This weekend things have started to move on the Andes Moto Extreme website development. Walter Colebatch got in touch about his latest project and through mutual support of each others projects I am now following on from my work on Sibirsky Extreme to now focus my efforts on the new website.

Sherri Jo Wilkins has also joined the team and will be the base camp manager, photographer and videographer. Other members of the team include:

Walter Colebatch – Team Captain
Lukas Matzinger – Technical Director
Barton Churchill – The Mountain Man

The plan is to take a troika of Husaberg FE 570s to South America and make a world motorcycle altitude record attempt of 20,500′ 6,250m!

You can follow the prep here (www.andesmotoextreme.com) ready for a kick off in March 2012.

For some time I have been troubled my motorists lack of awareness when it comes to noticing motorcycles. I have taken to riding around with my full beam on. A lot of people complain about this but I always point out… “well you saw me didn’t you?” I’ve heard twice now motorists say I didn’t see you.

It’s true. They look but they don’t “see”. Anyway I could rant endlessly on this subject but that is not what this post is about.

Over the weekend I decided to fit 50 watt HID’s. It looked complicated initially but once I got stuck in the electronics was the easy bit. Tucking the wiring away neatly and putting the panels back on proved to be the biggest eater of my time.

I’m hoping to post a ‘How To’ PDF on here soon but for nowI will only give you a few before and after shots.

These are just the stock halogens

and the HID’s after fitting

the bike went from this mess

to this. I’m very pleased with the end result.

These bad boys are too bright to be riding around with full beam. I have angled them down and left. After a quick ride out this evening not one motorist flashed me. The improvement was marked. I would like to angle them up some more but I realise I will have to compromise as I’m no the only road user. Thankfully tweaking the headlamps position is quick and easy enough to do.