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Back Country Repairs

MCMXCIVRS

More toys than space
I sure am glad I carry a good tool kit with me on my F800GS.

I had a couple opportunities to use them, once to help out another rider, none other than Paul Glaves who needed my GS-911 tool to diagnose a problem on Voni's F800S while at the Bee Cee Beemers rally in Nakusp BC last weekend. She was concerned that her odometer was not logging her miles and Paul wanted to confirm what he suspected the problem to be so he could order the part to get that fixed. After all, when you're closing in on a million, you don't want to miss any.

The next opprtunity to break open the tool kit was for my own bike and was a bit more dramatic and serious in nature.

I left the rally on Sunday with the intent of spending several more days touring back roads and finding fishing spots to camp and catch supper. My route for Sunday took me well up a mountain road, one in pretty decent condition, where there were a few small lakes. Not far from the lake I had chosen as the best spot to end the day, I rode over a flat stone on the road and it kicked up hard under the bike off the front tire. The stone clanked off the skid plate as have many before, that's what its there for after all. I thought little of it and continued the last couple kilometers to the lake.

I was just in the process of getting my tent set up shortly after arriving, when i noticed something dripping under the bike. A quick inspection revealed it was oil, the stone had dented the skid plate in quote badly, and I figured had also damaged the sump. A few minutes of panic ensued as I abandoned the tent and began to figure out what to do. Give up on the lake and fishing and make a run for civilization? Try to patch the damage out in the mountains? No cell coverage, little chance of anyone coming along to help, oh crap!

After the panic subsided and clearer thinking returned, i dug out the tool kit and set to work getting the skid palte off to assess the true nature of the damage. Sure enough, the sump had been cracked and a slow but steady drip of hot 10w 40 was issuing from the wound. With no way to get anything to stick to the damaged area while the oil continued to flow, I realised i would need to drain the remaining oil and remove the sump to effect any sort of repair that might have a chnace of getting me out of this predicament. I got out my Ortlieb folding dish pan and used it to catch the oil, then used my map case from the tank bag to cover it and try to keep the forest debris from getting in, or at least most of it.

Now that I had the oil drained, I got to work removing the sump which is fortunately a very easy task on the F800GS. With the sump removed, I was able to clean the oil from the damaged area, scrape it somewhat clean, and then apply a coat of JB Weld to cover the damage. Once that cured, I repeated the process on the inside just to be sure it was going to hold oil in.

With the damage patched, the sump went back on and I used one of my disposable paper funnels to return the oil to the engine. So far so good, no sign of a leak and only down to add mark on the dipstick. I left the skid palte off so I could keep an eye on the repair for the rest of the evening. By morning it was still dry, so on went the skid plate, which I had beat somewhat flat again (ironically using a large rock to do so).

This bad situation turned out not so bad after all, certainly not as bad as it may have been with a bit less luck or less preparedness. That bulky tool kit was worth every square inch of space it took to carry it.

Oh, and the fishing was fantastic. Even after doing the repairs, I still was able to pull in a nice pair of trout in time for supper.

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The sump off

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It's cracked

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scraped clean

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Repaired

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Skid plate dent

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From the underside

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The "workshop"

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View from the "workshop"

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Supper

I did end up changing my travel plans and headed for Kelowna and the new dealer there Bentley Motorad. They inspected the repair, cleaned up the oily mess and gave me the OK to proceed with confidence with fresh oil and filter and a cleaned and lubed chain to boot. The emergency repair was showing no sign of leakage, and held up just fine for the remainder of my wandering trip home. I will be replacing the sump though just to be sure.
 
:thumb Nice Job :clap It gives you a real sense of accomplishment when you can pull off a field repair like that. Gary
 
Well done, Ed. That would have been stressful for me.

Where exactly were you? Looks pretty exotic.

I wonder who carries the bigger tool kit, you or Dave Anderson? :D Actually, on his HP2, he carries three of them.
 
Serious toolkit. I better stick to RT's and the like if stuff like that is a possibility. I would be screwed in that situation as my wrenching knowledge is limited to changing the oil.
 
Well done, Ed. That would have been stressful for me.

Where exactly were you? Looks pretty exotic.

I wonder who carries the bigger tool kit, you or Dave Anderson? :D Actually, on his HP2, he carries three of them.

It was called Kathy Lake. Its about 12 Kms east off the Mable lake road at about 30 Kms north of Lumby. The mosquitos were not too bad, the fish were biting more than the bugs.
 
nice bodge, as Matt Parkhouse calls it. that must have been one helluva rock.

JB weld is a must-have in a toolkit, and it's saved my bacon, too.

a good complement to JB is some flat sheet aluminum, like from a soda can. this can help patch holes in valve covers that are larger than cracks.

ian
 
It was a sort of flat rock, so I suspect that it got up on edge and jammed up between the skid plate and the ground as I went over it. That's the only way I can figure how it got enough force to do that kind of damage.

I like the flat aluminum idea. I will have to add a scrap to the tool kit.
 
Did you re use any of the oil that was in the skid plate, Ed? Any thoughts of spacing that skid plate down, a bit?
 
Did you re use any of the oil that was in the skid plate, Ed? Any thoughts of spacing that skid plate down, a bit?

No I didn't reuse that oil, I wasn't that desperate. I hadn't lost an awful lot, only about a half litre after it was all done. I cleaned it up as best I could with some paper towel, which later made an excellent fire starter. I even used my folding shovel to clean up the oil soaked patch in the dirt and added that to the campfire to burn it off. Just shortly after I had got things back together, a forest ranger came by my camp, he left me a litre of oil he had in his truck, that got me topped off again and a bit to carry as reserve. Wasn't the right grade or weight, but better than nothing. He was also kind enough to call Kristi and let her know my situation in case I had further difficulties in the morning. I was using my SPOT on the trip, but did not feel it warranted a help message at that point yet. I just had him let her know to keep an eye on my progress the next morning. Once I was into Lumby and cell phone range, I let her know all was fine and where I was off to sorth the isssue out further.

I'm actually looking at a sturdier skid plate for it. There are a couple heavier duty ones on the market now.
 
Dave Anderson had his own little horror story a few years ago, not far from where your incident took place. He was riding home from the Hot Springs Rally on his R1100S, and went through a light debris field on Highway 6 at the Summit ski area. A few seconds later the engine went rough, and he shut it down. When he stopped, he saw a thin stream of oil pouring out of the oil filter, and an oil trail back up the highway.

He trailered the bike home, and the engine needed a complete rebuild. The oil filter had a 1/8th inch slit in it, from a piece of debris that had flown up off the road, and he has it hanging on his mechanical disaster board at Anderwerks. At one point he considered having a batch of protector plates manufactured for road going Oilers, but I don't know what ever came of it.
 
That makes a good case for mud flaps and fender extensions up front.
Hopefully the magnet I have stuck on to my filter adds a bit of armor!
 
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