Upon purchasing my motorcycle, and throwing a large log on the manhood fire, I figured I could stoke it by doing my own maintenance. Now, I’m no wrench-head but I can follow directions in maintenance manuals, if not fully understand what I’m doing, and know my way around a tool or two. As a geek, what I lack in engine knowlege I more than make up for with enthusiasm.

To keep track of the maintenance I’ve accomplished I built, what else, a database. It’s a really simple Filemaker database and you can download from the link below. It has a main window to prompt all pertinent information (date, type of maintenance, mechanic).

Form View

You can check out everything that has been done at a glance by selecting the List View layout.

List View

Using this database does require owning a copy of Filemaker to run. But, there are no locks on it and it is as customizable as any Filemaker database can be.

One item I haven’t added, but probably will in the future, is a cost calculator. I’d like to be able to track how much I’ve spent on the bike at any given time.

Click Here to download a zip file of the database.
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COMMENT:
AUTHOR: Anonymous
DATE: 8/29/2005 06:25:02 PM
Be careful!!! This could end up like the guy who tried to justify the cost of all his hunting stuff with the amount of meat in the freezer. Some things are best weighed as FUN/NOT FUN.
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COMMENT:
AUTHOR: J. Curtis
DATE: 8/29/2005 07:16:42 PM
i have no idea what that means.
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COMMENT:
AUTHOR: Anonymous
DATE: 8/29/2005 09:28:16 PM
Cost calculator? Why? FUN/NOT FUN … the rest is irrelevant
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COMMENT:
AUTHOR: J. Curtis
DATE: 8/29/2005 10:34:00 PM
ah! i understand. I would only do that on a separate layout… one that was printable for tax time, etc. I wouldn’t have that as a main feature…oh no.
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COMMENT:
AUTHOR: Anonymous
DATE: 8/30/2005 09:09:11 PM
Some people have saved so much money on fuel that now they can spend money on leather
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COMMENT:
AUTHOR: J. Curtis

DATE: 8/31/2005 04:44:40 AM
okay, the leather thing scares me just a little. seems like a mid-life crisis type reasoning.
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COMMENT:
AUTHOR: Anonymous
DATE: 8/31/2005 09:05:30 PM
Actually, you may not remember it, but, when I used to ride dirt bikes, I wore leather pants (with knee armor) and a leather racing type jacket (no pockets). It was long before my second childhood. And I remember my butt literally being saved by the cowhide. Of course, with those type of cycles the question usually was not, “Have you crashed lately?” but “How bad was it?” And then there was a good laugh.
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