A friend is finally selling his muscle bike, I guess the cobra replica he built is more fun. Blah blah blah
Yamaha xs 1100 special bored to 1200cc. Accel coils/wires, jet kit, top to bottom restoration. Ready for summer. Full fairing for those purple rain dieharders! Plenty of spare parts also.
Email cmaslen27@hotmail.com or call (503) 680-0585
As the riding season in Portland is starting to hit full swing everyone on the road needs to take a second and value everyone around them. It can be the rider who hasn't been in traffic in 7 months that is far too overwhelmed for every ones safety, the driver who isn't use to noticing something optically the size of a pencil in their mirror for that quick lane change maneuver or a combination of both but someone will be hurt and someone will have to deal with that for a long time. Traditionally this hasn't bothered me much, I know the few people I ride with anymore all know to ride and live well within the conditions(theirs and the environment). One of the main reasons I don't ride with a lot of people anymore if any at all is I don't want to see it happen and I don't want to hear about it.
This year is different, not because i suddenly started caring about strangers who are making decisions they probably shouldn't be making, not because I suddenly feel this overwhelming sense of compassion for grieving families that are suffering due to someones choices, not for what I feel in my heart every dang time I call my mom to let her know it wasn't me when there is a nasty moto fatality on the news, nope not for any of that. There is a rider out there hitting these mean streets for the first time in a very long time. This rider was never really a "rider" just a kid that cruised around some fields in Vancouver back in the day. As a driver he has more awareness and defensive technique than is required for triple digit lane splitting in LA and that's just when he is commuting in his little Subaru wagon. He can tell you what cars are four cars back at anytime, he drives mentioning what decisions the cars around him are going to make well before they ever have a clue what they are going to do. He taught me how to drive a stick for the first time when I was ten, he spent many many miles in the passenger seat of his pickup thinking he was teaching me how to drive when I had my permit but in fact he was teaching me unknowingly how to survive on a bike. When I look back on everything I've learned that has kept me safe in some of the worst traffic in Portland with a total of at least 100k worth of year round commuting miles from late '98 through the oddly specific 9-22-05 I was only using his tips and techniques. Know what's around you, go with the flow, this is life or death, anticipate, who's the one to look out for and the list goes on and on. When I'm doing my crazy long rides like the bay area, LA and such and the sleep deprivation and massive fatigue start to set in I keep myself alive by going over everything in my head. It turns out everything that I say to myself is everything he said to me from the passenger side back when I was fifteen. My little nonreligious guardian angel. I find myself worried sick at the thought of losing him in a motorcycle related accident.
This wasn't his decision. This wasn't his dream. He didn't make the sacrifices to make it happen. He doesn't have the sweat equity into it. This isn't something you just do, this is real life and not just a game. Motorcycles should be approached with a certain respect that one should have a good bit of self reflection on. If you do it right you'll have experiences and freedom blah blah blah but most likely you'll have some kind of a limp. You need to get into that line to sign up for that and not have it placed on your lap. I did it all wrong with him. He once had asked if a CB750 I had would be a good commuter bike and I shrugged it off with a no. In all my riding this has been the first bit of any shown interest in riding and was dismissed. A few years later he came by the house and I had 8 or 9 bikes in the garage and asked which of these would be a good commuter, discussed the pros and cons and thought about the perfect bike for him. A VT500 Ascot that he received on the next fathers day. In sourcing that rare perfect bike I wound up with three extras which have been destroyed in a manner fitting to a great bike, by riding the dickens out of them. He has his bike. He has his gear that would make any rider envious(thanks JK and BL) and he took his Team Oregon class. He then had some reservations, ones that I couldn't rationalize. They were solid reservations. A year or so later they appeared to have been worked out. I had just gotten to Wichita last week when I got a call from him. He was calling to ask if i would help someone with their car(which of course was a yes because he was asking). I then mentioned my flight issues coming in to Wichita which had him laughing pretty good(so i get motion sick, it is what it is). He then mentions that if I don't hear from him soon it'll be because he's going to start riding tomorrow with a weight to his words. Record scratch sound.
And this is why these words are on the page. This started as an article on target fixation accompanied by video of a rider riding a bit over his head that target fixates on a group of cycles. I think the motorcyclist should be charged with major crimes as a result. Riding in that manner that has him that close to the limit that he target fixates is a decision he made and not just an accident. So when you are on skyline riding at 11/10ths of your ability and you see a cyclist(that take over the entire road asking for it) that instills panic in you that you fixate try to focus on a big tree, it's a more "deserving" target. Side note, I do plan on more cycling miles than motorcycle miles so it hits a bit closer to home. Apparently I had a bit more on my mind than target fixating. I also had an article from Florida last weekend with a car turning left on a two lane highway that impacted the bike with such force the front wheel of the car came off and hit another car. All this stuff has been popping up so I thought I'd do a little article both for the riders to give it a second thought and make slight adjustments and the drivers that read this also giving it a bit of a second thought and maybe a tear could be saved somewhere. In theory I should chop out the center and turn it back into the article originally intended but I hurt my blood pumper typing this out so I'm leaving it.
My Dad's Ascot.
I hesitantly post. Only hoping to save one cyclist on skyline.
I traditional view bikes as "sexy" based on what they can accomplish in a non traditional but massively usable sense. The Guzzi has been a bike that has more character than almost anything on the road but somehow seems to have amazing sculptured lines.
As bikes leave the garage and the replacement is searched for high and low across the west coasts most active craigslist pages I craft my criteria for the next two wheeled machine.
So far it goes as such...
MUST
Character (sorry big three...)
less weight than the V-11 (anything not a harley or has tracks)
more power than the V-11 (sorry BMW)
Handling
Multi day trip reliability (Italians are exempt from this stipulation)
everyday useable if neccessary
Pine Cone worthy
Power Boat worthy
acquired for what I sold the KTM and Ascot for
CAN'T
Bland
Have too much power(I know, lame sauce)
Look like crap in scenic pictures
Get shitty tank range
Take a tire different than a 120/180-190 (keep it sporty and possibly out of town servicable)
Be too uncomfortable (exemptions will be made for the bikes sexiness)
If you can say every time you've loaded a bike it's been a success I'd like to come by next time you do it and take some notes. In my time riding, working, and sometimes crashing motorcycles I've had numerous opportunities to fudge up loading or unloading. Sometimes I have witnesses who get to view the spectacle, some have even been injured(which I felt terrible about) in the resulting whoopsy and I know I still have a scar on the side of my belly that happens to resemble a KTM footpeg of all things. I've been too weak in the legs to load a bike after a training ride and I've almost successfully pulled off an accidental back flip just missing a near perfect Kerry Strug olympic remake but with a well "antiqued" nissan pickup in the back drop. But one thing I haven't done is F'd up with a camera recording and that is success enough.
Enjoy...
P.s.
As for riding a motorcycle up a ramp into a truck you can count me out. I have witnessed one of my riding influences ride a full dresser harley up a tiny plank of a ramp into the back of an orange 4x4 dodge power wagon, no drama. I used to do that all to often until a person that had seen me do it tried to load a SV1000 into the back of a certain F250. He stalled the bike halfway up and from what was relayed to me he had a decent tumble. I haven't done it since.
With my ever changing vehicle line up I picked up another Benz diesel. Not just any diesel Benz but a W115 4cyl 4spd fuel economy champion. This thing oozes neat stuff. Just to start the car is reminiscent of firing up a fighter jet. Your hands dance between pulling, pushing, and turning knobs, levers and the key(which actually does the least of everything) with a glowing orb in the dash giving you the go ahead for the final extra pull to start. This is a car you operate not just drive. Truly old world German style when you need to actually read the owners manual(the most neglected of any books printed, period) just to get home from wherever you happened to purchase the vehicle. The pages of this particular owners manual are more dog eared and warn than the only romance novel that gets passed around a maximum security women's correctional institution. Once everything gets rumbling the 65hp diesel motor eagerly awaits a tiny bit of clutch and the rowing of the smooth shifting 4 speed. Brakes that can rival anything current and stable handling makes this thing more than capable on the streets with tons of character to keep you busy and working. Not unlike my moto guzzi, this thing operates with more "character" than it has horsepower or even pounds combined. I think the guzzi might be about 8 to 9 pounds lighter but it does have about a 10 hp advantage but who's counting. With the current state of my cracked tailbone the guzzi isn't getting touched for a while(i do have a onboard video of a swan island sumo run I might post at some point).
I did a few things to get the car on the road for service. It's currently running like a champ thanks to the services saving me from repairs. Here is some baseline info if interested.
The classic set up. Speedometer with max rpm shift points, coolant temp, oil pressure and tank level with a center clock. You can just see the center housing for the glow indicator.
Something almost any vehicle fan can enjoy. They sure don't tests cars like they use to.
Here in the wild we have a very rare sight, the 220D at the filling station(spoken like a narrator from a wildlife show). This 15 gallons should get me about 495 adventure miles.
