[Sir Trev]

Where is the bike? I cannot believe the Org cannot come to the rescue here. I'm no mechanical genius but pretty good at the sympathetic noises to accompany someone more proficient with spanners than me. Someone nearby will have a garage and tools. Another may well have a trailer. And so on.

Unfortunately with most dealers they do not put anything reasonable on as a temp hire bike. They may have some older items taken in PX hanging about but they need tax and insurance. Best bet is a demo bike but not every dealer has them. If a 'ped is all they have... The only bike I ever wrote off was a loan 'ped when a lane-changer decided he wanted to use the bit of tarmac I was already using. The shop were OK at the time, took me on to work with the mangled ped in the pick up, but they had all sorts of hell from their insurance and got nothing like true value for it. So, I'm not surprised you're not getting far with them.