The Wife's New to Her 96 VFR750

Well, as the title suggests, my wife now has a "New to Her" motorcycle. She has been looking for a little while now to get a bike for herself. My wife Angie has ridden many bikes before, but before my son Liam was born she decided to sell her last bike, a 1984 Nighthawk 750 to a friend of mine in Calgary. I too sold my old 97 VFR750 as I did not want to see the bike sitting idle in the corner of the garage wanting for someone to throw their leg over the seat. Since we both knew that we would have a fair bit less time to ourselves once the baby arrived the thought of selling the bikes seemed prudent and let's face it, financially opportunistic. Who ever said that babies aren't expensive has obviously not lived in this century. The baby is practically free, but the stuff required on hand after said baby comes home, hmmm, not so much.

With the kids now getting a bit older, our son Liam (now 6) and our daughter Chantal (now 4), are at the point that maybe a bit of fun in the biking world can once again return to the family. My son Liam regularly enjoys seat time on the back of my 2000 VFFR800, though for fairly short distances as opposed to epic journeys. My daughter Chantal has longed for the day when she too has grown enough to be able to ride pillion on the back of the bike. Well she is almost there and likely will be big enough to go for the odd scoot by the time next year comes around (I know some of you are thinking next year, Why Not Now???. One answer, SNOW is coming) but with winter in Canada fast approaching it is unlikely that the growth spurt will occur in time.

To that end my wife has decided on a bike, and after much deliberation, the result is in. She wanted a, you guessed it, A VFR of her very own. Have I ever mentioned that I really love my wife. As of Wednesday night we are now a multi-generational Viffer household. Angie has always found great amusement of poking fun at me (and the VFR breatheren in general for our overall obsessive nature about our bikes) and calling me, well, SPECIAL because of my fun in tinkering with my bike. Well, now she has the urge herself.

The new steed has been christened Rocketgurl, and she is a 1996 VFR750 in bright silver. AND without further ado, THE PICTURES!!!!!



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There are a few things that need to be addressed and merely because they drive my WIFE more mental than I would have thought possible.

First Issue. If you take a close look at the picture of the bike from the back, the Delkevic pipe exits the header at such an angle that we could gas the person in a car behind and to the right quite effectively (or a pedestrian or cyclist riding down the side of the road) and that will just never do, and the exhaust must be re-aligned.

Second issue. Again looking at the bike from the rear, the windscreen appears to be centered off to the left of the bikes center line. The PO mentioned that the bike had never been dropped as long as he has owned it (I performed a title search to ensure that there were no claims registered against the bike and found none) and he has owned the bike for the last 40,000 km's of its 55K. He did mention that it may have fallen over at some point and had noticed the fairing issue but had never addressed fixing it.

My wife may say that I am mental about keeping my bikes looking good (and I would be a fool to disagree) but deep down I know that she feels the same way. To that effect, the obsessive nature upheld by our family has started to clean up the bike and solve some of the issues that are easily addressed, like cleaning the years of dirt and crud that are lurking beneath the fairing. We discovered when looking for any damaged bits (the PO said HE never dropped it, but he was by own admission the 3rd owner) and even though there was no claims against the bike for insurance that does not necessarily mean it had never been dropped. We discovered that it had indeed fallen over, as evidenced by the tweaked upper cowl support and some vertical striations on the right side of the bike, vaguely reminiscent of someone losing their balance and dropping the bike on its side. No visible damage done to any fairing mounts, suggesting that it had never been dropped at speed. All the fairing mounts look straight and unbent, and the amount of dirt and crud hiding behind the fairings would suggest that the bikes body panels have never been removed to clean the bike.

Evidence you ask.................

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And so the saga will continue until Angie gives the OK on cleanliness. Ha Ha Ha, she has finally become ONE OF US. The crazed Viffer owner.

 

Damn.........that silver look good :thumbsup:
Congratulation to you both, always nice to have a life long partner to ride with. I am so jealous :sad:

 

Scratch the pampers and opt for a good coat of enamel followed by a couple clear coats and then just wash as needed.

Then the question begs to be asked, and demanded to be answered, Why has she not signed up here and posted her own pix.

Seriously though Bill, that is one clean looking bike for its age. Hell of a lot cleaner beneath the skin than mine and mine used to get pressure washed every Fall Winter and Spring day on #1 Freeway going to and from work. Thank gawd it is not red. You'd have two slow bikes in the family then.

 

Wow

Even if it has been on its side at some stage it still is a great looking bike.

I agree with Randy - its now time for Angie to join the world formally! - We are ready for her :welcome:

As for the "flaws" well the idea of gassing people in passing cars seems perfectly reasonable .. as for the wonky screen it may be a bit of a mission but I suspect if you pull the sides and whole front fairing you will find one or more of the mounting tabs have been impact engineered and are slightly drifted to one side. Fingers crossed once you bring the mounts back to their correct position the screen will centre up fine.

Take care



SkiMad

 

Nice Score for your wife-eee!!!

I have owned/raced numerous bikes in my time on this earth. Some have had bent clip-ons, some have had tweaked sub-frames, etc.

Some people are from the mind set that if you have bent handle bars the bike wont go down the road straight. I have proven this wrong by doing it personally, it may fatiuge you more, but you do get used to things. Sub frames are important as your arse is centered on the bike and you dont want it off in one direction or the other, that being said, I have raced bikes that had ones where my back side was off in one direction or the other.

My street bikes all have what seems to me, perfect geomotry. I got a nice new clip on for a bent bar on my viffer from Ebay not too long ago, I was riding with a bent clip on for over 17 years on that bike! So, now when you crank the handle bars from one direction to the other, there is equal distance to the petrol tank. Do I notice a difference? Not really...Point is, just get oot and ride before the winter shuts down your party.

One last thing, I never ride with bent levers! New ones are always in order, unless your in battle conditions :wacko:

Cheers and happy riding....

 

That's a nice one. A hearty welcome to her then. As for the hi mount muffler issue: maybe a misalignment of the mid-pipe?

 

As a fellow '96 owner, I can tell you a couple of things:

1.) That upper cowl fairing bracket is very complicated, and very easily bent. Even brand new, it looks tweaked. If it's not right, the upper/mid fairings/gauges won't sit right, and neither will the windscreen. Correction of tweaks & bends in this part require removal of the bracket. Replace all of the bulbs in the gauge cluster while you have it out.
2.) As stated above, I'd bet the midpipe is rotated out at the header pipe connection, which will affect the alignment of the slip-on

 

Awwwe. There it goes. I'm in your bad books. Mine have been bent since Long pushed me over down int San Diego in 2012. Really should replace that soon. Maybe a winter project seeing as I don't need the bike for commuting anymore.

 

Sounds like you have been pretty busy with all the fettling and it sure looks like Angie has got the bug. I expect it won't be long before all those spares will be on eBay to help pay for further upgrades.. and saves clogging up the garage..

Whilst Helibars are not cheap, they should make the riding position a lot more comfy, especially when coupled with a Corbin seat that will be great bike for long trips.


Take care




SkiMad

 

Hey Randy stop being a :baby: ound:
I have a set OEM let me know I can send them to you.

 

Nice find and congratulations. Why are all the 96's I find listed are all red?

 

Though I can not say for the US, the 94-97 model year VFR's in Canada were available in only red, with the exception of 1996 where they also offered silver.

Unfortunately they were never offered in Yellow, arguably the fastest color VFR,................. depending on who you talk to that is. LOL

 

man, nothing sexier that a woman cleaning a motorcycle! And the socks set it off! :biggrin:

My wife has no interest in tinkering with a bike and only the slightest interest of riding. Consider yourself lucky!

 

Well, she started the day off with removing all the body panels and then taking them completely apart. The bike's fairings now sit in about 30 different pieces so that we could remove all the dried wax from all the edges of the plastics that are hard as heck to get to with the pieces screwed together.

I took the tail light and all the turn signals to work with me today so that I could polish them. I had one casualty though. While polishing the left rear turn signal lens I had the light secured in the vice on the work bench and caught an edge with the polisher. The lens flew across the shop hit the wall and cracked a piece off the bottom edge. Now I need to find a new left rear turn signal. OOPS, my name is sooooooo going to be mud when the wife sees the broken piece.

Anyone have a spare left rear turn signal lens for a 96 VFR for sale. Ha Ha,

 

Well, as I knew would happen eventually the FARKLING has begun. Angie asked me the other day, "Do you remember the polished rear sets you had on your old 97 VFR," to which I responded, "Yes, why?"

The answer to this question being rather obvious I prepared myself for the inevitable, "Hmmm, I think that polished brackets for the driver and passenger would look really good with the silver on my bike, don't you think?"

So yesterday, my son Liam and I went on a mission to procure some polishing supplies. Since I had done the polishing on my 97 VFR's passenger and driver foot peg supports with a corded drill and a felt wheel and jewelers rouge, I thought this time I would get the proper tools for the job. After a couple hours of searching, we came home with an industrial 1/3 HP buffer (sort of like a grinder but operates at 1600 rpm versus the 3600 rpm for a grinder) some felt wheels, a couple tubes of jewelers rouge, and the overall desire to try out the new power tools and make stuff shiny.

I removed the left side drivers footrest bracket (I think they are technically called rear sets aren't they) as it was the quickest and easiest to remove and started to give it a buff with the new machine. I only spent about 10 minutes on half of the heel guard and wow, there is something to be said for having the right tool for the job. I think it took me about 8-10 hours to do the driver's rear sets on my last bike with the drill and a 3 inch buffer wheel, and not tom mention I damned near killed the drill.

Here is a picture of what I was able to get done very quickly with the new buffer.


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Angie also noted that the fairing bolts with the large diameter heads were also a little dull so she asked if I could make those shiny as well. AAAAHH hell, why not, I love a good project. Besides the fairing bolts are ridiculously easy to do and should take very little time.

AND SO IT BEGINS

 

What no before and after pictures......? ound:
You better make her happy otherwise

 

I think you said once before but I was reading without plugging one ear with my finger and all that info leaked out. Where do you get jeweler's rouge?

 

Well actually, if you look closely at the picture half the heel guard area is really shiny, whereas the part closest to the foot rest is sort of textured looking.

Here is a fairly good before and after of the fairing bolts. The one on the left has been polished, the middle one is half polished, and the one on the right is untouched.

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Total time required to make the fairing bolt on the right look as shiny as the one on the left, less than 20 seconds.

 

Nice :thumbsup:
You have the whole winter to polish ound:

 

I see zoom-zoom being quite busy this winter:

But. I been there done that: But only after I did this. and after aquiring this.