Chanin, team leader of the painting department at a motorcycle manufacturer in Thailand, reveals the secrets of the perfect pinstripe.

'My father was a painter before me; it's a labor of love. Anyone can apply line tape but it's just not the same. That's why we still do the pin-striping on the motorcycle by hand.

'The fuel tanks come to me painted and lacquered. We have a designated area within the paintshop for pinstriping. It's quiet, with good light. I start by flatting the tank down with 1200-grade flatting paper, which cleans up the surface and gives a good base for the paint. I use a bit of stainless steel as a palette, thinners, the paint itself (specially and secretly formulated by Chanin), and my brush. A pinstriping brush is weird-looking thing, with a handle about five centimeter long and bristles cut in a kind of dagger shape. It lets you follow right curves without affecting the width of the line – a normal brush splays out.

Most motorcyclists modify their motorcycles to some degree. Repli-racer riders are no exception, and many go to great lengths to build motorcycles perfectly suited to their needs and wants. We took such an approach with one of our clients 2005 Suzuki GSX-R1000, aiming to improve the motorcycle's track-day performance while maintaining its excellent streetability.

First, a little history: The Suzuki GSX-R1000 was semi-professionally raced for some seasons in Thailand and Malaysia. During all that racing the GSM-R1000 was a successful experiment in transforming a street-legal GSX-R1000 into a competitive racer.

Because the owner knew the Suzuki GSX-R1000 wasn't going to remain a racebike forever, we returned it, on request, largely to stock after the owner had enough of racing the motorcycle. We kept the internal fork modifications but swapped out the borrowed race-spec Penske shock for a new stock Suzuki damper. Changes to the fork included different needles, dampers shims, fluid, pistons and stiffer springing. The shock got the same treatment. These changes, firmed up the ride and provided a wider range of damping adjustability, allowing the GSX-R1000 to be both more track- and street-friendly. Regarding the latter, we even went so far as to review a luggage rack on the Suzuki GSX-R1000 – luckily the owner didn't see the need for that.

What if your belt driven motorcycle starts making more sound that a chain driven motorcycle? You have 10 to 15,000 kilometers on the clocks, and you start hearing a squeaking noise from the rear that sounds like a nest of young birds. The noise can only be duplicated under acceleration through all gears, and at all speeds. It doesn't happen on deceleration or coasting, or when the suspension is exercised.

And if the noise is not irritating enough, your dealer fails to correct the issue and seems to be loosing it. Even if some mechanics at dealer centers will correctly look at the drive belt and rear suspension, but even with adjusted belt, cleaned, and applied anti-seize, the irritating noise will return within a few kilometers.

In some desperate move some dealer mechanics will try you to agree in replacing the brake pads, but, while it's never a bad idea to check the rear brake – it's very likely not the source of the irritating squeaking noise.

Sure, you could wheel your motorcycle down to the local big bike garage or your motorcycle dealer and let them charge you a few hundred baht to change your oil, but where is the fun in that? Better to spunk that hard earned money on a few litters of gasohol at your local petrol-station, no?

And if you're going to work on your motorcycle at home, a choice selection of kit will help you do the job in half the time, with half the hassle of trying to use a broom handle and the butter-wrench that came with your motorcycle's tool kit, if the motorcycle even came with a tool kit, for anything more than important than opening a fresh oil can.

Ask a dozen motorcyclists which aspect of motorcycle design and technology causes them the most pain and I bet they say the word 'suspension' will rank high on the list of answers.

Well take heart because help is at hand. European wrenches and suspension manufacturers Benny Wilbers and Werner Koch have reached into their reserves of wisdom to produce Motorcycle Suspension Technology in detail, a 96-page hardback that sets out to provide the information you need to get your motorcycle's suspension adjusted to suit you and your riding style.

The book is divided, roughly, into three sections: design, adjustment and troubleshooting. The first section explains, with the aid of plenty of helpful photography, diagrams and cutaway plans, how the modern suspension unit is put together and how it works. It's all about spring movement and fluid transfer.

There's also a short section on overhauling telescopic forks that's frankly far too brief and too general to be of much help unless you're already a motorcycle mechanic.

There are several ways to make something out of metal. The part can be stamped, cast, forged or machined. In fact, most metal things are a combination of more than one of these operations.

The chosen methods of metal working for a given part are usually based on economy of scale. If you are going to make a lot of a given part it is usually less expensive to have a set of dies made and cast it or forge it than it would be if you were machining it from a solid chunk of metal.

On the other hand, if you are operating in custom or small lot sizes then the CNC machines make a fully machines part not only possible but also cost effective. There is another reason to fully machine a part: if you need or want to possibly make changes to its design later on.

Every so often you'll need to grapple with the dark arts, otherwise known as electricity. Given the reliability of modern motorcycles, chances are trials involving splicing wires and testing circuits will come only after you've done something silly, like hooking your iPhone charger to the turn-signal circuit.

As always, having the right tools will smooth your day and, as suggested, you won't really need to rob the hardware store to get going.

First on the shopping list is a multimeter. It's pretty easy shopping for these pups, because your needs likely will be modest. At the least, your multimeter should be able to measure DC voltage down to 100 millivolts and up to 500 volts. (Although you'll mainly be testing for 12 volts) It's should also measure resistance and current; our multimeter maximum current load is 10 amps, which is plenty. In other words, don't spend the big dough on a fancy multimeter.

A new silencer is perhaps the most common serious change most new motorcycle owners make to a motorcycle. Throw a new exhaust pipe on it.

On the face of it, you get a bit more power, lose a stack of weight, and get a nicer sound. And on some motorcycles – Suzuki's B-King, BMW's K1300S, etc... – you can replace questionable stock aesthetics with a sleek aftermarket exhaust replacement.

But in the past few years, the increasing integration of exhaust design into the motorcycle has made it much harder for aftermarket exhaust system manufacturers to make suitable replacements.

There are time when I get so angry over the repairs I have to do as a mechanic that I can't see straight. Call this catastrophe 'All for the sake of a blob of grease.'

On the majority of shaft-driven motorcycles, there are splines in the rear wheel which mesh with splines in the final drive housing. All it takes to keep these splines alive is, at every rear tire change, a palmful of high-temperature grease. Forgo that lubrication for two or three tire changes, add in some wet weather riding, and those splines will rust and strip in short order.

Well, I have finally done it, I got out on track with my Suzuki GSX-R600 K4. Its first shakedown was exciting and accelerating.

Prior to this, I fitted Brembo brake pads in the front to haul me up, and finished off the new-look panels with Pro-Bolt quick-release stainless fasteners. The fasteners look exactly like the titanium ones, only lot less expensive. They're dead easy to use, and very effective.

The new brake pads are Brembo's sintered fast road/track version. I gave them a good few laps with easy riding to bed them in properly. Once confident that they would sustain heavier loads, I upped the pace, and found them highly effective.

The Brembo brake pads are certainly better than standard ones I´d ridden with on the Suzuki GSX-R600 before. They offered much more power than the OE variety, with plenty of feel and progression too. This excursion was all about seeing if the Suzuki GSX-R600 itself was OK though, so I'll find out more with harder riding another time.

I was worried that the day may not take place at all, because the GSX-R600 wouldn't start when I was loading it into the pickup truck. The colder weather and long time without starting had defeated my battery, so I needed a bump start before the first session.