Hangin' with the Dirty Pirates

I'd heard a new motorcycle service shop had opened in central Phoenix a few months back, so when I decided to have a few things checked out on my new (to me) 2001 Kawasaki KLR650, I decided to give the new guys a chance at my business. Dirty Pirate Motorsports is located on the south west corner of 7th Avenue and Bethany Home Road, which happens to be just a few miles away from my office. Sweet. A convenient location is always a good thing.

I had heard good things already from several customers of the new shop. Apparently these guys had been around town for some time working for other shops, but I couldn't quite put faces with their names. When I rolled up to the shop, I was pleasantly surprised to see Eric Hancock coming out to greet me. Cool! Eric was formerly the service manager for Ducati/Triumph Superstore and is a certified Ducati Technician. I have had many positive transactions with him. He and his guys had worked on several of my bikes and I'd always been happy with the experience. Jeff is also a veteran motorcycle tech with a long history in the area.

Eric and his partner Jeff had decided to strike out on their own earlier this year, and so far, things are going well. Their shop is a traditional open storefront style building and it invites potential customers to walk in and see what's going on. This seems to suit Eric and Jeff who are both quite readily engage you in conversation and are happy to discuss any and all topics relating to motorcycles. They're both avid riders and are frequently found at the track testing and tuning their race bikes.

Eric explained that he chose the open storefront concept because he wanted his customers to be able to observe the work being done on their bikes. Cool with me! As someone who does a lot of work on his own bikes, I want to make sure I know what's being done and I want to verify that it's being done correctly. I'm sure that makes me a pain in the arse to some techs, but Eric and Jeff totally embrace the concept, and I think it's going to earn them loyal customers.

My KLR has been getting poor mileage and I was concerned that it wasn't jetted correctly. D.P. Motorsports has a Factory Pro EC997 dyno with a four gas analyzer, so they have the perfect tool to troubleshoot the issue. Rather than just slap my bike on the dyno, however, Eric hit me with a bunch of questions. What is the bike's service history? When was the last time the valve clearance was checked? How do you ride it? And several others. See, Eric KNOWS KLRs. As a long-time tech at a Kawasaki dealership, Eric has worked on more KLRs than he can remember He's intimately familiar with their quirks and idiosyncrasies and he knew right where to go to look for the problem.

Since I had recently acquired the bike and didn't have a service history, Eric recommended we check the valve clearance first. Obviously, you'll never get a bike running correctly by changing the jetting if the valves are out of spec. Fortunately for me, my valves were within factory specs. Throughout the short process of checking the clearances, Eric let me watch closely and ask questions. Since the bike is new to me, I am a sponge, soaking up every bit of knowledge about the bike I can find. He shared some tips and tricks he'd learned, such as how to get the piston at TDC without using a wrench to turn the crank. Simple, but a time saver. He also gave me lots of good information about other topics with regard to maintaining the KLR in top condition. Some techs might think of this as giving away business - telling the customer how to do things that might otherwise bring them in for service. Not Eric and Jeff. They're of the mind that excellent customer service will earn them repeat customers and lots of referrals. I think they're right.

Eric was sure to check the air filter condition after I told him that I had a K&N in there. Turns out it was clogged shut with dirt. I kinda suspected that might be a problem, but hadn't checked it myself yet. Doh! He also did a compression test and I was happy to see a reading of around 130 psi - well with spec. After checking the valve clearance, compression and installing a fresh spark plug (which required Eric run to the dealership to pick up, as he didn't have one in stock), Eric reinstalled the now clean air filter, buttoned things up and sent me off to Dyno Man Jeff.

I had been observing Jeff working on another customer's bike and he too was fully engaged with the customer as he pulled the fork leg off the late model Triumph Sprint ST. In addition to being The Man with the dyno, Jeff's also the suspension expert. D.P. Motorsports is able to help with any task from set up to service on your moto's suspenders.

Nothing too magic about the dyno diagnostic. If you know anything about dynos, you know the Factory Pro dyno differs from the ubiquitous Dynojet dyno. It does things a bit differently, and its makers claim it provides a more true measurement of your bikes power characteristics. As a result, the HP readings it delivers aren't directly comparable to those commonly seen from the more common Dynojet. *shrug* I don't care as long as it makes my bike work good. Actually, I do care, in that I like to know geeky details like that. But I digress.

Jeff did his thing and did his best not to trip over me as I was clicking away with my camera. Apparently the previous owner knew what he was doing, because the dyno and gas analyzer showed that my jetting was spot-on. Yes! Hopefully the clogged air filter was the source of my problems, but it was good to know for sure. My bike was making a whopping 39 horsepower. Wow! Not a number you brag about to your sportbike friends, but right inline with what one would expect from a low-tune 650cc thumper.

After paying my very reasonable service bill, I went on my way knowing that my new pride and joy had been handled with care by professionals who know what they're doing. That, and I'd learned several excellent bits of info about my bike that should keep it out of the shop for many miles to come. But if I ever do need to take it in, I know who I'm going to call.