hands are out there in the wind and they're fully exposed and getting all of that cold temperature hitting them.

00:23:58.103 --> 00:24:29.452
This is why most riders, their hands are what usually makes them feel cold the first. So if you have hand guards on your motorcycle, So, for example, there's a very common brand called Hippo Hands. And these are almost like mittens that you wrap around the handlebars and give you a glove that you can put your hands into. It looks a little silly for some people, but it keeps you incredibly warm in your hands. So there's a trade off of how good the bike still looks versus your ability to ride. And you have to choose where the the balance is for you.

00:24:30.020 --> 00:24:32.990
The second one that we're going to go over is insulation.

00:24:33.071 --> 00:25:08.412
layering is your ultimate approach. Now, you don't want to have these big, thick sweaters that you put on because the problem is they are taking up so much space. They're unlikely when you put your riding gear on top of them, your jackets and stuff. They're taking up so much space under the riding gear that you may not actually have as much freedom of movement as you would have had with a normal piece of clothing. So those thick clothes are to sort of be avoided. What you really want to focus on is some more of the advanced synthetic type of materials. So these would be things like wind blocking layers.

00:25:09.041 --> 00:26:15.165
Thinsulate goes a long way towards giving you that warmth and that wind protection, but not creating a huge amount of thickness underlying with your jacket. And some motorcycle jackets will also come with a liner for them. This is a way that they can extend the riding season already, but allow you to take the liner out for warmer temperatures. One of the jackets that I have is something called the Rev'It Livingston. They no longer make it, but it was a it's kind of a waxed cotton type of a jacket and it has a liner inside that will add in a huge amount of temperature range from what you would normally be able to do. And that's I basically ride that jacket year round. one of the ones that I use mostly on both my scooter and on the R18 and in the summer months, the liner is out in the winter months and in the fall months, that liner goes in and really extends the range of temperatures that I can comfortably ride in with that bike. Now, the third category is adding heat. we talked about blocking wind, we talked about insulation, but sometimes those two combined are just not enough.

00:26:15.465 --> 00:26:22.816
And when the temperatures really get low, you need to add heat into the situation, not just the heat that your body is providing.

00:26:23.145 --> 00:27:27.286
And there's a few ways that you can do this. One of them is on the bike, and a lot of motorcycles produced in recent years have heated grips from the factory. In fact, almost every single BMW that you can buy has heated grips. The very first BMW that I bought back in 1997 had heated grips. So they've been doing it a long, long time. But many other manufacturers are having heated grips from the factory out of the box you can get. And if you don't have heated grips from the factory, you can oftentimes get an aftermarket one to add on to your bike and just add that extra warmth. And remember, the hands are the ones that are the most exposed and they're the ones that you need the actual dexterity to be able to manipulate the controls, to be able to adjust your clutch, your your brake, your signals, anything that you need to be able to control on the bike. You need that dexterity in your hands. You need to have that warmth. Now the grips are going to warm the inside of your hand where your hand is wrapped around it'll warm your hand and then the heat will then come towards the outside of your hand.

00:27:23.236 --> 00:28:13.345
So if you've got that insulation of or sorry, the, the blocking win that we talked about of having those hand guards, you're not going to have as much wind sucking away that heat on the exterior. So it does help. So you need to think of these as combined together in expanding your temperatures that you can comfortably ride. Now, the next one that I'm going to focus on, and this is the one where I think really is the one that makes the biggest difference for a lot of riders is heated gear on the rider. Now I got my first piece of heated gear, more than 20 years ago and it was a heated vest was all that they had back then. It was kind of thick. It had some fairly widely spaced heating elements into it. There was basically an on off switch.

00:28:10.375 --> 00:28:22.067
It was either heated or it was off. Not a lot of variation that you could do, and it did help because it was around your core.

00:28:17.686 --> 00:28:27.346
But they have advanced tremendously in what is available. So there's a few different ways you can do this.

00:28:24.406 --> 00:29:16.820
You can get a heated jacket that you would effectively use as like a base jacket underneath your normal riding gear. And this is what I actually had after I had that vest. I had one of those and the one that I had was made by a company called Gerbings. Gerbings has been making heated gear forever. and it worked quite well. The downside of the heated jacket is it's fairly thick, it's bulky because it's meant as a jacket that goes over clothes that you're already wearing. But under your exterior riding jacket that has more of the abrasion resistance. So there is a thickness We get into that same problem that we talked about with the thick sweaters when you're using a heated jacket. So what has started to come in more recent years is really more of an emphasis on heated base layers. And this is by companies like Warm and Safe.

00:29:14.307 --> 00:29:29.361
And that's actually what I've switched to in in the past several years, is I use the warm and safe base layers. Now they make shirts and they make base layer pants. They also do socks.

00:29:24.921 --> 00:29:54.729
They do gloves. So you've pretty much got all of the different heating elements that you The second thing that these have versus that old vest that I had that was either on or off is these will have an adjustable controller so you can actually make it where you have effectively a dial or rheostat that will allow you to control exactly how much heat you want to add into the situation. So if it's really, really cold, you might turn it closer to full.

00:29:55.058 --> 00:30:01.943
And if it's just a little chilly, you may have it more in a medium or a low setting. all of these can help augment what you have.

00:30:02.423 --> 00:31:26.991
And I want to give a few examples of how I winterize my bikes. Now I'm going to cover three different genres that I use for my winter bikes. Now, the first one of these is my Vespa. The Vespa, of course, is a scooter. It is my commuting It's the bike that I use. When I got to run errands into town, Now, the thing with a Vespa or most scooters are a step through design. And so you have effectively in front of your legs is a little bit of a wind protection preventing that air from hitting directly onto your legs. So they already have more winter protection than a typical motorcycle where your legs are on the sides of the motorcycle and more exposed to the air. And I do a few things that add on to my scooter just to give a little bit more of that cold temperature capability. So the first one that I do, and this is usually something I add in in the earlier part of the fall is I add on a tall windshield. Now, the one I have is from Vespa, and it's a very tall one, but it also has these extensions in front of the grips. And what that does is it keeps a little bit of the air from hitting your hands. The second thing that I do, and this is very common in Europe, not just in the winter months, but actually year round is, I add on what's called a skirt. It basically covers over that area that's in front of your legs and covers over you.

00:31:26.917 --> 00:31:42.367
and it almost becomes like a bib in front of you, but fully covers along the sides of the scooter as well. So now no air is going to be getting into where your legs are and it's covering a big portion of you.

00:31:37.567 --> 00:32:02.621
This is adding a wind blocking layer The reason why it's used still quite a lot in Europe, even in non winter months, is it also tends to be waterproof. So if you're riding year round and you want to have some weather protection, this does a phenomenal Now mine has a little bit of almost like a fake fur interior lining, which just gives a little bit of warmth.

00:31:58.961 --> 00:32:31.007
And on my Vespa specifically, which is the GTS300, the radiator exits are right in the front of the bike and the skirt will actually cover those as well. It does have some opening louvres if you needed to have more of the heat come out, but it allows the heat that's coming from those radiators to actually warm in there as well. So it's almost like a little bit of a a space heater that you get and it really does warm up that area.

00:32:26.371 --> 00:33:10.599
The second or the third element that I add on to my Vespa is a set of battery powered heated gloves. And what these heated gloves do is there's just a small little lithium ion battery that I put into each glove and then I can control it in one of three different settings. The gloves that I have happen to be made by Klim. They're called the Harbinger. There's other brands that make gloves very similarly, but this allows me to have gloves that are heated to augment a bit of those conditions. I used to also have a set of hippo hands that I would put onto the Vespa, and they worked really well. They were amazing for blocking off that last little bit of wind.

00:33:06.640 --> 00:33:26.710
But what I found with those is that it was kind of hard sometimes to actually be able to manipulate the turn signal controls because they were completely blind. You was fully covered up and while you could do it by feel the Vespa, at least for me, the controls are not as clean as some other motorcycles for the turn signal.

00:33:26.710 --> 00:34:00.671
So I just found it was getting to be more of an annoyance to be able to see the conditions of all the switchgear. So I switched to the heated gloves a few years ago and that's what I use instead. When I just had the hand guards, I actually was able to go without heated grips, just some minor, you know, warm gloves and it was fine. and by the way, also let me say with the Vespa, this setup has allowed me to ride down into the teens with no issues and teens meaning in Fahrenheit. So, you know, ten, 15 degrees Fahrenheit.

00:33:56.980 --> 00:35:15.309
I've had no problems riding the Vespa in those temperatures. Now, my Vespa is predominantly used for short trips. So most of the trips have been less than 20 miles. So take that with a bit of a grain of salt. If I was going to be doing a longer trip, I would probably want to augment it with more heated gear, like heated grips or even some of the heated clothing. But this set up gives me so much wind protection, it is still a really good bet and very comfortable for even in those teen temperature conditions. So let's switch in to my cruiser. This is my R18 classic. Most of the riding year, I actually have the windshield that came stock with it taken off. It's a quick release. It takes about 30 seconds to put it on or off, but I usually have it off. And the reason for that is I actually like having the airflow that is in a more of a naked type of a bike. Um, especially as the temperatures get up into the summer, it's really, really hot. I usually take that windshield off and it only goes on in the fall through the winter and then, urn, early in the spring I'll take it back off again. Now I added on to my particular screen, I got a replacement of the plastic that was a taller one made by 7Jurock.

00:35:15.789 --> 00:35:56.931
And the reason is, is I'm six foot three. So at my height the taller windscreen keeps more of the wind off of me than that shorter screen we do. And mine also has a little bit of a lip, so it kicks even more air off of the top of my helmet and does a phenomenal job of keeping that cold air off of you. Now, my bike also has the heated grips from the factory, so I do have that warmth coming in. And what I have is there's a DIN plug on the left hand side. This is that sort of miniaturized type of a cigarette lighter and it ties into the CANBUS system on the motorcycle. But because of that, it's limited to only five amps.

00:35:57.481 --> 00:36:04.141
So the consequence is that I can't use all of my heated gear because that would pull too much.

00:36:01.530 --> 00:36:04.141
I would pull more than five amps.

00:36:04.652 --> 00:38:00.226
for this particular bike and the use case that I'm using it for, this still gets me a decent amount. So I'm able to actually use that warm and safe heated shirt and some of the socks. So I'm able to have that warmth coming in and I augments that with I use this windproof base layer pants that I have, and those will go underneath my regular riding jeans. I also use those same battery powered gloves that I used on the Vespa to help keep the tops of my hands warm. Now there is no hand guards on my R18 so my hands are still exposed into the wind. But combining the battery powered gloves with the heated grips still lets me get some really good conditions. Now with this setup, I'm actually able to ride the R 18 all day long in temperatures as low as 20 degrees Fahrenheit. Below that, though, the lack of hand guards is the main restriction because the tops of my hands will get too cold. Even with the battery powered gloves and the heated grips, just the windchill at below 20 degrees Fahrenheit is going to be so significant that the heat just isn't able to get in fast enough to be able to protect it. The next bit is that my legs will start to get a little bit cold, especially on the tops of the legs, because they only have the windproof base layer. but below 20 degrees Fahrenheit. I've just found that on that particular bike it's a little bit too cold. And that leads me to the last bike that I use in the winter. And this is my R1200GSA made by BMW. Now the GSA is the bigger bike from the GS line. It has a much larger fuel tank and it also has a larger windshield and has these deflectors on the sides of the windshield to even block more wind. As a consequence, just stock out of the box. So much wind protection is happening.

00:37:57.077 --> 00:38:14.507
It's really like riding in a full fairing motorcycle. So I find it actually it's so much wind blocking, I actually ride it a little bit less often in the summer months because I don't get the airflow and it's almost too hot. But in the winter months, this is ideal.

00:38:14.956 --> 00:39:09.233
Now it has heated grips from the factory and I add on a lip onto the top of the OEM windshield made by MRA to block a little bit more wind in the really cold conditions. I add in a heated gear coax which is tied directly into the battery. The GSA has a very large alternator. So the drain that's can be coming for all of my heated gear is not a problem on that bike. And I will now use the heated base layer pants, my heated base layer shirt. I'll use the socks that I use on the R 18 and I also have some gloves that are made by warm and safe that directly are heated. So this is different from the separately battery operated heated gloves that I used made by KLIM on the other bikes, these ones tied directly in. So I'm just running off of bike power so I can run much longer than I would with the other battery powered gloves.

00:39:05.766 --> 00:39:15.682
Now the beauty is with all of those situations, I've got every piece of heated gear that I could possibly put onto the bike.

00:39:12.443 --> 00:39:24.740
I've got a tremendous amount of wind protection onto that. I have found that I'm able to ride that bike in really, really cold temperatures with no problem.

00:39:25.041 --> 00:39:39.076
And the current record that I have on that bike is three degrees Fahrenheit. Where I've ridden for multiple hours at three degrees Fahrenheit. That's probably colder than a lot of places get in the winter.

00:39:36.496 --> 00:40:31.152
Certainly where I am, it's not uncommon for it to get much colder than it. Without also being a massive storm. So I find that that's pretty much the thing and the beauty of it, what I've discovered is even at that temperature, I didn't have the heat on full blast. Now, one thing I did forget to mention that I also add on to my my GS is the hand guards that I have stock on that bike are actually not the BMW branded ones. I actually added in some by an Australian company called Bark Busters and they're a little bit more heavy duty. They're sort of a metal core. So I ride the bike a lot off road. It will actually give a lot more protection when you're riding off road. That same company, Bark Busters, also makes a hand guard that you can add on top of their existent hand guards and they call it the Blizzard and it's really intended for those winter months.

00:40:27.731 --> 00:41:20.103
It takes less than 5 minutes for me to add them on to the bike in the winter. So it's pretty quick to do. And this gives far more coverage than I would have on the stock hand guard. So It's such a amazing amount of warmth that I have through that entire setup. I don't I don't even really think about how cold it gets. I'm still able to ride year round on that bike. I hope those three examples give you some inspiration for how you can adapt your bike to ride in some of the colder let's wrap up a bit. You know, we talked about some of the tips for ensuring that your bike is prepared for the next season If you do put your bike away for the winter months and you want to ensure that that slumber time is going to be not adding any sort of deterioration onto the bike. So how do you put your bike away and keep it safe?

00:41:16.514 --> 00:41:39.525
The other one we talked about is how you could still ride in the winter months, making sure that you have the appropriate gear that will keep you warm on the bike. But also having a mindfulness of the road conditions and Use your judgment of where you where you're going to go. So the question I have for you is which group are you in? Do you put your bike away in winter or do you ride year round?

00:41:39.945 --> 00:42:10.289
And then my second question is, if you do ride year round, what are some of your best tips for making the most of it? Now we have two ways to send your answers into the show we've had for a long time in the show notes where you could text the link in the show and this would actually open up a text message in your phone and you could send us a text But we also recently changed where we host the podcast Web site now. So what you can do is you can go to our website, it's throttleandroast.

00:42:10.289 --> 00:42:42.414
com and you're going to see a little tab on the right hand side that says, Send us a voicemail. And if you click on that, you can immediately then record a message to us. We can actually take that audio and use it into a future episode. So two ways you can do whatever one you prefer, you can either send us a voicemail and hear your voice on one of the future episodes, or you can text us the show through the existing Now I want to give a special shout out to everyone who has been listening to the show from the beginning. We just crossed over the 25 episode mark.

00:42:43.135 --> 00:42:58.945
This has been a really amazing experience of just continuing to produce this podcast on a weekly basis. We've now got a full six months, half a year of where we have episodes that have been coming out every single week and we will be continuing to do so.

00:42:59.244 --> 00:43:08.695
But we're really excited that we have hit that 25 episode milestone. So I want to thank you all for just continuing to listen and we'll speak to you next week.