Provisional Learner Licence comes to an end

At last! My upgraded driving licence

In about 10 days time, my provisional Learner licence will be come to an end and be upgraded because today I just passed the JPJ bike test for a full B licence. Yeah! After about a 40 year lapse, the motorcycle training course has been a very good refresher course and I even got to learn a few tips/techniques in handling the motorcycle in slow speed i.e. less than 20kph. On day 1, the trainer told me not to train in the figure 8 and the rest but to familiarize myself with the feel of a superbike because I have with me a cruiser where handling is very much different so it was just circling around the "road area". On day 2, I succeeded zig-zagging the 5 cone and going over several humps but never made it to half a figure 8. By day 3, figure 8, u-turns and road area were done adequately and improved on Day 4 but I could not complete the mandatory bridge yet passed the Routine Vehicle Maintenance test. On Day 5, after valuable tips from the instructor, I managed to complete the narrow bridge test several times. Truly practice makes perfect and the number of repeats needed to clear a hurdle is relative to a rider's skill.

Need for No.10 spanner

Yesterday, I forgot to take the key out from the Bobber which was left there for about 3 hours. It was switched on and so was the headlight but because the day was bright, I forgot to switch it off. The bike being still new said my salesman not surprising, I could not even use the horn. I took out the battery and brought it to the nearby petrol station where their charging unit only handles 12V and 24V battery mainly meant for cars and lorries. A phone call to my salesman confirmed mine is a 12V battery (one doesn't really pay attention to all this until it happens to us) so I was told to come back 3 hours later. Incidentally, a No.10 spanner is required to release the battery cables which I then carefully taped + and - cables separately to play safe. Well, we learn something new (I must be more careful with the key) everyday.

Need for No.17 spanner

Spanner no. 17 is a must-buy to readjust and tighten mirror stalk and mirror. There can be itchy fingers.

Production flaw

The problem of having a sharp eye is that things off balance usually catch one's eye. Observing the Bobber while taking a breath of fresh air after dinner has recently been bit of a norm for me. Somehow I noticed something was not right so started to closely inspect the bike. It then came to me that the rear fender support bars were not properly manufactured causing the rear fender to shift slightly to the left. Upon checking with my salesman who then checked with the assemblers, it was acknowledged that in fact all Bobbers manufactured happen to have this production flaw so getting replacement support bars will not solve the problem and totally out of the question. I knew they could have it realigned if they wanted to if their after sales service meant a lot to image building of their marque brand but sadly no, they were not interrested so that answers how concerned they are of their after sales service. I guess I might have been the only person to have made this complaint but sakit mata (@ pain in the #@%*) so I eventually agreed to have it rectified outside for RM80 which meant heating the support fenders then making the necessary adjustment followed by a re-spray. Done yesterday and looks better now where previously the right rear fender nut was probably about 0.5 cm away from the tyre side walls and I felt that could be too dangerous for comfort. Why wait for something bad to happen then complain.