Click on them.
There are more to come.
09 October 2008
07 October 2008
Busy
Update;
Here is The Beast.
Crap, I been as busy as a one legged man in an ass kicking contest.
I went to do a post last night over at the Ornery Bastard and fell asleep right in the middle of it.
I busted my ass all day Saturday, drug a 3/4 ton truck up onto a trailer with a come along and some help and then brought it to work and stripped it down to the frame and the cab. I think I popped a rib out of joint yarding on that damn come along.
Then I took the service body box off of my old Ford and swapped beds so at least it looks halfway decent.Of course I broke the back window out of it during this process, luckily the one I was stripping had the same window glass.
I had a buddy stay after work and help me put that back in too last night, then I spent two hours last night getting the bed bolted down and some of the wiring hooked up, cleaned all the crap out of it that I have been storing in it and put the canopy on it.
I still have a TON of work to do to this thing.
My Boss is on vacation so I am trying to get as much done as I can INSIDE of the shop instead of OUTSIDE in my gravel fucking driveway.
I still have brakes to do, a major tune up and the whole exhaust system to be replaced with headers and Flow Master mufflers.
I also still have to drill the frame so I can install the tow hitch assembly and put the back bumper on it.
That will at least make it street legal.
Much work to do, again, no rest fer the wicked!
Here is The Beast.
Crap, I been as busy as a one legged man in an ass kicking contest.
I went to do a post last night over at the Ornery Bastard and fell asleep right in the middle of it.
I busted my ass all day Saturday, drug a 3/4 ton truck up onto a trailer with a come along and some help and then brought it to work and stripped it down to the frame and the cab. I think I popped a rib out of joint yarding on that damn come along.
Then I took the service body box off of my old Ford and swapped beds so at least it looks halfway decent.Of course I broke the back window out of it during this process, luckily the one I was stripping had the same window glass.
I had a buddy stay after work and help me put that back in too last night, then I spent two hours last night getting the bed bolted down and some of the wiring hooked up, cleaned all the crap out of it that I have been storing in it and put the canopy on it.
I still have a TON of work to do to this thing.
My Boss is on vacation so I am trying to get as much done as I can INSIDE of the shop instead of OUTSIDE in my gravel fucking driveway.
I still have brakes to do, a major tune up and the whole exhaust system to be replaced with headers and Flow Master mufflers.
I also still have to drill the frame so I can install the tow hitch assembly and put the back bumper on it.
That will at least make it street legal.
Much work to do, again, no rest fer the wicked!
03 October 2008
Just A Little Teaser
I have asked my Dad to try and find the rest of the pictures I took at that Flat Track race I went to a while back, I did manage to find a couple.
I am currently unable to enlarge these, I am waiting to see if Pops can resend the whole batch and if I can't play with them then, sorry!
Here are a couple of old Nortons that were right across the road from us.
I am looking forward to this event next year already.
28 September 2008
Pre'65 Scottish Two Day Trial
All these sleds are 43+ years old and this is a hell of a climb! Enjoy.
25 September 2008
Wearable Motorcycle
Go see this video.
LATimes
The Deus Ex Machina is a wearable exoskeleton motorcycle concept, and it's pretty damn cool (although it looks a little impractical to me). Note that it says he invented a concept vehicle. It means he invented a concept, so it's legit. Crazy, impractical, and unworthy of attention, yes. But he did legitimately invent a concept. A very, very bad concept.
And here I thought center-punching a tree on two wheels was an unattractive prospect!
21 September 2008
The best laid plans ...
As I told ya about 6 weeks ago, I started my temporary 'retirement' at the beginning of the month. I started it off well, taking a nice vacation. So I get home Thursday night and the answering machine had about 10 messages (the first 9 from Mrs. F's clients who forgot she was out of town), the last from my buddy Nunzio who owns the place up the street from the shop.
"F-man, can you call me as soon as you're back?"
Mrs. F called it right away. "The Greek quit and he needs you to help him out."
"And where do I have the time?" I ask her. "I left Harry because it was too much and you want me to go work up the block?"
"He's your friend. Call him," Mrs. F said. "You'll figure something out."
So I call Nunzio (against my better judgment) and it's as the Mrs. thought. I start in 2 weeks from 8 - 12 in the morning until he can find a full-time guy. So much for my time away from fixing cars. Oy!
And, speaking of vacation, I spotted some wild things on the streets of Europe. Click the pics to make big ... very big.
"F-man, can you call me as soon as you're back?"
Mrs. F called it right away. "The Greek quit and he needs you to help him out."
"And where do I have the time?" I ask her. "I left Harry because it was too much and you want me to go work up the block?"
"He's your friend. Call him," Mrs. F said. "You'll figure something out."
So I call Nunzio (against my better judgment) and it's as the Mrs. thought. I start in 2 weeks from 8 - 12 in the morning until he can find a full-time guy. So much for my time away from fixing cars. Oy!
And, speaking of vacation, I spotted some wild things on the streets of Europe. Click the pics to make big ... very big.
I was in a hurry to get somewhere in Amsterdam when I spotted this GI-looking thing across a canal. I didn't have time to get over there so I zoomed in as best I could. Got any idea what it is?
And when I spotted this parked on the main drag in Amsterdam, I figgered Gord would get a kick out of it. The next amphib for the Marine Corps maybe? Heh ...
And I thought this wood carving in a shop in Florence, Italy a very cool thing.
I told Mrs. F I need one of these to run back and forth to Home Depot with.
08 September 2008
'Sickles an' old pals
I'm back from another whirlwind thrash to L.A. It was a dual purpose trip. The first purpose, chronologically speaking, was to pick up a piece of sporting gear. Backstory here and here. This is it:
It's an '05 290cc Sherco. The engine is a watercooled two-smoke. I could no way afford a new one at about $7Large, but I got this one for considerably less than half of that and I know its backstory and where it's been. My friend Steve bought it new and sold it to the gent I bought it from at the end of the '05 trials season. It has not been ridden since. It's been sitting for three years, which in a sport where the bikes get dropped off of cliffs, literally, pretty regularly, is a heck of a deal for me. I saw examples of this year, make, and model with four seasons on them for a $Grand more than I paid.
I bought it from Mike, a New Zealander who owns Kiwi Indian in Riverside. We got treated to a showroom full of Indian motorcycles, most of which were manufactured before 1954, and in the Back Room AKA the Service Dept., a full-bore dyno run on a customer's bike while said customer stood there watching his sled run faster sitting still than it probably ever has with him on it goin' down the road. I don't know what the dyno run turned up in terms of numbers or problems but it sounded great!
I've done similar dyno runs myself, and have been an interested party at dozens of 'em, and I've always kinda wondered what happens if the engine goes 'POP' and there is sudden silence, a brief flurry of shrapnel, and a hot oily mist in the room. Thank you Lord for my ignorance...
I haven't ridden the Sherco yet, or even started the engine, but I know for a fact, on the basis of what you can see in the photo, that it will go 70+ miles per hour for hours on end in 100° heat. And sideways at that!
The photo was taken at the Coso Junction rest area on US 395 in the southern Owens Valley. Click the link and zoom out slowly to see what the middle of nowhere looks like.
Just as an aside here, you make your choice as to which end of L.A. you want to go to at an intersection about 130 miles out in the Mojave Desert. Quite handy, really. From Riverside to the Sunland-Tujunga area of the east San Fernando Valley was a straight 60-mile shot on the connecting 210 Freeway.
The second purpose of the trip, and by far the most fun, was to go visit our friends Dave and Joy, and to attend our friend Arnie's 60th birthday party.
Dave is one of the best friends it has ever been my good fortune to have. We have had untold numbers of adventures over 35 years and we have a damn good time whenever we manage to get together. Joy is just plain gorgeous in every respect you could think of. She makes me look like a wingnut, and if she ever upgrades from dial-up, she'd be on the Feds' shitlist in a New York minute. Heh. We weren't there for politics, so enough of that.
By trade, Dave is an electrician. He figured out a long time ago that the way to make money is to do custom work for rich folks, and since he retired (yeah, right!) has more work than he really wants. He'll keep doing it 'til he has more money than he wants...
By avocation and nature, he's a stone(d) gearhead. Here's a picture of his dining room:
That's my Maggie heading for the kitchen. I took a picture of that as well, but forgot to check the batteries or the result, so it didn't come out. Suffice it to say there's a row of potted palms(?) and a small-block Chevy engine between the counter, the corner of which you can see, and the stove across the room. He has more kitchen workroom since he moved one of his Triumphs to one of the sheds in his back yard.
Dave is an El Camino freak and has several of them in various stages. I swear I can look at which ones he's been working on, and which ones run at any given moment, by looking at his house on Google Earth and seeing what's been moved around. He doesn't work very fast, so yes, Google changes the photos nearly often enough...
We sat around and shot the breeze all afternoon. Dave and I left the girls to their own devices and traipsed out to his shop, well-equipped and with wall-to-wall projects going on, a good many of which we chatted about. His shop is about the most fun old Triumph guys can have in L.A., and it's quite exclusive. Dave's latest deal is to dismantle LED taillight bulbs and rewire them to work on positive ground English motorcycles.
We were gone a long time. I sort of apologized to Joy and Mrs. G for that and Joy just laughed and said for as far back as she could remember, every time me'n Dave would smoke some home-grown and go out the back door, we'd be gone a while! Some stuff never changes.
We all watched a DVD I brought with me, and this takes a little background, but it's germane to this story.
The motorcycle club that Dave and I and Arnie all belong to throws a big invitation-only desert party every year and has been doing so since 1960. It's not a race, but there's a dirt bike run as the centerpiece of a three-day party in the middle of nowhere (there's a lot of that in the Mojave). The club is kinda famous for it in some circles, and an invite is a sought after hot-ticket item. Since the anti-fun people may, probably are in fact, watching, I won't go into the details. Let's just say a rollicking, rowdy good time is had by all.
For about 5 years in the '70s, I took Super-8 movies of this thing, both to record it for folks to enjoy and to get out of doing any actual work to pull off the event. I spliced the reels into 30-minute films and showed them at parties, in the club hang-out saloons, etc. There are four or five of them. No one, including myself (my projector broke), has seen them in 28 years.
For the last coupla years I've been wanting to transfer the movies to DVD but didn't know quite how to go about it. The answer came one day a few weeks ago in a blinding flash of inspiration while I was walking past the photo counter at Costco and saw a big sign that read "Put your Super-8 movies on DVD! Right here!". Doh...
I took one reel in to have it done. Just one because I wanted to see how it came out. It's $19.95 for the first 200ft and 12¢ per foot after that. They'll put titles and music on it. Your choice of music genre from a list, their selections. They add features so you can click to a variety of points, and put a montage on the case. It cost $49 and included two copies. It came out totally bitchin', and I'm going to get the rest of them done toot sweet. I was a little worried that it might have faded, but it hadn't. The movies have been in a nice cool place all these years and in fact look better on DVD than I remember them.
Purely by chance, I picked the DVDs up at Costco the morning I left for L.A. On the way down there I decided to give the spare copy to Dave, since he's in a position to make copies and dole 'em out to interested folks in and around the club. I never made the mental connection between the movie showing up in L.A. on the day of Arnie's party and the fact that everybody there was in some way connected with the club and had been to these desert runs. Dave made the connection instantly when I handed it to him, and off we went to the party in Joy's Honda Hybrid, DVD in hand.
On to the festivities!
First, a little mush is order. This was a surprise party given by Arnie's main squeeze Vivian. They've known each other almost forty years, the same time I've known both of them, but have only been an item for a year or so. I think that's nice.
Arnie is a Vietnam Vet brown-water Navy river rat and was in the same class to learn that stuff as John Kerry, although that meant nothing to him at the time, it's just interesting. He's also a hardhat diver and once cleared mines in the Red Sea. He's a member of the Piledrivers, Divers, Bridge, Wharf & Dock Builders Union. I'm not sure if that's the right local. Hard work, good pay. Besides being a dirt rider, he's an old Harley guy since back before they were all middle-aged yuppies.
The photo shows Arnie, bag in hand, not being very surprised. Vivian is in pink on the left almost, and Dave is in the formal t-shirt and ball cap. In between them, sitting, is another old pal, Chris, who is 81 years young and still rides his dirt bike pretty regularly, although he admits he can't do it like he could in his 20s. He proved later on that he could still smoke enough weed and drink enough beer to fall down. Heh. He had a slight heart attack at his 81st b'day party, and since all the guests were getting high, they couldn't exactly call 911 so they loaded him into a car and took him to the hospital. The nurse wasn't exactly amused by the alcohol on his breath, and told him he should quit all that and give up riding motorcycles too. When he innocently asked "Why?" as in "What? It'll keep ya from livin' to a ripe old age?", she had no good answer so he didn't.
Also there from the octogenarian set was a founding member of the club from 1949, 81 years young, the #1 desert racing champion in 1960, and great-grandfather of four, who rides his 650 Triumph desert sled every week, along with his club member son who is the grandfather of the four. The old dude has gotten high every day of his adult life. If weed'll kill ya, it's takin' its own sweet time about it!
The SoCal hard partyin' desert-racin' lifestyle is not for the faint of heart. I suppose some would say not for the particularly intelligent either, but they'd be wrong.
It was a lovely evening so most of the party took place outdoors on Vivian's patio.This photo shows, l to r, Chris, Arnie's brother Howard, Vivian, Arnie opening presents whilst seated on the lowest chair he could find, and Jamie in the pink.
Everybody trooped in to a huge flat screen TV and Dave put on the DVD. It played over and over all evening and was a big hit. Most of the folks at the party had been to that run and a lot of 'em were in the movie. Everybody had a great time of the "Look! There's _____ passed out under his bike!" variety. Toward the end of the movie, a young lady pulled down her top, exposing a little slice of heaven. Actually, it wasn't 'little' at all, a honkin' great boobie! This may have been in response to the 'Show yer tits!' sign I had hanging around my neck. Anyway, one guy actually said her name and nobody believed it. Determined to get to the bottom of this, and not minding a little hard work, a small band of guys watched the scene over and over, trying to figure out who it was. They finally did, believe it or not, by her smile. Turns out it was Jamie, in the photo above, who when they told her, promptly grinned and did it again! As a compliment to a pretty lady in her '50s, I must say gravity has ignored her so far!
Another reason I'm glad I gave the DVD to Dave was I knew he could keep control of it and not 'lose' it, and he's going to have to do just that. Everybody wants a copy, and they know there are more to come.
It was not a huge party, maybe twenty or so people, but it was the best party in years, they tell me. Folks got drunk and stoned and laughed a lot. No bummers except Jamie lost her shoes for a while. A good time was had by all. It would have been worth the trip by itself. Click here to see the birthday cake if you haven't seen it yet.
It must also be said that there was word about folks who are no longer with us. We're at that age, though.
It was the latest night out we've had in years. We were asleep at Dave's house by midnight. The four of us went to breakfast and me'n Mrs. G hit the road for home.
Lotta old memories and a few new ones as well. Couldn't ask for more.
Update:
Since I described Arnie's service, in fairness I should tell you about Dave's. He is a Navy Vet. He was a machinist and has a rather odd service-connected disability because of it. He goes to the VA for all his health needs, and has for 40-some-odd years. He was using a grinding wheel in port when there was less demand on the compressed-air system than at sea and the thing blew apart from excess speed and opened him up from belly button to sternum. I've seen the scar. It is not pretty. I saw him take his shirt off in Mexico once and about a dozen Meskins crossed themselves from being so close to one who had had such a close brush with death.
Dave served on the Bonnie Dick and went ashore in Southeast Asia during the Laotian Incident in '61 I think, perhaps to bolster the Thai government. He doesn't really know why, just that he was tagged for a landing force to augment the ship's Marine detachment. He remembers getting handed a rifle and being told to "do what the Marines tell you". Woulda scared the shit outta me.
Click photos to emhugen.
It's an '05 290cc Sherco. The engine is a watercooled two-smoke. I could no way afford a new one at about $7Large, but I got this one for considerably less than half of that and I know its backstory and where it's been. My friend Steve bought it new and sold it to the gent I bought it from at the end of the '05 trials season. It has not been ridden since. It's been sitting for three years, which in a sport where the bikes get dropped off of cliffs, literally, pretty regularly, is a heck of a deal for me. I saw examples of this year, make, and model with four seasons on them for a $Grand more than I paid.
I bought it from Mike, a New Zealander who owns Kiwi Indian in Riverside. We got treated to a showroom full of Indian motorcycles, most of which were manufactured before 1954, and in the Back Room AKA the Service Dept., a full-bore dyno run on a customer's bike while said customer stood there watching his sled run faster sitting still than it probably ever has with him on it goin' down the road. I don't know what the dyno run turned up in terms of numbers or problems but it sounded great!
I've done similar dyno runs myself, and have been an interested party at dozens of 'em, and I've always kinda wondered what happens if the engine goes 'POP' and there is sudden silence, a brief flurry of shrapnel, and a hot oily mist in the room. Thank you Lord for my ignorance...
I haven't ridden the Sherco yet, or even started the engine, but I know for a fact, on the basis of what you can see in the photo, that it will go 70+ miles per hour for hours on end in 100° heat. And sideways at that!
The photo was taken at the Coso Junction rest area on US 395 in the southern Owens Valley. Click the link and zoom out slowly to see what the middle of nowhere looks like.
Just as an aside here, you make your choice as to which end of L.A. you want to go to at an intersection about 130 miles out in the Mojave Desert. Quite handy, really. From Riverside to the Sunland-Tujunga area of the east San Fernando Valley was a straight 60-mile shot on the connecting 210 Freeway.
The second purpose of the trip, and by far the most fun, was to go visit our friends Dave and Joy, and to attend our friend Arnie's 60th birthday party.
Dave is one of the best friends it has ever been my good fortune to have. We have had untold numbers of adventures over 35 years and we have a damn good time whenever we manage to get together. Joy is just plain gorgeous in every respect you could think of. She makes me look like a wingnut, and if she ever upgrades from dial-up, she'd be on the Feds' shitlist in a New York minute. Heh. We weren't there for politics, so enough of that.
By trade, Dave is an electrician. He figured out a long time ago that the way to make money is to do custom work for rich folks, and since he retired (yeah, right!) has more work than he really wants. He'll keep doing it 'til he has more money than he wants...
By avocation and nature, he's a stone(d) gearhead. Here's a picture of his dining room:
That's my Maggie heading for the kitchen. I took a picture of that as well, but forgot to check the batteries or the result, so it didn't come out. Suffice it to say there's a row of potted palms(?) and a small-block Chevy engine between the counter, the corner of which you can see, and the stove across the room. He has more kitchen workroom since he moved one of his Triumphs to one of the sheds in his back yard.
Dave is an El Camino freak and has several of them in various stages. I swear I can look at which ones he's been working on, and which ones run at any given moment, by looking at his house on Google Earth and seeing what's been moved around. He doesn't work very fast, so yes, Google changes the photos nearly often enough...
We sat around and shot the breeze all afternoon. Dave and I left the girls to their own devices and traipsed out to his shop, well-equipped and with wall-to-wall projects going on, a good many of which we chatted about. His shop is about the most fun old Triumph guys can have in L.A., and it's quite exclusive. Dave's latest deal is to dismantle LED taillight bulbs and rewire them to work on positive ground English motorcycles.
We were gone a long time. I sort of apologized to Joy and Mrs. G for that and Joy just laughed and said for as far back as she could remember, every time me'n Dave would smoke some home-grown and go out the back door, we'd be gone a while! Some stuff never changes.
We all watched a DVD I brought with me, and this takes a little background, but it's germane to this story.
The motorcycle club that Dave and I and Arnie all belong to throws a big invitation-only desert party every year and has been doing so since 1960. It's not a race, but there's a dirt bike run as the centerpiece of a three-day party in the middle of nowhere (there's a lot of that in the Mojave). The club is kinda famous for it in some circles, and an invite is a sought after hot-ticket item. Since the anti-fun people may, probably are in fact, watching, I won't go into the details. Let's just say a rollicking, rowdy good time is had by all.
For about 5 years in the '70s, I took Super-8 movies of this thing, both to record it for folks to enjoy and to get out of doing any actual work to pull off the event. I spliced the reels into 30-minute films and showed them at parties, in the club hang-out saloons, etc. There are four or five of them. No one, including myself (my projector broke), has seen them in 28 years.
For the last coupla years I've been wanting to transfer the movies to DVD but didn't know quite how to go about it. The answer came one day a few weeks ago in a blinding flash of inspiration while I was walking past the photo counter at Costco and saw a big sign that read "Put your Super-8 movies on DVD! Right here!". Doh...
I took one reel in to have it done. Just one because I wanted to see how it came out. It's $19.95 for the first 200ft and 12¢ per foot after that. They'll put titles and music on it. Your choice of music genre from a list, their selections. They add features so you can click to a variety of points, and put a montage on the case. It cost $49 and included two copies. It came out totally bitchin', and I'm going to get the rest of them done toot sweet. I was a little worried that it might have faded, but it hadn't. The movies have been in a nice cool place all these years and in fact look better on DVD than I remember them.
Purely by chance, I picked the DVDs up at Costco the morning I left for L.A. On the way down there I decided to give the spare copy to Dave, since he's in a position to make copies and dole 'em out to interested folks in and around the club. I never made the mental connection between the movie showing up in L.A. on the day of Arnie's party and the fact that everybody there was in some way connected with the club and had been to these desert runs. Dave made the connection instantly when I handed it to him, and off we went to the party in Joy's Honda Hybrid, DVD in hand.
On to the festivities!
First, a little mush is order. This was a surprise party given by Arnie's main squeeze Vivian. They've known each other almost forty years, the same time I've known both of them, but have only been an item for a year or so. I think that's nice.
Arnie is a Vietnam Vet brown-water Navy river rat and was in the same class to learn that stuff as John Kerry, although that meant nothing to him at the time, it's just interesting. He's also a hardhat diver and once cleared mines in the Red Sea. He's a member of the Piledrivers, Divers, Bridge, Wharf & Dock Builders Union. I'm not sure if that's the right local. Hard work, good pay. Besides being a dirt rider, he's an old Harley guy since back before they were all middle-aged yuppies.
The photo shows Arnie, bag in hand, not being very surprised. Vivian is in pink on the left almost, and Dave is in the formal t-shirt and ball cap. In between them, sitting, is another old pal, Chris, who is 81 years young and still rides his dirt bike pretty regularly, although he admits he can't do it like he could in his 20s. He proved later on that he could still smoke enough weed and drink enough beer to fall down. Heh. He had a slight heart attack at his 81st b'day party, and since all the guests were getting high, they couldn't exactly call 911 so they loaded him into a car and took him to the hospital. The nurse wasn't exactly amused by the alcohol on his breath, and told him he should quit all that and give up riding motorcycles too. When he innocently asked "Why?" as in "What? It'll keep ya from livin' to a ripe old age?", she had no good answer so he didn't.
Also there from the octogenarian set was a founding member of the club from 1949, 81 years young, the #1 desert racing champion in 1960, and great-grandfather of four, who rides his 650 Triumph desert sled every week, along with his club member son who is the grandfather of the four. The old dude has gotten high every day of his adult life. If weed'll kill ya, it's takin' its own sweet time about it!
The SoCal hard partyin' desert-racin' lifestyle is not for the faint of heart. I suppose some would say not for the particularly intelligent either, but they'd be wrong.
It was a lovely evening so most of the party took place outdoors on Vivian's patio.This photo shows, l to r, Chris, Arnie's brother Howard, Vivian, Arnie opening presents whilst seated on the lowest chair he could find, and Jamie in the pink.
Everybody trooped in to a huge flat screen TV and Dave put on the DVD. It played over and over all evening and was a big hit. Most of the folks at the party had been to that run and a lot of 'em were in the movie. Everybody had a great time of the "Look! There's _____ passed out under his bike!" variety. Toward the end of the movie, a young lady pulled down her top, exposing a little slice of heaven. Actually, it wasn't 'little' at all, a honkin' great boobie! This may have been in response to the 'Show yer tits!' sign I had hanging around my neck. Anyway, one guy actually said her name and nobody believed it. Determined to get to the bottom of this, and not minding a little hard work, a small band of guys watched the scene over and over, trying to figure out who it was. They finally did, believe it or not, by her smile. Turns out it was Jamie, in the photo above, who when they told her, promptly grinned and did it again! As a compliment to a pretty lady in her '50s, I must say gravity has ignored her so far!
Another reason I'm glad I gave the DVD to Dave was I knew he could keep control of it and not 'lose' it, and he's going to have to do just that. Everybody wants a copy, and they know there are more to come.
It was not a huge party, maybe twenty or so people, but it was the best party in years, they tell me. Folks got drunk and stoned and laughed a lot. No bummers except Jamie lost her shoes for a while. A good time was had by all. It would have been worth the trip by itself. Click here to see the birthday cake if you haven't seen it yet.
It must also be said that there was word about folks who are no longer with us. We're at that age, though.
It was the latest night out we've had in years. We were asleep at Dave's house by midnight. The four of us went to breakfast and me'n Mrs. G hit the road for home.
Lotta old memories and a few new ones as well. Couldn't ask for more.
Update:
Since I described Arnie's service, in fairness I should tell you about Dave's. He is a Navy Vet. He was a machinist and has a rather odd service-connected disability because of it. He goes to the VA for all his health needs, and has for 40-some-odd years. He was using a grinding wheel in port when there was less demand on the compressed-air system than at sea and the thing blew apart from excess speed and opened him up from belly button to sternum. I've seen the scar. It is not pretty. I saw him take his shirt off in Mexico once and about a dozen Meskins crossed themselves from being so close to one who had had such a close brush with death.
Dave served on the Bonnie Dick and went ashore in Southeast Asia during the Laotian Incident in '61 I think, perhaps to bolster the Thai government. He doesn't really know why, just that he was tagged for a landing force to augment the ship's Marine detachment. He remembers getting handed a rifle and being told to "do what the Marines tell you". Woulda scared the shit outta me.
31 August 2008
2008 NZ Classics Festival
I got this via e-mail from my buddy Larry in L.A. Just go see and have a good look at some oddball stuff as well as just yer normal run-of-the-mill old bikes. If you have any questions, please ask.
3rd photo down is two young ladies with the Red Bull Royal Enfield. Ya think Red Bull'd help mine? Heh.
3rd photo down is two young ladies with the Red Bull Royal Enfield. Ya think Red Bull'd help mine? Heh.
29 August 2008
Phil Hill 1927-2008
If you are my age you know about Phil Hill. Much younger and you might not. Please hit the links and read about him.
LATimes
Another pioneer is gone. Godspeed, Phil.
LATimes
Phil Hill, a reserved Californian who became a gifted race-car driver and the only U.S.-born driver to win the Formula One international auto-racing championship, died Thursday. He was 81.
"Phil set the standard" for other American drivers who competed overseas, such as Dan Gurney and Mario Andretti, Shav Glick, the longtime motor sports writer for The Times, wrote in 2006.
Hill won his Formula One championship in the season's penultimate race in Monza, Italy, after he had swapped the series lead all year with his Ferrari teammate Wolfgang von Trips of Germany.
In the same race, Von Trips died in a crash that also killed 14 spectators. As a result, Ferrari did not participate in the season's final race at Watkins Glen, N.Y., and Hill was unable to celebrate his championship in his home country.
He was inducted into the International Motorsports Hall of Fame in 1991.
Another pioneer is gone. Godspeed, Phil.
28 August 2008
New Sled Hauler
Click to emhugen
Since me'n Mrs. G are gonna take a shot at trials riding (backstory), we figgered it isn't feasible to be taking the cap off the pickup all the time. We like the cap for day-to-day, so it stays.
The Joe Hauler hitch receiver-mounted JH-08 rack is our answer.
Specs: weighs 68 pounds, carries up to 600lb bikes, and has the Cam-Loc anti-rattle feature. That's a screw-operated wedge device that tightens the rack up in the receiver. Cost $389.95 + (gulp) tax. Also went for a locking hitch pin.
Just fer grins, go see their clever loading ramp/bed extender.
I ordered it at my local smoke an' roar motorcycle emporium, Thin Air Motorsports, on Tuesday. It came from the Parts Unlimited warehouse in Sparks NV on Wednesday. I actually wanted a slightly different model, but the $120 shipping from the manufacturer was a deal-breaker. This one with no shipping charge will do quite nicely, thank you. The $120 will buy a lotta enchiladas and chiles rellenos!
Note the provision for storing the loading ramp. Saves room in the bed, and I don't wanta try opening the tailgate with a bike on the rack or try to wiggle the ramp out with the cap open. I drilled two holes in my 30+-year-old ramp. Mrs. G came out to look at the finished project and asked if there was something I could do to make the shabby-lookin' ol' ramp look better! Heh. Badge of honor, baby. That thing has loaded hundreds of bikes from mopeds to baggers, and has been bent and straightened several times. When it goes, it goes, but for now it's goin' with us.
My tie-downs are 30 years old too. They work fine, but there's always been a pickup bed to catch the bike if something went wrong. Got a new set of Ancras. I like that brand because I think they have the best buckle device. I've used them for years and they've never slipped.
Reflective tape and a lighting kit are on the way as we speak from The Cheap Chinese Tool Co.
But wait!, you readers with good memories might well ask. Gordon, are ya not putting the cart before the horse? Yer partial trials bike kit is scattered from hell to breakfast around yer Little Ponderosa. You don't even have a bike yet and yer makin' plans fer haulin' it around?
Well, truth of the matter is I do have a bike. Well, not here and not yet, but it's comin'. Stay tuned...
25 August 2008
Um, no ...
Seems the US carmakers want a buncha guaranteed loans to upgrade their assembly lines and develop new cars more compatible with the 21st Century (as opposed to F-150s, Denalis, and V-10 Rams).
Dear GM, Ford, and Chrysler,
FUCK YOU!
I was alive and aware in '73 (the first gas crisis). The writing was on the wall then. I was driving in '78 (the next gas crisis) and your response was to foist hastily thrown together, supposedly fuel efficient vehicles, that were nothing but rolling pieces of shit (Chevette, Citation, Omni, Pinto). You idiots didn't give a shit when the Japanese started putting their minds to the problem 35 years ago. Instead of seriously looking at alternative fuel vehicles (and hi-mileage gas vehicles), you continued to put out V-8s and V-10s and your vehicles got bigger.
And now, because of your shortsightedness and greed, you want taxpayer money to make you competitive now that the Japs have handed you your collective ass? Fuck you. You should get nothing and hopefully you'll all go under to be replaced by a less myopic bunch (what should have happened to the major US airlines after 9/11 too, by the way).
And a big "fuck you" to all the other US industries (mortgage bankers come to mind) who've reaped big profits on the US taxpayer over the years and now, thanks to their bad business decisions, expect us to now keep them afloat.
Let me ask you mofos something. When did you ever give us a break? During recessions and tough times, when did any of you corporate sonsabitches ever say "hey, times are tough, maybe we should give the public a break now and create goodwill for the future"? I'll bet my house (singular) you never did. When did you ever willingly take less profit to ease the burden on the consumer until the prevailing economy turned around? Never. We need what you got (hello, oil companies; don't laugh, your time will come too) and you milk every bit of profit from us for it, good times or bad.
So I say "fuck you" to the corporate assholes who think the US taxpayer is their personal mint, just handing over money, maximizing your profits and minimizing your losses. The day one of you stands up and accepts responsibility for your idiotic business plans (get rid of golden parachutes for executives and bring CEO pay more in line with the rank and file), you can all just go shit in your collective hats.
No more government bailouts, period.
Regards,
Fixer
PS: Now I have to go work on your pieces of shit.
WASHINGTON - Automakers plan to urge Congress to support funding up to $50 billion in low-interest loans over three years to help them modernize their assembly plants and develop next-generation fuel-efficient vehicles.
Industry officials said the loans, which are twice the amount authorized in last year's energy bill, are a top priority when Congress returns next month because of the declining fortunes of Detroit's automakers and tightening credit markets.
...
Dear GM, Ford, and Chrysler,
FUCK YOU!
I was alive and aware in '73 (the first gas crisis). The writing was on the wall then. I was driving in '78 (the next gas crisis) and your response was to foist hastily thrown together, supposedly fuel efficient vehicles, that were nothing but rolling pieces of shit (Chevette, Citation, Omni, Pinto). You idiots didn't give a shit when the Japanese started putting their minds to the problem 35 years ago. Instead of seriously looking at alternative fuel vehicles (and hi-mileage gas vehicles), you continued to put out V-8s and V-10s and your vehicles got bigger.
And now, because of your shortsightedness and greed, you want taxpayer money to make you competitive now that the Japs have handed you your collective ass? Fuck you. You should get nothing and hopefully you'll all go under to be replaced by a less myopic bunch (what should have happened to the major US airlines after 9/11 too, by the way).
And a big "fuck you" to all the other US industries (mortgage bankers come to mind) who've reaped big profits on the US taxpayer over the years and now, thanks to their bad business decisions, expect us to now keep them afloat.
Let me ask you mofos something. When did you ever give us a break? During recessions and tough times, when did any of you corporate sonsabitches ever say "hey, times are tough, maybe we should give the public a break now and create goodwill for the future"? I'll bet my house (singular) you never did. When did you ever willingly take less profit to ease the burden on the consumer until the prevailing economy turned around? Never. We need what you got (hello, oil companies; don't laugh, your time will come too) and you milk every bit of profit from us for it, good times or bad.
So I say "fuck you" to the corporate assholes who think the US taxpayer is their personal mint, just handing over money, maximizing your profits and minimizing your losses. The day one of you stands up and accepts responsibility for your idiotic business plans (get rid of golden parachutes for executives and bring CEO pay more in line with the rank and file), you can all just go shit in your collective hats.
No more government bailouts, period.
Regards,
Fixer
PS: Now I have to go work on your pieces of shit.
Cross-posted at the Brain.
24 August 2008
Biggest Motorcycle
Don't let Fixer see this or he'll be adding a second story to his garage so one o' these'll fit...
"Alone in his workshop" speaks volumes! An idle mind is the devil's playground...
11 feet high. 20 feet long. And, a $300,000 pricetag. No one believed he could pull it off, but he built it anyway.
Alone in his workshop at home, Greg Dunham crafted the world's largest motorcycle. Not only does the giant machine look amazing, it actually drives!
"Alone in his workshop" speaks volumes! An idle mind is the devil's playground...
16 August 2008
09 August 2008
Off To The Races
I am currently in the little town of Castle Rock Washington with my parental units in their beautiful motorhome, using my trusty air card, to watch the First Annual Dick Andrea Grand National Flat Track motorcycle races and I am having a blast!
My Dad used to come here in the Seventies, back when he did motorcross, to watch the Flat Track races and there are some of his buddies here from way back when still running teams.I used to live nearby and have partied here several times.
I haven't been to a flat track race since I got dragged out of the San Jose Mile back in the Eighties in an arm bar by the local police for telling one to Fuck Off, after getting drunk on Tequila at nine in the morning.
Ahh, the good old days, that was a long, painful walk, over an eighth of a mile, getting my arm twisted out of the socket.
No sense of humor assholes.
Anyway. I had a blast last night and they are just now starting to practice for the even better show tonight.
This is a small track, kinda in the middle of nowhere and ya kinda have to know about it but there are a lot of people here and they are all friendly as hell.
Imagine trying this at a sporting event, walking up to the gate drinking a can of beer, several times, and just tossing the empty into a can and heading on in to yer seat.
The security guy's just smile and nod at ya, as long as ya ain't being a dick or are obviously impaired.
My kinda place.
I love it!
I have Dads digital camera and have been taking lots of pictures of some beautiful old bikes, Triumphs, Nortons, Harleys, oh, and a trio of the hottest young ladies, I won't go there, my, my, my.
As soon as I badger him into downloading and Emailing them to me, I will post them here.
Ol' Gord would be in heaven here and I have been thinking about him constantly.
Ta ta, I have many more beers calling my name before the evening is over.
My Dad used to come here in the Seventies, back when he did motorcross, to watch the Flat Track races and there are some of his buddies here from way back when still running teams.I used to live nearby and have partied here several times.
I haven't been to a flat track race since I got dragged out of the San Jose Mile back in the Eighties in an arm bar by the local police for telling one to Fuck Off, after getting drunk on Tequila at nine in the morning.
Ahh, the good old days, that was a long, painful walk, over an eighth of a mile, getting my arm twisted out of the socket.
No sense of humor assholes.
Anyway. I had a blast last night and they are just now starting to practice for the even better show tonight.
This is a small track, kinda in the middle of nowhere and ya kinda have to know about it but there are a lot of people here and they are all friendly as hell.
Imagine trying this at a sporting event, walking up to the gate drinking a can of beer, several times, and just tossing the empty into a can and heading on in to yer seat.
The security guy's just smile and nod at ya, as long as ya ain't being a dick or are obviously impaired.
My kinda place.
I love it!
I have Dads digital camera and have been taking lots of pictures of some beautiful old bikes, Triumphs, Nortons, Harleys, oh, and a trio of the hottest young ladies, I won't go there, my, my, my.
As soon as I badger him into downloading and Emailing them to me, I will post them here.
Ol' Gord would be in heaven here and I have been thinking about him constantly.
Ta ta, I have many more beers calling my name before the evening is over.
08 August 2008
Go for a ride
A 4½-minute ride on a Danish rider's '69 Bonnie. Pleasant scenery, GREAT sound! Enjoy.
More at bisgaardmotors.
More at bisgaardmotors.
04 August 2008
Damn you, Storz!
Me'n Mrs. G had a terrific weekend. Tipped off in advance by my old friend Steve, owner of Storz Performance, we went up to Donner Ski Ranch to visit and to watch him and his sons ride a trial sponsored by Sacramento PITS, the premier NorCal-based trials club. An explanation of Motorcycle Trials here.
'The Ranch' aka 'The Granite Patch', is about ten miles from home. We rode our bikes up there on Saturday morning. The 'sections' are laid out in a loop over a coupla miles so we just hiked up to the nearest one to the parking lot. At our age and that altitude (7200'), we deemed that sufficient exercise. I took this photo on Sunday of the trail we hiked up on Saturday. You can see our bikes in the upper parking lot. On Saturday, we were parked in the much larger parking lot and pit area beyond the ski lodge in the center. Camera-shy Mrs. G saw me pointing the machine in her direction and scampered behind the tree on the left. Heh. Although resembling a trials section, this is actually access between sections. This is gnarly country, folks.
The Saturday event was for Vintage bikes (and riders. Heh) and Beginners. Steve finished the section and hollered at me, "This is the sport for you, Gordon". More on this later.
Steve invited us for burgers. We decided to go home for a coupla hours and come back up in the pickup on the theory that a) it gets cold up there when the sun goes down and, b) in our tourist area, after the sun goes down, every driver is drunk.
We got home in time to watch a little of the NASCAR Nationwide series roadracing in the rain in Montreal. First time I've seen windshield wipers on stock cars, although some of them lifted off at speed. Best NASCAR race I've seen in years! They should water Daytona... Then a few minutes of an unlimited-class motorcycle hillclimb. 200hp bikes going straight up! Sometimes over backwards, too.
I called Steve to ask what I could bring for dinner, and what kind of pie he liked. His answer, and I'm not making this up, was "Oooh! Chocolate cream pie! And bring some burgers...". Come for burgers, and oh yeah, bring some burgers. I love that guy!
We had a nice dinner and a good visit. We watched a little extreme-o-cross bike action on the TV in Steve's motorcondo. One guy did a handstand on the bars about ten feet up in the air. I said, "I've done that", to which Steve replied, "Not on purpose, I bet". Well, no...
Thus endeth day one. A nice bike ride on two-lane mountain roads, plenty of sunshine, dirt bikes, old friends, met some nice folks, food, laughs, TV motorsports. Pretty good day.
Rode the bikes back up to the Ranch on Sunday. This was the regular event for Intermediate and Expert riders, and Steve and his sons Neil and Eric all rode. There were a coupla former National Champions there, and they were absolutely amazing to watch. Here's Steve after his first loop:
After his second loop, Steve was noticeably more tired and called it a day. 10 sections per loop and it isn't as easy as it looks. The trial was scored on 'best 2 out of 3' loops, so Steve had completed the event. His comment was, "Remember how we used to thrill ourselves at 80 miles an hour? Well, now we can do it at two miles an hour!"
His sons, 16 and 18 years of age, are really good at this sport, and have competed as far away as East Tennessee. I outsmarted myself by preemptively changing the batteries in my camera and installing bunk ones, so I apologize to them and you for no pictures of them.
Steve had gotten me thinking with his "This is the sport for you" comment, and I bit the hook by accepting his offer to ride his fantastic Sherco around. Grrr. It took me about ten seconds to fall in love with the damn thing. Here, kid, the first one's free...
Steve's an old Pommy single man like me, so in retaliation I made him clatter up and down the road on my Enfield. He got me better than I got him.
This is a great motorcycle sport for old farts like me. Low speeds, no handlebar-to-handlebar action so less chance of an ER visit (we heal a lot slower than we used to), ride at your own pace, and a relatively low investment in equipment. Also, PITS puts on several events each year within an hour's drive from my home. Feel sumthin' tuggin' atcher lip, old man?
Now, a new $6Large bike is out of the question, but I've got a garage full of old iron, of which several of whom could easily be converted for a casual fling at trials, perfect for a Vintage Beginner like myself. Then I remembered that I have an actual vintage trials bike that I took in payment for a $25 debt about 20 years ago. It's a Honda TL125. I had to dig, almost literally, around in my back yard for it, but here it is:
It's not as bad as it looks. I have the rest of it except for the rear axle and sprocket, and a few (we'll see!!!) minor mostly proprietary items. Funny story: I had this thing hanging from the ceiling of my motorcycle shop. One day a guy came in needing a rear sprocket for one of these but not really expecting to find one in a podunk 'sickle shop like mine. I smiled and said something like "we need only look to a higher place to fulfill your desires" and pointed up. Sold him the sprocket for 60 bucks, which was half the price from Honda dealers. I get the feeling that one's gonna come back and bite me on the ass...
More on all this happy horseshit as it develops, but I think I got a little winter project.
Damn you, Storz.
As a special added feature, here's part one of a two-part video on a PITS trial just south of Lake Tahoe, along with some very good commentary about the sport of trials. The Lewisport folks were at the Ranch as well. Please enjoy. Part two is here.
'The Ranch' aka 'The Granite Patch', is about ten miles from home. We rode our bikes up there on Saturday morning. The 'sections' are laid out in a loop over a coupla miles so we just hiked up to the nearest one to the parking lot. At our age and that altitude (7200'), we deemed that sufficient exercise. I took this photo on Sunday of the trail we hiked up on Saturday. You can see our bikes in the upper parking lot. On Saturday, we were parked in the much larger parking lot and pit area beyond the ski lodge in the center. Camera-shy Mrs. G saw me pointing the machine in her direction and scampered behind the tree on the left. Heh. Although resembling a trials section, this is actually access between sections. This is gnarly country, folks.
Click photos to emhugen
The Saturday event was for Vintage bikes (and riders. Heh) and Beginners. Steve finished the section and hollered at me, "This is the sport for you, Gordon". More on this later.
Steve invited us for burgers. We decided to go home for a coupla hours and come back up in the pickup on the theory that a) it gets cold up there when the sun goes down and, b) in our tourist area, after the sun goes down, every driver is drunk.
We got home in time to watch a little of the NASCAR Nationwide series roadracing in the rain in Montreal. First time I've seen windshield wipers on stock cars, although some of them lifted off at speed. Best NASCAR race I've seen in years! They should water Daytona... Then a few minutes of an unlimited-class motorcycle hillclimb. 200hp bikes going straight up! Sometimes over backwards, too.
I called Steve to ask what I could bring for dinner, and what kind of pie he liked. His answer, and I'm not making this up, was "Oooh! Chocolate cream pie! And bring some burgers...". Come for burgers, and oh yeah, bring some burgers. I love that guy!
We had a nice dinner and a good visit. We watched a little extreme-o-cross bike action on the TV in Steve's motorcondo. One guy did a handstand on the bars about ten feet up in the air. I said, "I've done that", to which Steve replied, "Not on purpose, I bet". Well, no...
Thus endeth day one. A nice bike ride on two-lane mountain roads, plenty of sunshine, dirt bikes, old friends, met some nice folks, food, laughs, TV motorsports. Pretty good day.
Rode the bikes back up to the Ranch on Sunday. This was the regular event for Intermediate and Expert riders, and Steve and his sons Neil and Eric all rode. There were a coupla former National Champions there, and they were absolutely amazing to watch. Here's Steve after his first loop:
After his second loop, Steve was noticeably more tired and called it a day. 10 sections per loop and it isn't as easy as it looks. The trial was scored on 'best 2 out of 3' loops, so Steve had completed the event. His comment was, "Remember how we used to thrill ourselves at 80 miles an hour? Well, now we can do it at two miles an hour!"
His sons, 16 and 18 years of age, are really good at this sport, and have competed as far away as East Tennessee. I outsmarted myself by preemptively changing the batteries in my camera and installing bunk ones, so I apologize to them and you for no pictures of them.
Steve had gotten me thinking with his "This is the sport for you" comment, and I bit the hook by accepting his offer to ride his fantastic Sherco around. Grrr. It took me about ten seconds to fall in love with the damn thing. Here, kid, the first one's free...
Steve's an old Pommy single man like me, so in retaliation I made him clatter up and down the road on my Enfield. He got me better than I got him.
This is a great motorcycle sport for old farts like me. Low speeds, no handlebar-to-handlebar action so less chance of an ER visit (we heal a lot slower than we used to), ride at your own pace, and a relatively low investment in equipment. Also, PITS puts on several events each year within an hour's drive from my home. Feel sumthin' tuggin' atcher lip, old man?
Now, a new $6Large bike is out of the question, but I've got a garage full of old iron, of which several of whom could easily be converted for a casual fling at trials, perfect for a Vintage Beginner like myself. Then I remembered that I have an actual vintage trials bike that I took in payment for a $25 debt about 20 years ago. It's a Honda TL125. I had to dig, almost literally, around in my back yard for it, but here it is:
It's not as bad as it looks. I have the rest of it except for the rear axle and sprocket, and a few (we'll see!!!) minor mostly proprietary items. Funny story: I had this thing hanging from the ceiling of my motorcycle shop. One day a guy came in needing a rear sprocket for one of these but not really expecting to find one in a podunk 'sickle shop like mine. I smiled and said something like "we need only look to a higher place to fulfill your desires" and pointed up. Sold him the sprocket for 60 bucks, which was half the price from Honda dealers. I get the feeling that one's gonna come back and bite me on the ass...
More on all this happy horseshit as it develops, but I think I got a little winter project.
Damn you, Storz.
As a special added feature, here's part one of a two-part video on a PITS trial just south of Lake Tahoe, along with some very good commentary about the sport of trials. The Lewisport folks were at the Ranch as well. Please enjoy. Part two is here.
03 August 2008
Au revior! Arrivederci! Auf wiedersehen!
Well, things at Casa de Fixer have gotten hectic enough where something's gotta give. With the house construction (which I'm doing myself), dad-in-law Fixer needing adult supervision, namely moving him in here by Thanksgiving and getting his house ready sell, and just the normal craziness, I gotta say goodbye to the boys at the shop for the foreseeable future. My last day will be 29 August.
I'm gonna miss the place, not working on cars.
I'm gonna miss the place, not working on cars.
30 July 2008
Faster, faster, until the thrill of speed overcomes the fear of death
This is a lighthearted counterpoint to Bustedknuckles' excellent post below.
Daytona Racing Timeline
A slight contrast with the thought of running out of dry lake bed at 793 per...
Daytona Racing Timeline
1903
[...] Barney Oldfield, driving Ford’s “999” (named after a famous New York Central train) was the first American to run over a mile a minute on June 20 at the Indiana Fairgrounds…59.6 seconds. Oldfield hyped… “You have the sensation of being hurtled through space. The machine is throbbing under you with its cylinders beating a drummer’s tattoo, and the air tears past you in a gale. I tell you, gentlemen, no man can drive faster and live.” [...]
A slight contrast with the thought of running out of dry lake bed at 793 per...
28 July 2008
Aluminum Wheels, Giant Brass Balls And A Land Speed Record
Almost eleven years ago, a Hurculean effort of unheard of proportions culminated with a Land Speed Record at the Bonneville Salt Flats .
This "vehicle" broke the sound barrier, without ever leaving the ground, doing 763.035 MPH .
A feat that has yet to be repeated.
I am going to link to the site I got these images from because I want you to go read the incredible story behind this accomplishment, such as the little known fact that it is one of the first success stories where the internet helped to spread the word about an incredible project where it not only helped to find a driver for it but had school children donating money to pay for the fuel to test it, estimated at 250,000 gallons.
That aluminum wheel was designed to withstand 35 G's!
Also developed with a computer.
that is an image from a Cray computer that was used with Aviation programs to help design the ThrustSSC.
The whole, incredible story can be found here, one of my favorite parts was what the criteria was for being considered to drive this monster;
Crazy with a death wish, no one knew what an effect a sonic boom would have on a car mere inches off the ground traveling at over 700 miles an hour!
It is a fascinating read and I highly recommend taking a bit of time to read it!
This "vehicle" broke the sound barrier, without ever leaving the ground, doing 763.035 MPH .
A feat that has yet to be repeated.
I am going to link to the site I got these images from because I want you to go read the incredible story behind this accomplishment, such as the little known fact that it is one of the first success stories where the internet helped to spread the word about an incredible project where it not only helped to find a driver for it but had school children donating money to pay for the fuel to test it, estimated at 250,000 gallons.
That aluminum wheel was designed to withstand 35 G's!
Also developed with a computer.
that is an image from a Cray computer that was used with Aviation programs to help design the ThrustSSC.
The whole, incredible story can be found here, one of my favorite parts was what the criteria was for being considered to drive this monster;
A competitive selection process took place to see who would drive the fastest car ever built. But rather than advertise for people to apply, he simply allowed the message to spread, thereby providing the applicants with their first test — their own initiative.
Thirty people applied. All of them were either drag racers or pilots. At the Center of Human Sciences in Farnborough, Professor Roger Green provided help with the project:
"What we had to do was decide how to whittle this down further. The most obvious thing to do was to give them all a sanity test and take the ones who failed. But one Richard Noble is obviously quite enough already."
Crazy with a death wish, no one knew what an effect a sonic boom would have on a car mere inches off the ground traveling at over 700 miles an hour!
It is a fascinating read and I highly recommend taking a bit of time to read it!
13 July 2008
Cannibal Cruise
Just got back from the 18th Annual Cannibal Cruise held at Truckee Regional Park about three blocks from home. Here's some photos and an observation or two. Click photos to emhugen.
A very nice Z28, but no matter how innocently folks do stuff, sometimes it can't help but make me feel older than dirt:
Mrs. G gets all nostalgic next to a '55 Chevy 2-door sedan. Her first car was one of these:
A '54 Hudson Hornet with Twin H-Power dual one-barrel setup. The things they'd do to get more power out of a flathead 6! Beautiful. Those things won a lot of races against larger displacement cars.
A funny display. The dummy was missing a shoe. A gal put the shoe back on it and said, "This is like takin' care of a drunk." Just then the dummy fell over and the four or five folks standing around just nodded. Heh.
Nice '64 single-carb Triumph 40-incher. My only thought was I wondered how much of what kind of goop did he use to fill in the sidewall cracks on those ancient Dunlop K70 tires. Amazingly, they still make them for vintage applications.
A '54 Marketeer. An idea whose time has come again. This is how I'd fix mine up! Check out the 'apes'. Heh. Probably won't go fast enough for the streamers to beat yer elbows to death. Notice it's still on its original tires.
I can't leave out the Blue Oval boys who populate this joint, so I saved the best for last. Very pretty '51 Ford convertible. Notice the standard Ford feature - the hood's up...
Me'n Mrs. G rode the Royal Enfield down to the show. I had to use extra throttle to get it to move with her on the back. She noticed it and cracked up because I didn't dare say anything...
A very nice Z28, but no matter how innocently folks do stuff, sometimes it can't help but make me feel older than dirt:
Mrs. G gets all nostalgic next to a '55 Chevy 2-door sedan. Her first car was one of these:
A '54 Hudson Hornet with Twin H-Power dual one-barrel setup. The things they'd do to get more power out of a flathead 6! Beautiful. Those things won a lot of races against larger displacement cars.
A funny display. The dummy was missing a shoe. A gal put the shoe back on it and said, "This is like takin' care of a drunk." Just then the dummy fell over and the four or five folks standing around just nodded. Heh.
Nice '64 single-carb Triumph 40-incher. My only thought was I wondered how much of what kind of goop did he use to fill in the sidewall cracks on those ancient Dunlop K70 tires. Amazingly, they still make them for vintage applications.
A '54 Marketeer. An idea whose time has come again. This is how I'd fix mine up! Check out the 'apes'. Heh. Probably won't go fast enough for the streamers to beat yer elbows to death. Notice it's still on its original tires.
I can't leave out the Blue Oval boys who populate this joint, so I saved the best for last. Very pretty '51 Ford convertible. Notice the standard Ford feature - the hood's up...
Me'n Mrs. G rode the Royal Enfield down to the show. I had to use extra throttle to get it to move with her on the back. She noticed it and cracked up because I didn't dare say anything...
12 July 2008
Old VS. New, Motorized Bicycles
Chances are, if you are over Forty, you will vaguely remember seeing something like this and snickering;
That one is brand new, for $600.00.
Courtesy of WildFire Motors.
Say hello to the latest upgrade.
Pretty wild design.
<
The first picture I found courtesy of Mother Earth News, after doing some browsing from an article on a little three wheeled truck that gets 72 MPG.
I guess my point here is, I am trying to kick myself in the butt and find a low cost, fairly simple mode of hauling groceries.
I will be the first one to admit that even for being so skinny, I am over weight and WAY out of shape. I am not into pedaling, but I could be if I hooked up a motorized bike and a little trailer like that.
I am extremely fortunate to live, virtually, in walking distance of THREE small shopping malls, complete with a Dollar store, two laundry mats, two banks, a car wash, a McDonalds and a Taco Bell, a DMV and three cocktail lounges.
If they put in a liquor store in one of those malls, I am good to go.
I am not into walking though.
I walked miles and miles and miles when I was younger. Yeah right, uphill both ways.
Seriously, I did and I am getting old and crippled up. I had my lower back fused twenty five years ago and now I am having hip and knee trouble, on top of my back killing me all the time, the fusion wasn't all that successful and I have lived in misery ever since.
Something like that set up, I waste more gas getting in the truck and getting to the street than one of those little critters would use on a round trip to the farthest point out of that circle!
I don't know yet.
I don't have the money to plop down for a motorized bike, yet. I can have the little trailer built for virtually nothing, just some parts scrounging and maybe a 20 dollar stick of tubing.
We'll see,I keep thinking about it, it would be a perfect setup for some one like me who has so many conveniences close by, at five bucks a gallon for gas.
Oh, by the way, I forgot to mention I am five blocks from the Columbia River, it would be perfect for a part time fisherman.
That one is brand new, for $600.00.
Courtesy of WildFire Motors.
Say hello to the latest upgrade.
Pretty wild design.
<The first picture I found courtesy of Mother Earth News, after doing some browsing from an article on a little three wheeled truck that gets 72 MPG.
I guess my point here is, I am trying to kick myself in the butt and find a low cost, fairly simple mode of hauling groceries.
I will be the first one to admit that even for being so skinny, I am over weight and WAY out of shape. I am not into pedaling, but I could be if I hooked up a motorized bike and a little trailer like that.
I am extremely fortunate to live, virtually, in walking distance of THREE small shopping malls, complete with a Dollar store, two laundry mats, two banks, a car wash, a McDonalds and a Taco Bell, a DMV and three cocktail lounges.
If they put in a liquor store in one of those malls, I am good to go.
I am not into walking though.
I walked miles and miles and miles when I was younger. Yeah right, uphill both ways.
Seriously, I did and I am getting old and crippled up. I had my lower back fused twenty five years ago and now I am having hip and knee trouble, on top of my back killing me all the time, the fusion wasn't all that successful and I have lived in misery ever since.
Something like that set up, I waste more gas getting in the truck and getting to the street than one of those little critters would use on a round trip to the farthest point out of that circle!
I don't know yet.
I don't have the money to plop down for a motorized bike, yet. I can have the little trailer built for virtually nothing, just some parts scrounging and maybe a 20 dollar stick of tubing.
We'll see,I keep thinking about it, it would be a perfect setup for some one like me who has so many conveniences close by, at five bucks a gallon for gas.
Oh, by the way, I forgot to mention I am five blocks from the Columbia River, it would be perfect for a part time fisherman.
03 July 2008
Ancient Secrets Revealed At Last!
Moto Tux did a good post on the trials and tribulations of the extraction of broken bolts and the installation of replacement threads. I mentioned that I have a technique to install spark plug Heli-coil thread inserts without removing the cylinder head. Me an' my big mouth, like what's new?
Anyway, he labelled it my 'secret technique' and asked two questions, 1) How do you accomplish such a miracle, O Wizard?, and 2) Why won't it work with Timeserts?
Since this ain't exactly a Knights Templar hand-me-down to the Masons, I'm happy to oblige. I learned it in the course of a two-year program at the taxpayer-and-industry funded L.A. College O' Motersickle Knowledge. Good thing too, as I have successfully evaded learning very much since the bike makers took the cams from down around yer ankles where they belong and stuck 'em up under the gas tank.
Hereinafter followeth the lesson.
But first (there's always a "but first"), since five minutes of prevention is worth an hour of cure, a few things that may keep you from having to do any of this. I'm talkin' about spark plugs here, but the following generally apply to all threaded fasteners.
Check the threads. A spark plug should screw all the way in with your fingers. You cannot strip threads with your fingers (If you can, call me, I got some work in D.C. for you involving unscrewing several examples of a different kind of poorly functioning 'heads').
If you encounter resistance, STOP. Figure it out and fix it. Sometimes there's carbon or a burr on the internal threads or they're starting to strip. Run a greased spark plug tap through it. Gently.
Some spark plugs have plating on the threads or a burr that will cause them to stick. Ease them with a thread file.
Never, ever, start a spark plug into its hole with anything other than your fingers. If access is a problem, use whatever tools you need, just make sure the motive power is your fingers only. I usually use a rubber plug cap. Starting a plug with a 3/4" air wrench is a sure-fire way to find out if this instructional works.
Use a little anti-seize on the plug threads, especially with aluminum heads, and torque them to 11-18lbsft, or for you godless commies, 14.9-24.4 Nm/Kgm, or as those of us with Royal Enfield manuals know, tighten plug very nice sufficiently to prevent gas passage. I think Mrs. G tried that on me once when I was asleep...
OK, here we go. These steps apply only to aluminum cylinder heads. If you have stripped threads in an iron head, yer screwed. I suggest a quarter-stick of dynamite and an 18mm tractor/flathead H-D plug, wedged into the hole with an anvil, screw jack, or some such fastener.
The only prerequisites for this procedure are physical access and an unobstructed straight shot to the plug hole.
First step is to thoroughly internally lubricate the object you wish toram insert your tool into with alcohol. Ooops...wrong kinda 'screw'. My bad (flips page).
1) Position the piston far enough down the cylinder that the tap won't run into it, with the exhaust valve open and the inlet valve closed. Remember, the sequence is 'exhaust valve closes, inlet valve opens' so run the piston up 'til overlap starts and back it off a little. That should also ensure the exhaust valve is not open far enough for the tap to hit and bend it.
2) Cram a wad of tiss-yoo paper down through the plug hole so it rests on the piston. Stick yer oil can into the hole and oil the crap out of it (applies to new as well as used tiss-yoo). This is so any chips that escape the next step will be captured.
3) Grease the flutes of the tap. Use a LOT of grease. The chips from the cutting operation will be trapped in the grease.
4) Tap the new oversize threads. Since you should back off a tap every thread-and-a-half or so anyway, use this step to clean the chips off and re-grease the tap.
5) Clean the new threads. Make sure no chips or grease remain.
6) Install the Heli-coil. Make sure the last thread on the insert goes all the way under the lip of the outermost thread in the head or it may pull out later when you least need it. Use a drop of Loctite if you wish.
7) Use needle-nose pliers to break off the installation tang. Grip them tightly and work the tang up and down. If it falls into the engine, you better hope it lands on the tiss-yoo since it's non-magnetic and maybe too heavy to blow out in the next step. Put grease on the flat tip of a magnet anyway and fish for it. Get it out.
8) Remove the tiss-yoo (those medical-type roach clips work good for this) and blow compressed air into the plug hole. This will blow any chips that escaped the safeguards out the exhaust valve and into the drywall in line with the exhaust pipe, where they may be examined at leisure.
9) Install the spark plug and all the other stuff you had to take off to get at it and go riding.
A note to you pros: be sure to charge the customer for 'R&R Cylinder Head' in addition to the insert job. I'm kidding, of course, but it's been done.
I think a word is in order about removing Heli-coils. Why would you want to do that?, you may well ask. Many reasons, but just as an example, you followed all the above steps and are congratulating yourself on the fine job you did and all the time you saved when you notice you just installed a 3/4"-reach insert in a 1/2"-reach hole. If you don't notice this right away, fear not, you will, either when the piston slams into it and makes the big-end bearings go away, or when the piston gets a hole burned through it from pre-ignition caused by 1/4" of red-hot metal in the combustion chamber. Your otherwise lovely shoes will not look so good when you peer into a spark plug hole and see them underneath the vehicle.
You can probably wiggle enough of it loose to grab it with pliers and give it a yank, but you might undo all the good you have just done by yanking the cylinder head threads out with it. Go ahead and try it. I'm kidding about the yanking. It works if you're the least bit cautious and sort of unwind it, and most likely you'll just end up with a six-foot-long insert you can dazzle yer friends with.
If that doesn't work, use a small triangular file to cut a notch down either side of the insert, stick something suitable in the notches and simply unscrew it. This works good on case screw holes as well. Duck soup, he says from the safety of his keyboard.
Now for Timeserts. You can probably do the same thing, but the more solid construction of the Timesert requires the removal of a lot more metal out of the plug hole. There are a lot more chips, and that's the drawback to me.
On the theory that it's always best to start in the cheap seats, the Heli-coil is the first repair attempt to use on stripped spark plug holes. The Timesert is called for when the hole is too wambled-out for the Heli-coil to accomplish a gas-tight seal.
Thus endeth the lesson. I hope it helps. No extra charge for the hyperbole or attempts at humor.
Anyway, he labelled it my 'secret technique' and asked two questions, 1) How do you accomplish such a miracle, O Wizard?, and 2) Why won't it work with Timeserts?
Since this ain't exactly a Knights Templar hand-me-down to the Masons, I'm happy to oblige. I learned it in the course of a two-year program at the taxpayer-and-industry funded L.A. College O' Motersickle Knowledge. Good thing too, as I have successfully evaded learning very much since the bike makers took the cams from down around yer ankles where they belong and stuck 'em up under the gas tank.
Hereinafter followeth the lesson.
But first (there's always a "but first"), since five minutes of prevention is worth an hour of cure, a few things that may keep you from having to do any of this. I'm talkin' about spark plugs here, but the following generally apply to all threaded fasteners.
Check the threads. A spark plug should screw all the way in with your fingers. You cannot strip threads with your fingers (If you can, call me, I got some work in D.C. for you involving unscrewing several examples of a different kind of poorly functioning 'heads').
If you encounter resistance, STOP. Figure it out and fix it. Sometimes there's carbon or a burr on the internal threads or they're starting to strip. Run a greased spark plug tap through it. Gently.
Some spark plugs have plating on the threads or a burr that will cause them to stick. Ease them with a thread file.
Never, ever, start a spark plug into its hole with anything other than your fingers. If access is a problem, use whatever tools you need, just make sure the motive power is your fingers only. I usually use a rubber plug cap. Starting a plug with a 3/4" air wrench is a sure-fire way to find out if this instructional works.
Use a little anti-seize on the plug threads, especially with aluminum heads, and torque them to 11-18lbsft, or for you godless commies, 14.9-24.4 Nm/Kgm, or as those of us with Royal Enfield manuals know, tighten plug very nice sufficiently to prevent gas passage. I think Mrs. G tried that on me once when I was asleep...
OK, here we go. These steps apply only to aluminum cylinder heads. If you have stripped threads in an iron head, yer screwed. I suggest a quarter-stick of dynamite and an 18mm tractor/flathead H-D plug, wedged into the hole with an anvil, screw jack, or some such fastener.
The only prerequisites for this procedure are physical access and an unobstructed straight shot to the plug hole.
First step is to thoroughly internally lubricate the object you wish to
1) Position the piston far enough down the cylinder that the tap won't run into it, with the exhaust valve open and the inlet valve closed. Remember, the sequence is 'exhaust valve closes, inlet valve opens' so run the piston up 'til overlap starts and back it off a little. That should also ensure the exhaust valve is not open far enough for the tap to hit and bend it.
2) Cram a wad of tiss-yoo paper down through the plug hole so it rests on the piston. Stick yer oil can into the hole and oil the crap out of it (applies to new as well as used tiss-yoo). This is so any chips that escape the next step will be captured.
3) Grease the flutes of the tap. Use a LOT of grease. The chips from the cutting operation will be trapped in the grease.
4) Tap the new oversize threads. Since you should back off a tap every thread-and-a-half or so anyway, use this step to clean the chips off and re-grease the tap.
5) Clean the new threads. Make sure no chips or grease remain.
6) Install the Heli-coil. Make sure the last thread on the insert goes all the way under the lip of the outermost thread in the head or it may pull out later when you least need it. Use a drop of Loctite if you wish.
7) Use needle-nose pliers to break off the installation tang. Grip them tightly and work the tang up and down. If it falls into the engine, you better hope it lands on the tiss-yoo since it's non-magnetic and maybe too heavy to blow out in the next step. Put grease on the flat tip of a magnet anyway and fish for it. Get it out.
8) Remove the tiss-yoo (those medical-type roach clips work good for this) and blow compressed air into the plug hole. This will blow any chips that escaped the safeguards out the exhaust valve and into the drywall in line with the exhaust pipe, where they may be examined at leisure.
9) Install the spark plug and all the other stuff you had to take off to get at it and go riding.
A note to you pros: be sure to charge the customer for 'R&R Cylinder Head' in addition to the insert job. I'm kidding, of course, but it's been done.
I think a word is in order about removing Heli-coils. Why would you want to do that?, you may well ask. Many reasons, but just as an example, you followed all the above steps and are congratulating yourself on the fine job you did and all the time you saved when you notice you just installed a 3/4"-reach insert in a 1/2"-reach hole. If you don't notice this right away, fear not, you will, either when the piston slams into it and makes the big-end bearings go away, or when the piston gets a hole burned through it from pre-ignition caused by 1/4" of red-hot metal in the combustion chamber. Your otherwise lovely shoes will not look so good when you peer into a spark plug hole and see them underneath the vehicle.
You can probably wiggle enough of it loose to grab it with pliers and give it a yank, but you might undo all the good you have just done by yanking the cylinder head threads out with it. Go ahead and try it. I'm kidding about the yanking. It works if you're the least bit cautious and sort of unwind it, and most likely you'll just end up with a six-foot-long insert you can dazzle yer friends with.
If that doesn't work, use a small triangular file to cut a notch down either side of the insert, stick something suitable in the notches and simply unscrew it. This works good on case screw holes as well. Duck soup, he says from the safety of his keyboard.
Now for Timeserts. You can probably do the same thing, but the more solid construction of the Timesert requires the removal of a lot more metal out of the plug hole. There are a lot more chips, and that's the drawback to me.
On the theory that it's always best to start in the cheap seats, the Heli-coil is the first repair attempt to use on stripped spark plug holes. The Timesert is called for when the hole is too wambled-out for the Heli-coil to accomplish a gas-tight seal.
Thus endeth the lesson. I hope it helps. No extra charge for the hyperbole or attempts at humor.
02 July 2008
Proudness ...
After a year and a half with us, Sam will be moving on. She landed herself a job in the local Chrysler dealership (all on her own with no help from us), allowing her to stop working two jobs (at the shop with us in the morning and the grocery store in the afternoon). We're all proud as can be that she learned something more than being a wise ass from us. She's a sharp kid and will go a long way in the business and we wish her all the best. We have her until 1 August so you can believe we're gonna torment the shit out of her until then. Heh ...
01 July 2008
How to diagnose an electrical problem by adjusting the clutch, Part 2
First, of course, you must read Part 1. Or just scroll down a little. Or start by selecting May 2004 in the left sidebar and be dazzled until you get here.
So there I was (well, it is sort of a war story, after all) tootling happily along on my way to the Post Office. I had just crossed the four sets of railroad tracks that bisect our town, call it bumpity-bumpity4, when the bike quit. No warning, no sputtering, no nuthin', just instant flameout. Being a champion multitasker I simultaneously thought 'uh-oh', whipped in the clutch, and veered into a (very) handy gas station/convenience store.
I sat there for a second wonderin' WTF and letting it all sink in. Then I noticed that the key was still turned on but there were no dash lights. Normally, all the little lights in the speedo are lit up like a Christmas tree until the engine starts.
Total lack of system power. I turned the key a coupla times, and since I'm a professional motorcycle mechanic, flipped all the switches and pushed all the buttons. Nuttin', honey. I pushed the thing out behind the station, lit the one cigarette I had in my pocket, and started looking for the problem, which, since I had no tools with me, consisted of pulling all the fuses out of the fuse block and holding them up to the light, and looking for any wires that might have fallen off. All OK visually.
This was not exactly the first time in my life & career that a motorcycle, even a brand new one, had broken down under me, so I knew what to do. I went into the food mart and bought a pack of Camels and a bottle of water and headed for the pay phone.
An observation: Being all legal with a new driver's license saved my ass. Up until a coupla weeks ago, I wouldn'ta bothered sticking my wallet in my pocket just to go a mile to the P.O. I had money on me as a result. Whew!
Called AAA. Even with gravel trucks going by to the right of me and a freight train going by to the left of me, I managed to discern that my $130-a-year 100-mile-towing membership wouldn't tow a motorcycle. Thank you very much, California State Automobile Association, you pricks. Next time my bike breaks, it's going to magically morph into a '92 Dakota. Once the tow truck driver gets there, I'll at least get the chance to try and talk him into it. I used to know them all, but they're all new guys now. They used to be pretty good about giving locals a break and maybe that still holds. Live and learn. Honesty isn't always the best policy when dealing with bureaucracies.
I had to get the bike home somehow. I've pushed motorcycles before, but there was no way I was going to push it from here. A mile, yes, 200 or so vertical feet at my age, well, maybe if I had to but I didn't have to yet, so hell no. It was just about the time Mrs. G would be getting home from work, so I called her. Not home yet.
While waiting, I smoked Camels and drank water and thought a little. I suspected an open circuit as opposed to a short because even though there was plenty of smoke in the air that day (last Tuesday), none of it was coming from under the seat. A very few possible places - the battery I knew to be OK unless it had instantaneously self-destructed and somehow taken out the power from the charging system. Not likely. Main circuit breaker, not too likely either. Ignition switch? More likely, but not much. Associated wiring, connectors, etc? Most likely. The thought occurred to me that I somehow caused the problem myself during the clutch adjustment process, but I couldn't see how. Gotta get 'er home and find out.
Finally got ahold of Mrs. G. Our pickups both have caps on 'em, so I directed her to go two doors down, see if my pal Jeff was home, ask him to pick up my ramp and tiedowns and please go bail numbnuts' ass out with his open bed Mitsubishi. Luck held and fifteen minutes later me'n the bike were home safe and sound.
Of course Jeff, a rider himself, had to yank my chain a little. When he pulled up to me at the gas station, this exchange:
J: "I thought you wuz a motorcycle mechanic."
G: "I can fix 'em just fine. If I could keep 'em from breakin' in the first place, I'd be so rich ya think I'd be livin' on our block?"
J (shit eatin' grin): "No shit!"
Total time elapsed from breakdown to home, a little over an hour. Total cost, $6.90. $5.35 for smokes (goddam, them things have gotten expensive!), a 20¢ bottle of water for $1.05, and 50¢ for a phone call. No real harm done.
I have two final thoughts on this phase of the adventure. First, the Buell Motor Co. should thank its lucky stars that this happened to me instead of a customer in their target demographic, an inseam-challenged beginner woman rider with no knowledge of motorcycles other than she thinks they're fun. It would have been considerably more expensive and inconvenient for someone like that than it was for me.
Second, I thank my lucky stars that it happened to me instead of to Mrs. G.! Say 'no shit!'.
I'm tired of typing now, but I will give you a hint: this turned out to be a warranteeable manufacturing defect, aka a 'factory fuck-up' that was installed on the assembly line by perhaps as many as three people with their heads solidly up their asses and involved the absolutely smallest, least expensive part on the whole motorcycle. It was going to happen. Period. I hope this was the only bike it happened to and it very well may be.
Your armchair diagnoses (that's where I figured it out) and wild ass guesses are most welcome in 'comments'. A prize to him/her that comes up with the correct answer.
Stay tuned.
So there I was (well, it is sort of a war story, after all) tootling happily along on my way to the Post Office. I had just crossed the four sets of railroad tracks that bisect our town, call it bumpity-bumpity4, when the bike quit. No warning, no sputtering, no nuthin', just instant flameout. Being a champion multitasker I simultaneously thought 'uh-oh', whipped in the clutch, and veered into a (very) handy gas station/convenience store.
I sat there for a second wonderin' WTF and letting it all sink in. Then I noticed that the key was still turned on but there were no dash lights. Normally, all the little lights in the speedo are lit up like a Christmas tree until the engine starts.
Total lack of system power. I turned the key a coupla times, and since I'm a professional motorcycle mechanic, flipped all the switches and pushed all the buttons. Nuttin', honey. I pushed the thing out behind the station, lit the one cigarette I had in my pocket, and started looking for the problem, which, since I had no tools with me, consisted of pulling all the fuses out of the fuse block and holding them up to the light, and looking for any wires that might have fallen off. All OK visually.
This was not exactly the first time in my life & career that a motorcycle, even a brand new one, had broken down under me, so I knew what to do. I went into the food mart and bought a pack of Camels and a bottle of water and headed for the pay phone.
An observation: Being all legal with a new driver's license saved my ass. Up until a coupla weeks ago, I wouldn'ta bothered sticking my wallet in my pocket just to go a mile to the P.O. I had money on me as a result. Whew!
Called AAA. Even with gravel trucks going by to the right of me and a freight train going by to the left of me, I managed to discern that my $130-a-year 100-mile-towing membership wouldn't tow a motorcycle. Thank you very much, California State Automobile Association, you pricks. Next time my bike breaks, it's going to magically morph into a '92 Dakota. Once the tow truck driver gets there, I'll at least get the chance to try and talk him into it. I used to know them all, but they're all new guys now. They used to be pretty good about giving locals a break and maybe that still holds. Live and learn. Honesty isn't always the best policy when dealing with bureaucracies.
I had to get the bike home somehow. I've pushed motorcycles before, but there was no way I was going to push it from here. A mile, yes, 200 or so vertical feet at my age, well, maybe if I had to but I didn't have to yet, so hell no. It was just about the time Mrs. G would be getting home from work, so I called her. Not home yet.
While waiting, I smoked Camels and drank water and thought a little. I suspected an open circuit as opposed to a short because even though there was plenty of smoke in the air that day (last Tuesday), none of it was coming from under the seat. A very few possible places - the battery I knew to be OK unless it had instantaneously self-destructed and somehow taken out the power from the charging system. Not likely. Main circuit breaker, not too likely either. Ignition switch? More likely, but not much. Associated wiring, connectors, etc? Most likely. The thought occurred to me that I somehow caused the problem myself during the clutch adjustment process, but I couldn't see how. Gotta get 'er home and find out.
Finally got ahold of Mrs. G. Our pickups both have caps on 'em, so I directed her to go two doors down, see if my pal Jeff was home, ask him to pick up my ramp and tiedowns and please go bail numbnuts' ass out with his open bed Mitsubishi. Luck held and fifteen minutes later me'n the bike were home safe and sound.
Of course Jeff, a rider himself, had to yank my chain a little. When he pulled up to me at the gas station, this exchange:
J: "I thought you wuz a motorcycle mechanic."
G: "I can fix 'em just fine. If I could keep 'em from breakin' in the first place, I'd be so rich ya think I'd be livin' on our block?"
J (shit eatin' grin): "No shit!"
Total time elapsed from breakdown to home, a little over an hour. Total cost, $6.90. $5.35 for smokes (goddam, them things have gotten expensive!), a 20¢ bottle of water for $1.05, and 50¢ for a phone call. No real harm done.
I have two final thoughts on this phase of the adventure. First, the Buell Motor Co. should thank its lucky stars that this happened to me instead of a customer in their target demographic, an inseam-challenged beginner woman rider with no knowledge of motorcycles other than she thinks they're fun. It would have been considerably more expensive and inconvenient for someone like that than it was for me.
Second, I thank my lucky stars that it happened to me instead of to Mrs. G.! Say 'no shit!'.
I'm tired of typing now, but I will give you a hint: this turned out to be a warranteeable manufacturing defect, aka a 'factory fuck-up' that was installed on the assembly line by perhaps as many as three people with their heads solidly up their asses and involved the absolutely smallest, least expensive part on the whole motorcycle. It was going to happen. Period. I hope this was the only bike it happened to and it very well may be.
Your armchair diagnoses (that's where I figured it out) and wild ass guesses are most welcome in 'comments'. A prize to him/her that comes up with the correct answer.
Stay tuned.
30 June 2008
Sunday Ride
I'm workin' up to Part 2 of G's Amazing Tales of Service Work Derring-do (Part 1 here), but I ain't all the way awake yet. Might not even get to it today. Just so you know both our bikes are fine, here's a shot, taken yesterday by our friend Bev the fiddle player, of me'n Mrs. G ready to leave Squaw Valley after listening to some Celtic music and stuffing face.
Note the smoke in the air. There's 800-1000 fires burning in California from Big Sur to Crescent City, hundreds of miles from us, but the smoke and ash take I-80 to go east through the Sierra like everyone else. It's been this way for a week, and yesterday was not the worst by far. Compared to earlier in the week, it's just about cleared up.
Note the smoke in the air. There's 800-1000 fires burning in California from Big Sur to Crescent City, hundreds of miles from us, but the smoke and ash take I-80 to go east through the Sierra like everyone else. It's been this way for a week, and yesterday was not the worst by far. Compared to earlier in the week, it's just about cleared up.
Click to embiggen
28 June 2008
Moto Tux
Our bud Badtux, The Wrenchin' Penguin, has branched out. He's started Moto Tux to separate his political and mechanical sides. To his everlasting credit, he'll tell us when things go wrong with the same panache as when things go right.
All you gearheads go check him out, if for no other reason than to keep from making the same mistakes yerselves.
After that crack I must go now and sandbag my roof as I expect a shower of Acme medium-range missiles from his direction presently...
All you gearheads go check him out, if for no other reason than to keep from making the same mistakes yerselves.
After that crack I must go now and sandbag my roof as I expect a shower of Acme medium-range missiles from his direction presently...
27 June 2008
How to diagnose an electrical problem by adjusting the clutch
The other day, Mrs. G told me that her Blast, which she has named "Buellah", heh, was making a pretty loud clunk when she'd put it in first gear while stopped. I tried it. It was loud all right, made my nutsack ascend vertically at high Δ acceleration until it banged into the stops at the thought of what was going on in the cog closet that if left uncorrected would make a lot of expensive work for me later on. I decided to adjust the clutch and see if that helped, so I set the sled up on the service stand I bought just for this bike and turned to. There's no flat surface on the bottom of the bike, so setting it on a milk crate is out of the question.The stand is absolutely essential to work on this thing and is turning out to be worth its weight in gold.
Just a note about the saddlebags. These are model-specific. There's really no place to attach brackets, so these are 'throw-overs', held in place by the seat and an array of nylon straps. The designer was either pretty clever or got the idea at a leather bar.
The clutch adjuster cover plate is behind the front part of the Y-shaped footpeg bracket, so that's the first part that has to come off. No way around it. Let the games begin...
I said in the post linked to above that there are two fasteners holding this thing on. There are three. After pulling off the seat and battery and moving a plethora of wires and hoses out of the way, the first two locknuts came off pretty easy after a little monkey-motion figuring out what combination of tools to use. The third one was a bitch. I think I had every ratchet, u-joint, extension, wobbler, end wrench, pitchfork, whatever was in my toolbox that I thought might work, laid out before I hit on the answer, which of course was the most time-consuming and inconvenient one of all and the one I was trying to avoid.
A breaker bar and a 12-point socket. Sigh. I like to use six-point sockets because there isn't as much chance of damaging the nut, but the breaker bar didn't have enough travel. It was turn the handle a little, reposition the socket on the nut, turn the handle a little, and so on and so on. Notice all the crap I had to move out of the way to get what little wrench clearance I got. Notice the drilled-off pop rivet that held the system relay on. I pop riveted it back on this time, but next time a nutsert is going in. There are wires and hoses down in the hole as well that had to be manipulated each time I repositioned the socket.
It was a mite tedious but eventually I got the bracket off.
I know all you wrenches are snortin' "Dummy! Why dintcha use an air ratchet?" I tried. My 3/8-drive air ratchet lacked 1/32nd of an inch in every direction of fitting in there. Grrr. A 1/4" air ratchet from the Cheap Chinese Tool Co. is heading towards me on The Big Brown Truck as we speak.
After a coupla hours of screwing around, which included smoke and cold drink breaks and plenty of throwing tennis balls for my pup Tami, this is where I was at:
A few minutes of scratchin' my head tryin' to remember why I took this piece off...
The clutch adjustment took about five minutes.
Reassembly of the footpeg bracket was the reverse of the above, but it went a lot quicker because I had the procedure figured out. Buttoned the sled up and tried the first gear shift. The adjustment had worked, just a nice 'snack' sound, pretty normal for a new bike.
Total cost for the job was about a long gone 50¢ for cable ties and a pop rivet which I always have in stock. I didn't replace the clutch adjuster cover gasket because it was in good shape and I'm saving my new one for the first regular service. I know what me'n Gascacinch can get away with.
All in all, not too bad for my very first time working on this bike. I topped out the learning curve for this procedure, which has to be done fairly often just in the general course of maintenance. It's just like racin' - first you learn the track, then you go for lap time.
Time to go for a test ride.
But wait, you say, what electrical problem did you diagnose?
Well, before you can diagnose an electrical problem, there has to be one.
I decided to go to the post office, a mile away, and pick up the mail. I didn't make it.
Later.
Just a note about the saddlebags. These are model-specific. There's really no place to attach brackets, so these are 'throw-overs', held in place by the seat and an array of nylon straps. The designer was either pretty clever or got the idea at a leather bar.
Click to emHUGEn
The clutch adjuster cover plate is behind the front part of the Y-shaped footpeg bracket, so that's the first part that has to come off. No way around it. Let the games begin...
I said in the post linked to above that there are two fasteners holding this thing on. There are three. After pulling off the seat and battery and moving a plethora of wires and hoses out of the way, the first two locknuts came off pretty easy after a little monkey-motion figuring out what combination of tools to use. The third one was a bitch. I think I had every ratchet, u-joint, extension, wobbler, end wrench, pitchfork, whatever was in my toolbox that I thought might work, laid out before I hit on the answer, which of course was the most time-consuming and inconvenient one of all and the one I was trying to avoid.
A breaker bar and a 12-point socket. Sigh. I like to use six-point sockets because there isn't as much chance of damaging the nut, but the breaker bar didn't have enough travel. It was turn the handle a little, reposition the socket on the nut, turn the handle a little, and so on and so on. Notice all the crap I had to move out of the way to get what little wrench clearance I got. Notice the drilled-off pop rivet that held the system relay on. I pop riveted it back on this time, but next time a nutsert is going in. There are wires and hoses down in the hole as well that had to be manipulated each time I repositioned the socket.
It was a mite tedious but eventually I got the bracket off.
I know all you wrenches are snortin' "Dummy! Why dintcha use an air ratchet?" I tried. My 3/8-drive air ratchet lacked 1/32nd of an inch in every direction of fitting in there. Grrr. A 1/4" air ratchet from the Cheap Chinese Tool Co. is heading towards me on The Big Brown Truck as we speak.
After a coupla hours of screwing around, which included smoke and cold drink breaks and plenty of throwing tennis balls for my pup Tami, this is where I was at:
A few minutes of scratchin' my head tryin' to remember why I took this piece off...
The clutch adjustment took about five minutes.
Reassembly of the footpeg bracket was the reverse of the above, but it went a lot quicker because I had the procedure figured out. Buttoned the sled up and tried the first gear shift. The adjustment had worked, just a nice 'snack' sound, pretty normal for a new bike.
Total cost for the job was about a long gone 50¢ for cable ties and a pop rivet which I always have in stock. I didn't replace the clutch adjuster cover gasket because it was in good shape and I'm saving my new one for the first regular service. I know what me'n Gascacinch can get away with.
All in all, not too bad for my very first time working on this bike. I topped out the learning curve for this procedure, which has to be done fairly often just in the general course of maintenance. It's just like racin' - first you learn the track, then you go for lap time.
Time to go for a test ride.
But wait, you say, what electrical problem did you diagnose?
Well, before you can diagnose an electrical problem, there has to be one.
I decided to go to the post office, a mile away, and pick up the mail. I didn't make it.
Later.
26 June 2008
A New Meaning For Hot Foot
Steam powered cars were fairly popular at the beginning of the last century and were very fast for their day, the Land Speed record for a steam powered car still stands from 1906!
128 miles an hour.
Fantastically fast for the day.
That record could soon come crashing down if a certain British team has their way.
They are set to try and top 200 MPH in August.
More info at the Times Online. There is a slide show link for more pictures too.
Originally found at Fark.com
Pretty cool.
128 miles an hour.
Fantastically fast for the day.
That record could soon come crashing down if a certain British team has their way.
They are set to try and top 200 MPH in August.
More info at the Times Online. There is a slide show link for more pictures too.
Originally found at Fark.com
Pretty cool.
20 June 2008
Limey Day ...
Every so often, we get 'days'. Last week we had a 'Pickup Day'. Mostly everything in the lot were full size pickups. Today was 'Limey Day'; nothing but British cars. I had a couple Jags, a Mini, and to cap it off, Nunzio brings up this '71 Triumph TR-4 for a safety inspection.
Nunzio (l) and Harry (r)
Click pics to embiggen. Cell phone pics; sorry about the quality.
17 June 2008
Hey OPEC, Seen This Yet?
Custom Made Oil.
Made with genetically altered microbes;
LS9 DesignerBiofuels™ products are a family of fuels produced by specially-engineered microbes created via industrial synthetic biology. Starting from raw, natural sources of sugar such as sugar cane and cellulosic biomass, these renewable fuels will fundamentally change the biofuels landscape and set the stage for widespread product adoption and petroleum displacement. LS9 hydrocarbon biofuels have higher energetic content than ethanol or butanol and have fuel properties that are essentially indistinguishable from those of gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel.
It's a reality.
It is nowhere near ready to be produced in the astronomical amounts the world uses every day, but it is real and it is coming.
It may help with peak oil, but we still need to get it together and find alternative ways to power our insatiable use of energy.
I am still amazed.
15 June 2008
"Untainted by Technology"
I haven't put up much about my new bike. I been too busy ridin' the sonofabitch. My choices are to:
A) Piss Fixer off by using all his bandwidth
B) Post everything I want to on this sled, or my favorite
C) All of the above
It might be down for a day or so pretty soon as I intend to install the right side shift conversion at the 500 mile service. In the meantime, us old farts with Royal Enfields are pretty much interchangeable, so enjoy this video. His bike is newer than mine and has quite a few detail differences, but it's pretty close.
The gent makes one little mistake - he says the rear wheel is turning because the clutch is dragging. It's turning because the rear wheel is off the ground with the clutch engaged. This is entirely normal and just means that the rotation of the crankshaft is passing through the gearbox to the rear wheel without much resistance. That's a good thing. The rear wheel will stop turning without any change in engine note once he rolls it off the center stand.
I think from his license plate that he's in New Jersey, but I could be wrong about that.
Thank you, glssgrg.
A) Piss Fixer off by using all his bandwidth
B) Post everything I want to on this sled, or my favorite
C) All of the above
It might be down for a day or so pretty soon as I intend to install the right side shift conversion at the 500 mile service. In the meantime, us old farts with Royal Enfields are pretty much interchangeable, so enjoy this video. His bike is newer than mine and has quite a few detail differences, but it's pretty close.
The gent makes one little mistake - he says the rear wheel is turning because the clutch is dragging. It's turning because the rear wheel is off the ground with the clutch engaged. This is entirely normal and just means that the rotation of the crankshaft is passing through the gearbox to the rear wheel without much resistance. That's a good thing. The rear wheel will stop turning without any change in engine note once he rolls it off the center stand.
I think from his license plate that he's in New Jersey, but I could be wrong about that.
Thank you, glssgrg.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)