I don't know what my issue is with motorcycles. I have the attention span of a flea when it comes to bikes. I have loved every bike that I've had so far......but there's just that....something.......about the next bike up the food chain.
So it was with the XX. Totally happy with my ST1100s, I caught wind of the test reports and rider reviews of the XX. A bike that could do 180 mph with no vibration? Fuel injection? Linked brakes? I want one.
Right when winter 2002 set in and my boredom (and lack of saddle time) was setting in hard, I saw a cycletrader.com ad for a dead bird in Pittsburgh. Only 3 hours away....to make a short story long, it was in my garage before the weekend was up.
Here are a couple of shots of the newly-acquired "Blackbird Down":
The rebuild looked fairly easy, but as I would find out later, it took a lot more effort than I expected to bring this beauty back to life. Every single piece of body work had to be at least sanded and repainted, some pieces were unusable and needed to be replaced, and other pieces needed major reconstruction.
Mechanically, some challenges were found from runaway idle (cut radiator hose = NO coolant in engine!) as well as problems with the linked braking system, requiring a lot of parts to be purchased.
I also traded out some parts for stock, such as the exhaust cans; I prefer silent stealth mode for my exhaust.
So about six months later, here's what I had:
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I added an aftermarket Givi screen, and Nelson-Rigg saddlebags. Coming soon will be VFR bars, heated grips, GPS, and all the other requisite goodies. I haven't had much saddle time on this bird yet as I await the scheduled DOT salvage inspection (so I can get plates!).....but the few stealth runs that I've made on her have been incredible in terms of its power, brakes, and handling.