Ownership Verified: RdKetchup X-Plane triple (2016 Yamaha FJ-09)

Today I went for my first proper ride with the FJ. 545 km total, some nice riding roads, and 2 of my long time riding buddies to share the experience.

Today's ride almost didn't happen. Our destination, the Tracy Road in NY state is a very nice road in the Adirondack, but today is the last day of Quebec yearly construction holiday, a 2 week period where most of the people of the province take their vacation at the same time. Since our destination was across the border, we were afraid of a potential multiple hour wait to cross the border back to Canada at the end of the day.

Still, we decided to take our chance, and left around 9h30 this morning. At the border crossing, I went last to the custom officer, and was quite puzzled when he asked me if I had a licence plate. Turns out, it fell off sometimes in the last few days. The cause is probably my own stupidity, when I got the plate the day I bought the bike I tighten the nuts and bolts holding it with only my fingers, and I forgot to redo it properly with tools afterward.

So here I was, at the border thinking my day was ruined. But the custom officer checked my registration papers against the VIN on the frame, and told me that as far as he was concern, I was OK to enter the USA. So we decided to go ahead, hoping not to get pulled over.

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After rougly 125 km of highway (it's sad to have to ride that far and across a border to find nice roads, but then again it's one of the main reasons I bought this bike), we reached route 9N, a nice road that follows the Ausable river.

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My bike in the middle, flanked by a 2015 FJ-09 and a 2005 GSX-R1000.

Eventually, we forked onto Hurricane road, a nice little road full of second gear 20 MPH suggested corners. I had left the traction control ON, and it turned out to be a very good thing, the road was quite dirty and on a few occasion I felt the TC intervening coming out of corners.

Eventually, we reached our main destination, the Tracy Road. I had only ridden that road once, probably 10 years ago, and for some reason it didn't leave a particularly good impression. Today's ride fixed that! The road was awesome, good to acceptable pavement, curve after curve of third gear corner (30 and 35 MPH suggested).

After riding it once back and forth, we stopped for lunch in Moriah Center, and then proceeded to Ensign Pond Road.

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My buddies and me (last at the back) at the end of the Ensign Pond Road.

We then did one more run on the Tracy Road, and then headed back home the same way we came, using the 9N and Hurricane Road once again.

We made it back before diner, and despite our fears, the border crossing was actually pretty smooth, taking less than 30 minutes.

Now I need to get a new licence plate, and do the 1000 km maintenance (mainly oil and filter change), the FJ being now just over 1200 km :)
 
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but what is the X-plane you mention in the title?
the crank? but it's a 3cyl?
aren't all 3cyl X-plane? is there such a thing as a flat plane 3 cyl?


Also came in thinking someone had mated motorbikes and flight simulators....

Anyway nice bike! Im arriving at my mid life crisis and bikes are looking better and better while my belly grows.
 
In the last week I've done the first oil change (slightly late, at 1200km instead of 1000), and even washed it, something I had not done properly to one of my bikes for probably 10 years.

Odo now reads 1350km, break in is pretty much over :D

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:D
 
During my last work trip I bought a tank bag and a tail bag.

Came back home yesterday, so today I decided to install them, and fit the O2 controller I also bought a little while ago.

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Then I went to run a few errands, and actually needed both bags (and use the expansion zipper on the tail bag) to bring back 20 pounds of meat from the butcher.

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The O2 controller seems to make the throttle easier to control at low openings, it is still a bit jerky, but I think it's an improvement nonetheless. Mode A (more aggressive than std) seems more usable.

Taking the side plastics off to install the O2 controler was a pain in the ass. It's a freakin' puzzle. And when I put it back together, I ended up first with an extra fastener, and when I saw where it went, I realized that I had put the one meant to be there elsewhere, and the one I had left was too short! :censored::idiot: Finally figured it all out, and put everything in it's proper place.
 
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ABS might have saved my ass this morning. It was 11?C, I was distracted for ? a second, and the traffic in front of me stopped suddenly. First time I've had the ABS kick-in on the front brake (just a little bit). Reassuring to know it works well, without drama.

A few minutes later somebody tried to kill me, merging into my lane (at least the fucker had is turn signal ON, a rarity in these situations). I need some sort of dash cam!
 
Whew.
 
ABS might have saved my ass this morning. It was 11?C, I was distracted for ? a second, and the traffic in front of me stopped suddenly. First time I've had the ABS kick-in on the front brake (just a little bit). Reassuring to know it works well, without drama.

A few minutes later somebody tried to kill me, merging into my lane (at least the fucker had is turn signal ON, a rarity in these situations). I need some sort of dash cam!

isn't that "just another day on the bike"?
 
Surprisingly, the past 2 weeks have been very light in "everyone is trying to kill me" moments.
 
Friday my friend Fran?ois (the other FJ09 owner) and I took a day off before the Canadian Thanksgiving to go riding in NY and VT, for what would probably be the last real ride of the season.

The day started cold (at around 15?C), but eventually warmed-up to a nice 24?C.


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We started by going to the Tracy Road again:

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Followed by the Ensign Pond road:



After lunch, we were met by American riders who drove a few hours to join us, bringing nice machinery with them:

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A group of riders stoped next to us, with some more nice machinery:

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As we were setting off, our Hypermotard friend noticed Fran?ois rear tire looked really low. Upon closer inspection, a screw was found, and the pressure was down to 8 PSI. Lucky for us, we found a car garage that was able to plug the tire, despite being disturbed during their lunch break:

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That garage also had some nice 4 wheel machinery on display:

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Finally, we were on our way to our final destination, Route 17 in Vermont. I had only riden that road once, more than 10 years ago, and it had resulted in my first ever motorcycle crash. In the past few years the pavement had deteriorated to the point of not being worth going, but it was repaved earlier this year, and is now one of the greatest road I've seen in the North-East.


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Last run up to the outlook:


A superb ride of 637 km.
 
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Oups, forgot the first anniversary of the FJ last month.

I just passed 4000km, which is ridiculously low millage for a year, specially if I compare with the first year of ownership of my first bike, where I rode 32000km IIRC.

Still love the bike, still do stupid stuff on it, and still have a valid drivers licence and no crash with this one :D
 
One thing I miss about the east coast, both north and south of the border, are the old covered bridges. And proper fall colours. I hope you have more road trip photos planned for this fall. :)
 
Last weekend I finally prepped my FJ09 and my wife's CBR500R for the new season, changing the oil and filters, cleaning and greasing the chains, etc...

The battery on my bike was completely dead (I didn't use my battery tender over the winter). A boost and a slow charge got it working the next day, but every startup felt sluggish.

I took it to work on Wednesday, but when I tried again the next day, the battery was too low to start.

So new battery ordered and received, will go in today.
 
Well that was a total fail.

Despite the battery replacement being listed as 100% fit for the FJ on the seller website, to actually be fitted it need to be layed sideways, and the battery is for vertical installation only.

If I try to fit it vertically, the poles are inverted, and the leads are not the proper length. I can get it to fit, but then the front seat would lay directly on the wires, putting pressure, and I can easily imagine damaging them in the long run.

So battery will be RMA'd on Monday.

Original battery, on it's side (note it's marked unspillable).


New battery, fitted vertically. Note the leads are inverted, positive on the right, negative on the left.


Back to the original (weak) battery, with the seat support installed over.
 
Forgot to update on the resolution.

I contacted the online store and explained the problem, they told me they would issue a refund, and that I didn't need to ship back the first battery.

I ordered the factory activated and sealed one, it was delivered the next day, and the bike has been running great since.

That's proper customer service.
 
The weather has been pretty awful so far this summer in here. While still a bit cold (it was 13° C when I left at 07:45 this morning), today is looking up to be a beautiful day.

One of the motorcycle parking at work is already pretty busy at 08:15:

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So it's now early August, and the only ride I did so far in 2020 is a run to the gaz station back in April.

Because of the pandemic, I decided to de-register the bike in May to save money, and I registered it July 1st, but because of various circumstances I didn't take it out a single time.

I've been in quarantine for the past 2 weeks following a short business trip to Denver, but that quarantine ends this afternoon. So I took advantage of the great weather this morning and gave the bike a wash.

And while I was in Denver, I received the Sargent seats and backrest I ordered in early July (blame @Blind_Io and @altoid).

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I should now be able to properly start my season.
 
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