Towing trouble
 

So sunday I am towing my bike back to Borden from Petawawa, like I have been doing most weekends and ran into some issues. First 150km were good but then while driving through a long left hand turn all of a sudden the car started to fishtail with trailer. I quickly pulled off the road to see what was up. Sure enough, one of my brand new tires a big hole in it. Left rear to be more specific. I can tell from the thread grooves in the hole that I ran over a 3/16 bolt. Normally wouldnt be a big deal but the hole fell right on the edge of the tread. Doh :icon_doh:

Ok so I ran over a screw, not the end of the world, Ill just put on the donut. I empty out my trunk (hunting, fishing and scuba diving equipment, tools, bike parts, and this and that so I can get the spare out. I pull up the flooring, move amp and capacitor and yank that sucker out just to find that it has gone flat in the couple years it has been sitting in there. Perfect.

Oh and one point I missed, I am in the middle of Algonquin park with no house, gas station or cellphone service for 40km. At this point Im thinking, ok, just unload the bike and drive it out to get spare filled up but purposely had not filled the bike to keep weight down as much as possible while towing with my little car. It was empty to say the least.

After sitting around for about 20 minutes I heard a car coming. The thing sounded like a tank. Old toyota tercel with swiss cheese exhaust. Flagged them down and luckily they had a little compressor. Plug it in and start filling the tire. No problems to about 35 psi. The compressor decided that was enough pressure and died. Damn.

Beggers cant be choosers though so I thanked them for their kindness, appologized for killing their compressor and mounted that bad boy on there. 2 hours of 80km/h after that I made it home.

Moral of the story, check to make sure you have air in your spare tire.

$200 for a new tire and then today $300 for taxes. Goodbye RR swingarm dreams.

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You are lucky someone came along & actually stopped to help. Kuddo's to the people who stopped to help. I travel for a living in my car & always have a compressor with me & air in the spare before take-off for trip. Would a full tank in the bike really make a difference? Glad you made it home safe.

Yes things worked out in the end mostly. Last night I replaced the tire with the new one and ended up breaking off one of the studs so now I have to fix that too.

As far as gas weight goes, the bike was already empty because I had been working on it and had the tank off so I figured why tow the extra weight if I dont have to. My little 5 speed G5 tows the bike half decent but on some of the large hills going through the park she really struggles.

Glad it all worked out for you, seems lucky to me that the only random person you happen to encounter has a compressor with them! Your luck is better than mine!