What motorcycles teach about maintenance

https://books.worksinprogress.co/book/maintenance-of-everything/vehicles/what-motorcycles-teach-about-maintenance/4

by ericwaller • 3 years ago

109 151 3 years ago

books.worksinprogress.co

taeric13• 3 years ago

I find the root premise flawed. I have known many people that loved working on cars. The plethora of very old vehicles where I live kind of holds that up, as well. My truck is 23 years old, and I'm positive it isn't even close to the oldest around here.

Even closer to the general idea, the radio show "Car Talk" was less about cars than the name would have implied. Would love to see it revived in spirit.

That said, still a fun read. Not entirely sure there are general learnings that can't be found anywhere. Such that I would push for the takeaway of "don't stop looking for lessons when out of the job or classroom."

korse• 3 years ago

I think the key is that motorcycle riding hooks you into the machine in a way that few car builds can replicate. Motorcycle maintenance and riding is a tighter loop, with far higher stakes if simple procedures are not followed. Troubleshooting may be similar across all machines, but the best troubleshooting is not having to do it at all.

If nothing else, the tight loop created by the motorcycle teaches preventative maintenance schedules in a way that is tough to replicate outside aviation. Or you die/stop riding.

For example, I've blown a front tire in my car at speed on the highway with no adverse consequences except having to steer off center for a moment and swap the wheel in 5 degree weather. No biggie.

My bikes get routine chain, tire, fluid and electrical checks however, as a similar failure could end me.

taeric13• 3 years ago

This feels largely like a post-hoc justification for what is clearly more of a hobby.

That is, the miles you have put into a car "at speed" is almost certainly far greater than what you put your motorcycle through. For reasons of the car giving much more utility of use. And the fact that you still have a motorcycle is clearly a choice. One that you have to put effort into keeping up. That you would also choose to see something special about that choice is not at all surprising.

detourdog2• 3 years ago

There is a similar type loop between old "British" racing cars I spent a fair amount of time driving cars from the 50 and 60s. The driving experience was a combination of boat/biplane/tractor. The little British cars had a certain sound that was correct and any variation from that sound was heart stopping. The best example from my experience happened on the Taconic Parkway. The sound shifted as the fan blades started to detach and fly off. I had no idea of the cause until I opened the hood.

Here is additional reading about mechanical things from a different era.

https://mossmotoring.com/manhattan-mechanic/

https://mossmotoring.com/souvenirs-and-socket-sets/

I'm sure non-british cars of that era are similar.

smileysteve7• 3 years ago

I think this can be felt in cars; without the extreme life and death situation.

My father taught me the skill of listening to the car, I can diagnose many problems with a motor with barely any description, but I can get really far with a screwdriver as a stethoscope. Thanks to understanding how they work, even rough descriptions of symptoms or noises 20 yards away and I'll remark about what's wrong with the engine or accessories. (Granted, as a kid, we had the sounds of Sebring on reel to reel)

Luckily, ICE knowledge is also transferrable to fun things like boat engines. Boats, then have their own set of physics to try fun things with (like trim tabs, outboard hydrofoils)

As it turns out, a 20 year old car, a 20 year old boat, hobbies like track days and slalom skiing lead to many busy weekends.

ben77997• 3 years ago

Lots of jobs you can do on a motorcycle yourself in a garage are like 100x harder on a car so it's nowhere near as accessible.

Stuff like needing a lift, or needing a hoist to lift heavy parts like the engine or transmission.

And even almost new motorcycles have minimal computer/electronic issues where the manufacturer is hiding how to do things. Get the Service manual and it tells you basically everything except how to hack the ECU.

taeric13• 3 years ago

Certainly. But the premise was 'Nobody proclaims “Live to ride! Ride to live!” about cars.' Obviously, the bit about there being popular philosophy written around motorcycles is true, but I'm not sure that proves much?

I'm surprised you would say modern motorcycles aren't harder, honestly. Even modern bicycles are getting into the "you really can't do this without a dedicated shop" for a lot of things. Regular maintenance is easy enough. But that is true of cars. I'm always surprised when I hear folks have never changed brake pads. Drum brakes are a pain, sure, but most folks don't have drum brakes.

radiorental2• 3 years ago

Right! just last night I had a couple of free hours and thought... 'you know, I really should do a preventative valve check on my honda 450'. Youtube step by step to the right, cold beer to the left. Just bliss.

About the ECU. Bikes are becoming increasingly hobbled by emissions compliant ECUs. The aftermarket ECU options allow you to tune the bike the way you want. I'm not talking diesel-gate here either. My Honda ECU was getting me 40mpg, my aftermarket is getting 50-60 mpg but with maybe higher CO2 per gallon??? I dont understand what the rules/laws are optimising for?

HybridCurve• 3 years ago

I agree here: Cost of maintenance from time, parts, tools, space and accessibility are all lower here. Also, as a whole system, a bike is more simple than a car. The only downside I can think of is that a bike is much less forgiving to mistakes.

As a car person I am a bit envious and long for the day when cars could be smaller, cheaper, lighter, and more simple.

polartx• 3 years ago

I think you nailed it on the head. Whenever something brakes, we’re faced with basically 3 choices: fix it, pay someone to fix it, or abandon it. One of the most critical moments before a choice is made, is the problem solver mentally overcoming the problem and envisioning themselves fixing it. “How much will I have to learn?” “How much will I have to spend on tools I don’t have?”, etc.

Accessing the troublesome parts of a motorcycle is orders of magnitude easier than with a car. And few specialty tools (I can’t think of any right now) are generally required.

I owned a few motorcycles in my 20s, but sold them after my first child was born. A decade later, after a significantly challenging year, I decided to buy a motorcycle because, “I just want something to look forward to.” Beautiful days are more meaningful when the weather is granting you permission to go for a ride.

1970-01-012• 3 years ago

One time, when a customer asked him to help revive a beloved 1983 Honda Magma V45 that hadn’t been driven for two years, Crawford responded harshly: “Assuming it’s got all the usual problems from sitting, you’re looking at a thousand dollars to get it back on the road.

First, it is the Honda Magna. Second, this mechanic took him to the cleaners. The Magna isn't nearly as complex as a Goldwing. $1000 for cleaning the carbs and a new battery simply isn't honest.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7txrxM-NCc

mikestew• 3 years ago

You obviously RTFA, but it's intellectually dishonest to state that all it needs is a new battery and a little carb cleaner. Sure, you get it running, and take it down the road. Now the forks seals demonstrate that they're dried out and cracked, and leaking oil. I don't know how old the bike was at the time of writing, but let's assume 30 years old. Odds are really good that the brake lines have never been replaced. Hell, it's possible that it's riding on original tires.

As one who has made the mistake of buying a bike that had been sitting a few years, if someone asked me to ball-park an estimate, $1000 might begin to cover it. One might very well get away with less, but I wouldn't count on it for my estimate.

(And I've owned several Honda V4s over the years: those carbs do NOT come out easily, and they go back in even harder.)

1970-01-012• 3 years ago

No, "all the problems from sitting" for 2 years should not include new brake lines, forks, etc. It does need just a carb clean and battery. Over-estimates are just as bad, if not worse, for a mechanic's reputation. He either did work that did not need doing, or simply said $1000 because he didn't want that shitty job.

moudis• 3 years ago

It discounts what you're liable to run into once you start disassembling things on old bikes, really. Sometimes you discover that a previous owner or mechanic thought red Loctite belonged on the screws holding the four carburetors together[^0], and your afternoon now involves a torch and chasing threads in old aluminum carburetor bodies. Sometimes you find that the bike was last touched in an era before anyone knew what a JIS screwdriver was, and every fastener is nearly stripped. Sometimes it's not even the bike, but that the last supply for a part is some shop in Maine that just happened to hold one for two decades.

My last encounter with a VFR750 involved a heat gun and a pry-bar to remove the carburetors, they're no joke.

[^0]: I love my GS1000G, but this wasn't my favorite part of getting it roadworthy.

futureproofd• 3 years ago

Here in Ontario at least, when you transfer ownership of a bike, you have to get it certified for safety. In my case, the bike was an '81 xs400 which required a fork seal replacement and new front tire (due to side wall damage). With parts and labour I paid approximately $500. Fair enough.

Now, if he had recommended a full carb clean and battery replacement, of course that would bring the total to over $1000. Those recommendations are optional though, and your bike can live without them (if you enjoy using the kickstarter constantly ;)

stcroixx• 3 years ago

He probably also replaced all gaskets, seals, possibly even belts. Flush and replace all fluids. Just had this done to an even simpler bike for $1300.

NikolaNovak3• 3 years ago

I am not even remotely an expert, but many motorcycles I've seen that spent couple of years in the storage, let alone ones as old as that, need a lot of gaskets, seals, tubing and what-nots worked on or replaced - or at least examined/tested/cleaned. Plus you want to give a conservative estimate.

Also remember - if I am doing repairs for fun, I only count the parts cost.

But if I go to professional mechanic, it's $100/hr in labour. So $1000 might be $300 of parts and a day of labour to restore to safe operation an old motorcycle.

That is quite in line with the amount of work I've seen friends do to bring old bikes back on road (well... my friends would spend weeks and dozens of hours, but we're assuming mechanics are more efficient:)

dclowd99016• 3 years ago

Bike mechanics are in high demand and not super common. The quote he gave seemed super on point to me. It’s what I’d charge if someone asked me to do the same thing. I could probably get it running for less but it would probably continue to break down over time

blahyawnblah• 3 years ago

Couple years ago I took my friend's XR600 out for a trip. It had been sitting for a year or year and a half. Two kicks and it started. Didn't leak at all.

am44jnsf• 3 years ago

two years is really nothing. you'll have to charge the battery and change the fuel, put air in the tyres, but it'll probably ride

Swizec2• 3 years ago

My local motorcycle shop charges about $200 per mechanic hour. I would love a $1000 bill!

On the bright side, I’m learning more and more about sidewalk mechanic-ing. It’s a lot of fun. Very flow state in that way that programming just hasn’t been able to scratch in years. You go to replace some mufflers and what feels like 5 minutes was actually 2 hours.

inconceivable2• 3 years ago

the trick to wrenching on your own stuff (including home maintenance) is to take your time and never rush anything. read the directions and watch the youtube video 10x before you start. just assume it's going to take hours and hours. go to the auto parts store or amazon as many times as is needed to get it done right. get the right tools, even the cheap version will save you tons of aggravation and frustration.

a lot of younger folks are impatient (past me included) and get suboptimal results for a lot of time spent, which puts them off of doing work themselves. the irony is of course that younger folks have all the time and none of the money. they are also the ones complaining the most about how expensive home/auto/whatever services are.

this will also teach you the limits of what you actually can and can't do, so that when you do spend money on a pro it's money well spent. they also prefer to do the more complex jobs (less customer overhead, setup and cleanup time eating into margins) so it's win-win. as someone above said, they're far more efficient at the actual work but you can't make a lift go faster or shortcut any consumables used.

salonium_• 3 years ago

The article is on a collaborative online platform, so you can add comments or suggestions for corrections on the website :) https://books.worksinprogress.co/book/maintenance-of-everyth...

dwater• 3 years ago

"The carbs will need to be gone through, it’ll need new fork seals, new battery, new tires, probably new hydraulic lines, and who knows what else."

The parts for that these days would probably be over $500, and around here shop labor is $100/hr, so it would probably be more than $1000 today.

kube-system2• 3 years ago

What Motorcycles Teach About Maintenance: fuel injection is great.

marssaxman• 3 years ago

...and shaft drives are the way to ride.

bityard3• 3 years ago

As the happy rider of a 1979 Suzuki GS850G, can confirm.

kevin_thibedeau• 3 years ago

Or at least insist on a centerstand which so many modern bikes unfortunately can't fit because of their complex exhaust configurations.

throwaway5d097• 3 years ago

I abuse O-ring/X-ring chains on my dirt bikes, haven't had any failures besides a mangled master link clip I caught

mox1• 3 years ago

As a long time gear-head with lots of various engines around (cars, motorcycles, snowmobiles, etc. etc.) I would second this. Never buying a carburated thingy again. Its electric motor or fuel injection.

pibechorro• 3 years ago

Carbs are also great. My xr650r can sit in a shed for 300 years and if it was clean when stored will start up in 2 kicks or at worst in 15min after opening the bowl with one screwdriver and cleaning the jets.

There is no fuel pump to break (or weight the bike down), I could run the carb with a soda bottle if I had to. There are no complex computers to break and brick the bike.

Beyond the reliability, the real value of the carbs is the FEEL. This bike is analog, the rumbling sounds, the brilliant popping and gurgle on deceleration. Its a motorcycle, mechanical gear changes, cable operated throttle, controlled explosions.

We loose something with tft displays, riding modes, non analog throttles, and every granny safety algorithm in between our brains and the rear tire.

ben77997• 3 years ago

Car guys are almost completely unable to understand the "feel" difference you're talking about between carburetors and EFI because the car's controls are separated by so many levels from the engine and basically all street cars have such huge flywheel mass that you can't really feel what the engine is doing.

And the # of people who ever drove a car that had separate throttle butterflies + carbs for each cylinder is miniscule. Even with EFI not many people have driven a car that is built like a motorcycle. Pretty much only supercars are built that way.

Most cars with carbs seem to have had far more issues than bikes too.

kube-system2• 3 years ago

We loose something with tft displays, riding modes, non analog throttles, and every granny safety algorithm in between our brains and the rear tire.

My EFI bike has none of these.

EFI is just fuel metering. And properly designed EFI can theoretically do even better at a carb at doing what you've commanded the bike to do, because it can adjust fuel mapping in many more dimensions than a couple of needles.

I love my carb'd bike for what it is, but it ain't any better at doing what I've told it to do. It has character, and I can appreciate it for what it is, but it is not more precise or direct in feel than my EFI bike.

There is no fuel pump to break

Some carb'd bikes have fuel pumps

bee_rider• 3 years ago

I just revived a car that’d been sitting way too long, just needed a new battery and an oil change (actually, it already ran OK, but I got the oil change just in case). Fuel injection is magic. So, what car stuff has taught me about the universe is… mistreat objects, they aren’t sentient, you just make them do what you want.

Someone needs to write “Zen and the art of keeping my filesystem tidy” or “Zen and the art of keeping a rolling release distro up to date.”

luckystarr• 3 years ago

I've read ZATAOMM some time ago and remember it highlighting my bias in perception. Mostly you look at things for what "they are" or "how they look" but not "how they work" or "their potential uses". I found that quite insightful and thought it was applicable in my work as well. I can't tell if it actually was though. :)

jgust• 3 years ago

Mostly you look at things for what "they are" or "how they look" but not "how they work" or "their potential uses"

Say more. I feel I'm the exact opposite if I understand you correctly.

KineticLensman• 3 years ago

The actual quote, from the OP, is "Pirsig proposes that to become expert at keeping anything in good repair, you need to understand it in two ways—how it works and how it’s made"

This seems intuitively sensible for mechanical / physical objects, although I'm not sure how well it applies where the broken thing is software, with deep complexity and multiple layers of abstraction.

ethanbond• 3 years ago

I think the more macro point is that these are all different, equally valid, and differentially useful ways to slice the world. It's good to have a lot of different ways to slice the universe and to use them consciously and explicitly for what they're each good at.

I.e. ontologies exist in consciousnesses, not in the universe, and they're really powerful tools

ljm• 3 years ago

When I finished reading this book I felt like Johnny Truant ruminating on a non-Euclidean house.

raintrees• 3 years ago

I use metaphors like this when talking about programming: Any system of systems complex enough can easily be anthropomorphized...

But they both come back to basics: What is the overall model of how it should work? What are the symptoms? What do we know about the possible underlying causes of those symptoms? How do we design a test to see if the hypothesis is right? When we run the test, do we get confirmation, denial, or something else entirely? Did the test properly test the right thing?

And so on...

And at some point, is it worth fixing?

dclowd99016• 3 years ago

The biggest part for me is the “reducing complexity” part. What are the intended bounds of operation for this piece of the system. What upstream effects can hit it or what downstream effects can it create.

A lot of analogies here with fuel systems in cars. When a car isn’t “running right” we generally start with the basics: is it getting air, fuel and spark, and go from there.

Kapura• 3 years ago

I've been watching mechanic channels on YouTube recently when I need some background noise, and It's very interesting to see them do their once overs on the car, and hear their initial theories get confirmed or disconfirmed as they move through the vehicle. You can feel their experience for the sorts of issues that are likely or unlikely, and the focus on root cause (whether a botched repair job or something broken from the factory) is very... motivational? Difficult to describe, but it's uplifting.

One channel is mostly teardowns of different busted car engines, and as those are essentially all postmortem operations, they play out like murder mysteries as different parts of the engine face varying degrees of damage from whatever went wrong (oil starvation/clogging typically, sometimes hydrolock or more exotic combustion failures). Apart from absorbing some small amount of understanding of how internal combustion engines work, the need for regular oil changes and inspections has been impressed on me about 20x.

dclowd99016• 3 years ago

If you enjoy these, I highly recommend the show Wheeler Dealers, especially the seasons where Ant Anstead and Mark Priestly are acting as shop mechanics. Their systematic approach to diagnosis and clever problem solving are incredibly cathartic. And they’re also very good at what they do.

StayTrue2• 3 years ago

Agree the shop parts of WD are very cathartic. That contrasts with the buying/selling aspect of the show. I use the ffwd function liberally to edit episodes to half their length.

WirelessGigabit• 3 years ago

If we're talking about the same channel it also shows the fallacy of having a small engine.

A 1L 3cyl Ecoboost w/ 120hp has the same highway MPG as my 3L 6cyl w/ 340hp.

Smaller engines push in extra fuel to cool: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9aO2vC_iMTI

Retric• 3 years ago

Yea no, you misunderstood what was being described driving at normal highway speeds is a low load in his examples.

It’s more accurate to say these engines are more efficient under normal driving conditions, but have the option to be driven at high acceleration or extreme speed. Anyone can get poor gas mileage in a Prius if they drive like a race car driver, nobody has the option to drive a big V6 efficiently.

Aka Nobody publishes cannonball run fuel efficiency because that’s abnormal conditions.

bluedino• 3 years ago

I think I enjoy both hobbies because diagnosing a failure in a car is a lot like figuring out why something is broken in some program/system etc. You just get a lot dirtier working on a car.

cand0r2• 3 years ago

The Just Rolled In channel is good for a laugh. Although it is a little terrifying knowing that these people are on the road with you.

artisanspam• 3 years ago

I’m curious to hear the perspective of someone who is both into motorcycles and bicycles, as I’ve only ridden on a motorcycle a handful of times, while I cycle nearly daily.

Bicycle maintenance can be annoying, but it doesn’t seem nearly as time-intensive as motorcycle maintenance. On the other hand, the process of cycling feels better to me compared to being on a motor bike. It’s quieter, slower, and great exercise. I can talk with others. I feel as though I can get into a state of peace on lower effort rides, as well as a state of flow while racing.

jethro_tell• 3 years ago

Sometimes going fast is the point, there's a certain peace of being so fast the world can't touch you.

Sometimes going slow is the point, and there's a certain peace of be able to view and interact with the world in that way.

f001• 3 years ago

Motorcycle:

- long distance trips through N America led me close to a ton of wildlife I would not have seen or dared come close to on bicycle. Mama bears with curious cubs, moose drinking water by the roadside, wolves in one case

- allowed me to tackle trails in a day I would not be able to do on a mountain bike (eg. the trails around Moab)

- ability to go on roads Bikes are not legal (crossing the confederation bridge to get to PEI; don’t think bikes are allowed)

- ability to traverse distances equivalent to a car, but while feeling much more connected to your surroundings. Helps when you only have so much vacation time you can take.

Bicycle:

- much more enjoyable trips through Toronto via routes not possible on motorcycle (parks, ravines, etc.)

- many trails do not allow motorcycles but allow mountain bikes

- allowed a limited freedom at a young age to explore the city around me

- the wonderful post exercise feeling

xkcd-sucks• 3 years ago

Maybe bicycle racers / crazy downhill mountain bikers will disagree, but half-assed YOLO cowboy maintenance, and deferring of maintenance, feels much less risky on a bicycle than on a motorcycle.

Of course the powertrain and packing of components is orders of magnitide more complicated too, it's more similar to car maintenance that doesn't require a lift

ben77997• 3 years ago

I would count as a bicycle racer and crazy mountain biker I guess.

I think the thing is a lot of bicyclists are not really doing things half-assed YOLO style.

Bicycle mechanics are rarely really professionals. There's very little training or education requirement for being one compared to motorcycles or cars.

I have had a lot of cases where so called professional bicycle shops did work that was so bad they'd be in legal trouble if they were working on cars. And I can and do buy most of the same tools they do.

The only thing I really draw the line on is I do not do major wheel repairs or build wheels or disassemble & service hubs. Those jobs are so rare I just can't justify the space or cost for the tools. If I only need something once every 10 years I just can't see dedicating that amount of space & money to it.

ecefour2• 3 years ago

To me bicycle maintenance is tedious. It’s something I do too on keep my bike running smoothly but not something I look forward to.

Motorcycle maintenance is more rewarding. I have a 70s bike so it requires a lot of work to keep it running smoothly. Motorcycle maintenance more complex and I find far more enjoyment in it. It can be tedious, but it’s not as bad as adjusting a derailleur or lubricating a chain.

I think this article could be summarized as “problem solving offers many learning opportunities”

Fradow6• 3 years ago

I do car maintenance rather than motorcycle maintenance, but same opinion: bicycle maintenance is tedious. So tedious that beside chain greasing and tires pressure, I pay someone rather than DIY. I hate adjusting breaks or gears with a passion.

On the other hand, cars (and I assume motorcycle as well) maintenance is enjoyable: there is no fiddling with stuff, you fit it, torque it and it's good.

ben77997• 3 years ago

I kind of see it both ways. Some really complex stuff on motorcycles is incredibly time consuming & hard. The two hardest jobs I did on my motorcycles were:

First - Repairs after a big racetrack crash where the bike slid and then cartwheeled after crashing around 70mph in a corner. Bike would have been totaled for sure if it was a street crash. It took me months to fix everything considering I was working full time.

Second - Repairing a coolant leak in a horrible spot that required removal of gas tank, airbox, EFI system, etc.. massive surgery. The leak was not that bad but was driving me insane and the shops were all trying to talk me out of doing it as they said they'd charge me a lot.

Those big motorcycle maintenance jobs were insanely rewarding once complete though. And I think they cause you to really view that motorcycle as "yours".

Some bike jobs I do find tedious (cleaning) but things like adjusting a derailleur I'm so good at it I can do it in my sleep so it's quick and hard to get bothered.

Bicycle stuff that bothers me is stuff like routing internal cables or bleeding badly designed brake systems. I do tend to do those though as the shop will charge like $100/hr labor for it and tell you that you have to wait weeks for them to do it. Bicycle tools are super overpriced but they still pay for themselves after only 1-2 jobs!

Bicycle repair does not grant as much of a rewarding feeling when your done and so much bicycle stuff is throwaway. The components all wear out pretty fast and are mostly not repairable.

tonymet4• 3 years ago

I spend more time on a bicycle , including commuting , and ride a motorcycle regularly. The two hobbies complement each other well. The riding experience and maintenance skills are complementary .

Motorcycles naturally offer more range for explanation and carry more load . i use mine to discover new routes and destinations and later hit them on the bike

Motorcycle handling requires similar techniques and the mindfulness that is developed on a bike . Though handling doesn’t translate 1:1– an expert cyclist will quickly develop expert moto handling – especially off road

Maintenance has similar parallels. Bike maintenance is a great intro to moto maintenance . Troubleshooting , understanding systems , experimentation , observation , patience , using hand tools etc are all skills that are foundational for motorcycle maintenance

I would encourage every cyclist to take on motorcycle riding . Motorcycling benefits from a similar mindset and expands on the skills and experiences

Velofellow3• 3 years ago

was typing my reply before I saw your comment. Glad to see someone else being a proponent of the "do both!" camp. Happy riding.

sublimefire• 3 years ago

Motorcycles these days need little maintenance, except washing it. I know I know you need to look after the chain and do the pre-ride checks, but that is it. I own 2 motorcycles, one new and the other old. The old one needs some stuff done but I cannot do that myself because of a couple of issues: do not have a garage, do not have all the tools. The new one needs nothing, it just rides and I need to bring it for servicing once in a year.

The most annoying thing for me is that I can leave the motorcycle outside with a lock but I need to bring in my bicycle into the garden shed (it is just too light).

Bicycle on the other hand is different, it is much easier to get a puncture, the bolts get lose, it wears off much more quickly. You can also fix it in your home, e.g. change tubes and tires easily.

Velofellow3• 3 years ago

Very much into both!

I'm at an extreme end on of the cycling hobby by hours spent on the bike and miles covered (mountain biking, road biking, racing) and currently ride a very modern, and very red Italian sport bike - just for pleasure on quiet roads, no commuting or errand running. From a maintenance perspective given my use patterns (~8,000 miles/year human powered, ~4,000 miles moto powered) I'm wrenching, fixing, replacing parts far more often on my bicycles. An absolute money pit, but one that gives me the best emotional and physical ROI. YMMV but my experience with modern motorcycles has been they are almost shockingly reliable given their power output, electrical and rider aid improvements, etc.

I've had vintage motorcycles that required more tinkering which is engaging in its own right but am thankful modern tech has gotten to a point where I'm not constantly doing maintenance on my entire two wheeled fleet. I get my joy from the use of the machine, rather than the upkeep. I'm eternally grateful to those who view things the other way. My preference is to wrench on bicycles though, mainly because of their relative simplicity and limited number of specialty tools required. With 2mm-8mm allen keys, and a small screw driver you can do most basics of maintenance. Not counting suspension service, bearing service, and the like.

Side note: Being deep into both worlds I feel that my bike (motorcycle) handling skills have vastly improved because of my mountain biking: Body positioning, threshold braking, leaning the bike independently of the body vs. leaning with the bike etc. Curious if anyone else here has had that same realization. I've tried converting some cycling team mates to the moto world... few takers but I believe there is true cross-training to be had there.

dahart• 3 years ago

I’m into all things two-wheeled, have done lots of road & mountain biking on bicycles, and road & dirt motorcycling. I’ll share my perspective, and apologize in advance for the length. I wouldn’t put them on a single 1D spectrum and presume to call one better than another, for me they all serve rather different functions. I’d completely agree with the advantages you list for road bikes, I just think there are other different advantages for mountain bikes, dirt bikes (off-road motorcycles), and road motorcycles.

Road motorcycling, especially if you can fix anything on the motorcycle, comes with a strong sense of freedom compared to car driving, and it’s for traveling longer distances. There’s an aspect of shedding all your dependencies, not needing to rely on a huge machine that you can’t fix, but still being able to go fast & far. Weird analogy, but I find it similar to long distance running - there’s a threshold for me above about 15 or 20 miles where it suddenly starts to feel like I can go anywhere with my feet.

Dirt biking is technical motorcycling, shares some aspects of downhill mountain biking, but requires a lot of very different skills from any other kind of riding. Learning those skills is really fun, and being able to get far out into the wilderness and access places you can’t go by any other means is also very fun. The technical riding requires a lot more simultaneous clutch, brake, and throttle work than road riding, and I find it similar in certain ways to playing the drums in the sense that you need a lot of body awareness and the ability to do things with hands and feet at the same time. Technical uphill riding is very different from downhill and/or mountain biking. BTW technical dirt biking can be insane amounts of exercise. Some dirt moto rides I’ve done are equivalent to doing 50-100 miles with big climbs on a bicycle, everyone in the group burned thousands of calories and started bonking by the end. Can’t talk while you ride, but it’s very social; riding with others is an absolute must, there’s planning beforehand, there’s lots of stoping and talking, and you can end up with a lot of camaraderie when working through difficult features and pushing your abilities or helping others.

Mountain biking has all the advantages you mentioned for cycling, it can quiet and serene. Even better than road biking sometimes since you don’t have to deal with traffic. I usually ride with others, but sometimes alone is very zen. There’s anything from riding dirt roads, to cross-country single track through the forest, to adrenaline: technical downhill or mountain bike park with jumps. Fabulous exercise, and a great way to experience the outdoors.

For the maintenance question, I’d say I probably spend as much or more time on bicycle maintenance, but it’s mainly because I currently ride bicycles much more frequently. The maintenance tasks are smaller, shorter, and simpler, but need doing more often. Cleaning, chain & joint lube, and fixing flats is the majority of bicycle maintenance. I bled my mountain bike brakes once, and that was pretty involved for a noob, required a special kit & a couple hours. The moto maintenance tasks take longer per session, they’re more difficult, and require more tools and knowledge, but they’ve been less frequent. Changing oil, bleeding shocks, fixing electrical, replacing parts. A tire/tube change on a bicycle is a 5 minute task, while a tire change on a motorcycle can easily take an hour or two if you try to do it yourself with tire irons (not recommended!). The big stuff goes to a professional mechanic, of course.

ben77997• 3 years ago

I don't motorcycle anymore but did for a long time and did both a huge amount of riding and some very serious maintenance jobs. I have kept bicycling thousands of miles a year since. In the past I did a bunch of different types of bicycle racing. Never did motorcycle racing but I did go to quite a few track days.

In general with a few exceptions everything on motorcycles is far more competently engineered.

Bicycle manufacturers brag about engineering a lot but actually seem to employ very few engineers. The bicycle industry is still re-engineering things like brakes over and over when all those lessons were learned on motorcycles decades ago and the bike companies could have copied almost all of it from motorcycles.

There's just a lot of stuff on bicycles where the tools are more expensive than the motorcycle equivalents and the maintenance procedures are more annoying. Motorcycle brakes are a great example. Things are relatively standard and all the tools are affordable and the maintenance procedures are great. Do the same job on hydraulic disc brakes on a bicycle and it's all terrible. Tools cost 3x more and might be vendor specific, procedures are terrible because of the design of the brakes, and the job probably takes longer.

You can go spend more on a Trek or a Specialized than a lot of motorcycles at this point. Other than the amount of carbon fiber there is almost no justification for the price, especially since 99% of the bicycle is outsourced.

I always found the education level among motorcyclists in terms of how a bike actually rides much higher. The % of "expert cyclists" who understand basics like counter steering is shockingly low, and bicyclists are far more likely to have poor understanding of how to ride in traffic safely. Mostly because motorcycling actually has a training & education system. I always felt like motorcycling actually taught me more about bicycling than the reverse.

Velofellow3• 3 years ago

Absolutely agree with the high end bike vs. motorcycle cost analysis. My new, but prior floor year Ducati was roughly the same price as either of S-works mountain bikes. Sorta crazy to the uninitiated. Or anyone.

I have a pet theory, that the proliferation of top-shelf Class 1/pedal assist Ebikes ($14-15k) has given manufacturers the green light to raise prices on top of all the covid supply chain gremlins. The number of $10k analogue mountain bikes has blown up in the past 3 years.

I do wonder how any cost impact that comes from miniaturization of bicycle components (coupled with smaller production quantities using composites) looks compared to their moto counterparts. Offering the same bike frame with 5+ different component builds must have some cost ramifications with supply chain management in buying /allocating groupsets & components en masse. It does seem like the mountain bike market has matured a bit: fewer radical yearly geometry changes, more streamlining and sensible, incremental changes. Just my thoughts as a voracious consumer of bike stuff. I'm all for a standardizing brake bleed ports and hydraulic maintenance - mineral oil please!

It's funny, I've anecdotally noticed the opposite here in Austin. The number of motorcycle riders who clearly have no concept of handling a moto seems to outnumber the people acting the same way on bicycles. Can't speak to your locale, but Austin certainly has a strong cycling community with lots of proficient riders; I think I'm also in a bit of a filter bubble with my riding crew.

taeric13• 3 years ago

I'm curious if they really could just copy something from the motorcycle world? In particular, I would imagine that the constraints on weight and power that can be applied by the user are very very different.

StayTrue2• 3 years ago

The author also cites sailors Knox-Johnston and Moitessier. I learned about both here on HN and found their respective books bingeworthy.

dmckeon• 3 years ago

I expected the writer's footnote regarding organ donation to be anecdotal, but was surprised to find studies confirming a small, but significant basis in fact: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/articl... https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33334475/ https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/motorcycle-rallies-and-o...

bityard3• 3 years ago

People in the medical field refer to motorcycle riders pejoratively as "organ donors".

Which is fair, given how most riders I see out on the road have zero concern for their own safety, let alone others.

BluePen75• 3 years ago

Even as a rider myself, just seeing how others ride I'd agree.

If you're going to go twice the speed people are expecting a vehicle to go, in a space nobody expected a vehicle to fit, in a vehicle that offers none of the usual protections, your luck may run out sooner than average.

It's frustrating because everyone wanted to cite the statistics at me when I started riding, but I just wished I could get those stats filtered by people who ride in a civilized manner.

bertil• 3 years ago

The motocycle maintenance metaphor was very popular at Facebook.

Talking loudly about your accomplishment too, on the dedicated Workspace/Facebook @ Work—too much to the taste of several of my colleagues.

Someone once connected the two. They did so using a metaphor that compared the sound at the end of the digestive tube with the exhaust. I won’t repeat it here, but thought it was clever.

intrasight• 3 years ago

In Pirsig’s book there is never a mention of the make and model of his motorcycle.

This past weekend I was on a road trip to South Carolina. On the way, most every motorcycle that I saw was a BMW. I told my girlfriend after seeing the Nth that it can't be a coincidence, and I went and found out there was a BMW motorcycle rally taking place that weekend. Anyway, seeing some old BMWs made me remember the book, and I mentioned it to my GF. She had read it too but may years ago like myself - like 40 years ago. But one thing that I had remembered was that the bike was a BMW.

After reading the above quoted line about Pirsig not mentioning the make, I looked it up, and I had to reset my memory. It's the Sutherland's who are riding a BMW, and they don't have an interest initially in doing any of their own maintenance. Well, at least I remembered that there was a BMW in the story. ;)

squalo4• 3 years ago

I wondered why the guy who published chapter 2 didn't talk about the other couple's resistance to maintaining their bike and Pirsig's take on that.

silisevic• 3 years ago

In TFA there is a photo of Pirsig and his son on their motorcycle taken by Sylvia Sutherland, with this legend: "Robert Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is a novelized account of a real road trip he took in 1968 with his troubled 11-year-old son Chris. Over the course of a month, they traveled 5,700 miles from Twin Cities, Minnesota, to San Francisco and back. His motorcycle was a 1966 Honda CB77F Super Hawk, Honda’s first sport bike. The model’s speed, power, and reliability made it a standard-setter for modern motorcycles."

Also, this: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/cycle...

tonymet4• 3 years ago

There is a major step change in maintenance difficulty from motorcycles to cars .

motorcycles are more exposed and intimate so it’s easier to detect issues earlier .

Modern cars have adopted more non-user-serviceable tech. Intermediate procedures like clutch replacement , brake maintenance , tune ups are accessible to beginners on a motorcycle .

in general motorcycle maintenance is more accessible due to the open drive train, smaller footprint and user-serviceable technology .

For those discouraged to put their life in their own hands – it’s much riskier to put your life into someone else’s . You can mitigate the risks with checklists and solid testing procedures . Trust me , you will develop safety and quality standards that are much more rigorous than a shop .

taeric13• 3 years ago

Careful, there. Modern motorcycles are probably beyond many home mechanics, as well. Similarly, if it is for the hobby, older cars are fine.

And if you don't trust the shop you are taking your vehicle to for rigorous standards, you should probably look into a different shop. :(

tonymet4• 3 years ago

can you be more specific ? what systems?

slicktux• 3 years ago

I recently took a car in for a clutch master cylinder replacement. It’s was for a Honda with a 4cylinder and it was buried inside the engine cabin below hydraulic ABS and the Break Master Cylinder; I’m mechanically inclined but this time I was too busy to make time for replacing it myself.

I get the car back and the idle is rough…it stalls (car is running lean)when disengaging the clutch and oddly enough brake booster vacuum is completely lost when it stalls…(not normal as breaking should work for a couple of pumps before stiffening the pedal). Almost crashed…

Anyhow I open the hood check all vacuum hoses for cracks or improper connections. Long story short the mechanic forgot to put the break master cylinders coupling gasket back on the brake booster was letting in unmeasured air causing it to lean and stall; which also caused me to loose breaking when stalled. Worst case scenario.

Honest mistake probably but I feel like the shop mechanic may have been rushing and completely messed up. Luckily I caught it. So yea I don’t trust most shops mechanics…

avmich• 3 years ago

Maintainers learn to be causation experts when dealing with repair. They build two narratives, one for finding the problem, and one for solving the problem.

I'd prefer to have those narratives delivered as part of the product when maintainer is hired.

unregistereddev• 3 years ago

Having tried to read Persig's Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, I struggle to understand the book's popularity. The more I read the more I was convinced it was not the work of a healthy mind. Maybe he was schizophrenic? Wikipedia says yes, he was.

As someone who enjoys working on my own car and motorcycle - and as someone who does find a certain zen in maintaining the machines that I own - the book was a profound disappointment. Instead of finding philosophical insight from a relatable perspective, I found the ungrounded ramblings of a man who is seeking to understand a world which only quite exists inside his own mind.

dole• 3 years ago

Zen was published in 1974, and I believe followed [cashed in on] the motorcycle boom from the late-50's to early-70's. Chopper, motorcycle gang, and greaser culture was just starting to fade and by the time it was published, those reformed 50's and 60's hoodlums were coming of age.

cand0r2• 3 years ago

What stuck with me (I couldn't finish it either) was the difference between the main character and his friend's attitude to maintenance issues. Specifically the soda can shim situation. His friend had a loose handle bar or something, and the solution was a metal shim. The friend refused to "use trash as a shim" (a piece of aluminum can) and would rather pay someone at a shop to fix it. That sort of world view is something that always really irked me, but I never know how to describe it.

KerryJones• 3 years ago

I think the problem is you didn't finish the book. It pretty directly answers your question and dives deeper into philosophy than many philosophy courses do... it sounds like you quit too early. I agree that the early rambling was a bit hard to deal with.

motohagiography• 3 years ago

I maintain my motorcycles but the romance around it is just a way to moralize fixing the consequences of my own negligence and incompetence:) That said, there's a life or death gravity to it, as the failure mode of a bike in motion can get a bit runny - and the romance is an instance of the idea that physical competence is fundamentally moral, which goes back to the stoics and Aristotle, and it underpins a lot of the hacker ethic.

The shortest summary of it I could describe is from the concept of "trueness," where you have a wheel or a reference point, a straight edge, or even just geometry, so you can physically apprehend what something is supposed to do as an objective ideal, and then you use that reference to reason, refine, and gauge your effort against it. Like the process of truing a wheel. Once you have an idea of what the perfect case is, chosing to align to that case is essentially moral.

In the case of a motorcycle, someones life depends on the integrity of your alignment to ensuring the trueness of the moving parts together. The effect of people generally choosing this now-moral alignment to precise measures and ideals produces desirable outcomes. This is what I think makes bike maintenance and other physical competencies philosophical, as their logic translates into metaphors pretty seamlessly.

Great article anyway. His comment on the public good of providing live saving organs is funny and accurate:

The supply of organs and tissue from motorcycle riders has gone up in recent decades, especially in the 22 states that still don’t have helmet laws.

It's why EMT's call them donor-cycles.

squalo4• 3 years ago

As someone who read Zen the first time many years ago, the book talks about the joy you get from seeing the world on a motorcycle (or bicycle) over being in a tank like car where you don't fully experience your environment. At its heart though, Pirsig used the concept of motorcycle maintenance as an examination of quality, value, and what brings people fulfillment. It takes a meandering path to get there which is probably why so many people don't finish it. The most memorable thing in the book for me was the topic of gumption and how it can so easily be destroyed. In my work in tech, gumption traps are everywhere. Reading this book made me recognize them so that I could logically decide my next action rather than making an emotional decision.

I wish I was articulate enough to properly detail how really interesting the book is even for someone who has absolutely zero interest in maintaining a combustion engine

detourdog2• 3 years ago

The book was on the recommended list for second year Industrial Design students at my school. The discussion on quality is why it was there.

apsurd• 3 years ago

can you talk more about gumption (inspiration) traps you experienced at work? i take this to mean some powers-that-be destroyed internal motivations you had?

also curious to hear your learnings on holding onto inspiration.

squalo4• 3 years ago

I have a lot of examples. I'd love to tell the most recent one but its specific enough to possibly be identified. Instead I'll travel back in time a bit.

I was lead infrastructure engineer for middleware at a large retail company. When I started, they were just starting a project to roll out a content management system. Because they didn't have expertise in house at kickoff, they paid the vendor to do the infrastructure design. The visio drawing was delivered to me when I started for review. Despite the guy who drew it supposedly being an expert from the vendor, it was missing two of the most vital components in the drawing. He'd also asked for a total of over 30 physical machines which was way over the capacity that was needed then (or now). I setup a meeting with the Enterprise Architect who was heading the project. He didn't know anything about the solution and was the one who had suggested they hire the vendor to do the design. I explained to him the issues with the design and suggested a different design. I explained how the vendor charged by vcpu so implementing this overkill of a solution would result in millions of unnecessary dollars being spent. His response was "they've already budgeted the money so we should spend it while we've got it." I said ok and that was the end of the meeting.

I had already drawn out my corrected design and I assigned my team to build my design. This was 2012 and outside of a hardware refresh and updates/upgrades, that design is still in place and still being used. The company has saved millions in licensing fees and they don't even know it.

Most people would have just gone ahead and built it as told. My inspiration was to always do the right thing. It was obvious to me that the EA didn't have that same motivation.

Animats• 3 years ago

One aspect of maintenance is understanding the mindset of the original designer. This is pleasant for very well designed machinery. Here's a long description of a Teletype restoration I did a decade ago.[1] Mostly this is about the mechanical processes, but sometimes I wrote about the thinking behind the design.

Teletypes were originally rented, with maintenance included. So they were intended to be reliable and repairable, and capable of a long life with periodic maintenance. All parts outside the motor are individually replaceable. Parts were treated against corrosion by Parkerizing, a chemical treatment involving hot caustic baths that leaves a rust-resistant coating. Few parts are unreasonably tiny, so you don't need tweezers and magnifiers. This did result in a bulkier machine than really necessary. Most moving parts are powered in one direction and spring return in the other direction. If something sticks, that doesn't cause further damage. Almost every screw has a lock washer. One of the few exceptions was due to a drafting error, as I mention in my writeup.

Mechanism design balances size, cost, ease of repair, wear, and lubrication requirements. The number of people really good at that is not large. All the good Teletype machines were designed by two men, Howard Krum and, later, Ed Klienschmidt. There were some other, inferior designs best forgotten. (The Teletype Model 26 was what happened when management wanted a cheaper machine than the classic Model 15. Many Model 15 machines are still running; few Model 26 machines are. And the Model 26 turned out to be no cheaper to make.)

Once you can appreciate this, you'll see good and bad mechanical designs more clearly. It's clearer in the mechanical realm than the software realm, because failure is more obvious.

[1] http://brassgoggles.co.uk/forum/index.php?topic=43672

eternityforest• 3 years ago

Mechanical design is just orders of magnitude harder than software or electronics. Those are 2D, and largely 1D, and in software there is no concept of tolerance, wear, or yield.

Fradow6• 3 years ago

A lot of things have left me a bit flustered, to the point I assume the main reason it has been done like this is that parts where taken from a parts bin from the manufacturer and cobbled together to work.

There are a few examples on my car like that that are a bit infuriating (and were corrected on later revisions of the model, which I know because a friend has a later revision).

tylervigen• 3 years ago

While not the key point of the article, if this made you at all curious about engine maintenance then I would recommend checking out howacarworks.com

It was posted here a while back and I’ve been enjoying the detailed build up.

paddy_m• 3 years ago

I wish I could find a good enduro (KTM, Beta, Sherco) or motocross bike (KTM, Honda, Yamaha, Kawasaki) with zerk fittings for the suspension. The expectation is that you take apart the whole suspension and grease it every 25-50 hours.

mitchbob• 3 years ago

By Stewart Brand, editor of the Whole Earth Catalog, author of The Media Lab, co-founder of the Long Now Foundation, one of Ken Kesey's Merry Pranksters, assistant to Douglas Engelbart on The Mother of All Demos, and subject of the recent film We Are as Gods. Glad to see he's still busy!

talldatethrow2• 3 years ago

I'm about as diy shade tree mechanic as it gets. Every car my extended family owns is over 200k miles, and we havent paid for a mechanic in over 25 years. I do it all, from general maintenance to swapping or rebuilding an automatic transmission.

A motorcycle actually taught me my main lesson of maintenance: sometimes it's just better to leave a well working system alone instead of servicing it for fun. I once did a task that was 2x behind schedule, and while doing so exposed a problem that almost caused it to fail hard the following weeks commute. If I had done that before a long trip, it would have been a serious problem.

I told this story to a prior air force mechanic and he laughed. He told me the military learned long ago that there is a limit to preemptive maintenance such that the likelyhood of problems from human error and just chance overshadows the benefit of the preemptive maintenance. I now no longer do any "might as well!" maintenance at all, and never do major maintenance before a trip without a good chunk of time prior devoted to road testing the vehicle again before the trip.

talldatethrow2• 3 years ago

A seasoned mechanic told me the 3 stages of a mechanics career progress.

1st a mechanic learns to fix things without breaking things along the way.

2nd a mechanic learns to do things quickly.

3rd a mechanic learns to do things without getting dirty.

What motorcycles teach about maintenance

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