2013 Stelvio life span

[Motormike]

Interesting topic:  High mileage motorcycles and the economies of rebuilding one.  Of course, we pretty much live in a "throw-away" society.  I hate throwing stuff away that should be fixable.  Of course, cost is always an issue.  With mass production, repairs can be and often are more expensive than replacement.  I have a nice Panasonic 40 inch Plasma TV sitting in my garage, all boxed up.  It died (won't power up) because of a simple power relay that need to be replaced.  Fixable, but the cost would be close to what I can now buy a new LCD set for.  Let alone the fact that TV repair, once a common small business, is now a lost art. I haven't had the heart to toss it yet, but suppose I will end up doing so.  One of the lasting appeals of Moto Guzzi (at least one of their traits that appeals to me) is they are often overhauled or rebuilt rather that scrapped.   Harley Davidson is (was?) much the same.  "Nobody ever throws a Harley Davidson away," Peter Egan once said.  Unfortunately, Harleys have been so over-produced in the last few years that I suspect many will be indeed scrapped.  Simply more of them out there than there will ever be riders for in a slowly declining market.  With the small numbers of Moto Guzzi's produced each year, I hope that will never happen to them.

[BRIO]

Things last as long as your interest and patience. There are Alfasuds on the road and Volvo 240s in junkyards.

[Huzo]

With regard to reply #30.
I cringe like a child when I see Hueys being pushed overboard on carriers when deemed necessary.
WW2 Mustangs, Spitfires..et al, scrapped/scavenged or abandoned back in the day.
You just get the feeling that some 11 year old kid will spot the TV one day and inform you that he has the same generic component from a 40 buck device that he’ll install in 20 minutes for a back seat jaunt on the Guzzi.
I’m reminded of a time back in the 80’s, when I had a very nice VW Kombi with factory pop top and fridge, gas cooker etc..
It had the old DC generator with shim adjusters in the pulley (I think), which became problematic and generally acted like a thorough bastard. I went to a known good Auto Elec. to see if he could fit an alternator, he said it was economically unfeasible to do so due to the work involved and since his reputation was Beetle/Roperesque, I accepted his word immediately and began to leave.
A chance comment made by me to the effect that I, “thought it would be just a matter of a rectifier or some such” but admittedly I was clueless on such things, was greeted by...
“Oh shit yeah it basically is mate, but it’s the mounting of the alternator where all the tough stuff is, the rest’s a piece of piss..”
Well, the “tough stuff” held me up for about 2 hours and he did what I though was impossible while I went for lunch.
You just have to “know what you know” well...
And “know what you don’t know” even better..

[Moparnut72]

That is interesting. My old '98 Cummins Dodge lost the alternator on a trip once near a smallish town. The parts house didn't have a replacement. They sent me to an auto electric guy, in fact he came to me. He said he would take the alternator and repair it if it was repairable. He also said the ECM acted as the regulator and that could also be the problem and that was big $. He said if it was he could wire up a regular regulator. I told him to go right ahead. However all he had to do was overhaul the alternator.

Years ago I used to fix my own. You could get brushes, bearings, bushings etc or whatever you needed. Recently I worked in a NAPA store, I went through the catalog (computer) and could find none of that stuff. I am sure you could get it from specialty supply sources, probably in lots of a hundred though.
kk

[LowRyter]

Seems like you can drive anything forever if you take care of it.  Some guy drove a Volvo 1800 3.2M miles before he died, not the car.

https://www.roadandtrack.com/car-culture/classic-cars/a25165860/irv-gordon-million-mile-volvo-p1800-obituary/

[Motormike]

Seems like you can drive anything forever if you take care of it.  Some guy drove a Volvo 1800 3.2M miles before he died, not the car.

True, but there's taking care of something vs. constantly rebuilding it.  In a motorcycle rag a few years ago, some Harley rider bragged about his 250,000 mile Harley Davidson.  When asked what it took in the way of maintenance to reach such a lofty milage, he basically listed off replacing almost every part on the engine several times with the exception of the crankcases.  I wrote the editor to tell them that a Harley Davidson is just like a good hammer.  You know, a good hammer will last forever, as long as you replace the head and handle once-in-a-while!

[Moparnut72]

We still have several 60's and 70's Volvos running around town.
kk

[Huzo]

True, but there's taking care of something vs. constantly rebuilding it.  In a motorcycle rag a few years ago, some Harley rider bragged about his 250,000 mile Harley Davidson.  When asked what it took in the way of maintenance to reach such a lofty milage, he basically listed off replacing almost every part on the engine several times with the exception of the crankcases.  I wrote the editor to tell them that a Harley Davidson is just like a good hammer.  You know, a good hammer will last forever, as long as you replace the head and handle once-in-a-while!

Nonsense good Sir...!
I have it on good authority that 90% of Harleys are still on the road...

[Motormike]

...and the other 10% made it home safely!