Buccaneer SRT250 Classic or Cafe Purchase - Page 12

ChopperCharles · 02-26-2019, 06:44 PM

Check this video:

At 32 seconds in, it shows the tail of the bike. This bike has some sort of grab bar bolted to the fender bolt, which wraps around under the fender and attaches somewhere beneath. This could be the basis for a luggage rack that mounts the same way. I'd love to get my hands on one.

Charles.

ChopperCharles · 02-26-2019, 11:53 PM

400 mile oil change today, and no more swarf! Only one tiny piece of metaling the filter. Otherwise it looked perfect. Buccaneer didn’t it take several oil changes before the swarf disappeared from your bike? Maybe running it harder just got it all out sooner? Who knows.

I rode it on the highway for the first time, and I had no trouble keeping up with traffic in the right two lanes. Even got it up to 80 indicated briefly. When a car is in front of me, even two or three lengths away, it breaks the wind enough that I hardly have to use any throttle to maintain that speed. On an open road with zero traffic the bike might struggle to go fast, but with medium-light traffic there was just no problem. I wasn’t passing people in the fast lane, but I never felt like I was struggling to keep up either.

Charles.

Buccaneer · 02-27-2019, 05:22 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopperCharles

400 mile oil change today, and no more swarf! Only one tiny piece of metaling the filter. Otherwise it looked perfect. Buccaneer didn’t it take several oil changes before the swarf disappeared from your bike? Maybe running it harder just got it all out sooner? Who knows.

No. In my logbook for my 411-mile oil change I wrote, "Swarf essentially gone. A few tiny flakes on side filter." After that, nothing is recorded about swarf. I think you damaged your bike.

My belief is that the engineers know what they're talking about when they recommend break-in procedures, and that owners who decide for themselves they know better and act on this supposition are making a mistake.

Good luck with your bike.

Buc

ChopperCharles · 02-27-2019, 09:49 AM

I don't see it that way. Bike is running great, no problems whatsoever, and no more metal in the filter. I think I just had more swarf than you. I plan to put 10k miles on it this year, so we'll see how it holds up.

Charles.

Azhule · 02-27-2019, 11:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Buccaneer

My belief is that the engineers know what they're talking about when they recommend break-in procedures

Cough cough

KTM, Honda, Kawasaki, Suzuki, Beta, etc... all do a "Hard Break-In" on the engine before it even gets installed into your future bike...

Hard Break-In is the only way to go

We can all thank Jake TheGardenSnake for doing some research for us

Buccaneer · 02-27-2019, 02:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Azhule

Cough cough

[link to Jake the Garden Snake]

KTM, Honda, Kawasaki, Suzuki, Beta, etc... all do a "Hard Break-In" on the engine before it even gets installed into your future bike...

Hard Break-In is the only way to go

We can all thank Jake TheGardenSnake for doing some research for us

Yes, I've seen this kind of thing, including a different, very thorough comparison involving two specially-assembled and measured motors, one broken in by the book and the other not. No differences in the rings or pistons were found after 1000 miles. But the issue is not only seating the rings and pistons.

It's what happens to all the bearing surfaces. The difference between Charles's and my own bike's swarf deposits suggests a hard break-in is not good for them, though it doesn't prove anything, being only a single comparison.

My real position has nothing to do with what Jake the Snake finds out, or my own experience (or yours). I believe that engineers, with years of training, and years of practical experience, testing and analysis behind that, know what they are doing when they recommend a slow break-in.

If Jake the Snake's findings were persuasive to them, the first chapter of your owner's manual would begin, "Jake the Garden Snake has proved that hard break-ins are the bee's knees! So we here at Honda/SSR/Yamaha recommend you ride your bike as hard as you can right away!" But it doesn't.

I'm not an engineer, and I bet you and Jake the Snake and Charles aren't either. So I think it completely pointless to argue. If you were a mechanical engineer, I would politely ask your opinion, and then perhaps ask you for a recommendation on some reading I might do to increase my understanding, as a non-engineer.

But you're not, are you? If not, I regard this kind of conversation as a waste of everyone's time. And I continue to regard dismissing actual engineers' recommendations as foolish, for the reasons just given.

Good luck with your choice.

Buc

ChopperCharles · 02-27-2019, 03:15 PM

Actually, I am an engineer. NCSU class of 2001. I'm not a materials or mechanical engineer, but I am an engineer nonetheless.

FWIW, the reason I chose to do a hard break in was based in large part on the recommendations of my late uncle, who drag raced semi professionally for more than 20 years. As a machinist, he built a great many of his own race motors, and he was a proponent of a hard break-in. Why or how or the details are lost to time and the grave. I wish I could pick his brain now... but he'd likely give me hell for buying a Chinese bike

I'm not telling you you're wrong, btw. I decided to do it my way, you decided to do it yours. I am not at ALL interested in changing your mind, only in sharing my experiences with this bike as I'm enjoying it. However you want to break it in is completely up to you!

Charles.

Buccaneer · 02-27-2019, 04:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopperCharles

Actually, I am an engineer. NCSU class of 2001. I'm not a materials or mechanical engineer, but I am an engineer nonetheless.

FWIW, the reason I chose to do a hard break in was based in large part on the recommendations of my late uncle, who drag raced semi professionally for more than 20 years. As a machinist, he built a great many of his own race motors, and he was a proponent of a hard break-in. Why or how or the details are lost to time and the grave. I wish I could pick his brain now... but he'd likely give me hell for buying a Chinese bike

I'm not telling you you're wrong, btw. I decided to do it my way, you decided to do it yours. I am not at ALL interested in changing your mind, only in sharing my experiences with this bike as I'm enjoying it. However you want to break it in is completely up to you!

Charles.

Good deal! The wish is certainly returned.

I'm, shall I say, from an engineering family (all mechanical, FWIW), but am myself a black sheep, a non-engineering professor.

I can see how short-lived engines like drag racers primarily need their rings and pistons to seat, and don't warrant much concern about long-term bearing life. I'm also aware that brand-new engines are revved to redline at the factory (at least, they often are). But that doesn't change my respect for the break-in recommendations in the manual. They must there for a reason, or the companies would happily change them, since their products would be that much more enjoyable right off the showroom floor. The fact that they don't change those recommendations says quite a lot, to me.

By the way, I salute your intention to put 10,000 miles on your Buccaneer this year, including touring! I have found this bike completely engrossing, as I think you have too, and was considering (really, dreaming about) riding it out to Wyoming or Idaho this summer, from Wisconsin, to meet up with my brother. But I've finally decided to ride my Moto Guzzi Griso 1100 instead, since I have many memories of transiting Wyoming at 7000+ feet against the inevitable 40 mph westerly headwinds. (And since I've equipped my Griso well for such trips, including adding a real cruise control.) The Buccaneer would be hard pressed out there. For now, I think it will stay east of the Missouri River. I am thinking of riding to St. Joseph, Missouri, to enjoy the Lewis and Clark vibe, but not any farther.

Buc

P.S. I've about decided that all the oil-immersed parts of the Buccaneer drive train are identical with its Yamaha forebear's. As such, they are probably immune to possible break-in abuse for at least 10,000 miles!

Azhule · 02-28-2019, 02:12 PM

I first learned of doing the "hard break-in" on new engines years ago from my father (I was 4 years old and got a Yamaha PW50*), uncle, and also my aunt brought the subject up a few times over the years when they heard I was buying new things with engines...

All of them would easily meet those basic qualifications of needing to be an engineer, the three of them have an insane amounts of degrees under their belts... my aunt is probably the most "qualified" of the three, as she builds aircraft jet engines for GE, and likes to do repairs on old single propeller planes/engines on her spare time... she has also been known to take old junkyard engines from cars and build reliable, flyable ultralights that have hundreds of thousands of hours of air time with no rebuilds, only a few complete inspections were she takes the entire engine apart, and writes a book load of numbers down... if she trusts a "hard break-in" for something that is thousands of feet in the air and needs to be reliable at all times or it comes crashing down to earth... its good enough for this ASE certified auto tech

The reason every single owners manual states those things are basically because,

1) It is already done for the new owner on all the major brands (car, truck, and motorcycle)... key word here... "major brands" as, most everyone but chinese built powersports/motorcycles (Harley/Honda/etc. excluded)

2) They don't want every yahoo who just bought the vehicle to go driving/riding around in traffic, acting like a jackhole randomly accelerating up past speed limits and engine braking back down to idle... not everyone lives near an "off road coarse" to properly do the "hard break-in" after all...

3) It will quickly show you the problems from any of those cheap, inferior, and sometimes fake parts... those failures would have happened several hundred, or maybe even a few thousand of miles from now...

The dealerships don't want a few dozens (out of several thousand of units sold) of customers returning angry because their expensive new toy just broke down a few minutes/miles up the road...

I don't know about anyone else, but I'm one that wants to know what I need to replace/fix/beef up the first few hours of ownership... not when I smiling, having a good day trying to make to, or from the mountains/work/etc.

If done right the hard break-in will do no extra wear to any "higher" quality parts, be it a bearing, a valve, a piston, a spark plug, a transmission, etc... all when using a proper "break in oil"

But to each their own

* PW50 is still running strong and is still on it's first engine I broke in at 4 years old, countless hours of riding and abuse from me growing up, and is currently being abused by it's third family of kids, this will be 7 kids worth of abuse since I gave it away... and I used to race that pink sucker every weekend it was "nice" when I was growing up (if we could open the garage and get the bike into the truck, I was either racing or riding that weekend)... I had a lot of first place races and crashes going full throttle and top speeds for 4 to 10 laps a race, it was a blast

Buccaneer · 03-01-2019, 11:42 AM

Think as you like.

I suggest we go back to Charles's intent, "sharing my experiences with this bike as I'm enjoying it," and leave this other topic behind.

Buc

ChopperCharles · 03-01-2019, 12:12 PM

Indeed!

So new info. A guy on ADVRider bought the Buccaneer classic, and it is also missing the axle spacer. Apparently this is not an isolated issue with just my bike, and it's obviously not limited to just the cafe version.

Charles.

Buccaneer · 03-01-2019, 12:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopperCharles

... A guy on ADVRider bought the Buccaneer classic, and it is also missing the axle spacer. Apparently this is not an isolated issue with just my bike, and it's obviously not limited to just the cafe version.

<sigh>

It reminds me of Moto Guzzis. The usual refrain is to blame assembly errors on "Luigi," drinking on the job, right there in the Italian factory.

The manufacturer must have had an insufficient supply of spacers and decided that one per axle was enough!

As far I know, my bike was delivered with all its parts.

Buc

ChopperCharles · 03-02-2019, 10:33 PM

Interestingly enough I got 59 MPG using the 87 octane, and I was only getting 56 MPG with the premium. Need to run more than one tank and get more data though. I also achieved 84mph (indicated) on my brief stint on the highway earlier today.

Charles.

ChopperCharles · 03-03-2019, 03:29 AM

From my ride yesterday!

Charles

culcune · 03-03-2019, 02:42 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ChopperCharles

From my ride yesterday!

Charles

How far did you ride in total?
You guys have me really thinking about this bike, or the upcoming Lifan cruiser, since the engines are the same. But knowing myself, I will probably end up with a thumper in an enduro, lol.

02-28-2019, 02:12 PM	#174
Azhule Join Date: Dec 2015 Location: CO Posts: 1,525	I first learned of doing the "hard break-in" on new engines years ago from my father (I was 4 years old and got a Yamaha PW50), uncle, and also my aunt brought the subject up a few times over the years when they heard I was buying new things with engines... All of them would easily meet those basic qualifications of needing to be an engineer, the three of them have an insane amounts of degrees under their belts... my aunt is probably the most "qualified" of the three, as she builds aircraft jet engines for GE, and likes to do repairs on old single propeller planes/engines on her spare time... she has also been known to take old junkyard engines from cars and build reliable, flyable ultralights that have hundreds of thousands of hours of air time with no rebuilds, only a few complete inspections were she takes the entire engine apart, and writes a book load of numbers down... if she trusts a "hard break-in" for something that is thousands of feet in the air and needs to be reliable at all times or it comes crashing down to earth... its good enough for this ASE certified auto tech The reason every single owners manual states those things are basically because, 1) It is already done for the new owner on all the major brands (car, truck, and motorcycle)... key word here... "major brands" as, most everyone but chinese built powersports/motorcycles (Harley/Honda/etc. excluded) 2) They don't want every yahoo who just bought the vehicle to go driving/riding around in traffic, acting like a jackhole randomly accelerating up past speed limits and engine braking back down to idle... not everyone lives near an "off road coarse" to properly do the "hard break-in" after all... 3) It will quickly show you the problems from any of those cheap, inferior, and sometimes fake parts... those failures would have happened several hundred, or maybe even a few thousand of miles from now... The dealerships don't want a few dozens (out of several thousand of units sold) of customers returning angry because their expensive new toy just broke down a few minutes/miles up the road... I don't know about anyone else, but I'm one that wants to know what I need to replace/fix/beef up the first few hours of ownership... not when I smiling, having a good day trying to make to, or from the mountains/work/etc. If done right the hard break-in will do no extra wear to any "higher" quality parts, be it a bearing, a valve, a piston, a spark plug, a transmission, etc... all when using a proper "break in oil" But to each their own PW50 is still running strong and is still on it's first engine I broke in at 4 years old, countless hours of riding and abuse from me growing up, and is currently being abused by it's third family of kids, this will be 7 kids worth of abuse since I gave it away... and I used to race that pink sucker every weekend it was "nice" when I was growing up (if we could open the garage and get the bike into the truck, I was either racing or riding that weekend)... I had a lot of first place races and crashes going full throttle and top speeds for 4 to 10 laps a race, it was a blast __________________ "Think as you like... but this self proclaimed Professor is always right" - Buckshot "You never know what someone is hiding beneath their smile..." - NinjaTom - R.I.P.
	2

02-26-2019, 06:44 PM	#166
ChopperCharles Join Date: Feb 2018 Location: RDU, NC Posts: 677	Check this video: At 32 seconds in, it shows the tail of the bike. This bike has some sort of grab bar bolted to the fender bolt, which wraps around under the fender and attaches somewhere beneath. This could be the basis for a luggage rack that mounts the same way. I'd love to get my hands on one. Charles.
	0

02-26-2019, 11:53 PM	#167
ChopperCharles Join Date: Feb 2018 Location: RDU, NC Posts: 677	400 mile oil change today, and no more swarf! Only one tiny piece of metaling the filter. Otherwise it looked perfect. Buccaneer didn’t it take several oil changes before the swarf disappeared from your bike? Maybe running it harder just got it all out sooner? Who knows. I rode it on the highway for the first time, and I had no trouble keeping up with traffic in the right two lanes. Even got it up to 80 indicated briefly. When a car is in front of me, even two or three lengths away, it breaks the wind enough that I hardly have to use any throttle to maintain that speed. On an open road with zero traffic the bike might struggle to go fast, but with medium-light traffic there was just no problem. I wasn’t passing people in the fast lane, but I never felt like I was struggling to keep up either. Charles.
	1

02-27-2019, 09:49 AM	#169
ChopperCharles Join Date: Feb 2018 Location: RDU, NC Posts: 677	I don't see it that way. Bike is running great, no problems whatsoever, and no more metal in the filter. I think I just had more swarf than you. I plan to put 10k miles on it this year, so we'll see how it holds up. Charles.
	0

02-27-2019, 03:15 PM	#172
ChopperCharles Join Date: Feb 2018 Location: RDU, NC Posts: 677	Actually, I am an engineer. NCSU class of 2001. I'm not a materials or mechanical engineer, but I am an engineer nonetheless. FWIW, the reason I chose to do a hard break in was based in large part on the recommendations of my late uncle, who drag raced semi professionally for more than 20 years. As a machinist, he built a great many of his own race motors, and he was a proponent of a hard break-in. Why or how or the details are lost to time and the grave. I wish I could pick his brain now... but he'd likely give me hell for buying a Chinese bike I'm not telling you you're wrong, btw. I decided to do it my way, you decided to do it yours. I am not at ALL interested in changing your mind, only in sharing my experiences with this bike as I'm enjoying it. However you want to break it in is completely up to you! Charles.
	1

03-01-2019, 11:42 AM	#175
Buccaneer Join Date: Jan 2019 Location: Madison, WI Posts: 83	Think as you like. I suggest we go back to Charles's intent, "sharing my experiences with this bike as I'm enjoying it," and leave this other topic behind. Buc
	1

03-01-2019, 12:12 PM	#176
ChopperCharles Join Date: Feb 2018 Location: RDU, NC Posts: 677	Indeed! So new info. A guy on ADVRider bought the Buccaneer classic, and it is also missing the axle spacer. Apparently this is not an isolated issue with just my bike, and it's obviously not limited to just the cafe version. Charles.
	0

03-02-2019, 10:33 PM	#178
ChopperCharles Join Date: Feb 2018 Location: RDU, NC Posts: 677	Interestingly enough I got 59 MPG using the 87 octane, and I was only getting 56 MPG with the premium. Need to run more than one tank and get more data though. I also achieved 84mph (indicated) on my brief stint on the highway earlier today. Charles.
	1