Death Wish II

Originally uploaded by ~Haggis~

I haven’t written much in awhile. I haven’t had much to say. The Triumph is a wonderful bike but not something I would want to take long distances after all. I could put a lot of money into fixing that, or I could start with a better foundation.

I chose the latter option.

Last week I picked up a 1985 Honda V65 Magna. The bike has been torn down to the frame & reassembled with many new parts. There are some areas that didn’t get enough attention so I’m sorting that out now. Minor stuff, really.

She wasn’t starting in the sub-freezing morning temperatures we’ve been having here so I replaced the original lead acid type battery with an AGM type battery from BatteriesPlus+ with a very high CCA value so she turns over quite easily in even 20 degree temperatures.

But the starter has issues. The starter clutch is on its way out. It can be coaxed into engaging but I don’t wish to be stranded with a dead starter, so I’m going to rebuild it.

The speedometer cable is broken. Will fix that. Also the alternator cover leaks and doesn’t have a real gasket, just RTV. So I’ve got a gasket to install.

There are cooling issues. I rode to Durham yesterday in sub-freezing temperatures and the coolant temperature gauge was warning over imminent overheating unless I rode the balls off the bike (quite a thrill with this beast, let me tell you!)

But the foundation is there. The frame on this bike is a bit more stout. With some luggage farkles added, it should be able to haul quite a bit in the way of spare parts, tools, supplies, etc for longer trips. And the engine? Well, for those of you who aren’t familiar with the old V65 Magnas, let me point out that this was the Hayabusa of the mid 1980’s. Yeah, it looks rather cruiser-ish or mildly UJM-ish, I know. But this is a muscle bike. With a more average sized rider it could turn quarter mile times under 11 seconds!

I don’t need all of that power for racing or riding like a jackass. But I’m a big dude, and when you add long haul luggage, the bike is going to be carrying over 350 pounds of rider + cargo. With the big water cooled V4 to haul me up the side of a mountain and the monster dual disc brakes up front to ease my descent, I’ll be in pretty good shape.

I ordered a Renntec Sports Rack from Newbonneville.com last week. They packed and shipped my order the same day after confirming to me that they had it in-stock. It was waiting on my front stoop when I got home yesterday, and with nothing more than a 13mm socket wrench I had it installed in under 15 minutes on my Bonneville.

I need to get some photos of it mounted on my bike. I went with the black finish instead of chrome. Chrome just isn’t my thing (I sometimes say that I’m no chromosexual).

This thing is built like a tank, though! I think it’s only certified for like 5 or 6 pounds but I’ll tell you what, I picked the back of the motorcycle up by the rack and it felt super sturdy! It anchors at six different points on the frame and they didn’t cheap out on any part of it.

There’s not a lot of surface area here, but I feel I have a very sturdy surface to strap bags to now.

I just heard back from my HR manager:

Hi Magnus,

You currently have 90.8 vacation hours available.  Plenty of time for a
motorcycle trip!  

Please let me know if you need anything else.

Thanks!
Lisa

Great news! Looks like I’ve got two weeks to burn. I don’t think I’m going to use it all on this first trip. Maybe I’ll burn a week.

Now where to go…

OK, I might be throwing caution into the wind a bit here, but I’m going to take a cue from minimalist bikers and scheduling some time off to travel without having a luggage rack or GPS or any of that crap on my bike. I’ll invest in some bungee cords to hold stuff down to the back of the stock Triumph Bonneville plank seat. I’ll get some hefty bags to cover my stuff with if it rains. But I think I’m just going to pack light and go.

To that end, I sent an email to my Human Resources manager inquiring about how much vacation time I’ve got queued up. I’m not going to take it all on the first trip but if I can take a week, maybe I can see a good bit of the country before I have to turn around and head home.

I’d love to hear some travel stories from people who have done minimalist touring on a cruiser or other naked bike like mine.

This question gets asked a lot and I wanted to put something here for Google users to find.

In stock form, my 2007 Triumph Bonneville T100 865cc would consistently get 34-35MPG. It didn’t matter if I rode it like a hooligan or a little old lady. Same result.

I had the air injection system removed after a year, replaced the silencers with Emgo widemouths (with baffles removed), and had the carbs dialed in at the dealership. If I keep my top speed below 70MPH (where wind resistance becomes a major factor) I can average around 42MPG.

Addendum

I am 6′2″ tall and weigh somewhere between 310-325 lbs without my clothes & riding gear. Despite my height, my inseam is only 30″ so I’ve got short legs and a lot of torso. In short, I look a lot like Shrek. So weight and wind resistance are likely major factors in why my fuel efficiency is going to be lower than other Bonneville riders.

The NC/VA state line near Danville, VA.

It was such a beautiful day out and all of my responsibilities for the weekend had been fulfilled. The bike has been running fantastically so I decided it was time to try my first long-ish solo ride.

I rode around close to home for about ten miles and then fueled up in Raleigh before taking highway 70 out to Hillsborough, NC.  From there it was a straight shot up highway 86 to Virginia.

My bad knee was bothering me after a bit, and while I could really have used some highway pegs to relax my knee, I decided to stop at a convenience store in northern North Carolina. The lady in there seemed pretty shocked to see a fellow in there with a mohawk and nosering, a reaction I don’t get very often here in Raleigh. I asked her the name of the town I was passing through and she seemed surprised to get such a question “Why it’s Prospect Hill, of course” she told me (as if I should have known).

With my knee feeling a bit better I hopped back on my Bonneville and resumed my course north on 86. This eventually got me into Danville, Virginia which is right near the state line. I never saw a proper sign telling me that I was now in Virginia, but as soon as I saw a Virginia seat belt safety sign I knew I wasn’t in North Carolina anymore so I snapped a photo of my Bonnie in Virginia to commemorate the moment that we crossed our first state line together. Hopefully this is the first of many.

Once into Danville, I hopped on highway 58 Business westbound in search of food. I figured a Chinese buffet is what I was after. I didn’t find that but I passed slowly by a gathering of 30-40 or more bikers that had stopped at a restaurant that was way too small for their group. I didn’t stop but they mostly stopped talking and looked at me, maybe trying to figure out if I belonged to their group or not. Or maybe they were admiring my very dapper high visibility yellow riding jacket. I know it’s the envy of all the bikers in town who want to throw out their black leather and look like a Power Ranger just like me.

Danville’s food offerings weren’t kind to me. After heading west awhile I turned around and headed east. I found a Chinese restaurant but when I pulled in, it looked as if they had been closed for some time. Bummer. Got back on 58 Business eastbound and took it in to South Boston.

Having ridden well over 100 miles and not found any Chinese food, I relented and hit Burger King. Since I was close to my normal distance for hitting the reserve, I pre-emptively hit the Sheetz gas station across the street after my meal and fueled up. Amazingly, my Triumph which normally gets almost exactly 34 or 35 MPG had scored 43.6 MPG and I was not yet in need of a refill! I was amazed at this much improved fuel economy but I chalk it up to spending most of my time at 55-60MPH on this trip whereas I normally commute on the superslab at higher speeds than this.

I got to ride back to North Carolina down highway 501 from South Boston. I took the main roads through Roxboro and it’s awful town-wide 35MPH speed limit and then once I got into the Timberlake area I got off of the main road and started opening it up a bit more (though safely) on the back roads that I was a little more familiar with. The sun had set by now and the road was starting to get dark. After a bit of fun I made my way back towards highway 501 and took primary roads back home to Raleigh.

This was my first long-ish trip with a motorcycle and I learned that I need some things (besides a knee replacement) in order to more fully enjoy my longer rides.

• It would be easier to cover longer distances without breaks if I had highway pegs to rest my feet on and stretch my legs a little bit.
• After about 175 miles my butt really didn’t like me. A softer seat would help.
• I think my riding posture would be better if my handlebars were a little taller, a little wider, and a little further back. Nothing like ape hangers but I’ve seen some options for the Triumph that should work well.

All told, I put about 195 miles on the bike during today’s spontaneous cruise. That’s maybe a little more than I anticipated but it is encouraging and I hope to try getting out a little further next time.

visited 2 states (4%)
Create your own visited map of The United States or jurisdische veraling duits?

After all too long a wait, I got my motorcycle back today in good running order. I put about 80 miles on it locally just to make sure there were no surprises. So far, so good.

I’m thinking I’ll need to get a tank bag with a map holder and a parcel rack behind the seat to give me some more range.

My motorcycle has been at the Triumph dealership for a week and a half with some electrical issues. No spark. Turns out the Ignition Control Unit was fried. After a warranty review, Triumph America approved the warranty-covered repair and I should have the motorcycle sometime next week.

I’m going to put on a couple hundred miles or so close to home to make sure the issues are sorted out. Last time I rode it, I got 30 miles from home out on a country highway when it stalled at 65MPH. Not fun.

Once I feel warm and fuzzy that the gremlins have been exorcised I’ll venture further out.

I thought it would be fitting to post a photograph of my bike. And it struck me that all of the good photographs of my bike include pretty girls sitting on top of or in front of it, and nothing really to show the bike all by its self. I’ll have to fix that at some point.

I’m sure you can find forgiveness in your heart for only getting a part of my motorcycle while most of the frame is dominated by Lauren and her great pair of … sunglasses.

visited 1 states (2%)
Create your own visited map of The United States or another interesting project

I got my motorcycle license and my first motorcycle last year, took the MSF course, and got about 6,000 local miles under my belt. That map is looking awfully empty. I’d like to start filling that up now.

I also dabble a bit in photography and you can be sure I’ll be taking some pictures on my motorcycle journeys.

Here is an older video showing my bike shortly after I got it. I’ve done a few minor but tasteful modifications to it. After having too many cagers try to run me over I did finally subscribe to the “loud pipes save lives” philosophy and put some Emgo widemouths on it (not in the video). It’s not obnoxiously loud but people know I’m there now.