Motorbikes inside the house?

[3DP]

I'm having a battle with my Mrs concerning me having the Ducati in the house during winter. Her main objections are

a) I don't want it in the house, friends will think you are weird.
b) The kids may damage it, which would force me to strangle them Homer Simpson style
c) You are not a bachelor anymore.

My counter arguments are that it would give me more space in the garage to work on the bikes over winter and that the bike is on display in art museums, so must be worthy of a place along the wall in a land locked 'through' room in the middle of my house.

She has firmly put her foot down on this one and much as I'd like to say "bks - I do what I want", as I've stated previously, if she stopped looking after me, I'd be a malnourished hobo in stinking dirty clothes inside 2 weeks. I'm that crap.

Question to the masses - what are your views on moving a bike inside the house for periods of time? How many of you have actually done it and why? How have you convinced other halves?

[CBR JGWRR]

I got in a lot of trouble last year with the letting agency over this...

[Otter Smacker]

Not enough space

[750turbo]

Just do it, post the pics.

The bruises and scars will heal in a few weeks time

[Golgarth]

If I had a garage I would struggle to get it past "her in doors".

Don't think I would like it in the house anyways, the chance of the bairn knocking it over etc would do my head in.

[SpeedYellow]

This was my Foggy rep that lived in my 8th floor flat in London, wasn't going to leave that on the street. Did get funny looks in the lift though and going through the lobby

[sc0tt]

I wanted to bring the bike in on saturday to do the non messy bits of the service.

I froze in the garage. She said, "you are not bringing THAT in the house. End of" when i knocked on the door with it.

[R8Steve]

I did it a few years ago - my parents/friends/neighbours thought i was mad, i thought it looked quite good sat in the dining room. Unfortunately it stank the house out with the smell of fuel so it was moved back outside.

Unless you can drain the fuel totally and clean it thoroughly it will stink your house out so probably advisable

[hman]

this, I leave my bike in a carpeted and heated out house - even with the fuel tap off it still vents fuel and stinks the place out.

[LeMomo]

One of my friends is in the process of buying a house at the moment, and on of his main requirements was that there must be space and easy access for storing motorbikes inside the house. This is because in his price range he would only get a single garage and currently has 3 race bikes and 1 road bike. He has stated that he will never sell his zx10 superstock bike and would rather keep it on display in the lounge now that it's being retired from racing (was supposed to be out of homologation for the TT from 2013 onwards so he's bought an RSV4 to replace it)

[moanthebairns]

I would but I live on a first floor flat with the o/h.

I have all my fairings etc in the house just now. The o/h went mental when she came in last night and seen them on the living room floor under the tree. More so when I cleaned them and managed to spread tar and oil all over the floors throuhout the flat.

It was even worse this morning when I made her get up from her pit so I could put them on the bed so she wont scratch/stand on them when ironing in the livingroom.

[George29]

I replaced the kitchen table with my bike for the past few weeks. It's warmer to work on it than when it's in the garage

[Condi]

Okay if you've got a spare room to keep it in, but otherwise a simple shed with a heater will do.

[3DP]

My garage is heated, carpeted and well lit, so storage isn't an issue really and I'd have no desire to work on the bike inside the house away from my tool chests. There's too many bikes in my garage to work efficiently around sometimes as it's single width, but double length with the far end done as a workshop with ramp.

SpeedYellow said:

This was my Foggy rep that lived in my 8th floor flat in London, wasn't going to leave that on the street. Did get funny looks in the lift though and going through the lobby

^^
Liking the cut of your jib sir

@hman - I'd forgotten about the fuel smell. I don't really have this problem in my garage, but it's quite well ventilated and not permanently heated in the winter. Indoors where it's a bit warmer and less well ventilated could be an issue, but before draining anything, I'd probably just whack a blu-tac bung in the fuel breather pipe to start with before draining the tank to see if that worked.

[R8Steve]

I tried blocking the fuel vents, it still seems to escape from everywhere! Having said that it was a 98 R1 so had carbs, it might be better with fuel injection.

It got to the stage that i was getting headaches from it and afraid to flick a lightswitch in case the place blew up so that gives you an idea of the severity of the potential problem

[heretheygo]

lived in a farmhouse with a huge vaulted mill room for a couple of years - used to sit on the bike reading the paper on the odd sunday morning.... fortunately was a bachelor in those glorious days, with only a semi adopted stray cat to wonder WTF I was doing.
bikes in the garage for now. stray cat was poisoned by a neighbour. times change.

[SpeedYellow]

I never noticed the fuel smell could be due to spending far too much time around cars or the fact the building I lived in had central heating for the whole block which required windows open at all times to stop being cooked alive!!

[Fleegle]

Pete

Your wife is being unreasonable. Grounds for a divorce in my books

[Hooli]

SpeedYellow said:

This was my Foggy rep that lived in my 8th floor flat in London, wasn't going to leave that on the street. Did get funny looks in the lift though and going through the lobby

Good work sir.

[George29]

Have you tried explaining that the Ducati could be seen by some as a piece of art? That's a perfectly normal thing to have in a house