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     1313 |
Nice old Flathead:  Another reminder of Lou 'Mystic' Usher from the JB2 ride. To wit, I respond - 'AMEN!':  You know, there might be a reason that this is only about the 4th or 5th V-Rod I've seen with ape hangers...  Now this 'Hot Wheels' bike is the start of the eclectic mix of motorcycles (and other transportation) seen on Reeperbahn:  Definitely more to come, 1313 | ||
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Let me get this straight. I said El Machico was my favorite H-D at Hamburg Harley Days? Well, Black Betty here wasn't on the official eventsite...   I said other eclectic transportation, didn't I?  Not a bad version of reality:  1313 | ||
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Personally - since I have a Firebolt Front Fairing on my XT - I can't see how one can improve on the Firebolt Front Fairing. Apparently this guy doesn't see things the way I do.  It doesn't really look all that bad...  If there weren't so darn many V-Rod's there, this could've been in contention for my favorite H-D:  Yeah, I guess it really don't make much sense that my favorite H-D was a Softail... Interesting bike of Pearls:  1313 | ||
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Well, I guess the Firebolt Front Fairing isn't the perfect fairing for all motorcycles...  Why can't motorcycles co-exist like this in the US?!?!   1313 | ||
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OK, I really dug these next 2 bikes as well. I guess I can't narrow myself down to just one favorite bike from Hamburg Harley Days. This also might have some insight into why I currently have 3 bikes in my garage. But I digress...   Hey, this chopped Moto Guzzi ain't all that bad either-  Nice saddlebag...  1313 | ||
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Like I hinted to before, there were more than just motorcycles on Reeperbahn. These trucks made me think I was back in the good ol' US of A!     Kinda funny how a weekend after I got back to NC from Homecoming I went to a Hot Rod show in Hickory, NC... 1313 | ||
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Someone else with a beef with the Firebolt Front Fairing?  It doesn't really look that bad...  As much as I like both H-D and Buell, I'd never do this:  1313 | ||
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I'm usually pretty good with identifying old American Iron, but the last thing I expected to see in Hamburg, Germany was a 1958 Pontiac (if I identified this one right):  This little 2CV was having just as much fun revving it up and dumping the clutch to produce a small tire squeal. Just enough to have the crowd cheer/egg him on:  Supporting the Performing Arts, once again:   1313 | ||
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Winner for the 'Truth in Advertising' Award:  Gee a taxi in Hamburg is 66 66 66...  So close to 666 666... 1999 X1 Blue Race Stripe:  When I took this pic, I just thought it was a cool bike. Now after studying the picture a little more, the picture is cool on so many levels:  1313 | ||
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Back on the event grounds, everywhere you looked there were more Buell's.  This bike has something on it that Last Laugh needs.  I honestly can't remember what Last Laugh's timer cover looks like, but this one is definitely fitting for it:  Nice (non-Firebolt) front fairing.  It's kinda old news now, but I still dig it!  1313 | ||
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Before you surmise it to be this way, NO, these Buell flags and Buell balloons were not just at the Fighter's Garage.  Pesky little sucker...   Cool X1:  1313 | ||
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Another Green XB:  And a S2!!!  I had met the owner of the S2 at the 2007 MSM. I found it quite odd to be in Hamburg for the first time in my life and being able to walk up to the owner of the S2 and shake his hand like an old friend. But that is the International Brotherhood of Buell, folks! Can't identify the tail on this M2:  Blade Trinity Edition XB12R. These were Special Edition XB12R's offered in Germany with, IIRC, 3 different paint schemes available.  1313 | ||
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For those enamored with celebrity, Bill Davidson was in attendance at Hamburg Harley Days.  But I think more will be enamroed with this awesome artwork. And don't worry, the original high res pic was already sent to Spidey many moons ago.  To close out my coverage of Hamburg Harley Days, here's another 'favorite H-D':  Next up some more pics from Berlin, 1313 | ||
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Back in Berlin on Sunday - thanks to the ICE train Saturday night - I met up with a friend in Berlin with plans of the 2 of us riding 2 of his bikes.  Here the lovely Bijella is seen by 2 of my friends bikes, unfortunately both of these are BMW's. The plan was that I would ride the white one (R80GS with 1000 cylinders) while my friend would ride the red one. But unfortunately the GS wouldn't start and we couldn't jump it so I got stuck riding bitch. And then we ended up getting soaked. All in all it's a fantastic memory! Before we went out riding and got soaked we had to run a few errands in Berlin and I snapped this picture from the dash of his Mercedes wagon.  190 Km/hr is the limit with winter (snow) tires? 190Km/hr is just under 120 MPH... One day after work with a different colleague I went to a bike shop in Berlin, where I was surprised to find a Buell that I saw at the 2007 MSM:  It's hard to tell from this pic, but I guess them weak looking custom sprockets are just that - WEAK!  NICE COAT RACK!  1313 | ||
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The rest of the week in Berlin (other than work) was boring with anticipation building for this years MSM. All throughout the week I would see posters for some Monster Truck deal. As I was beginning to head toward the MSM Thursday afternoon I just happened to go by where they were really putting down some heavy promotion for the Monster Truck event:    All 3 of the above pictures were taken while going around (or preparing to go around) a roundabout, so I'm actually amazed how well they turned out. And I truly love that Monster Benz! Now it's time for a little break. A fellow Buell rider from Wisconsin IM'ed me and wants to go out for some drinks - the traditional Wisconsin Winter pasttime when there is this much snow on the ground. So I gotta shower and get ready. Once I get back, I have 35 pictures to post from Frankfurt Harley-Davidson and Buell, and then 145 to post from the 2008 BORG MSM. Until then, however, hopefully I've posted enough to whet your appetite, 1313 | ||
| Court |
I love your accounts of your German travel . . . . . the Germans are wild over their Buells and they've done some incredible things. Did you see Frank this trip? Thanks for a fabulous report. | ||
| Rotzaruck |
WOW!! What a fantastic trip(s), especially work help getting there! Lucky guy. Thanks for sharing a great "picture up"! | ||
| Nevrenuf |
nice gig there. i have to look around for a pic i have of a bike that was brought over from germany so he could go to bike week a number of years ago. this thing was mad max all the way. | ||
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Sorry everyone for the delayed 'break'. The drinks on the night of the 25th took a little longer than I originally estimated. Which rolled over into the Wisconsin tradition of a Friday Night Fish Fry (Damn, how I miss them!!!), which lead to another night out drinking, which lead to spending Saturday afternoon at the Harley Davidson museum (originally with plans to have dinner at Conejito's Place - are you salivating, Court?), which lead to a quiet night drinking at a friends house. Now that I'm back at my parents house, I hope that I will be able to finish this 'picture-up' in it's entirety before there are any other interruptions... Court, Of course I saw Frank during my visit to Germany this past Summer - me attending a Buell event in Germany without seeing Frank is something that is not very likely to happen. In fact Frank was taking pictures of me on my demo ride on a XR1200 - where I topped the sucker out!!! But more about that later... First let's get through Frankfurt Harley-Davidson and Frankfurt Buell and get to the MSM... I'll skip the late night misadventures of trying to find the MSM campground, this year located about 30-45 minutes outside of Frankfurt, in order to expedite the completion of this report. But suffice to say - even having borrowed a GPS from a colleague didn't eliminate all the problems. Anyways, I finally made it to the site of the MSM very late Thursday night/very early Friday morning. Just enough time to drink a Bier or 5 with the Germans who were already there - among others, this included Frank, Scott and Jens. The people that were already there were mainly the group in the region where the MSM was held this year, as they were responsible for making this years party. Each year, it's the responsibility of the BORG members in the region that the MSM is going to be held to arrange the party. After a decent nights sleep in the quiet German countryside it was time for me to drive my rental car and follow Scott driving his car back to his place in Frankfurt. The reason for driving to Frankfurt was to drop off my rental car at Scott's place and pick up his '98 S1 Lightning. Since he was part of the group responsible for making this years party Scott would not have time to do any riding, which meant that I could use the bike as much as I wanted. After parking my rental car on a street not too far from Scott's place, and picking up the S1, Scott lead me over to the Frankfurt Harley-Davidson dealer and the Frankfurt Buell dealer. Even though the 2 dealerships/buildings/stores are connected, they each have separate entrances. This is, by far, not my first time being exposed to German H-D and Buell dealers - or other European locations for that matter - but I was surprised quite pleasantly at what I saw in Frankfurt. Here's a pic of the Harley-Davidson part:  And here's the Buell part:  As I was taking in all of the activity outside the dealership, from the loading of some of the dealership bikes headed to the MSM on a trailer-  to certain aspects of the H-D and Buell business that is quite a bit different from the US business-  Scott asked me whether we should go into the H-D part first or the Buell part first. Thinking to myself, I always like to save the best (i.e. BUELL) for last, but instead I answered Scott as follows: Let's do the H-D side first, they can't have that much 'interesting' stuff in the H-D side. Oh, how wrong I was... 1313 | ||
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As I walked into the H-D part of the dealership, I immediately realized how big of a mistake I made by saying that there wouldn't be that much interesting in there. First I laid eyes upon these beauties:   For some reason it didn't really seem that odd to see a classic Indian in a H-D dealer...  And this was only the beginning... 1313 | ||
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There were interesting, for lack of a better word, 'display' bikes from every era in H-D's history (with only a brief sampling shown here...)    And there were also complete engines on display from every era in H-D's history (FYI - the Evo Sporty engine on display is actually a Buell engine...). I'm only showing the V-Rod engine because it had a little more than just the base holding it up.  So I wonder what the Buell section of the dealership in Frankfurt has in store... 1313 | ||
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A few RSS's have made it into Germany, so I guess I shouldn't have been surprised to see one at the Frankfurt Buell dealer.  I found the existence in Germany, of one of the bikes in this line up, very interesting. Considering how the Blast! has never been distributed in Europe I found it quite interesting to see one at Frankfurt Buell.  OK, this is a repeat from one of the Buell's in the Fighter's Garage at Hamburg Harley Days, but check out the cool stuff on the wall.  A Blade Trinity Edition Firebolt:  And another 'definitely not as they come from the factory' Buell:  Hang on guys - there's a bunch more magical about Frankfurt Buell, 1313 | ||
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Well, looky here, it's an XBRR:  Can you tell (yet) how much I dig this graphic?  Even though most of us know that 56 XBRR's were made worldwide, I'd put some trust into the "7 pieces in Europe and 3 pieces in Germany".  As is tradition, this one was #17:  Oh yeah - you better believe that there's still more to come from Frankfurt Buell... 1313 | ||
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Here's a Firebolt decked out in nearly a complete bodyset of Carbon Fiber:  I know I've commented before as to how much more 'open' European Buell Marketing is. Hopefully this picture will show it a little clearer than I can put it into words:  The X1 image above kinda makes the XB12STT poster below look tame:  Now, where is Scott's XB9R racebike? 1313 | ||
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Currently Scott owns 4 Buell's; 2 registered in the US - a Blast! and a 2002 M2L; and 2 in Germany - the '98 S1 he rides ont he street and a XB9R that is his racebike. He may be giving the XB9R to his son to use as a race bike after he gets an 1125 for the track, but that is not quite a done deal yet... In any event, Scott's race XB9R is stored at the Frankfurt Buell dealership, which provides Scott with some good contacts at the dealership. If you want to know how good the contacts are, you should see how sweet of a discount the owner gave me on all of the shirts and the jacket I bought... Oh yeah, where's Scott's racebike XB9R? Hmm, this ain't it...  Hey that looks like one of them there...  Sure enough 2 out of the 3 XBRR's in Deutschland were at Frankfurt Buell that day. This one is #22:  Ah, here's Scott's XB9R racebike, and yes, that's Scott standing by the bike:  What else could Frankfurt have that could be considered interesting? 1313 | ||
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Here's an 1125R track bike in it's infant stages.   And this classic Buell - another RSS - made me cringe due to the fire damage it had sustained:   Not to worry, as it is planned to be restored soon. From the non-pivoting footpegs on this bike (and IIRC as well as on the white RSS on the floor) this tells me these RSS's are actually part of the 1991 Buell RSS 1200 builds - the ones that were meant exclusively for disribution in Japan.  Something tells me I missed some critical details about the 1991 Buell RSS 1200 while I was away at school one semester. What else does Frankfurt have that's cool? 1313 | ||
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Cool aftermarket flyscreen:  Used leathers hanging from the rafters:  And even gauge faces:  Were just some of the cool Buell stuff in stock at Frankfurt Buell. I could've spent a lot more time at Frankfurt Buell (and, yes, even Frankfurt Harley-Davidson), but thankfully Scott reminded me that we had to get back to the MSM for the real festivities. Next stop - back at the MSM, 1313 | ||
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Well, this is taking a little longer than I originally thought it would. I guess that means I should quit it with the typing... So, in a change of plans, I will put a little more up tonight and will hopefully be able to finish off the 145 pictures fromt eh MSM tomorrow night, 'cuz we all know that New Years Eve will not provide an opportunity to post more... Here's an interesting part that, if I interpreted it correctly, one of the BORG members originally created.   XB...  Pegasus...  XB...Pegasus...Tastes great!!!Less filling!!! 1313 | ||
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Just as always, checking out the bikes... Nice Green Meanie:   Orange:  I bet nobody knows whose bike this is. Yet I know a lot of you are familiar with a creation of the bikes owner. Here's the bike:   If any of you've heard of a nice little program, that allows you to adjust certain parameters within your ECM, that goes by the name of ECMSpy, then the owner of the bike pictured above is the person you need to thank for it's existence. Unfortunately as those of us with DDFI3 ('09 and up) bikes know, ECMSpy doesn't interface with the DDFI3 ECM. 1313 | ||
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Before I break for the night, I guess I'm a little overdue for showing the '98 S1 Lightning that Scott so gratiously allowed me to ride during the MSM.      With 131 pictures still left to post (and unfortunately some words needing to be typed to give some background info) I've got a feeling that finishing this will be an abitious project for tomorrow night... 1313 |
