| Author | Message | ||
     No_rice |
Well we made it there and back mostly in one piece. put about 700 miles on the bikes and didnt really go anywhere, lol. i honestly dont think i've had a better vacation. so much adrenalin going through my system i had the shakes for 3 whole days!!! it was sweet. even met a few fellow buellers recognise me there. went for a ride with Macbuell for awhile too. cool guy. loaded up and ready to go   at the look out on the dragon  2003 XB9R and 2002 TL1000R posing for some pics  my new favorite pic, the high res version looks WAY better. the old girl sure made an impression at the dragon. everytime we stopped people were standing around it looking and going man i saw you guys screaming down the road back there. think us flatlanders showed them we could still hang a corner.  had to get some corner pics of our own. i did manage to modify the toes of my boots fairly well even with the balls of my feet on the pegs.  the TL did manage to snap its almost brand new chain just coming out of a corner though. we both got lucky. him because it mostly spit the chain out and it was right at the end of the corner, and me because it didnt spit it out into my head at the rate we were moving. Zee from zeefoto.com was meeting us when it happened and turned around loaded up the bike and took us to Wheelers in Robbinsville. he's a great guy and was very helpful. got us on the road in no time and didnt actually charge that much. Zee was great to for the ride and everything. talked to killboy at wheelers also, he was working on his husky motard. pretty cool guy.  my pegs were barely off the ground a few times from what the video and my friend says but it still looks like it had more left to give! he followed me on his TL with a tank cam but i have yet to get to see that. we are going to watch it tonight!   iron horse. our base station for the attack, lol  mandatory scenery pic. it fogged over every night  our last trip down the dragon in the truck at about 5:30 am on the way home  i just had to get a pic of this...  no matter how hard we looked though i couldn't find the general lee. what else could have wrecked that sheriff's car... and the banjo's played... (Message edited by no_rice on August 28, 2006) | ||
| Dragonbuell12r |
Sweet. Thanks for sharing.  | ||
| Macbuell |
No_Rice, I had a great time riding with you guys on Friday. Too bad I got stuck in Atlanta on Thursday or I could have riden with you a little longer. It was a blast though. I'll tell you what, the Dragon sure makes you keep your senses sharp. I had a hard time keeping up with you guys up there but hopefully when I ditch the Dunlops for some Diablos and dial in the suspension a little more that will fix that. We'll have to meet up and give it a go again. You guys were right about the CheroHala Dragon loop. The CheroHala Skyway was cool and so was the Dragon, of course, but the ride in between was kind of boring. It's funny. As much as some people like to rip in to the XB's, they sure turn a lot of heads and get a lot of compliments in a crowd. All I heard all weekend long was, "wow, that thing looks like fun", that's a sweet looking bike", etc, etc. Cool pics by way. | ||
| No_rice |
you did fine as far as i'm concerned. even my friend thought you did good. we were worried we were going to lose you or that you might try and push to hard to keep up since we had know idea how your riding style was. as long as you were comfortable with the pace you were keeping thats all that matters. and you were keeping a good pace going. i keep saying i need more gears to run that skyway full tilt like it could be. i could have run it flat out most the time on the buell with those big sweeping curves | ||
| Hattori_hanzo |
What? A CHAIN snapped? Surely you meant the piece of crap '03 Buell belt snapped. There is no way a chain could let go! Tell the truth and let every one join in on another belt breaking... Nice pics by the way...I'm jealous! | ||
| Kdan |
No_rice, where did you get that sprocket cover? Like the pics! | ||
| Dmextreme |
NIIICE Pics Tim.. Bravo. and I see you was cruising almost horizontally.. glad to see your fine and still wish in you were there.. take care bud!! Thanks for sharing!!! | ||
| No_rice |
it is one of kevin's prototype covers. the production ones will be close, but no actual holes. just pockets so stuff cant get in the belt as easy(like my shoe laces...) not sure if he has any production version ones yet (Message edited by no_rice on August 28, 2006) | ||
| Rasmonis |
No_rice, I love your bike's paint job. Now that I have a new airbox cover I'd like to do something with the original one. What paint did you use? I've been looking for the real mil spec OD paint but I'm having a hard time finding it. | ||
| Hammer71 |
What? A CHAIN snapped? Must have been handled wrong. LOL Glad to hear all went well with that, could have been nasty. Great pics, cant wait to snap some of my own down there. | ||
| Swordsman |
Fantastic pics! I'd love to give that a shot... but I'd probably get run over, 'cause I'm pretty much a chicken! (They're MY chicken strips, and I love 'em, dangit!)  ~SM} | ||
| Marhaba |
Sounds like you had a kick ass time at the Dragon. I'd be sending out pics right now, but unfortunately my camera is broken. Will be getting another one soon. I can't believe Brian's chain snapped. That really sucks. Glad to hear you had an great time though. Post more pictures and the video, I really want to see that!!! Take care and see you sometime soon!! | ||
| Rubberdown |
Glad you had a great time. Great pics! Wheeler's great. He's saved my ass before! | ||
| Mikexlr650 |
we stayed at ironhorse in july, great place! are you having "withdraawwls" yet? the first few days after i returned all i could think about was going back to get my next fix. felt like a serious addict. the roads in that area are fantastic. we hit almost no traffic and saw only one patrol car in 2 days of blissful "pace" riding. | ||
| Jlnance |
You lucky Ba$tards. You were there during the women's sportbike rally. Did you get pictures? | ||
| Macbuell |
For my first time in the mountains with a new bike I am not totally comfortable with, I thought I did pretty well. A few more runs and some more time in the saddle and who knows. Anyway, I thought I would tell a little about my trip up from Atlanta as well. I headed out with the XB12R all loaded up from Atlanta on Friday morning. The plan was to leave on Thursday morning, but plans change. Friday morning I was all packed and ready to go.  I headed up 400 to US19 which turns into US129 as the bottom of Blood Mountain. We all know where US129 leads. Before I got to US129, I hit the intersection of 60 and 19. At this intersection is the grave site of a Cherokee Indian princess. Legend has it that if you place a rock on top of the grave site you will have good luck. Well, I couldn't resist. I won't bore you with a picture of the rock, but it's there.   The ride up Blood Mountain, two lanes most of the way, is a really nice one, especially if you don't see any LEO's. Well, I didn't see one officer and not much traffic at all. It was a nice little ride to let her rip. I stopped at the Appalachian Trail crossing to get a drink and enjoy the scenery.  Say Hello to my little Friend ... who decided to keep me company.  From there it was on to the Dragon. I made pretty good time, checked in at the Inn, dumped my stuff and headed to the Dragon. I took it easy on the first run considering that I'd never been there before and had just over 1K on the new 12 before heading up. It was a lot of fun but man are there a lot of decreasing radius turns. As I was finishing my run I'm passed by an XB9R and TL1000R. I immediately recognized no_rice's ride and turned around to try to to catch up to them. Of course I didn't catch 'em but I found them filling up at the Motorcycle Lodge. We then hooked up riding the Dragon and 28 the rest of the afternoon. No Rice says Hi!  The next day I went up to the Motorcycle Lodge to check things out before I ran the CheroHala Dragon loop. Bikes and more Bikes  The Tree of Shame, thankfully I didn't make any contributions.  From then on it was one more run through the Dragon and then through the Cherohala Dragon loop. A view from the Overlook.  A pic from the CheroHala Skyway. You can see why they call them the Smokey Mountains.  Only 45 more feet and one of the Sportbike Girls and I could have joined the mile high club.  Well, that was it and then it was homeward bound. I made it home with everything in the same place as it was when I left and no tickets either.   Over 650 miles in a day and half. I know there are those here that will put that to shame, but it's not bad for me. | ||
| Brineusaf |
Awesome trip summary guys.... ride safe | ||
| Slickster |
No Rice and Macbuell Thanks for great posting about one nice trip. The picture and narrative were sweet. Makes me want to head that way to use the side of my tires a little more. Thanks for sharing Slickster | ||
| Diablobrian |
Hey Tim, Did the chain snap, or did he lose a master link? If it was a new chain I'd be asking the manufacturer some questions about it. That should never happen. | ||
| Macbuell |
Thanks guys. I had a blast and I'm already trying to figure out when I can make another journey. Oh, and I forgot to mention that when No-Rice and I were heading up the Dragon Friday night, right around dusk I saw about a dozen wild turkeys at the edge of the road and then a deer around the next corner. He heard the Buell coming right at him and turned and high tailed it back into the woods. Pretty cool. Thank goodness he didn't run out in front of us though. (Message edited by MACBuell on August 29, 2006) | ||
| Glitch |
New12r and I went up the weekend y'all first planned on going. We'll have to try again. Maybe now that summer's almost over we can get a big BadWeB crowd up that way. Great pics. McBuell, long time no see!  | ||
| No_rice |
he's already trying to get something done about the chain it did break the masterlink. snapped the pin clean off. managed to crack the first link also. what we figured out was that it looks like they had packaged a masterlink for a different chain in with his x ring one. nice huh. i have to figure out how to afford pants before i go again. it was hard to keep myself from sticking my knees in the ground! i also have to tear the bike apart and figure out whats making noise in the primary/tranny. not sure whats up with it. doubt it's just the nut needing to be tightened. it even clunks sometimes when the bikes in neutral and i'm pushing it around. shifted hard and also didnt want to find a gear once or twice, but other than that it's just making noise. | ||
| Rocktoy4me |
I was there two weeks ago to the day.....cant wait to go again. Great roads and scenery. Seth | ||
| Buellfirebolt31 |
Hey no_rice check the compensator nut. the one thats in the primary...we see alot of those problems. and also, can your Buell on NOS keep up with the TL? i know you can walk him in the twisties but was wondering about the straight? | ||
| Xb9ser |
I was at Ironhorse back in july great place to stay. Their computer in main lodge will never be the same. names will not be told to protect the guilty you know who you are!! when we going back!!  probly the most fun I've ever had with my cloths on!! | ||
| No_rice |
ya, the nut is the first thing to check, i've checked it before but will do it again. doubt thats it though as it does it when not in gear also. his TL is actually tweaked pretty good but i can pace him just fine most the way up to my redline in 5th without the nitrous. he does start inching away in 5th though. | ||
| Macbuell |
No_Rice, some pics are up at zeephoto for the 25th. http://www.photoreflect.com/scripts/prsm.dll?eventthumbs?event=0HH6004W06&start= 200 | ||
| No_rice |
yep, i've been constantly checking the sites to see myself, lol. i like this one of my friend and i both mid corner http://www.photoreflect.com/scripts/prsm.dll?eventorder?photo=0HH6004W050629&sta rt=0&album=0&adjust=-1 www.dragonslayerphotos.com has some up also killboy is having problems getting the 28,000 pics he took to load. man thats alot |
