What did you do with your ST1100/ST1300 today?

Put new tires on my '91 1100, new seals in rear brake caliper, new "O" rings in rear drive, removed the Moly Grease on the splines (they look brand new) and replaced with Moly Paste, new rear brake pads. The rear rotor was scored and worn badly but I lucked out and found an OEM one, still in the original Honda packaging on CL in Talahassee for $75, WOOHOO!
 
Any excuse to ride, today's version. Hit a deer on Monday, so my wife's car is at the body shop and I had been driving her around today In my truck. She had left her credit card carrying case at the hair salon, maybe 12 miles from home. Asked me if I'd mind going to get it (they called to tell her, she hadn't missed it yet). I of course took the "ST long way", with plenty of curvy country roads then diverted even further east when I caught up to a line of slow pokes. Crossed into King George County then backtracked on 218 to White Oak Hair Cuttery.

Retrieved it and called her to let her know (Sena rocks). She just ordered wings from the Buffalo Wild Wings (Garrisonville Road) in the complete opposite direction, would I mind picking those up? So, I enjoyed 40-some miles of 43 degree sunny day riding and returned home just in time to see the start of the Steelers game against the Dirty Birds.

I didn't mind one bit!
 
It was just one of those days. Of all the highlighs glimpsed today, this was only the one I stopped to snap. I'm sad you're missing more. Up ahead the Port Townsend Ferry, Mr. Rainier off to the south, and on Madrona Way here, over my bike to the north, Mr. Baker. Off to the northwest, the San Juan Islands, and reaching southwest, the waterside twisties along Hood Canal. As I say, it was just one of those days.

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Styles
 
New rubber day for the '96. I decided to hold off on getting the new tires installed since these still have decent tread and aren't unreasonably old. Until this covid thing abates, I'm not planning anything further than local exploring, so these are fine.

 
Installed 2" Rox risers and took them for a test ride.

I previously had 1" of rise from the flip-clip mod, but I have short arms and was wanting for just a little more. The 2" risers are a good compromise between steering effort and comfort.

I had to reroute the clutch and brake lines.


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Front and rear wheels back on. Front straight forward as usual. The rear wheel takes some patience and some fiddling. What I've always loved about Honda is that things are engineered to actually go back together every time! I say this from 50 years of working on bikes of all flavours.
 
New front wheel brngs. New tires,(cheap winter tires) built new over mirror brackets for clearwaters. Ready for winter riding.
 
I took the wife out for a night ride (we live in Florida) to check out the local Christmas decorations. She is in her high stress mode during the Holiday Season (Oct. 31 - Jan 2) and riding pillion always allows her to chill and relax. The ride went relatively well except at one point where some @ss-hat in a pick-up truck, whose family tree must resemble a corn stalk, passed us on the right shoulder as we were riding in the right lane on US1. We were going 50 mph, he was going about 75, there was no traffic in the left lane, *****? Anyway, when we got home and I turned off the ignition, a huge cloud of steam billowed up from underneath the forks. Immediately employing its' death grip on the obvious my tiny brain bubbled up the thought "well that can't be good", quickly followed by "thank you God for getting us home!"
So yesterday I pulled the plastics and found some coolant droplets around the thermostat housing area. I had replaced all of the coolant hoses earlier this year, including the elbow fittings under the carbs so I didn't expect there to be a compromised hose. The overflow reservoir was full to the top, hmmm, not how I left it. I took off the radiator cap and found a large deposit of debris on the left side of the area where the cap seats and jamming (I assume) the cap spring in the open position allowing the reservoir to fill with coolant. All of this is a long way to say that I found another alternate radiator cap to the expensive OEM. I called O'Reily's looking for a Stant 11233 or 11242 but he doesn't carry Stant products, he sells Murray brand which he cross referenced to a number 7516. $9.60 with tax and it seems to work fine, also, it is made in Mexico NOT China which to me is A VERY GOOD THING right about now.
 
I locked @Igofar to his telephone all day yesterday. (Well, from 1pm - 9:30pm CT -- so we can call it *all* day.)
My SMC came in almost 2 weeks ago, and I finally carved out time to git 'er done. Had planned for Saturday, but I got called out for a pc job Saturday just as we were about to begin.
So why so long?
1. Garage is stuffed and I didn't have adequate walk-around-the-bike room.
2. Due to the cramped workspace, I kicked over my brake fluid catch jar at least twice.
3. It was my first time not only replacing the SMC, but bleeding the brakes.
4. I wore out Larry's phone at least once, so he had to recharge.
5. I'm just plain old slow, and I am somewhat meticulous in these things.
6. I had initially left too much hose between the bleed nipple and the Motion Pro tool.
7. At some point I took a break to eat supper upstairs with my wife.
8. I had to keep moving the worklight from side to side, in addition to myself and my tools.
9. I also kept laying things down and forgetting which end of the bike and which side of the bike I last used it.
10. And lastly, I so enjoyed talking to Larry that I didn't want to let him go.
That's my story, and I'm sticking to it!
And just for fun, I noticed my rear tire had gone flat since I rode it about 2 weeks ago.
So here's another project.
Mucho thanks-a-ton's to @Igofar for his limitless patience, and his giving spirit!
Part below is for my 2008 ST1300.ST1300 SMC.jpg
 
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