Archive for October, 2008
Disc Brake Pads – Construction, Selection and Break-In
From: The Ducati Garage Tech articles.
Most of you will have to replace your bike’s brake pads at least once during your lifetime — unless your idea of riding is pushing your bike back-and-forth in your living room, Flintstone-style.
As you wander into your local dealer or thumb through the pages of your favorite catalog, you’ll find many different brake pad manufacturers, such as Ferodo, DP, Galfer, and EBC. The problem is selecting which pad best suits your riding style and conditions. Other than the a few lines of marketing blurb on the back of their packaging, there’s not a lot of information available on how to differentiate pads from one another.
Why would I try and save water?
I hate paying my water bill. I’ve just paid my tri-annual ‘Services Account’. Although I don’t mind paying for the water. There is no financial incentive for me to bother to try and save water.
The cost of installing and plumbing up a rainwater tank vs. what is available in the form of rebates is a joke. The out of pocket charges are huge. The ‘Services Charges’ remain the same, and the drop in town supplied water charges is negligible.
The government offered a $2000 cash back grant for fitting an LGP system to a car. With some installations only costing $2500 it was only a $500 out of pocket expense. The price of LPG is a lot cheaper than petrol so there are some substantial on going savings to be made too.
Yet try and save water a ‘precious resource’ and there is no financial benefit to be gained, only extra expense.
The Pace
The Pace
Separating street from track, riding from racing
writer: Nick Ienatsch
“The Pace”, first appearing in the November 1991 issue of Motorcyclist magazine.
Racing involves speed, concentration and commitment; the results of a mistake are usually catastrophic because there’s little room for error riding at 100 percent. Performance street riding is less intense and further from the absolute limit, but because circumstances are less controlled, mistakes and over aggressiveness can be equally catastrophic. Plenty of roadracers have sworn off street riding. “Too dangerous, too many variables and too easy to get carried away with too much speed,” track specialists claim. Adrenaline-addled racers find themselves treating the street like the track, and not surprisingly, they get burned by the police, the laws of physics and the cold, harsh realities of an environment not groomed for ten-tenths riding. But as many of us know, a swift ride down a favorite road may be the finest way to spend a few free hours with a bike we love. And these few hours are best enjoyed riding at The Pace.
A year after I joined Motorcyclist staff in 1984, Mitch Boehm was hired. Six months later, The Pace came into being, and we perfected it during the next few months of road testing and weekend fun rides. Now The Pace is part of my life – and a part of the Sunday morning riding group I frequent. The Pace is a street riding technique that not only keeps street riders alive, but thoroughly entertained as well.
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