New bikes start to trickle in!
THIS MONTH I HAVE MOSTLY BEEN… “Starting to count the days...”
It won’t be too long now until it’s time for me and the MT to part company. Thus far it’s been a real blast, as anyone reading (or watching on YouTube or wherever) will have doubtless realised. I’m also pretty satisfied with how she’s turned out too, after all the modifications. She comes well stacked out of the box, of course, you almost wouldn’t want for any more. She’s fully filthy for starters, up for a serious roll in the hay and can bang all night long. But there’s little doubt the make-up is a little smudged in places, there’s a bit of sag here and there she could do with losing, and there are areas in which she would benefit from a touch more class.
All of those frayed edges, I think, we’ve made smarter and more defined via the chassis and braking mods. Looks-wise, well, one man’s (or woman’s...) hottie can easily be another’s nottie, so I’ll leave it up to you to decide whether or not the MT’s visage floats your boat. I actually quite like it, minus the screen I fitted though. As I’ve said before, it does a job, but it makes it look too much like an Adventure machine for my liking.
But we still have at least a couple of months left together, so it’s time to do some more bits and pieces, plus put her up against (what I think is) her nemesis. First thing first, though, which is getting that M4 exhaust fitted, the one that’s been teasing me whenever I pop up to JHS Racing, sitting there on the shelf, being all alluring, whispering soft nothings, the littleminx. I’ll need an extra switch from Dynojet so we can map two modes, too, as it’s time to get that naughty full-beans B-Mode playing ball. Then when that’s completed, we’re finally done on the power chase, althoug gh I’ll admit to being more than happy with the current SP Engineering can and y-piece, Dynojet PCV and JHS James’ superb fuelling-map, which produces just over 150bhp, with huge gains across the range on both power and torque.
Chassis-wise, we’re there now. As I said last month, I did flirt with the idea of going for Nitron’s fork kit to supplement the rear shock we fitted. But having now ridden it a lot, the front (sporting James’ static set-up) is bang on, I don’t want for any more. Sure, it would definitely get even better and far more sophisticated if I did decide last-minute to go down that route, but adding any more ‘spend’ to the MT would ruin what I have planned.
And that’s to stick her head-to-head against that aforementioned nemesis – the Yamaha MT-10 SP. Yes, that machine is indeed a direct rival for the stock bike. Okay, the 2017 stocker has a quickshifter and a few minor tweaks, but it is £799 more expensive (£10,799) than the original. The SP is £13,399, and the mods I’ve made to this MT are around about that difference. But which is better? My MT has some upgrades the SP doesn’t, even with its flashy electronic Öhlins suspension. After hearing about the bike from the launch, I reckon mine might, just possibly, be a little better. Or at the very least, a viable alternative to going la route SP. Anyway, I’ll get around to that at some point.
Before then, though, there’s some boring (but essential) maintenance to do. The chain has seen better days, winter has not been kind, so I’m going to do a guide on how to bring a seemingly knackered chain back to life. Additionally, there is, sadly, some mild corrosion here and there (another bane of continuous winter usage), like on the oil-cooler and a few other places. So I’ll also be doing a guide to ridding yourself of that, too. I had kept relatively up on keeping it drenched in protective juices, but even then sometimes that pesky corrosion gets its foot in the door. Even a modern bike is built to a cost, so it can happen, but we’ll see what we can do to lessen the effect and get her back into tip-top, ship-shape (and Bristol) fashion.