Back after a long hiatus!

Well…it wasn’t long ago that I returned from an all expense paid vacation to Iraq and Afghanistan.  I took time to reunite with friends and family and enjoy life.  Since my return I have moved to some of the best motorcycling country in the US.  Southern AZ.  I do have a deep seeded love for Mt. Lemmon Road.  It was where I really first started riding.  Since arriving to Tucson I purchased a new project.  My new to me 1977 Honda GL1000…or as it is more commonly known…a Goldwing.

I had the fork seals replaced and all the fluids replaced.  The bike seems to run pretty good with the exception of an off-idle stumble that I need to sort out.  It is 35 years old after all and it has 4 carbs.  I am running some Sea Foam through the fuel system in the hopes that it is just a little dirty and a cleaning will do.  It brakes fine although I will probably update the pads soon.  And the transmission shifts fine.  It is a 5 speed tranny.  The only aftermarket parts on the bike so far as I can tell is the floorboards and the heel/toe shifter.  I am not sure if I like it or not and am currently on the fence as to whether or not I will return it to stock.

I rode Mt. Lemmon on the bike on Sunday morning around 0600.  To the top and back down.  The bike performed well.  I am not quite happy with the throttle response from steady throttle transitioning to a more open throttle as it feels like it sometimes surges.  This could be a matter of adjusting the throttle cables.  Or it could be a carb sync issue.

The best thing is that the bike only has 52K miles on it which is barely broken in for a Goldwing!  Stay tuned for pictures.

I am glad to be back!

More videos!!!

Some of these have been around for a while…but maybe you haven’t seen them.  Comments are always welcome!

Watch out for that deer!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dut1es8KxdU

Not for the faint of heart.  A compilation of crashes…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08xynVd3kF0&feature=related

A couple of videos for you…

Okay…the first one is a good example of a little too much front brake application when leaned over in a curve.  I wonder how many people crashed due to the Chippy being in the outside of that corner?  Guy leans over in the curve, comes through to the point he can see the CHP and then grabs a handful of front brake.  Good thing he is okay…but at that point folks…you are caught either way.  You aren’t going to out-brake the radar or laser.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBTGgT_V5F8

The second one is a couple of fellas on the east coast.  I won’t ruin this one for you by providing any details but it is impressive.  Volume on for this one for maximum effect.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0nrMQ3QwyPo

Let me know what you think.  Comments are welcome!!!

Riding at night…watch out for deer!!!

Okay…so you already know about deer and other wild critters that can be active at night.  Hopefully you also know that your shouldn’t out ride your headlight (if you don’t know what that means please ask).  But here is a scenario I saw one night coming back from San Jose to Monterey.

I was heading south on Hwy 1 in the middle of three lanes. A good ways ahead of me and in the slow lane was a car.  Following the car in the slow lane was a cruiser style motorcycle.  He was maintaining a good following distance and a sane speed.  He appeared to be doing everything right.  I glanced in my rearview mirror to see another car fast approaching behind the motorcycle in the same lane.  The car literally had to lock up his brakes to avoid hitting the guy on the motorcycle (and for the record, I don’t think the guy on the motorcycle ever realized it).  Why did this happen?  Well, the motorcyclist was static in the right third of the lane he was in.  To the driver of the car, the motorcycle appeared to be the tail light of the car that was much further ahead.  An optical illusion if you will.  Luckily the car driver realized it in the nick of time but it was very, very close to ending badly.

I offer this up because it was something I never thought about in the past.  I am not saying you should weave like a madman at night so cars can see you…that would draw the ire of law enforcement.  But a gradual but deliberate adjustment of lane position isn’t a bad idea.  And remember…check your mirrors!

Ride safe…

Impressive!

So it isn’t really a motorcycle license test…but the skill is undeniable!

Thanks to Eric Popham on finding this.

http://community.motorcycleshows.com/_Japanese-Motorcycle-License-Test/blog/3504065/151420.html

Adventure touring anyone?

If you have ever thought about adventure touring, here is an article about some of the best bikes on the market:

http://editorial.autos.msn.com/listarticle.aspx?cp-documentid=1182533&icid=autos_0497&GT1=22021

Where my motorcycling life began…Continued

So I moved to Monterey, CA in 2007.  At that time I still had the Triumph Daytona 675.  I decided I didn’t want to have a bike payment at that time so I returned the Daytona to stock trim and sold off all the goodies seperate and the bike as well.  I got more of my money back that way.

As luck would have it, my friend Maurice Flores was the service manager at Moto Italiano in Santa Cruz and he had heard that I was looking for a Honda Hawk GT.  He had just had a customer in a few days prior looking to sell his.  Fate!

The bike had about 20k miles on it and came with a nice Alpinestars jacket, a bike cover and a ton of spares. 

Around this time as well I made a couple of friends out here in California and both of them were Rider Coaches with the MSF.  One was actually the site manager for 2 sites.  I inquired about becoming a RC.  Long story short, the whole affair went on for about a year and I had basically written off the opportunity due to never hearing back from the company.  It was about 30 days after that when I got a call asking me if I wanted to become a RC!  This was 2008.

I went through the RC Prep course in November 2008 and have been teaching BRC and BRC2 (ERC) ever since.  I have to extend a personal thanks to Ian Martinez for getting me started!

I loved my Hawk GT but it wasn’t the greatest bike for highway commuting.  Great in the twisties, but the small tank and lack of wind protection got old quick.  That led me to sell the Hawk GT and buy the 2008 Kawasaki Concours 14 ABS.  Stellar wind protection and gobs of power made my commute quick and easy!

When the housing market really took a nose dive and the economy went down with it, enrollment was low at the site I was teaching at.  There were more RCs than shifts at one point and work wasn’t consistent like before.  A large corporation won the contracts to teach motorcycle safety for the Army and Navy and I was hired on by them in late 2009.  In late 2010 they sent me to Washington state and I went through the Military Sportbike Riders Course (ARC-ST) certification course.

Between my work with these two companies I have taught over 1000 students in the past 2 years.  Between my work with the US Air Force and my work with these two companies, it is rare that I have a weekend off.  I have went 2-3 months straight without missing a day at times over the past 2+ years.  But I enjoy what I do so it hardly seems like work!

Because I work all the time…I rarely rode the Connie for pleasure.  It was only used to commute to work or to commute to work 99% of the time.  I couldn’t stand to see her sit in the carport and I couldn’t justify the payment when I wasn’t realing using it for its intended purpose.  I posted an add looking for a payoff of the banknote and a KLR 650 for my Connie.  I got the deal I was looking for!

This was just a couple of months back.  I went from 150hp to 45hp.  A 4 cylinder to a single cylinder.  The bikes are really polar opposites.  In the next week or so I am going to write my impressions of the KLR.  The KLR has been around relatively unchanged for a couple of decades so there are a ton of review out there…but this will be mine!

Check back for the write-up.

DLI MMP Ride

 We met this morning at 0830 at Monterey Peninsula Powersports.  KSU was just a bit after 0900.  We had 14 riders today.  V-twin cruisers both metric and H-D.  Sport bikes were well represented with a ZX-6R, R1, 1198S and others.  The dual-sport bikes were represented by the KLR650 and a Multistrada.  My man Alan pulled out the Concours 14 and a Goldwing was representing as well.  The dealer was nice enough to provide doughnuts and coffee!

The ride down to Lake Nacimiento and the Waystation Saloon was uneventful…at first.  There was a mix of experienced and new riders in the group.  We strive to improve every time we go out and I think quite a bit of advice was given to our newest rider.  She was a little apprehensive.  There is no substitute for getting out and riding and she made it to the saloon in one piece!  Good job!

As we were nearing the restaurant we had an incident.  The rider neared the shoulder and drifted off.  There was about a 6 inch drop.  The end result was the bike parked on its ear and a little hurt pride.  The photos below will show the path of travel and the bike after it was righted.  The most important thing was that the rider is doing fine and actually finished the ride!  My guess is some Motrin and a good nights rest will heal all.  The bike had the passenger armrest broke off and some scratches.  She fired right back up!

Not pictured is another rider that had an incident.  The saloon is on a hill and has a dirt drive and parking area.  The rider attempted to downshift to first gear to come up the hill and inadvertently found neutral.  He went to roll on throttle to climb the hill and the bike just tipped over.  With the exception of a broken clutch lever, the bike didn’t appear to have a scratch.

We had some lunch.  Pictured is the restaurant, us at the table and the proprietors.  The grub was awesome and I recommend you stop in if you are ever out that way.

The rest of the photos are random shots of bikes at out stop points.

Total trip was around 220 miles.

Special thanks to Bob Dooley.  He planned the ride this month.  Great job.

Thanks to Eric Popham, Jon Rice and Alan Bastura.  They worked with the group as sweepers and road captains.

Thanks to all the attendees!  Check back here, the MilitaryMotorcycleSafety FB page and the DLI MMP FB page for more details on M/C safety and upcoming rides.

Seriously!?! Well…at least the mounting and balancing was free…

Okay…I bought some brand new Avon Gripsters for my KLR650 from a local dealership.  They gave me my 10% military discount and free mounting and balancing with the purchase which is pretty sweet.  My Cycle Gear discount is 30% but that means I have to drive to Gilroy and that I have to pull the tires off the bike myself so all in all, it about equals out in time/labor saved.

The first thing I noticed was that the rear tire rubbed a little.  I went online and found out that this is a common occurrence with this tire on this bike and easily remedied.  I took care of it myself but did make a point to mention it and show it to the service manager today so he would know in the future.

I worked in Gilroy last weekend.  I taught two Basic Riders’ Courses.  On the way home Sunday I got a wicked weave going on with the bike.  Scared the crap out of me.  It was windy and my speed was up a bit but I still didn’t expect that out of this bike.  Something didn’t seem quite right.

I rode out to meet Smitty, a fella that offered my some assistance with my bike.  I mentioned some of the things happening and he said his KLR seems stable as can be and that my situation seemed odd.  Something wasn’t right.

Today I was cleaning the bike and checking it over in anticipation of the ride tomorrow.  I remembered that I asked the service manager when I picked up the bike about how much air pressure they put in the tires.   He said it was on the invoice and we looked to see 32psi front and 36psi rear.  I took them at their word.  But after all the odd handling going on, I decided to double-check my tire pressure.  The front checked out at 32psi.  I made my way around to the back tire…53.5psi!!!  Are you freaking kidding me?  The tire is rated max pressure 36psi cold.  17.5psi beyond the max.  That is downright dangerous.  I don’t want to think about what might have happened if the tire blew out.  I had ridden Laureles Grade and Cachagua Rd just days before.

I will be bringing this up to the service manager tomorrow…I am not sure I will be able to maintain my tact.  I feel like I need to yell.

What would you do?

Defense Language Institute Motorcycle Mentorship Program Ride

So tomorrow morning we will be conducting a ride to Lake Nacimiento.  You can view the route here:

http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Ftinyurl.com%2FAprMMPride&h=8b6ed

We will stop for lunch at the Waystation Saloon.

The total trip will will be approximately 220 miles.  Check back for a post ride report and pics!