Trip to France

[gvy]

Last week I returned from a 2900km  trip from Belgium to St-Raphael ( between Cannes and St Tropez) France with 4 mates.
The goal was the journey not the destination, so we did almost zero highway km's. SO long days in the saddle

Oosterzele-Peron : 769km
Peron-Barcelonnette : 372km
Barcelonnette-St Raphael : 263km
resting day at st Raphael : local trip 150km
St Raphael - Buis les Baronnies : 376km
Buis les Baronnies - Vezelay: 594km
Vezelay - Oosterzele: 480km

We have done beautiful high mountain passes in the Alps.

Ready to Go : I decided NOT to use my panniers to stay light , small and compact.


Fantastic roads and hairpins at the alps: For the first time I scraped footpegs with my Tiger multiple times and it was fun. I have my Michelin pilot power 2ct tires without any chicken strips


One mountain tiger:


A Tiger sport , A KTM 1190 Adventure, A Yamaha TDM900, A BMW GS1200 and a BMW R1100R. The last one didn't make it till the end sadly


Some views

[seangee]

Great pix - thanks for sharing. Looks like a great time.

[tiggersteve]

 
About time we had a ride report

[gvy]

The 2016 Tiger Sport did well, It was a joy to handle,  apart from 2 things....

1. The saddle is uncomfortable for the many hours ,ranging from 6 to 11hours a day. The first 2 days I had padded cycling pants under my Hood motorcycle jeans. But I was under the impression that this was not really a good solution, so I didn't use them anymore from day 3.
My former street triple 675 had an optional Sargent Seat and that was way better. But I got it second hand, because they are expensive, and even then, they are not available for the later Tiger Sport.

2. It seems there is a problem with Triumph 3 cilinders and high altitudes......

Last year I was in the pyrenees with my 2010 Street triple 675 and all at ones, during a stop at real high altitude, the triple started to spit out an excessive amount of coolant.... I was so worried that on a next stop I started removing the radiatorplastics , let the engine cool down, opened up the radiatorcap and yes, when I started the engine, I got some airbubbles out of the system that were trapped. I filled up with some mountainriver water ( all I could do then) and afterwards, all was good again. Of course, ones home I changed the coolant, but I never had any problems again or before with the cooling system.

Fast forward to this year... 1050 triple in the Tiger Sport.... The Alps . We got to an altitude where there was the everlasting snow present. SO one of the real high altitudes again. We stopped to enjoy the scenery. And yes, The Tiger started spitting out some coolant . Not as dramatic as the street triple the year before, but again I got worried. This time I didn't open the circuit. The temperature indicator was never indicating extreme temperatures.The fan kicked in when needed.  I topped up and after some rides I checked the coolant level when cold ( just above minimum and when hot, just under maximum ). Any way...It never did it before, and I never got any problems afterwards, ( and we really pushed it in the mountains ).

But I find it strange that both bikes only had this issue ones at "real" high altitude.......the lower absolute athmospheric pressure??

[fred piket]

Originally Posted by gvy

But I find it strange that both bikes only had this issue ones at "real" high altitude.......the lower absolute athmospheric pressure??

beautiful pictures! I do not know much about motorcycles, but this sounds logic....

[Paul2bikes]

I recognise the Verdon gorge in your pics. Beautiful area. You had a great tour, St Rapheal is good, St Tropez a bit disappointing.

There's no reason for coolant probs on the TS1050, I've ridden many high passes on mine eg Grimsel & Stelvio with no issues. Missus & me used to ride the passes for our hols on the Sprint, all the highest eg Col de L'Iseran & the Bonnette, the two highest passes in the Alps with no issues. Trumpies don't like the overflow bottle to be above min when cold, or they spit it out when hot.

What Happened to the broken-down BMW, did you dump it there? Ha.

[Dusty ST]

Fabulous pictures, make me realise how much I'm going to miss not going to France this year 
Just my unqualified thoughts on the coolant thing....
Altitude should have no affect on the coolant as pressure in the radiator/engine is maintained by a spring under the rad cap, however engine running temperature could increase as the engine is working harder (pulling uphill, producing less power with less efficient cooling due to less dense air), and the altitude lowers the boiling point of the coolant once it's past the rad cap into the expansion bottle, which might be made worse by a weak and/or old mix of coolant or slightly over filling the system.

[gvy]

We kinda had to dump the Beemer.
After trying to get it running , I was sure there was fuelpressure, but no injection (we got the injectors out, on the side of the road and it was the only time on this trip , the rain started pooring down and we got soaked while trying to fix it  )
So we towed it to a nearby campingplace and asked if we could leave it for a day.
My mate (owner of the BMW) has a brother living in France , not that far away, so they managed to get it transported to a garage and he returned home to Belgium, the day after by rail. Leaving us with 4 to continu the trip. (As far as I know, the BMW is still in France).

About the coolant spill on the Tiger . It is a fact like you said, the coolant needs to be, when cold, just at min level, not any higher ( Mine was filled higher somewhere between min and max level at the time) . But it is also a fact that the only time this happened to my Tiger was then at real high altitude. And idem for the street triple. I had that one for 4 years and the only time the issue with spilling coolant happened, was when pauzing at high altitude. Never happened before, never happened afterwards and apart from refilling the circuit, I did not change anything, not even the radiator cap.

In the case of the street triple, the year before,  I admit I had pushed the bike uphill. It was heavy loaded ( I wheigh over 100kg in my gear + all luggage ) and we really were scraping pegs from bend to bend enjoying the ride, going into real high revs all the time. I was the only 675 engine, the others had +1000cc bikes.

In the case of the Tiger , this year, at the time it happened, I was not really "racing" the bike, we were enjoying the scenery and the fact there was snow around us.

So infact , no worries, just a bit weird

Anyway, I guess you are right

[Tigermike]

Thanks for sharing some great photos, always lovely to see other parts of the world and read the trip reports.
  keep em coming