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Let’s share femme-friendly techniques, tools and hacks for working on and around bikes, because she can do anything he can do, right? When it comes to know-how? Sure! What about the plain old brute force strength that occasionally seems to be required with moto-maintenance? Hmmm… I’m a fairly new rider - I’m celebrating the 4th anniversary of buying my first bike in about a week - but in these 4 years, I’ve put 70,000+ miles on my Transalp throughout North and South America. For me, understanding the mechanics of my bike and learning how to work on her has made me a better rider. I’m not sure if it’s because the more I learn, the better I understand how to manipulate my machine while I’m on her… Or maybe it’s just another component of building confidence around motorcycles… The knowledge that, if necessary, I’ll be able to self-rescue is HUGELY rewarding. I’ve been really fortunate that the men I ride/have ridden with have been really supportive of helping me to increase my technical know-how. Sometimes, this is relatively pain-free for them But sometimes, when I’m stuck on something and insist on not having any help, it can require a massive amount of patience (the above tire change, rear and front, took HOURS)… Advice is easy to find - post a photo like this on social media, and you’ll get dozens of “Try this!,” “You’re doing this wrong!” comments… many of which are useless if you’re 5’4” and under 120lbs. I understand it can be hard for someone who is a foot taller than me, has 50-75 pounds of muscle on me and has been working on bikes for YEARS to understand that methods that work for HIM might not work for me. So I wanted to start up a thread where we (both men and women) can share femme-friendly techniques, tools and hacks for working on and around bikes... Like the hack below... I’ve found that my GoGirl is actually much easier to use as an oil funnel than for it’s intended purpose I have a few other tidbits I’ve picked up along the way and made short videos of that I’ll share when I have better internet, but for now, please throw in your two cents and let’s help one another out!

XLADV is the big bike version of ThumperTalk and they have a store. I figure why shouldn't we? I'll be putting together some ideas and wanted to get your feedback for the store. We obviously have our XLADV stickers (2/$5) and Beyond Starbucks stickers ($5) and soon (Jul 17) we'll have the Team XLADV race t-shirts to sell but I have bigger plans. I'm talking with a friend with years of experience in the motorcycle apparel market and knows all the factories and the design process, etc... He's made a lot of stuff you would know. The jacket would be probably the most functional jacket out there but sort of an "Un-Jacket" in that it's not going to have shiny bright logos all over it. I think riders have grown tired of being rolling billboards for apparel makers and want something not just un-branded, but something they themselves can even customize with their own club (PNW Riders, GS Giants, SoCal DualSport, etc...) patches. Not a price point of $400+ but perhaps $250. Also talking with a make of soft panniers for something rugged, versatile and functional. And of course I'm sure we can drop-ship any number of tire makes we have a good history with already (Motoz, Shinko) that will give us good coverage for the 50/50, 60/40 and 70/30 segments. Also considering carrying a line of tents and sleeping bags. Thoughts?...

sign me up.

Yeah I guess I could do that! I haven't figured out the "right" formula to put a proper vid together. Purely Experimental. Lol!

Fixed!