After weeks of woes with my dealer service, and a week out from an off road ADV camp in NJ's Pine Barrens next week, finally got to just work on my bike instead of have problems with it. Thanks again to everyone on the forums who's helped me get to this point.
First up was reinstalling the brackets to hold this quick release Touratech headlight guard for offroad use. Awesome, just pops right on and off with rubber grommets. It helps a lot to actually install it with fasteners instead of just loosely sitting the metal brackets in the air vents, as the dealer did. I got a refund on the $82.95 service charge.
My new rescue dog I adopted last week 2 days before my apartment flooded in NYC wanted to check out the AT while my shy wife laughed her ass off.
Got the other spring on the center installed as the dealer didn't do as elaborated in a painful thread elsewhere. Me an auto mechanic neighbor did it with brute strength and went wild when we got it on after we bent a prybar trying to leverage it on! One spring sleeve will forever stay off, but it's done and now I can do my own wheel and chain maintenance and not have to deal with that dealer.
Next up was Mosko Moto Reckless 40. Looks like I'm gonna have to camp in NJ for 3 days, and I couldn't be happier with this rackless system from them. I've done a lot of solo bikepacking (long distance bicycling with camping gear) and the construction of this bag system and thoughtfulness behind every detail is awesome. At first all the straps were a little perplexing but now I can get the thing on in 5 minutes. Love that it's entirely rackless and how it attaches. I could easily take this down to South America and fix it to a 250cc if I had to.
With the 22L Stinger tailbag in the expanded beavertail, I can fit everything I need to camp for 3 days minus replenishing water, and 2L of extra fuel in MSR bottles in the side pockets. My one person MSR tent / poles / footprint / rainfly slides right into one of the leg sleeves. Other sleeping gear on the other side, food and cooking system, and tools to fix a flat including a compressor and all else in the stinger. I reckon you could even fit their Stinger 8L that the Reckless 40 comes with under that beavertail. I love this luggage, cannot say enough good about it.
And then it was off to shake it down. Nice 200 mile ride alternating from dense urban traffic to highway to rolling twisty backroads to some service roads and even some singletrack that was muddy as heck from Ida passing over the NE. The AT handled it all beautifully, and why I love this bike so much. I feel like I can go **** near anywhere, do about anything.
Thanks again to everyone in the forums who's helped me with so much since the day I got this bike a few months ago. I love it even more, I know it's capable of even more, and goddamn what a joy it is to ride.