Mental Motorcycle Maintenance

Posted September 4, 2004
By Ian Johnston

One of the important aspects of owning and riding a motorcycle is maintenance. Your maintenance procedures can determine the outcome of a ride, independent of the quality of the road, the weather, or the traffic you encounter.

Maintaining a bike is a constant learning process. This is most obvious when you're just starting out, but even seasoned mechanics are constantly learning new things about their bikes.

Motorcycle maintenance is a full-time job. Every time you're near or on the bike, your mind should be in "maintenance mode," even if it's only a tiny bit. Even off the bike, you may find yourself thinking about your bike, and what may need to be done to it soon.

One key to good bike maintenance is orderliness. It helps keep your mind focused on the task, as well as making the job easier to do.

Always Learning

You can start learning about motorcycle maintenance at any time in your riding career. The best time to start is when you start biking, but that's no reason to avoid it if you're already a skilled rider. Anyone can be active in keeping their motorcycle running in peak shape, and it only takes a small investment of time and effort to start seeing results.

One of the first things to learn about any bike is its normal behavior. This includes everything you normally encounter while riding: starting habits, normal acceleration, hard acceleration, deceleration, cornering, braking, etc. Pay attention to how the bike normally rides, and you're automatically setting yourself up for success in solving problems later on.

The next (and most obvious) thing to learn is how the bike works. Not just how to adjust a chain and fill the tires -- although these are important -- but how a four-stroke or two-stroke engine works. How the clutch and transmission work. How the brakes and suspension work. Spend some time on howstuffworks.com reading about the relevant systems. Some of these topics are difficult to master, but they're all important in keeping your bike in shape. Fortunately, they're also quite "portable" -- most bikes share more similarities than differences. Note that you probably won't be able to learn all about how motorcycle systems work without an "expert" (whether that's a friend who already rides, or a friendly mechanic, or a motorcycle club member) who can help you with the bits that the websites and books neglect.

The more you can learn about your motorcycle, the better you'll be able to maintain it. This is fairly obvious. What's not so obvious is that as you understand the bike better, it also improves your ability to ride it well. Engaging your mind and thinking about what's happening as you operate the clutch, or throttle, or brakes can noticeably improve your riding skill. As your riding skill improves, riding becomes more enjoyable.

The inverse is also true: as you become a better rider, you will probably find yourself becoming a better mechanic. All aspects of riding are interrelated, and improving one can help others along. In the same way, neglecting one aspect of riding can cause others to develop more slowly than they potentially could.

For the Non-Mechanical Rider

If you're just not a mechanical person, and never will be, don't despair. You can still usefully contribute to your motorcycle's maintenance, and ease the burden on your pocketbook.

One thing you should do is figure out how to do the simple maintenance by yourself. It's cheaper, and you'll get to know the bike better. This includes things like lubricating and checking the chain, checking the tires, checking the lights and so on. A trick to help you figure these things out is to ask your mechanic if he'll explain what he's doing next time he performs the services for you. Local motorcycle clubs may have some folks who would be happy to help you out, as well. (Unfortunately, yes, most motorcycle mechanics are male.)

If you have trouble with your bike, pay attention to it and describe your problems to the mechanic. He'll appreciate any information you can give him -- mechanics have no magical powers to discern what's wrong with your bike. Anything you don't tell him up front, he'll have to discover at $72 per hour.

The more you know about your bike the better, but anything's better than dropping it off at the mechanic and saying, "it doesn't go right." Chances are excellent he'll ignore the bike, call you back in a week saying, "we couldn't find any problems," and charge you $150 for bugging him.

Doing Your Own Work

The "next level" in motorcycle maintenance is to actually do your own work on the bike. This can range anywhere from things everyone should know how to do (like lubing and adjusting a drive chain, checking brake wear, etc.) to massively involved tasks like rebuilding an engine or transmission.

For any maintenance task, from the simple to the complex, there is an established procedure. It's usually detailed in a service manual, so this is almost always a wise investment if you intend to do your own work on a bike. The factory service manual is commonly an excellent choice, although they can be expensive. Some bikes have Hayes or Clymers aftermarket service manuals. These are good choices because they're commonly based on experience the authors gain from taking apart the bike and put it back together -- they share methods that worked for them, some of which may even be improvements on the factory techniques. They're usually cheaper than factory manuals. Both types of manuals can commonly be found used, but make sure the manual you're buying really covers your particular model and year of bike.

Some service procedures and information is available from other sources. The Internet is a common choice these days, and there are often websites and mailing lists devoted exclusively to a particular brand or model of bike. Doing a little Internet detective work with Google or your favorite search engine can yield good results. Be aware that this information is commonly "fan donated" and there's absolutely no guarantee of accuracy -- the printed manuals are more likely to be 100% accurate. The Internet is a good source if you're having trouble, but remember to engage your brain before following any advice you don't consider totally trustworthy. In your searching, keep in mind that interactive forums like mailing lists and bulletin boards encourage critical discussion. This commonly leads to a higher quality and accuracy of information when compared to websites where the information is presented as fact.

Once you're ready to perform a maintenance procedure, it pays to be orderly about it. This applies to everything you do -- from how you arrange your work area to how you proceed with the job to how you clean up afterward. Lay out the tools you intend to use within easy reach. Have a place ready, for the pieces you'll remove.

Every service manual says something like, "it's best to perform these procedures in a well-lit and clean work area." It's commonly in the beginning section that everyone skips over in their eagerness to find the section they're actually working on. However, this is really important, so here it is again:

It's important to do your motorcycle maintenance work in a well-lit, clean and organized work area.

This doesn't mean you have to have a fancy garage with a workbench and all your tools arrayed in dedicated holders. It just means your work area should be as good as you can make it. If you're working on the street, grab a couple of extra rags or sheets of newspaper to use as a tool or parts area. Grab some clean yogurt containers or one of those plastic multi-compartment boxes to organize bolts and screws. If you're draining fluids, get the container ready beforehand to catch it. Take a few minutes to get organized, and it'll make the whole job easier to complete. Note what's missing as you work, so you won't forget it next time.

Once you're all set up and can start in, remember to read the manual as you go. Particularly factory manuals can have procedures that seem needlessly complex, but often what seems excessive on paper actually makes the job much easier to do in practice. The key here is that there are no shortcuts. Of course you can skip some steps, but that often leads to more work than if you'd just done it right the first time. This is particularly true if taking a shortcut means you have a hard time doing it correctly on the the first attempt -- then you might have to take it all apart again and do it a second time! Shortcuts don't seem so appealing after you've had to duplicate your work a few times.

Finally, remember to take breaks. Every hour or so, stop what you're doing, get away from the bike and drink some water/coffee/beer/whatever. Sit down and stare at the TV or read a non-motorcycle book for a few minutes. Don't forget what you were doing, but even a few minutes off can provide perspective and give you a chance to rest.

Record Keeping

Some people find it helpful to keep records of their maintenance. This can be as little as a small notebook in which you note what you've done, or it can be an Excel spreadsheet, or a website detailing everything you've done. You can just note major service, or every time you touch the bike. You can keep track of your gas mileage as an indicator of potential engine problems. Find a level that suits you.

If you decide to keep records of maintenance you do, the most important things to note are the date, the approximate mileage (to the nearest 100 miles/km on the odometer is usually enough, although no one will quibble with better accuracy), and a brief description of what you did. Include part numbers or specifications if you can, particularly of parts you'll need to buy again like filters or tires.

Keeping these kinds of records will help you in a few ways. First, it will allow you to pinpoint exactly when you last did a service, or when you made a modification. This is important for things like changing the oil and doing other periodic maintenance. Second, accurate and detailed records can help increase the resale value of your bike. If and when you decide to sell it, being able to show potential buyers what all you've done to the bike can be quite valuable.

Even if you opt not to keep any written records, try to keep some mental records. Remember when you last changed the oil, or checked the tires. Remember to follow a pattern of maintenance (checking tire pressure every week on a particular day, or lubricating and adjusting the chain every second tank of gas, for instance). This will make mental recordkeeping easier.

And Finally

Remember when doing your motorcycle maintenance to use an orderly approach. If you have the manual, use it.

Pay constant attention to the bike, and it will tell you well in advance of a breakdown about most of the problems that may occur. Motorcycles require more maintenance than cars, so if you treat your bike like an appliance, it will eventually come back to haunt you.

When working on your bike, be calm or take a break. Only fools get angry at inanimate objects -- the bike doesn't care, and it's not trying to anger you. Remember that they had to put it together at the factory, so there is a way to do it.

Finally, enjoy yourself. Owning and riding a motorcycle is about having fun, so if you're miserable, you're probably doing something wrong. Take the bike to a mechanic if you can't stand working with tools. It's ok, that doesn't make you any less of a "real motorcyclist," and if that's what it takes to keep this whole thing enjoyable, then it's worth it.