My New Laptop

A couple of weeks ago I bought myself a new laptop as a self-congratulatory birthday prezzie. I've got a work laptop, but it's a bit large and heavy for my purposes. The one I ended up getting was the Asus Eee 1005PE with Windows 7 Starter Edition. I got the black one but it also comes in white. It has a 10.1-inch screen, a 250GB hard drive, a 1.66GHz processor and 1GB of RAM (upgradable to 2GB). It also has a six cell battery and is notable for the very long battery life, which to me is one of the most important aspects. As with most small laptops there is no optical drive; there are three USB ports plus the usual essentials.

So after starting it up for the first time I proceeded to delete all the crapware that is part and parcel of all new computers. This forum thread was a great help. They try to sell you Microsoft Office when you buy the machine, and even if you decline (as I did) a trial version is pre-installed. I consider trial versions of everything to be crapware, so I said goodbye to this and numerous other 'user empowering' rubbish.

A list of free applications under Windows 7 is given in this thread. With help from the list, I ended up installing the following.

Internet: Firefox, Utorrent, Bit Torrent
Office: Open Office, Abiword, MikTeX, TeXnicCenter, R
Audio: Audacity, Foobar2000, iTunes
Video: Any Video Converter, GOM, VLC, Movie Maker
Images: GIMP, Picasa, FastStone, Photoscape
Viewers: Foxit, Ghostscript, Ghostview
Tools: IZArc, K-Lite Codecs, PdfCreator, Security Essentials

After buying a dongle I'm now fully internet mobile!

PW: Guard of Honour

Last week Peter Willoughby was taken by cancer aged fourty-four. I didn't know him well as I rarely do evening group rides, but he was a popular member of the Victorian motorbiking community and it was appropriate that I joined him for his last ride today to Altona Memorial Park. We donned green ribbons (Peter was a Kawasaki fan) and rode behind the hearse for the short distance from the petrol station to the park, making a loud racket as we made the final turn into the park gates.

The funeral had a huge turn out and was very emotional compared to other funerals I had been to. Cancer is a terrible disease. Peter was diagnosed with cancer four years ago. He did more in his fourty-four years than most people do with eighty-four. I could never cope with the knowledge of death as well as he did: death scares the hell out of me. That isn't such a bad thing though; although I am thirty-two I have already done everything that I really wanted to do in life. Looking back, I have done a lot. I attribute this to my fear of death; everything from now onwards is a bonus. When it happens to me, I hope it is sudden.

Peace, perfect peace.
Peter Willoughby

Time For A Service

After retuning from Mt Gambier, my bike has done nearly 13000 kilometers and a major service was due. I do the servicing myself now, as it helps me learn about the bike and cuts down on cost. The major service on the GS500 involves the following

Big Stuff:
Check the valve clearances (replace the shims if needed)
Replace the oil and filter
Replace the spark plugs
Replace the air filter
Correctly torque nuts and bolts
Check the drive chain (adjust or replace if needed)
Check the battery (recharge or replace if needed)

Smaller Stuff:
Check and adjust the idle speed
Check the fuel hoses
Check the brake hoses, pads and fluid
Check the PAIR hoses
Check and adjust cable freeplay
Check wheel runout
Check and adjust steering head bearing freeplay
Front and rear suspension checks
Lubrication of cables and pivot points

Things like tyres, lights and controls should be checked far more regularly. Of the above list, I have never checked the valve clearances before. This is probably the most time consuming task, but also an important one. After taking off the fuel tank, detaching the throttle cables, removing the breather cover and finally removing the valve cover I revealed the cylinder head, as pictured above.

Most bikes have four valves per cylinder (two intake and two exhaust) but as my bike is old technology, it only has two per cylinder (one intake and one exhaust). The GS500 has two inline (side-by-side) cylinders, so four valves in total. The camshaft at the top of the picture (towards the front of the bike) links the two exhaust valves, and the one at the bottom links the two intake valves. The cam chain in the middle rotates the camshafts. The gap between the cam and the shim that the cam lobe presses down on should be between 0.03-0.08 mm for all four valves. My feeler gauge has 0.05, 0.06, 0.08 and 0.10 mm blades, and the result was as follows.

Left Intake: 0.05-0.06 mm
Right Intake: 0.00-0.05 mm
Left Exhaust: 0.08-0.10 mm
Right Exhaust: 0.06-0.08 mm

The right intake valve clearance is some value under 0.05 mm which is fine. No commonly available feeler gauge has blades less than 0.05 mm, so I'll assume it is okay. Of more concern is the left exhaust valve which is out of specification, but only just since I can't get the 0.10 mm blade through the gap. I'll leave it for now as I haven't got replacement shims anyway, but it's something I need to look at for the next minor service.

Day 4/4: Beyond The Great Ocean Road

A detour North to Penola would have been good, as the place is famous for being a key location in the life of soon-to-be-Saint Mary MacKillop (pictured). But on this bitterly cold morning (the early morning temperature was one degrees celcius), I decided to head straight back to Melbourne to avoid the returning long weekend traffic: a direct route via Casterton, Hamilton and Ballarat.

At least that was the plan. At the first set of lights in Mount Gambier my bike died and wouldn't start. It has always been totally reliable. What was the problem? I wheeled the bike to the side of the road and left it for 15 or so minutes for a walk in the memorial park that happened to be close by. Upon my return, I was in luck, as it kicked back into life. After letting it run on a high choke for a few minutes to well and truly warm it up, I hopped on and was on my way. Low gears and high revs was my initial approach, and the bike seemed to be fine from then on. Perhaps the cold had got to it. It had certainly got to me; even though I had all my warm gear on, my fingers and toes were tingling. Perhaps an electrically heated vest would be a good investment.

And so a direct route it was, refuelling at Hamilton and stopping for lunch at a small place called Skipton, just West of Ballarat. The road from Hamilton gives a great view of the Grampians, a mountainous area in an otherwise flat region. In the early morning two kangaroos, one adult and one joey, were stationary just off the side of the road. They took so much of my attention that I forgot to slow down when passing; a major error on my part but fortunately with no consequences.

An uneventful and generally traffic free ride from Skipton to Melbourne meant that I was back home at 3pm, despite my early morning mechanical problems and losing 30 minutes for the time difference. Time for tea.

Riding Distance: 465 kms
Total Distance: 320 + 250 + 110 + 465 = 1145 kms

Day 3/4: Beyond The Great Ocean Road

A fairly relaxed day today, looking around the sites of Mt Gambier and the region. Mt Gambier is 'the city of craters, lakes, caves and sinkholes' according to the tourist brochures, and it's the second largest city in South Australia, lying halfway between Adelaide and Melbourne. Most tourists come to see the crater lakes area, which I rode around in the morning.

The blue lake and the valley lake (bottom picture) are the only lakes remaining that contain water (though one tour guide thought that the valley lake will become dry within the next decade), and they are both impressive. The blue lake is the big drawcard; apparently the water turns a brilliant turquoise colour in the summer due to the surrounding limestone. Mt Gambier gets its water from the blue lake and you can even tour the pumping station. The centenary tower, overlooking browne's lake (dry) and valley lake is worth the short steep walk from the car park.

From the crater lakes I went South towards the coast to Dingley Dell, the former home of the famous poet and horse jockey Adam Lindsay Gordon, who shot himself aged 36. The small restored house was an interesting visit due to the enthusiasm of the owner. From there I took a ride along the coast, having lunch in Port MacDonnell, and then back to Mt Gambier, stopping at Mt Schnack. Mt Schnack is a volcano crater similar to those in Auckland. You have to walk up (30 mins return) to the top to peer into the crater, but time was getting on so I decided against it.

Back in Mt Gambier I had a look at the three city sinkholes: the Engelbrecht cave, the Umpherston sinkhole and the cave gardens. The cave gardens looked particularly idiosyncratic, being located just behind the main road. Then back to the jail for some rest, avoiding the cute inquisitive alpaca that for some unknown reason is tethered outside the building.

Riding Distance: 110 kms

Day 2/4: Beyond The Great Ocean Road

The main attraction in Port Fairy is Griffiths Island, which is linked to the mainland by a footbridge. In the morning I did the picturesque one hour walk around the island, passing the historic lighthouse. The sight of me in full bike gear walking on the beach may have been odd, but on this blustery morning there was only a wallaby to share it. He hopped along side me, looking curiously as if to say 'What the hell are you?'. I liked Griffiths Island.

I took in the amazing coastal views along the local Ocean Drive, then rode inside the disappointingly uninformative historical cemetery. With Port Fairy covered, I headed to Portland, stopping at the Codrington Windfarm viewing area along the way. The windfarm even does guided tours for pre-booked groups. I'm not sure what they would entail. 'Here's a gigantic windmill. And here's another gigantic windmill. In fact, there's about 20 of them. I hope you enjoyed the tour.'

Portland could have been the state capital had history taken a different turn. As I rode aimlessly about the town centre, I happened upon a vintage car museum. It had a few old bikes inside, including a four cylinder 750cc Honda that didn't look too dissimilar to my GS500. The guy at the museum had a hobby of restoring old bikes, and after an interesting chat I went down to Cape Bridgewater and the blowholes on the shipwreck coast (35 kms return). The end of the road bisected yet another windfarm; the sea was impressively tempestuous.

After lunch I set out for Mt Gambier on the slightly less direct but far more scenic Discovery Bay Road (C192), where pine forests stretch out in all directions. I hit the state border, denoted by an impressive South Australia sign and a less than impressive Victoria one. I had nothing to place in the quarantine bin, and I couldn't set my watch back half an hour since it went kaput the day before, so I ploughed on into South Australia grateful for the increase in speed limit (to 110 km/h) and the lack of useless Victorian signage ('sleep now or die imbecile').

A fairly early arrival in Mt Gambier meant a relaxing evening walking in town. I'm staying at the old jail, which is literally an old jail. It seems to be split into two areas: one for travellers and one for a purpose I can't determine. Weird. But weird is good.

Riding Distance: 250 kms

Day 1/4: Beyond The Great Ocean Road

I've just returned from Perth and Fremantle, both very pleasant places and neither of which I had visited before. Closer to home, I've never visited Mt Gambier in South Australia either. So that was the plan for this trip, stopping at some points on the coast West of the famous Great Ocean Road.

A very late start and city traffic meant that I had to minimize delay if I were to reach my intended coastal target of Port Fairy (lighthouse in top picture) before nightfall. I headed to Geelong and took the Hamilton Highway, stopping at the very tiny town of Lismore for some nice pub grub at the Lismore Hotel. Lismore also has free tea for visitors, a fact which is well sign-posted along the highway. It wasn't the best ride: windy and wet, and colder than I expected, and the police were out in force. The dark clouds and the mist took away all the scenery. When I stopped I noticed that the rain cover on one of my panniers had almost completely fallen off, and was only being held on by the passenger footrest. I got lucky, as it didn't interfere with the back wheel. I'll now make sure that checking the drawstrings on the rain covers is part of my pre-ride checks. Lesson learned.

After the pub grub things cleared up a bit and the rain fortunately stayed away. I headed to Warrnambool, taking the Hopkins Highway at Mortlake, and then to Port Fairy on the Princes Highway another 25 or so kilometers along the coast, where I eventually found the YHA Hostel (bottom picture). My luck was in, getting a dorm room all to myself.

Riding Distance: 320 kms