If you’re a rider, we know the snow and cold can really put a damper on your spirits and winter’s just beginning. Bikes Built Better feels your pain, so we put together this guide for ways to stay in touch with your motorcycle and beat the winter blues! These are some tips for keeping you and your motorcycle happy till spring arrives!
Heat and Insulate Your Garage
The chill of winter can not only keep you off your bike, but can even force you out of the garage altogether. Most garages are not insulated well, and are very drafty, so they tend to be notoriously hard to heat. Unless you don’t mind working on the bike in snow gear, you’re going to need both an adequate source of heat, and a way to keep that heat in the garage where it belongs.
Bad Ways to Heat Your Garage:
- Extending ducts from your home system (transmits vapors and odors from garage into home; is probably against building codes)
- Portable kerosene/oil/propane heaters (emit noxious fumes; require venting; degrade air quality; deposit moisture and soot into air)
- Wood stoves (fire hazard; can’t be turned on and off on demand; can be overly regulated)
- Portable electric heaters (usually underpowered for garage spaces; draw a lot of power; can be a fire hazard)
Good Ways to Heat Your Garage:
- Sealed combustion space heater (does not affect air quality; very efficient; no fire hazard)
- Mounted electric heater (powerful; inexpensive up-front cost)
- Electric radiant ceiling panels (efficient; silent operation; heat evenly; good to augment heat source in your work area)
Build or Buy a Motorcycle Work Table
If you’ve spent any amount of time with a sore back after crawling around on the floor trying to get some motorcycle work done, you already know the benefit in having a motorcycle work table. A good work table will bring a bike up to standing height, give you a nice work space to set down parts and tools, and – if equipped with wheels – give you a platform to roll a bike around at your convenience. It’s useful for any bike, but a definite must-have if you’re doing major service or a full restoration or build. Motorcycle tables and stands start at about $279 The one pictured to the left is $779
Install Garage Flooring
The single biggest source of cold inside your garage, and the one that will take the longest to heat, is a bare concrete floor. Cold concrete will multiply the amount of time it takes to get a room warm, and will always be uncomfortable under foot. Adding some type of simple garage flooring will take the edge off the cold, and reduce the fatigue you get from standing or sitting on a hard floor while you work.
Garage flooring solutions don’t have to be expensive, and most are easy to install yourself. The cheapest solutions are usually some sort of commercial carpeting, either in tiles or cut to fit from your local home store.
Carpet has many drawbacks in a garage; it stains easily, is generally not durable, and melts or catches fire easily, so as a permanent solution it leaves a lot to be desired. However, it’s a cheap way to keep the garage warmer and more comfortable in the winter, and is easily removed or replaced when it warms back up.
Do a Disassemble-Clean
There’s washing your bike, and there’s detailing your bike – then there’s doing a disassemble-clean of your bike. If your bike and you are cooped up for the winter, this is a perfect time to pull parts off and clean those areas you could never get to without partially disassembling things. This is a good time to not only clean that grime that builds up for months (or years) but lubricate moving parts as well.
Some good areas to disassemble/clean are:
- Wheels
- Inside fenders
- Inside fairings (especially lowers)
- Inside sprocket cover (you wouldn’t believe how much grime collects there!)
- Inside chain guard
- Inside swingarm
You’ll feel a lot better after pulling these parts off and giving them a good scrub when you see how dirty they get in areas you can’t normally see. This is also a good way to become acquainted with dis-assembly reassembly of your bike so you can do more complex maintenance tasks later!
Send Off Parts for Modification
There are some awesome bike modifications out there that are still done the old-fashioned way, by the hands of skilled craftsmen. But the down side is that you usually have to send out your stock parts to get them done; things like Custom Paint, Chrome Plating, Powder Coating Embroidery, or leather work.
It usually takes several weeks or even months to get custom work like this shipped and completed, and the last thing you’ll want to do is miss out on a few weeks of ride time in spring while you wait on your chrome wheels to get back from the plating company.
Plan ahead by getting mods like this done over winter, and spend the warm months riding instead of waiting!
