Go in the Merc and still buy bottles 

Cos it is being sold as 'trade' which means it has not been tested or prepped. If you ride it away and kill yourself they might feel bad but they won't be liable...

It runs (vid available on request), has an MoT and has had its 18,000 mile service, which is more than my K13 has 

It's strange, of all the bikes I've owned, I have always fitted alarms to those that didn't have them as standard and then came the K12 and I think I alarmed it twice and have never bothered on the K13. I mean, who would nick a K13. Oh, sorry!

You were 'lucky' with the throttle return springs. Back on the old site are the various legendary tales of woe from first off Dusty in Scotland with his phantom 11,000 rpm tickover which mysteriously disappeared every time he trailered it to the stealers and then my saga which didn't and cost me a set of throttle bodies which luckily came off eBay for the princely sum of £99 with free postage from James Sherlock.

Never did find anything wrong with the old ones but even when there was nothing but the bare bodies and butterflies, they would stick if you closed them normally but worked perfectly if you let the throttle snap shut.

Nice set up. The problem with the Rally is that there is no spare room on the bars and what there is is in the wrong place for a rear brake lever.

There are small serrations on the clip or the plastic reservoir to stop it turning inadvertently in normal use.

If you twist the bottle you can feel and hear the clicks as the serrations move against whatever it is that stops it turning normally. The only way that the thing can turn in the clip is if the top has been butchered on wayyyy too tightly and has twisted the whole shebang as Chris admitted he had done.

One wonders if the dealers just let the apprentice do the job. For those of us who still use the dealers it is yet another thing to check before we blithely ride off into the sunset... 

Whereas too much means your fillings fall out and if you don't have fillings, your teeth fall out 

With a squirt of WD on the threads of the shock (which is really the damper) you 'should' be able to turn the spring and adjustable spring seat by a gloved hand. Glad you got it to move either way. Don't forget to tighten the grub screw again...then you put the egg to your mouth...

Once you realise how restrictive the stock silencer is, I can guarantee that you will be putting the lovely, quiet but fruity, GPR back on. It transformed the bike in my honest humble opinion.

Luggage is a purely personal thing, no metrics or facts will change what you need/want. Speak to David about top boxes to see what vitriol can do to overcome emotion...

The AS3 gear lever needs a drill and a bigger bolt. Damned if I could ever get the round tuit to work.

As the old saying goes, once you buy it you can do what the hell you like with it as long as it makes you happy.

Oh, and Salisbury Plain is a huge playground. I suggest you pm #boboneleg on ADV. No, really, he truly does have just one leg and a hollow lump of Aluminum for the gear changer side (I think?).

He lives in Bristol and rides SP long and often.