My buyer's remorse

pwatts · 08-21-2009, 7:50 AM

After my previous blade got totalled when it fell off a trailer, I thought I'd be clever and buy a used one with a little damage and use the cash difference from the insurance to get it kitted out. Got this one, 2007 with 12,000km and a small slide. Owner decided to rather get a Chinese aftermarket fairing on eBay than fixing the damaged ones, and this flamy thing was the result. I thought I'd be able to look past the flames but oh no, El Flamo (laughing stock of my friends) really shines in the sun. But the worst is that these fairings are made of an inferior plastic, with the result that where the two side panels join below the exhaust headers, the whole thing has begun to melt and warp (visible in the pic). This is despite plenty of heat shielding, and after it's been running it produces the nastiest molten rubber odour. On the dyno it kicks out 5hp below my previous blade and even less than the other blades on the same dyno database, and during constant revs the transmission feels jerky (similar to chain slack, but I think it's probably an injector problem).
So long story short, this piece of sh#te is getting parked at a dealer next month, all the mods and bits swopped over to a different blade with less intrusive damage, and the old one left on the floor for whatever I get for it. Oh the remorse..

pwatts · 08-21-2009, 7:55 AM

After my previous blade got totalled when it fell off a trailer, I thought I'd be clever and buy a used one with a little damage and use the cash difference from the insurance to get it kitted out. Got this one, 2007 with 12,000km and a small slide. Owner decided to rather get a Chinese aftermarket fairing on eBay than fixing the damaged ones, and this flamy thing was the result. I thought I'd be able to look past the flames but oh no, El Flamo (laughing stock of my friends) really shines in the sun. But the worst is that these fairings are made of an inferior plastic, with the result that where the two side panels join below the exhaust headers, the whole thing has begun to melt and warp (visible in the pic). This is despite plenty of heat shielding, and after it's been running it produces the nastiest molten rubber odour. On the dyno it kicks out 5hp below my previous blade and even less than the other blades on the same dyno database, and during constant revs the transmission feels jerky (similar to chain slack, but I think it's probably an injector problem).
So long story short, this piece of sh#te is getting parked at a dealer next month, all the mods and bits swopped over to a different blade with less intrusive damage, and the old one left on the floor for whatever I get for it. Oh the remorse..