Oldfeller said:
Add Bigzuk to the tally sheet as being "up there" -- we got us an extra hotel room "maybe" available and we got us a mixed bag of folks some showing up at the Gap and some at Toymakers, some camping, some not.  And everything is rapidly changing as the GO date Friday 6/26 approaches -- 14 days left to go.

Sounds all confusing to me -- but I'm easily confused anyway  (hee hee)

You guys that are coming in late to the program you need to get up with Toymaker about your souvenir shirt should you want one.   You need to make some arrangements with Toymaker, you do or you will be shirtless and unfed if you don't get up with the man what's in charge (Toymaker).   PM him.  Get a response from him.  Watch this thread and post occasionally so folks will think you are still coming.

You also need to ring in with Toymaker if you want to be eating with the group at the Gap Hotel as we will be buying groceries at Granite Falls and bringing them up with us -- obviously we need us an accurate mouth count to be buying them groceries for or mistakes will be made (gasp).  

I've PM'ed Toymaker about a t-shirt and to let him know I'll be camping so I'm OK with my own bed and meals.

Thanks,
Bigzuk

Please reserve for me one of your finer slumber vestibules and a clean plate.  My native guide will also need a place to flop and a crust of bread.  or vice versa.

Pre-trip maintenance item (recommended that you do it now at home)


Your foot peg threaded pins live under a chromed plastic glory cap that faces to the front.  You will get the glory caps off with a knife (and likely tear them up doing so but you are going to trash them anyway so don't sweat it)

Your footpeg pins are likely corroded in place.  Sorry, but there was no grease put into the joint by the factory and that glory cap isn't water proof -- so you have XX years of corrosion living in that joint plus the fretting from the pegs rotating on the pin making little raised corrosion lumps that tells the pin it ain't coming out of that hole.

Spray it with good WD-40 or Kroil and let it sit overnight.  Break it free with the allen wrench and exercise it back & forth some without unthreading it and spray it again with WD-40 and let it soak again to soften up the hard lumps before trying to remove the pins.  Exercise it as you untread it attempting to break up the corrosion lumps as much as you can.   Push down on the footpeg to increase the lump scraping power of the joint itself as you exercise and remove the threaded pin.

The right side is easy, you can get to the back side of the threaded part of the fastener and push it out with a punch once it runs out of threads.   Be careful not to lose the funny little adapter thingie that lives on the right side -- it is held in place by the pin and falls off in the grass when your back is turned.  YOU NEED IT so remove it carefully noting the orientation of the little adapter part.

Getting the left side out is a lot more fun as the threaded faster is enclosed with solid cast steel and the threads run out before you can grab on to the fastener.   There is no way to access the back side of the threaded pin with a punch.  Tease it out using the square short end of your allen wrench putting it into a hex bind by levering at it.  Rotate while levering the allen wrench and pulling up/out on the wrench at the same time.   Now you see why I said soak it twice to soften up the corrosion lumps ....  (BTW there is no adapter thingie on the left side, the steel casting itself does the same job)

Clean the rust and crap off your parts.  Clean the gross rust off your pin but don't sand it excessively as it is plated to hold corrosion down.

Put your stuff back together using lots of Never-Seize or lots of heavy grease if you don't have Never-Seize at hand.

Why are you doing this now?   Imagine fiddling with those stubborn rusted connections lying on your side in the wet grass up on the Blue Ridge Parkway with no WD-40 and no time to let it soak thru the nasty mess.   (voice of experience speaking -- we did it last time)

I filled my allen head joint area plumb up with Never-Seize to make sure that no water makes it past the head of the pin and gets into the joint again.  Yeah, I know water can spray into the joint 3 different ways from the bottom, etc but that is why you were generous gooping in the Never-Seize (or heavy grease as the case may be)

When I go horizontal and bust my pegs off it will be an easy quick job to get my pins out and my new pegs replaced instead of being a royal pain in the ass.

<grin>

How about you and your pins?   How badly corroded were yours?

me  too.extra plug modded bike that is.

meant to say the extra plug has it's own pair of wheels now.

Houston, we have a go to commence final count-down.


Start final count down  .... now!


10 ....

9 .....