| Author | Message | ||
     Crusty |
Flat Track, The Iron Motor and WTF??? I love Flat Track racing. Two weeks from now, the Troy Bayliss Classic is going to take place in Taree, NSW which is only 425 miles away from my present location. Five top American racers have been invited to participate along with Australia's best and invitees from Japan and the U.K. Jared Mees, Brad Baker, Sammy Halbert, Jake Johnson and Henry Wiles will be racing against Troy Bayliss, Mick Kirkness, Anthony West and a a whole lot more. From what I've seen on the internet, it looks like a TT track without a jump. I don't know the displacement of the bikes, the size wheels, what tires they'll be using or even the length of the track,but even so, I expect the Home Team to dominate. It looks to me like Henry Wiles should smoke everybody else, but we'll see, come race day. I have no means of transportation, right now, but if I can figure a way, I'll be there. And I'm doing my damnedest to figure a way. ********************************* The Sportster is coming along I’ve got the Primary cover back on and the clutch adjusted. I kicked the bike through a few times, and it has compression. I put power to the battery cables with one of those portable jumper bawhangees, and the tail light and brake light work, the high beam indicator lights when the switch is set to high and I got a nice fat spark when I kicked the bike over. (I also got a sharp pain in my ankle, but that went away quickly). The headlight didn’t work because the bulb is dead, and the bulbs are out of the turn signals, so I don’t know if they work, either. The horn also didn’t work, but I would have been surprised if it did. I have to see why the electric starter would’t work. Was nothing getting juice? The solenoid did’t click, so I’ll start chasing right from the battery cable and work my way down the line. Wires, relay, solenoid and starter. I’ll get it sorted soon. I think the Iron Motor is almost ready for some gas. ********************************* Why am I so forgetful when I sit down to type a Snippet? I had three things I wanted to write about and I can’t remember what the third thing is. Usually, I write the title of the Snippet first, but today, I copied a post that I put on Badweb about the race, and didn’t write a title. Then I forgot. Oh well; if it’s important, I can always crank out another Snippet, or I could just save it for the next one. | ||
| Damnut |
I know you usually go for a New Years day ride and since you're kinda bikeless at the moment, I took the S1 for a ride for you today. Happy New Year.  (Message edited by damnut on January 01, 2016) | ||
| Crusty |
In The Early Morning Rain It’ s raining.A light rain that’ll stop shortly but will continue on and off all day. It’s supposed to do this for a couple of days. I’d like to see a good steady soaking rain, but intermittent light showers is what we’re getting. Count your blessings, dammit! Any rain is better than no rain. It’s warm, anyhow. I think that today I’ll try to sort out just what’s wrong with the electric starter on the Iron Motor. It’s funny; the people on the Sportster forum think I should spend my money getting the Iron Motor fixed and forget about the other bikes I’ve been thinking about getting. I will fix the Iron Motor, but I want to do it right. Any motorcycle that I ride has to be capable of carrying me on a thousand mile journey without issues popping up. I don’t think the Sportster will be up to that until I’ve gone through it a good bit. I could get it up and running and just use it locally, for now; and I’ve been working toward that. But I want to restore it to its former beauty with a few improvements. Since it needs new fork tubes and at least a front brake master cylinder, I’m thinking that a more modern front end with better brakes off eBay would be a better way to go. And I definitely will be going for good shocks for the rear. I’m hoping that the rear master cylinder is salvageable, since they’re no longer available as well as the rear caliper. Once I can get it running, then maybe I’ll be able to determine just what problems it has that caused Melia and Roni Ann to park it, then give it to Ben so he could fix it (HA!). The bike has many problems that I can see; it’s the ones I can’t see that are bothering me. I’ve gotten so many confusing reports, I have to discount them all and start from scratch. It’s going to take a while to get it all sorted out. In the meantime, I want to ride. I'm without transportation, and it’s killing me. Being the nut case that I am, I want a motorcycle instead of a car. I live on the back of a motorcycle. I don’t particularly like Inline four cylinder motorcycles, but, to paraphrase my old boss; “If Kuminsukmi were the only people making motorcycles, then I’d ride a Kuminsukmi.” Who knows; maybe I’ll find a decent Sportster for relatively short money here. There was an ’06 883 listed on Bikesales for five grand. Maybe I should try to figure out how to come up with that? Nope; can’t do it. I can find a way to come up with half that to buy an ’83 Yamaha 900, though. (remember; the Australian Dollar is only worth .72 US Dollars. That means that $2500.00 AUS is $1875.00 US) All I have to do is hang on until I get my next check. If I live really frugally for the month after that, I’ll be able to ride. Well; we’ll see how things look after I sort out the starter issues. | ||
| Natexlh1000 |
Can you hear the relay click? Mine was acting bad but it was a bad contact in the spaghetti pile in the headlight bucket. Suggestion: Hold down the button and wiggle the wires in the headlight mess. If it is the relay under the oiltank/battery box, it's just a FORD part. | ||
| Crusty |
Today, Hopefully Well, I got the electric starter on the Iron Motor working yesterday. I also sorted out Ron’s wrenches and sockets. All the metric wrenches are in one place and all the SAE wrenches are in their own drawer. The same holds true for the sockets. I had some reservations about sorting out the tools until Melia told me that when they were shipped to Australia from Micronesia where Ron had been working, everything was completely jumbled and mixed up and they never got properly sorted. Now, all the wrenches are laid out in order and are easy to find. Same with the sockets. You can actually find the tool you’re looking for without having to paw through three or four different drawers. Ron will probably give me grief for doing it. Then again, Ron would probably give me grief if I didn’t do it. Today, I’m going to try and get the Iron motor to run. I’ve got a pan under the breather hose as I expect a bit of oil to pump out of it. I expect that the crankcase is full. When It cranked over yesterday, it sounded OK. No unusual clanks or thuds. It sounds like a Sportster should sound when it’s cranking, so I’m feeling a bit hopeful. I’ll have to put everything back together, which will take a little while. I’ll probably just put the dead battery back in just so there’ll be something in the circuit, and I have to put the throttle and switches back on the bars as well as put the gas tank back on. If she does fire up, she’ll be getting an oil change pretty soon, like as soon as I can get some oil. I have some oil filters in original boxes for it (it has an aftermarket oil filter setup. the bike didn’t come with an oil filter originally), I hope they’re not rusted to hell. I feel like the Three Stooges when they were Aircraft Engineers. “Anything the Wright Brothers can do, the Wrong Brothers can do! Right?” “Right!” “Wrong… Brothers!” When I go into town,to get the gas, I also have to go by the Chemist’s (Drug store) and get something for Athletes foot. My feet are really itching. And I’m not even an Athlete! Yeah, I know; you really didn’t need that little bit of information. Oh, well. | ||
| 46champ |
Just call it trench foot Crusty. With some of the jobs you have had in the past I will bet you had wet feet all day long every day. | ||
| Alfau |
Bleach your feet with a strong solution then dose your washing machine as you wash your socks, boots ,shoes and slippers to kill the bacteria. Don't forget the shower base and others members of the family if they are affected. This is the subtropics after all. Bleach your hair too for affect. I know it sounds stupid but it is cheap and it works. | ||
| Crusty |
It’s Alive!!! The Iron Motor starts and runs! Now, I have to get parts to make it road worthy. A battery, Ground strap and some new fuel line, to start. Lots more in the future. Forks, shocks, handlebars, rubber riser vibration dampers, New Master cylinders, switches, a new starter relay… and on and on. As Mike Kerrigan said, Now I have a new Bucket List item. It won’t all get done this year. When I come back next year, I’ll be carrying two suitcases, and one will be full of parts. Even with the additional price for an extra bag, it’ll be cheaper than paying for shipping. I feel like celebrating! The next time I go into Brisbane, I’ll be coming back with goodies to get the Iron Motor closer to being road worthy. Once she’ll start and run on her own (without having to use a jumper) then I’ll start working on the brakes. Little by little, she’s coming along. | ||
| 86129squids |
SCHWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEETTTTTTT!!!! "Time and Perseverance"... So glad to hear of this. | ||
| Buellish |
Great news John,long live the Iron Motor! | ||
| Pwnzor |
Huzzah for the Iron Horse!!!! This is truly good news, needed it this morning I can tell you. | ||
| Tootal |
That's awesome John! Nothing like hearing one come back to life after a long sleep! Way to go!  | ||
| Damnut |
Go and celebrate with some......  | ||
| Crusty |
Jim; I'm allergic to seafood and I don't like plastic women. Nyuk, nyuk, nyuk! | ||
| Akbuell |
Actually, the shrimp on the barbie is kinda cute. On another note, a short article on the Troy Bayliss Classic is posted at CycleWorld.com. Overhead view of the track, a 3 1/2min video of the 2015 event, and some nice related videos on the screen after the feature video is over. (Message edited by Akbuell on January 04, 2016) | ||
| Crusty |
Tarzan and the Huntsman Remember all those old Tarzan movies with Johnny Weissmuller? They’d show a jungle scene, and you could hear all the wild animals in the background making noise. Hoo, hoo, hoo, hoo, ha,ha,ha, etc? Well, those aren’t African sounds at all. I never heard anything like that when I was in Africa. However, those are the sounds of Kookaburras. An Australian bird. The night before last, there was a large group (Troop?, Pod?, Gaggle?) of them in the trees out in the paddocks. I wouldn’t have been surprised if some half naked guy came swinging by on a vine. Boy, they sure make a lot of noise, but it’s a very enjoyable noise. It beats the hell out of hearing BNSF trains passing every 20 minutes. Yesterday, Melia and Tylana were taking down all the Christmas decorations. Melia took down a plastic piece of Poinsettia that was about four feet long and made a muted scream. She held out the branch and there was one of the biggest spiders I’ve ever seen. It had to measure at least five inches between opposing legs. I’ve seen Tarantulas that were bigger, but this was pretty huge. Melia brought the branch outside and the spider got shaken off the front porch. It was a Huntsman Spider, and though their venom isn’t deadly to adults, it’s still pretty painful. Tylana didn’t see it, which is a good thing. She has a bit of a phobia about spiders and it would have ruined her day. I don’t have a phobia about spiders and it really surprised the living bejeezus out of me. I’d hate to see one coming after me; and that’s no lie. The weather forecasters here are about as accurate as the ones back home. It was supposed to quit raining last night and today was supposed to be just overcast. Instead, the showers became a steady heavy rain that’s lasted up to now, and who knows when it’ll quit? I’m not complaining about the rain, as we need it, I’m just commenting on the skill of the forecasters. I already wrote about getting the Iron Motor to start and run; I’m still excited about that, and I’m really looking forward to going back to Morgan & Wacker’s and buying things for it! Just wait; by this time next year, she’s going to be a real thing of beauty. | ||
| Greg_e |
Since the forks are going to be replaced anyway, is it worth the effort and minimal cost to try and fill in the rusty spots with super glue or JB weld? Might get you riding short trips during this leg of the journey? I've never tried it, but since they will be replaced anyway, I'd prolly give it a go and see what happens. What's the worst that could happen, you'll leak oil out of the fork and tear up the seals? All stuff you plan on fixing during the next trip anyway. | ||
| Crusty |
Short & Sweet The iron Motor runs! I’m going to the Troy Bayliss Classic. I’m leading a Charmed Life (for the time being) Another Huntsman Spider got into the house. I got a picture of him and will post it when we get more bandwidth. The rain has stopped, and the sun is shining in a cloudless sky. I’m wearing a T-shirt on January 6, and I’m perfectly comfortable. | ||
| Natexlh1000 |
You missed a "lovely" evening/morning here. This morning was 7F. Truck barely started. Time for a battery. Great to hear you got the bike running. What ended up being the issue with the starter? | ||
| Crusty |
What ended up being the issue with the starter? I'm not sure. It was either the switch (button) on the handlebars or the relay... Since the handlebar switches will be getting replaced, and relays are cheap, both will become non issues. Today is a good day to get things in the shed sorted out. Maybe I'll start playing with the brakes, as well. | ||
| Court |
Crusty . . . . . Enjoy . . . temps hovering near zero F here and wind chills below zero. But . . . . hey, it's a gorgeous town. Out the window about 20 minutes ago . . .  | ||
| Ourdee |
Woo Hoo it's alive. | ||
| Crusty |
 | ||
| 46champ |
Nice spider. | ||
| Crusty |
Just to put it into perspective, the wall slats are 4 inches wide. This one was smaller than the one that was on Melia's plastic poinsettia.  | ||
| Natexlh1000 |
If it gets that big, I wonder if it starts to taste like crab legs? Steam that puppy up! | ||
| Pwnzor |
holy moly... that's a spider. | ||
| Brother_in_buells |
But now the question ,what kind of spider? | ||
| Pwnzor |
Huntsman Spider | ||
| Crusty |
One Liners Not much to say today. It’s currently 32º C (90º F) with a few fluffy cumulus clouds. It’s supposed to hit the high 80s and low 90s (30 - 32º C) every day until Monday when it goes up to the mid 90s (34 - 36º C). There’s no rain in the forecast. We went into town to get a few things. The Cicadas here sound like the noise a Flying Saucer makes in a ’50’s era Sci-Fi / Horror movie. And there are a lot of Cicadas. We could barely carry on a conversation in the car. I’m going to take a picture of that sign that says, IN CASE OF FIRE, CALL 000. I still see CALL GOD. I want to get a picture of the Koala Crossing road sign that looks like the Koala is flipping you the bird. Speaking of Koalas, there’s another Koala hanging out on the property. Actually, it’s not on the property; it’s in a Gum tree right across the road from the main gate. I’m fixing Spaghetti & Meatballs for dinner tonight. My spaghetti sauce is almost as famous as my fried potatoes, which has (have?) won critical acclaim on three continents. I’m going to try to see if the owner of that Yamaha XJ 900 will come down a little in his asking price. If he won’t, I’ll probably wind up with that K 100 BMW “Flying Brick”. I’d prefer the Yamaha, but I only have so much money. If the owner won’t come down, then I’ll be riding a Teutonic Toilet. Remember; any bike is better than no bike. In the meantime, I’m still progressing with the Iron Motor. On Saturday, I’m going to buy a few parts for it. Mostly small, but necessary. Next weekend ( the 16th) is the Troy Bayliss Classic. I hope it’s as good as I’m wanting it to be. Looking at the aerial view of the track, it looks like Henry Wiles will be the man to beat. I could very easily be wrong, though. There are 35 very fast riders who are signed up. I still think an American is going to win it, but we’ll see. Ciao for now. (Message edited by Crusty on January 06, 2016) |
