Pics or it didn’t happen!
The bedonkadonk (trunk) of a PC800 is unique among motorcycles. The cargo area is under the seat like a scooter’s but it’s larger. Scooters can have that storage because they have entirely different engines and drivetrains. I don’t know of any “normal engine” motorcycle with anything like the PC800’s bedonkadonk.
It makes me happy. It’s weird yet practical. Why have hard saddlebags, when you can let engineers off the leash to come up with something entirely new?
In the photo below, I leaned the new tire (shipped in plastic wrap) against the bike. The old rear tire is still on the bike. It’s tucked under and behind the license plate. I’m not sure Yoda could fit in there!
BTW: The old tire isn’t super bald, I expected this whole “new tire” situation to go on forever and started early. I could’ve maybe run it a bit longer. On the other hand, the bike was used and I’ve no idea how old the tires actually are. Better to swap early than wreck trying to squeeze out a few more miles.
Gaze on the glory of the bedonkadonk! The lid (the rear passenger’s seat) is huge. There’s awesome access to the whole storage compartment. It seals out water perfectly. The bedonkadonk is said to be so good you can dump ice in it and use it as a cooler. (There’s a drain if you want to do that. Of course they thought to include a drain!)
Someone added a mirror. I don’t like it. What am I going to do, use it to adjust my eyeshadow? I leave it there because it’s not taking up space and I don’t want to rip it off and create an adhesive cleaning issue.
The bedonkadonk has a little “dome light”. I can even have it automatically turn on when I open the lid. It’s amazingly civilized. Usually I leave the “auto on” switch off, but it’s a pretty neat feature.
Accessing the tire seems hopeless. But don’t despair. Honda engineers are clever. They gave you all you’ll need. See those four screws on the rear edge of the trunk? Remove just two of them and the whole thing is accessible. It’s diabolically effective.
I’m not sure about vocabulary. Some of the things you find on a PC800 just don’t exist on motorcycles. Anyway, two hex screws is enough to loosen the rear bumper / license plate holder / tail & brake light… um… “assembly”. From there you pop out two friction fit tabs….. GENTLY! It’s very solid but also old plastic that’s irreplaceable. Once it’s free, unplug three lights, wiggle the wiring free and Bob’s your Uncle.
If you knew what you were doing, it would be a 5 minute job to get that far. The biggest risk is setting the removed assembly down on your garage floor and accidentally stepping on it.
I zip tied the wiring out of the way just to be safe. Out of curiosity, I compared the dreaded and feared PC800’s body panels to my very traditional 1999 Honda Shadow ACE. With the assembly popped off, there’s more access to the PC800’s tire than the Shadow. (Also the Shadow lacks a center stand.)
I want to repeat this because everyone loses their shit about “plastics”; after 5 minutes of fiddling, the PC800’s access is actually better than reaching under the metal fender of a “normal” cruiser.
I’m as surprised as you.
I really liked what I saw with the rest of the rear hub too. The rear drum brake linkage (with the spring) is held with a wingbolt! (The bolt also adjusts the brake position. You can tweak your brakes without even needing a tool.) To remove the linkage, just spin the wingnut off! (This is the exact same linkage design as my Yamaha TW200 dirt bike.) Drum brakes aren’t sexy but any brake you can adjust with a wingnut is super practical.
The bar below the brake linkage links the hub to the swingarm. I presume this is so the hub doesn’t spin around. I had to pull a cotter pin and loosen a 10mm (or 12mm, I forget) bolt. I got this far with tools from the bike’s “emergency tool kit”. (How better to test if you’re travelling with adequate tools?)
Nice!
The 27 mm axle bolt on the other side of the wheel was a different story. I tried the wrench from the emergency kit. I didn’t expect it to work. It didn’t work. “Emergency kits” have their limitations.
I drove to town and bought a 27mm impact socket from Horror Freight. I tried that with my impact wrench. Nope!
I began to wonder how old that tire really was? Would I be fighting 10 years of corrosion? 20?
It was time to walk away and ponder. (Actually I lurked on more online forums. I can’t be the first guy who’s encountered this. And I wasn’t.)
This is the exact point where Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance would go off on a three chapter discussion the Ancient Greek concept of “Arete“. It means the quality of excellence or “full realization of potential or inherent function”.
Whoa? Where did that come from? Apparently, I remember more of the book that I thought. Huh?
I like the word Arete. It inspires me to think of greater meanings in the things around me. The ancient Greeks were not perfect but they diligently explored thinking; and how to properly live. They had words for degrees and types of virtue and excellence; with a whole consideration of “fulfillment of purpose”. Smart dudes like Plato and Socrates were pondering virtue, knowledge, self-restraint, and justice 2,500 years ago.
What have we done with our time? Our half ass existence is embarrassing. In all that time, we should have mapped the contours of wisdom. But no! We’re absolute dumbasses.
How did that happen?
Consider arete and then consider what we think about. The debate of the day is what to do about a woman who killed her three children. Regardless of what I say about it, I’ll piss off roughly half the populace. A couple millennia should have been enough to suss out a general policy for infanticide. Nah, we just freak out when it happens and then line up in a circular firing squad. Our families are broken. Our words obfuscate. We’re forced to refer to bums as “unhoused”, illegal aliens as “undocumented”, and lies as “disinformation”. A jurist on our highest court cannot define “woman” and neither can an organization of Women’s Basketball. Our movies are propaganda. And it’s not even good propaganda. The richest nation on earth amassed the largest national debt to ever exist in the entirety of human civilization. We invented Pop Tarts, stare at screens, and got fat.
It doesn’t have to be that way. Diogenes would know what to do. Half naked, living in a barrel, and whacking off when he felt like it, he still worked hard trying to live correctly. He’d bitch slap every damn one of us, fling a plucked chicken at Congress, and then go back to his barrel. A lunatic talked smack to Alexander the Great because what he had to say was wise. Murderous violent conqueror Alexander listened, because he too was wise.
We are either idiots, or we mimic their behavior; functionally the same damn thing.
Which is to say, I couldn’t fix the bike until I got that 27mm nut loose.
The next post will ensue when I get my ass in gear and type it.