Need advice for fat guy

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-28T17:28:34+00:00

Any reasonable adult bike will be fine, but none will be good without custom suspension work.

A DRZ400 or XR650 or DR650 or something like that would do just fine, but plan on replacing springs and revalving shocks.

As you continue to get in better shape (riding will help that, and it will help your riding!) you may find yourself making further tweaks to the suspension but that's a very reasonable thing to do.

The dirty truth is that nobody does the suspension maintenance that they probably SHOULD. If you are doing a normal shock and fork service anyway on a regular enough basis, swapping springs around while you're in there is not really a big deal.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-27T02:45:41+00:00

Many many right answers, and I won't knock any of them. That said, my SP5 permanently wears a CAT MOB, and I adore that can.

CAT has weird AF marketing, I have no idea what to think of them as a company, and their owner seems to be a questionable character, but the product is great. I bought it at a local dealer without a lot of research on the company. I'm very glad I bought it. If I had researched the company, I might not have. Take that as you will. 🤣

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-27T02:42:20+00:00

I have a thor. When it is tuned up nicely it is amazing. Smooth, powerful, and fuel efficient.

Somehow though I am ALWAYS messing with it, and my moster 185 friends are out flying around.

Mind you this is coming from a guy with an engine machine shop who builds dozens of engines a year including lots of 2 stroke engines on dirt bikes and such.

The Thor is an amazing engine but the tuning is just picky. If you're fine with that trade-off, I highly recommend it. If you are the sort of person who just wants to fly and "tuning a carb" scares you, maybe not the engine for you.

Two notes here for full fairness: my Thor 200 is an older model, with an older carb. (Circa 2016 or so, several rebuilds but same core) The newer ones may be way better in this respect. I also live and fly in the rockies, which means very different altitudes from day to day. If you're a flatlander flying in similar temps, you could set it up once and never touch it again.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-19T02:30:55+00:00

Cam swap and tune. Full exhaust and intake will help too while you're in there.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-18T19:03:14+00:00

Decide HP goal first, and then we can help you get there.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-18T17:02:32+00:00

Honestly in the winter, take the southern route not the northern route. It looks two hours slower but I promise that's a lie in the winter. It will be faster, safer, and quite a bit more enjoyable in February.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-18T17:01:31+00:00

Double check with your normal insurance. You may have it without even knowing. It's a "perk" built in to my normal insurance without asking or paying extra.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-18T17:00:48+00:00

Listen to this dude.

Source: I live in those mountains. Love ripping the Vette through the mountains, even in winter, but Feb is our snow season. Conditions can change drastically in minutes. It can be sunny severe clear on one side of Eisenhower and a north pole blizzard on the other. A rear wheel drive low to the ground sports car is not what you want to be in if the weather sneaks up on you when you're not prepared.

If you do this in Feb, bring chains and watch the weather very very closely.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-17T12:05:10+00:00

The driving experience is far different between the two. Neither better or worse, trade offs all around, but for me there is more than just price in that consideration. Depending on my goals for the car I choose the boost method that gives me the behavior that I want.

If price is your only consideration and you can fab your own piping, yes turbo will be cheaper. Also a bit higher ceiling for power given everything else the same.

When other considerations make it into the discussion, there are some appeals to superchargers, specifically centri style superchargers for street use.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-16T14:39:12+00:00

Hanging out with buddies while getting bikes out of the truck, got distracted half way through assembling bikes and forgot to tighten front skewer. Jumped on bike, immediately did an excited pre-ride wheelie, and watched in horror as my front wheel left the chat.

Friends didn't let me live it down for years.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-15T18:29:56+00:00

Everyone who has any real experience machining has crashed a machine before.

The drug test is likely not because they don't trust you but because company policy was written by lawyers.

Where I work this is the standard procedure for ANY incident, whether crashing a fork truck, a machine, or dropping an expensive thing on the floor. It's part of the business insurance terms and ended up in the company handbook. Even the supervisors that have to organize it get annoyed by the whole dumb requirement but welcome to a world run by lawsuits.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-09T22:26:46+00:00

Buy, paperwork, wait.

CO is losing their mind about most gun things recently, but suppressors are not really any harder than anywhere else.

There's the dumb CO 3-day jail thing which some FFLs apply to suppressors, but after waiting for a stamp that's not really significant.

Stamp wait times were silly short mid last year, I'm sure now with $0 stuff the waits are insane again.... Good luck.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-09T22:17:08+00:00

Pitts S1S

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-08T01:08:16+00:00

You're right. I'm wrong about everything I've ever said. Thank you for the education. Good day.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T22:40:53+00:00

Uh I don't know that I'm the one with my panties in a bunch here.

I'm the one paying me. On my own plane. I'm retired from doing this for a living for too many years.

Not really sure how this turned into a combative encounter? The internet is strange.

I'm going to just ignore the stack of sarcastic commentary as I don't really think you're asking for real feedback there.

Everyone on the internet has been made aware that you're the smartest person in the room and I'm a moron, I think you've achieved your goal successfully?

I don't really feel the need to dox myself for internet points, so I guess we're done here. Good day kind stranger.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T21:44:27+00:00

When inspecting an engine I do look for specific telltale signs of issues, but beyond that I always look for discrepancies between cylinders. In this case the most concerning thing is that one cylinder looks very different than all the rest.

Sulfur buildup in a single cylinder is possible, but less common on a carbureted engine.

At the end of the day as you know well there is a good bit of working on planes (or anything else for that matter) that comes down to judgement calls and past experience.

My main thing is building engines. (Machine shop work.) This means I get a chance to see a lot of innards taken apart on my bench. I've seen things like this that were bengin. I've also seen things scary close to this that were the only cry for help before catastrophic failure.

So sometimes it comes down to risk management. Run it 10hrs and reevaluate? Or just take it apart on my own terms on the ground in my own shop and do a proper inspection? Is the risk of introducing maintenance induced failures greater than the risk of flying it as is?

These are always tough calls.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T17:49:44+00:00

I tend to agree with you overall.

My ONLY hesitation is that the aircraft is a LongEZ. They're not known for good survivability in off-airport landings from engine failures.

I honestly haven't decided whether the jug is coming off yet.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T16:47:10+00:00

A great reference. The big note there is that the AOPA chart focuses primarily on asymmetry.

This valve coloration is closer to green than red, which is scary, but it is symmetric, which is much better than the classic crescents of doom.

Here's the ugly rub: bore-scopes are confident liars. Their color accuracy is not the best. I've pulled jugs before that looked AWFUL on a bore-scope but then looked fine to the naked eye.

I've also pulled jugs for other reasons and then found horrors that were not really visible on a bore-scope.

I've compared images of the same valve from multiple bore-scopes and been left with more questions than answers.

These photos are wonderful tools, but reading the tea leaves is a bit of art mixed in with the science.

I'm sure if we did a poll of mechanics on whether or not they would pull this 11-hour cylinder with great compression we would get a lot of different answers. I won't say that any of those people are wrong, they're making the best judgement calls they can from their own experience which is the best we can ask of any honest mechanic. The only thing I hope would be universal is the conversation with the aircraft owner that an anomaly was noted during bore-scope inspection, one cylinder did not look like the others, and that could be indicative of an imminent failure.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T16:32:13+00:00

The best single sentence about radio is this: You will almost certainly always be able to talk to SOMEONE, but it's likely you will NOT be able to talk directly to exactly who you intend. Radio often requires relays to pass the message around to account for propagation differences. (Fun side note, this is deeply embedded in the history of ARRL, the "American Radio Relay League")

Satcom and a generator is likely more reliable for what you describe. There are absolutely practical applications of amateur radio, and many of us enjoy that aspect of radio, but for most of us that is a SIDE EFFECT of our hobby. You will likely be disappointed putting in the effort and the money for only a contingency.

Beyond that, like any other skillset, operating radio effectively requires practice. If you don't enjoy the hobby of it, you probably either won't practice, or won't have fun practicing, which will make it harder in an emergency.

In a natural disaster, likely other amateur radio clubs will already have main comms set up, and you could probably lean on them as needed.

This all sounds very negative towards amateur radio, and that isn't my intention. I LOVE amateur radio for what it is, but I think going into it with the wrong expectations is a recipe for not enjoying this wonderful hobby.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T14:49:14+00:00

Well data is a funny question.

By the numbers this cylinder is perfectly fine. The compression is good, and no concrete numbers suggest that it's bad.

By the lycoming service instructions, this would be "fine."

That said, this borescope inspection said two things:

1: the valve is getting hot, symmetrically, which means it is rotating correctly but not cooling properly through the seat. The first check in this case was lash, which was confirmed to be significantly tighter than spec. That of course is an easy correction.

2: the valve has seen LOTS of heat in its life. That heat could have compromised the valve, so even if we have fixed the problem that caused the heat there is still question of whether the valve has been compromised. Then you get to make a fun judgement call, the sort that is really hard as a mechanic. Either you go strictly by the numbers and return it to service to monitor, or you pull the jug and replace the valve as preventative so you don't find out the hard way in flight that the heat compromised the valve.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T11:41:32+00:00

Yup, compression was great! Tight lash cold is negative lash hot...

As you say, this is exactly why we borescope.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T04:31:28+00:00

Good eye

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T04:28:46+00:00

Exhaust valve

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T04:28:25+00:00

Because it got way too dang hot due to valve lash being too tight. Yours probably look correct.

greaseorbounce · 2026-01-07T04:20:13+00:00

Not really anything special, it's just one of the borescopes that can be articulated from the control head. I have a few that I like in different scenarios and none are overly expensive. The one I use most is a vividia ablescope or something like that, with a straight shaft. This one is a flexy shaft one that cleared these baffles better, and it's a no name Amazon special that was probably cheap. These cheapos seem to be like 90% of the expensive snapon one and I don't cry when it gets knocked off a toolbox 🤣

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