Urban Cammo

 

Love Drips and Gathers…….

 

Acid, Incense and Balloons

 

Atom Heart Mother

 

Unfinished Project [Part Two] Getting There.

 

Madagascan Vanilla Custard

A pleasant couple of weeks spent pottering around on the ‘unfinished project’ no major heartache just working through the boxes of bits that came with the bike and choosing what to keep and what to offload on EvilBay [first thing was the undoubtedly well made brown leather ‘brat style’ seat, me and ‘brat style’? Nah] I decided to keep the standard seat, just removed the pointless passenger grab strap, that’s more like it.

The standard silencers were removed but the catalyser was still present cunningly positioned between the down pipes below the radiator, radiator? yup, this is the first of the water/air cooled Bonnevilles.

It’s a bit of a faff to remove the [very heavy] cat involving the removal of one bolt-on down tube on the frame but a really simple job. The P.O. [previous owner] had spent a lot of money on aftermarket parts from Triumphs catalogue including the high-level Vance and Hines two into one exhaust pipe which in all honesty is a bloody lovely piece of kit. To fit it requires a new scalloped side panel and heat shield again an extra in the Triumph aftermarket catalogue. 

Everything fits lovely with none of the usual ‘massaging’ of parts to allow fitment and let’s face it so it should for a very salty £1500, [not long ago you could get a decent bike with an mot for that money!] Along with the exhaust the P.O. had purchased the ‘factory’ bash plate and cosmetic ‘side bits’ that hides the space when you remove the cat. Reading that back it sounds a bit ‘Shoreditch’ probably everything I’ve always hated in the past but I sat for a few hours with a brew looking at it with and without but finally came to the conclusion that it looks better ‘with’ so they are staying. For now. Unless I change my mind and take them off.

Amongst the other goodies that came with the bike were LED indicators, [nice, small, bright, winner, winner, chicken dinner] heated grips, genuine Triumph heated grips, none of that 1981 motorcycle despatch rider, CX500, Oxford, massive electrickery control box that looks like something out of Dr Who’s Tardis mounted with crosshead, Pozi-Drive screws on the left hand side of the bars.

Digging through the boxes I discovered Triumph bar-end mirrors which I didn’t like on first look but I’m going to try to see what there like as I have the Oberon’s off the KTM Duke if I don’t like them, there was also a horrible, piece of shit tailtidy which was the ultimate in cheap tat and discarded immediately and placed on said ‘Bay to be snapped up by an eager beaver with an EC2 postcode which was nice.

So, no major engineering, just a simple bolt it together job, everything was pretty clean, judicious use of my trusty torque wrench, a dab of Loctite here and a healthy coating of the dreaded copper grease and everything went together with the minimum of fuss. I had to replace the front brake pads, upgraded to EBC HH items as the standard items had inexplicably fused together, possibly damp? Why did I decide to change a light weight, fast 105 bhp machine for something that’s heavier and with half the power? Well, although the 790 Duke was an exciting machine it eventually proved to be a bit of a liability on the road, it encouraged hooligan behaviour and hands up time, I admit to indulging in it every time I rode it, in the cold light of day, sitting in the shed with a beer and reflecting I decided it had to go. It turned me into a knob and I rode it accordingly, it had to go. With hindsight, [a wonderful thing] I should have kept the Guzzi and traded the KTM but hey, I’m a bloke, big bollocks and all that, stay tuned race fans..............

 

Unfinished Project

 Unfinished Project. Shattered dreams and failure laid bare on a ‘well known internet auction site’ What starts out as a dream bike, more often than not, ends up desperately trying to recoup some money, trying to hide how much you have actually spunked, hiding those receipts from your better half and which is probably more telling, having to admit to yourself that you didn’t actually have the funds/acumen/skill/time/commitment to see it through.

     Hey, there’s no shame,there, I’ve had to bail a hundred times when I sat down in the shed, in the cold light of day and realise that I was in above my head. My ill fated dabble at racing bit me on the arse, I didn’t have the skill or funds to pursue my dream, my race MZ engines were £1400 a go. I blew,two at Snetterton one weekend. That’s big money. Keith Richard wouldn’t spend that much on coke. The BMW race bike was never going to be competitive, the bloke with the Laverda Jota, gixxer wheels, Brembo M4 calipers and wavy discs was always head and shoulders above a couple of wankers who liked engineering and building bikes, [to the rule book, which sadly seemed to get forgotten when the series ‘champion’ and all the money pumped in via sponsorship got the rules ‘massaged’]

 So, scanning the ‘net one night and I chanced on the fabled ‘unfinished project’ a Triumph Street Twin, the original owner bought the bike new and rode it for a thousand miles before deciding to build his ultimate machine, endless nights on the web, buying parts, stripping the bike doŵn to large component parts, a big stack of bits sitting in a [ may I say, a very, very nicely appointed manspace/garage/clubhouse] filled with expensive four wheeled exotica and classic motor racing ephemera]

 The bloke had stripped the bike down to component parts, four boxes of bits, but soon lost the impetus to to make his dreams real. He showed me the receipts for the bike and parts he had bought, bloody hell, serious mullah! He’d realised he was in above his head and decided to bail, unfortunately he’d already offloaded the Brembo brake conversion kit but the sum of the parts was more than I had into the 790 Duke so a simple swap deal was my offer which he jumped at. He gets a complete, running, mint bike and I get?well, I get a bunch of bits that needs bolting together.........

Disco From A Space Show

 So, sat in the shed listening to one of the excellent Numero Group compilation albums of rare soul/funk/disco, [must admit buying a lot of the vinyl records from this imprint but that’s by the by, trouble is they are quite rare in the UK, so postage from the States adds a whole lot of mullah to the bill, they are also limited editions and finding copies sees me searching EvilBay and Discogs almost every day for listings] Sorry, drifted a tad there, back to motorcycles. Anyone notice anything missing in this photo?

    

Moto Vloggers

 Moto Vloggers. YouTube is inundated with opinionated, free loading tossers posting downright boring and may I say embarrassing reviews on motorcycles, some are downright amateurish, cringeworthy and in some cases actually dangerous with the ‘advice’ that they post and laugh out loud errors when getting into the more technical aspects of the machines that they are critiquing  Then there’s the slickly produced almost cinematic Vlogs, brilliant photography, great music and slickly produced but sadly lacking any ‘soul’ and definitely aping the turgid ‘Top Gear’ style of presentation.

    So, dear readers, who or what are my recommendations for good YouTube motorcycle Vlogs? Well first up is the brilliant 44 Teeth, starring Al Fagan [Statham] and Baron Von Grumble [Sue Perkins]  and new boy Mike Booth [Boothy] These lads are seriously talented riders, [Fagan and Boothy have both raced in the TT and various classes in British Superbikes] the bike reviews are honest and informative as well as outrageously funny, it really is like having a laugh with a couple of mates, lots of swearing, farts, belches and references to Jizz as well as some stunning onboard riding footage. 

    The 44 Teeth Budget Bike Battle is legendary, they buy a bike for a couple of grand and proceed to tour across Europe and complete a trackday or two on what are basically a couple of knackers, hugely entertaining but the boys are up for anything from endurance racing on a 125cc Suzuki to riding across the deserts in Morocco. Definitely my number one channel, catch it quick before it goes behind a paywall.

     Also up there for me is Chris Northover who sometimes presents on the Bike World channel. Chris is another ex racer, stuntman and demon mx racer and up and coming flat track rider who is a ridiculously talented rider and his reviews are excellent, when he chuckles when he’s doing wheelies and skids on bikes [see the FTR 1200 picture above] it really is infectious and I know when he shouts ‘Weeeeh!] when cresting a rise and the front wheel comes up that he somehow embodies the joy and fun of riding a motorcycle without pretension.

     My final choice is one of the smaller channels, Rarified Road, the presenter, Tim, by his own admission isn’t a vastly experienced rider, [give him a break, he’s only a young guy!] and he doesn’t try and make out that he knows everything about the inner workings and mechanics of the machines that he tests but his reviews are charming and filled with dry self deprecating humour which is sadly lacking in a lot of the other tripe out there, well worth checking out. 

     So, gentle reader, what are your own recommendations? What hidden gems are hiding out there that I haven’t discovered yet? Answers on a postcard, send a carrier pigeon or just comment below.....

Quick update, just realised that the YouTube links don’t show on the mobile version of the blog, click ‘view web version’ to see the links........

King of the Baggers

https://youtu.be/BOFDCnA7zb8

So, the season of fruitful mellowness descends on us once again, the clocks have gone back, it’s getting dark at five in the afternoon, the leaves are falling from the trees and we continue to lurch into civil disobedience, lockdowns loom on the horizon, [too late for Wales, it’s ok to buy a bottle of vodka but you can’t purchase a birthday card as it’s a ‘non-essential item’] but anyway onto more important matters.

As the blogosphere disappears at an alarming rate to be replaced by TikTok videos of narcissistic morons singing on the toilet, throwing children over the sofa and licking food in Walmart I must admit to trawling YouTube for entertainment. One of the channels I’ve subscribed to is MotoAmerica, it’s a bit like BSB with similar support classes, 600 Supersport, LiquiMoly Talent Cup, etc, some hard and fast racing from iconic tracks, even before lockdown there wasn’t the same crowds as BSB but some good racing nevertheless. 

When the idea of racing ‘baggers’ was muted I must admit to being down with it straight away, I mean what could be more improbable than the thought of massoof overweight Harley and Indian lard arse touring bikes being ragged mercilessly around a track especially as the rules allow turbo charging, wheel, brake, suspension and fork changes? A true ‘silhouette’ class, [harking back to the ‘original’ AMA Superbikes] so long as it looks ‘standard’ you’re good to go. 

So, I’ve been looking forward to the inaugural ‘King of the Baggers’ race for some time and been following the Vance and Hines Harley build and the Roland Sands Indian bike builds with interest, throw in the Indian Factory bikes and the amazing Trask turbocharged bikes and some very talented riders and I wasn’t disappointed with the race! I’ve posted a link to the full race, I really hope this takes off, it’s the most innovative thing I’ve seen for years and hugely entertaining. Kudos to the riders, anyone who can wrestle one of these monsters around Laguna Seca’s corkscrew has massive cojones......

Sudden Awareness Of Now