Strange things you find in old bikes!

[CraigB]

Today I was taking the front alternator cover off my 2002 R1150RS. I've been going through the bike, since it is new to me, trying to take care of any maintenance and get a base line of where the bike is at. So as I pulled the bottom of the cover away out falls all of this. Actually there was more but I vacuumed up some of it. At first I thought it was sun flower seeds but not sure now. There was a big spider and a few other bugs. I guess the PO had a mouse problem? Maybe. I went over the rest of the area under the tank and looking for more seeds and maybe chewed wires but it looks ok.

 

Strange things.

 

cb

[mrduck]

[CraigB]

I don't feel so bad now!

 

cb

[TEWKS]

Nasty little critters. I just bought a used RAV4 that was sitting for a while. I found a big nest on top of the cabin filter. One KIA, hope they're gone. 

[Rinkydink]

18 minutes ago, CraigB said:

Today I was taking the front alternator cover off my 2002 R1150RS. I've been going through the bike, since it is new to me, trying to take care of any maintenance and get a base line of where the bike is at. So as I pulled the bottom of the cover away out falls all of this. Actually there was more but I vacuumed up some of it. At first I thought it was sun flower seeds but not sure now. There was a big spider and a few other bugs. I guess the PO had a mouse problem? Maybe. I went over the rest of the area under the tank and looking for more seeds and maybe chewed wires but it looks ok.

 

Strange things.

 

cb

Looks like black oil sunflower seeds. Good find. 

[Paul De]

Damn that looks familiar.   My wife loves feeding birds and put a bag of sunflower seed in the garage in close proximity to my then 2y/o R1100RT.   One day I pulled the bike out for a ride and it was only running on one cylinder.    Left header was cold. After pull Left panelI found a few sunflower seed husks on the floor which fell from who knows where and the issue was readily apparent.  That bastard critter actually chewed through the wires to the left side injector.  Barely enough wire sticking from the connector to solder it up.  I went out and bought my wife an old school galvanized trash can for her bird seed.  Bated the little bastard and saw it had one last good meal....

[Antimatter]

Many moons ago, I bought a used Kawasaki Voyager (the old one that was a GW knock-off) that had been sitting around for a while.   Ran like sh!t on the way home, and when I tore into it I found a huge mouse nest taking up the whole upper part of the air box.   The old Voyager had this funky two-stage airbox that was perfect for a mouse house.  I called in the expert to remove some dead rodents (wife - cancer researcher who handles mice for a living), then cleaned the rest out.  After that, the bike ran like a top.

[BamaJohn]

I feel all your pain....I had a BMW Z4 ragtop and live in a log home in the woods (with all the requisite critters).  A young woman from Georgia came over to buy the Z4 and I was showing her the interior stuff...opened the glove box and found a mouse nest of pink insulation material and lots of acorns...the buyer almost died!  This had a good ending though...she bought the car and loves it!  I got a feral cat and turned her loose at my house....she helped a LOT!