Just brought home my new '06 FJR

[basicjim]

My son and I took a 5 hour trip east into PA to pick up my new-to-me FJR. Met with BkerChuck and the owner of the bike. The bike is beautiful! Well cared for and well farkled! Got a complete run down of the bike and then a truck load of windshields, original parts, manuals, and accessories. The owner was soooo cool. He also gave me a sweet sleeping bag, a NWT pair of Olympia riding pants, inflatable pillow, a couple tanks bags, and more!! BkerChuck threw in some spare stuff from his '07 (rest it's soul) that won't fit on his Gen III.

We grabbed some lunch with the fine gentleman that shaved a couple hours off our trip by meeting with us, then headed back to NW Ohio. Just before climbing on the bike, the former owner noticed a screw in the rear tire. We used some liquid to see if it was leaking air but found it was not. I figured if it wasn't leaking, my best bet was not to mess with it until I got home. I paid close attention on the ride and had the plug kit and portable pump the former owner ALSO threw in.

5 min into the ride, my son called me. He questioned my route and I realized that we weren't going home the same way we came. I was too busy getting the feel of the bike to worry about the route and was just following the GPS. We took the next exit and I confirmed my suspicions... The Garmin 660 that the previous owner ALSO THREW IN WITH THE BIKE was set to avoid toll roads. I corrected that and we started back the way we came.

The ride was good. I stopped and changed the seat position on the Laam seat just to try that out. The high position feels strange. I am going to switch it back to the low.

It wasn't long before I flipped the switch on the heated gear. The jacket did well and the Ken Phenix heated gloves could have warmed up a pizza in a blizzard! WOW!!!

The FJR is a different beast than my V-Strom. WAAAAYYYYY more pep! Former owner set it up to be really quick and the mods did their job on that. It sacrificed some fuel mileage, but that was still good too! I kept trying to go to 6th. V-Strom has 6 and it sure felt like I needed to hit 6th on the FJR. Heavier too. At a stop, I notice the difference between the weight of my 650 and the FJR. Oddly enough, as soon as I start rolling, the FJR feels LIGHTER than the V-strom.

We started out at 48 degrees F and by the time we hit the Ohio border, it was 36F and it was snowing. The windscreen BkerChuck donated off his '07 did a GREAT job. It really helped me stay toasty warm. At full height, the wind was just hitting above my visor. I could feel the wind, but not much in the way of buffeting.

It was probably a good thing that I had my son driving the truck home with me. I kept rolling back the throttle to keep him within sight behind me. There are several times I got a little into the throttle and didn't even notice. One time after slowing back down to let him catch up, I rolled passed a State Trooper and was SUPER glad I was within 3 mph of the speed limit.

Almost home, on the dark back roads, I checked out the lighting. LED swapped for the bikes lights. WOW they looked good. Kicked on the 2 additional sets of lights. Low beam the controller has additional lights at 20% NO problem with visibility. Kicked them up to high beam and 100% aux lighting and behold! Daylight!! Damn that's nice.

Pulled her in the nice warm garage and then ran to take care of the family obligations I was missing. I can't wait to get back on that bike!!

Tomorrow, clean the FJR back up and see what I can do about the screw in the rear tire.

Jim

[wheatonFJR]

Awesome report!

[bill lumberg]

Great post.

[rbentnail]

Welcome! PM sent.

[raYzerman]

Glad you're having fun, Jim... I've forgotten, it that bike an A (blue) or AE (Cerulean Silver).....

[CollingsBob]

Welcome, great ride report!.. I came from a 1000Vstrom which had been tweaked. The Vstrom was more nimble, more flickable. My ‘17 is more stable and one helluva lot faster..a better LD bike.

[gixxerjasen]

Sounds great, also sounds like you got a great job with all the extras. It's pretty silly how flickable the FJR is once rolling, I swear it's better than my sport bike. Eventually, when pushing hard she starts feeling heavy again, but everywhere in between she certainly shines. Enjoy the new bike and your upcoming stellar summer you guys have up there.

[FJRoss]

Pictures, please!

Has the cam chain tensioner been replaced - if not, you should do it sooner rather than later.
Power Commander to help with the abrupt throttle typical of the '06 and '07?
I took off the one I had on my '07 and quickly got used to the throttle behavior - I think some were worse than others. I hung onto it in case I changed my mind. Still have it even though I sold the bike a couple years ago...

Sounds like you got some nice extras with the bike. How many miles on it?

[Madmudder]

Now that you drank the Koolaid nothing else will satisfy your thirst like an FJR. Congrats

[basicjim]

Pictures, please!

Has the cam chain tensioner been replaced - if not, you should do it sooner rather than later.
Power Commander to help with the abrupt throttle typical of the '06 and '07?
I took off the one I had on my '07 and quickly got used to the throttle behavior - I think some were worse than others. I hung onto it in case I changed my mind. Still have it even though I sold the bike a couple years ago...

Sounds like you got some nice extras with the bike. How many miles on it?

I am not sure about the cam chain tensioner, but I will check.

It doesn't have the abrupt throttle issue, so I am going to ASSUME that this was due to the power commander along with the performance boost. I am not sure if that was the primary reason for it's installation though.

It's got 67K on it.

[basicjim]

Glad you're having fun, Jim... I've forgotten, it that bike an A (blue) or AE (Cerulean Silver).....

Cobalt Blue - A bike!!

[FJRoss]

Very nice!!
Looks to be in superb condition and very nicely farkled.

Try to find out about the CCT and plan to change it if it is original.
The biggest plus for a Power Commander is to smooth out the throttle response - snatchy throttle at low openings was a problem. Unlikely to give you more than 1-2 HP, no matter how it is set up. Biggest downside of the PC is that fuel mileage will take a hit, depending upon how it is configured.

[basicjim]

Very nice!!
Looks to be in superb condition and very nicely farkled.

Try to find out about the CCT and plan to change it if it is original.
The biggest plus for a Power Commander is to smooth out the throttle response - snatchy throttle at low openings was a problem. Unlikely to give you more than 1-2 HP, no matter how it is set up. Biggest downside of the PC is that fuel mileage will take a hit, depending upon how it is configured.

I'll check the MPG when doing a little bit of riding like I normally do! Previous owner had it set up to be a quick bike. Since I do the rally thing, I am going for MPG and comfort. I am not sure if i am going to leave the tune as-is or see about going for better MPG....

[Madmudder]

Nicely farkled you will be very happy with that unit. Your alternative to the power commander and better fuel economy is Ivan's ECU flash.
http://www.ivansperformanceproducts.com/fjr1300_g2.htm

[ionbeam]

Another Very nice for your new ride!!

The wave rotors up front are interesting, I wonder what type of pads the calipers are loaded with.

The bike has aftermarket cans, it is possible the Power Commander has a custom tune, either a downloaded tune specifically for the cans or possibly a DynoJet dynamometer tune. The (or some) previous owner clearly has done a lot of work to the bike.

Look around the faring at the CCT, if it has been replaced it will have a blue or green dot on it. The the dot will be approximately the diameter of a #2 yellow pencil eraser or maybe a bit smaller. If the cam chain isn't making noise there is no great emergency to check this.

At some point you may want to follow the ignition switch wires to the connectors and see if there is a yellow band around the wires by the connector. There were a number of ignition switches with failed contacts, the replacement switch harness has a yellow band.

Does the ambient temperature instantaneous MPG readout work? The '06 had a defective readout that required the entire Meter Assembly (dash unit) to be replaced. Unfortunately the mileage was stowed in the Meter Assembly so any mileage was lost as the replacement assembly started at zero miles. The dealers were instructed to write the original mileage in the owners manual and/or open the glove box door and put a mileage sticker on the bottom of the door. You may want to take a peek, if the ambient reads instantaneous MPG correctly the Meter Assembly was replaced.

Starting with the '06 Yamaha used a new grounding scheme using a 6 pin connector with a 6 tab shorting bar plugged in to it to gang connect the ground wires; there are 6 ground connectors. It was a good idea that turned out bad. Because of the way one ground connector got connected to the next ground connector it would overload the first few connectors causing them to melt, then the grounds would fail. Some wise guy in a Forum thought the 6 pin shorting bar looked like a spider so it has been called a ground spider ever since. Sooner than later you need to look at the ground connectors to see what condition they are in. Yamaha had a recall for this problem. The dealers were to either add more grounding to the existing harness, or if the harness was already damaged to replace the whole harness. This can leave you stranded, you do want to check this.

Some FJRs in the early Gen II production have started to have rear wheel ABS failures. A spool valve in the metering block for the rear wheel would freeze and that's it, dun fer, can't be fixed. In almost all cases the first time you know something is wrong is when the rear wheel locks up. It isn't a common failure but it happens. Front wheel ABS failure is almost unheard of. You can and probably should check the rear wheel ABS so there are no surprises down the road. You can go old school and slam the pedal on a loose surface so you can control the consequences. You can also follow the FSM procedure which will activate the ABS system. The FSM procedure is a good idea because it moves fluid through the metering block and prevents ABS failure in the long run by cycling fresh brake fluid through the system.

Enjoy your new ride!

Edit to add: And another thing Check the two screws that hold the locking tabs inside the bags. The screws will go MIA if someone didn't loctite them.

[FJRoss]

I thought the problem with the early Gen II meter assemblies was the instantaneous MPG readout. Did it affect temperature readout too? If the dealer recorded stuff as they should have, Yamaha can verify your bike's status regarding meter assembly, grounding harness, ignition switch and possibly ECU recall for "altitude fix" - this was an '07 issue but not certain it affected '06.

Madmudder posted about Ivan's ECU flash for Gen II. Has anybody tried the Gen II version? I wasn't aware it was available although I knew it was in the works.

[ionbeam]

I thought the problem with the early Gen II meter assemblies was the instantaneous MPG readout...

Of course you are correct about the Meter Assembly fault being the instantaneous MPG readout stuck at 17.0 mpg. Fixed my post.

Yes, some '06 were affected poor engine performance with change in altitude which required an ECU replacement to fix the problem. The problem only showed up if the rider used small throttle adjustments which caused the ECU to not update engine parameters.

Since I'm here, I'll ask if the OP got the body colored caps (very expensive caps) that go over the saddle bag holes when the bags are removed and did you get the third lock that fits a Yamaha trunk if you buy one.

[BkerChuck]

I don't know if cam chain tensioner was done for sure. Seller did not do it. I think owner before might have. Bike has OEM pads in the calipers, I know that. I rode that bike for months last year and everything works quite well. I believe all recalls are done save the "altitude sickness" thing which I never verified. My coworker Bill was the seller and PO before him was a guy from the other sandbox.

[ionbeam]

I don't know...Seller did not do it. I think owner before might have. Bike has OEM pads in the calipers,....everything works quite well... I believe all recalls are done...

Like a Chinese menu, it's all there, just chose what you want to focus on. In any/all cases it a really good bike and a magnificent ride. The new owner is in for a great ride.

[BkerChuck]

Caps went with bike. Don't know about the third lock, bike had a Shad trunk from owner before my coworker.