BluepoofBikes Motorcycle Adventures

Janky Elbow

I rode up to Rick Mayer Cycle in mid-April for a custom seat for the Beemer; a fun ride, but the friction zone on the clutch was too far out (even adjusted all the way in), which left my forearm and elbow a bit unhappy.

I replaced the levers with Wunderlich Vario adjustables, which helped a bit...

Stock clutch lever:

Vario lever:

But I continued to ride, and continued to aggravate the nerve, and now I have Janky Elbow.  

Janky Elbow is a distant cousin, I believe, of my old friend Angry Shoulder, except that Janky Elbow is at least predictable.  I pretty much can't pick anything up with my left hand, and forget about squeezing anything with my arm extended....y'know, like a clutch lever.

So, here's Janky Elbow currently.  

It's incredibly frustrating, to understate the obvious.

The wrist wrap and forearm strap help a bit, but I still can't do anything nuts like ride a motorcycle.  Astute readers might remember that I don't actually own a car, so I've been hemorrhaging money for the last two weeks on a rental car.   I'm also doing daily heat/ice cycles, ibuprofen, and regular chiropractic visits.

I seem to be able to play hockey without pain or inflammation (though backhands can sometimes really tweak it unexpectedly), so at least that's keeping me marginally sane.

In the meantime, I added Rox bar risers to the Beemer, which did bring the bars back farther, but I think the bars are fundamentally still too high and too wide.  

Peter gave me the suggestion to sit on his Airhawk, which actually did help my posture -- who knew I'd ever need a HIGHER seat?? So I might be heading back to Rick Mayer to add some more height back onto the custom seat (well, when I can even consider riding 250 miles, that is).  

I'm also looking into swapping narrower bars on; I like how the wide bars feel more stable in turns, but it's clearly keeping my elbows at a, well, janky angle.

So, the short story is that I'm incredibly frustrated but, hopefully, Janky Elbow is on the med and I'll be riding again soon...fingers crossed.

I swear, in my next life, I'll be averaged sized and not have ergonomic problems with every single thing I try to do.  Rarrr.

Beemers now and then

Two happy Beemers in the work parking lot.

 

Fangirl!

So, about a month ago, I was hanging out at Cal BMW waiting for the windscreen for the Beemer.  It was a weekday afternoon and the only people loitering in the shop were me and a couple who looked vaguely familiar.  Dirty BMW suits, check.  Tall blonde guy, short girl with buzzed haircut, check.  

I finally got the courage to go up to them and say, "hey, are you guys riding around the world?" "Guilty as charged!" they replied, which is how I met Simon and Lisa Thomas.

(photo from RoadRunner magazine, who's running articles from Simon and Lisa over the next few months)

For those that don't follow Round-The-World motorcyclists, Simon and Lisa have been on the road for six years now, riding through 50+ countries so far.  Their goal is to ride to the northernmost and southernmost part of every continent.

They have their own site, 2RideTheWorld.com, which is the perfect antidote to a boring Friday afternoon -- conveniently, it's Friday now! So go look!

Anyway, they were at Cal getting their Beemers serviced in anticipation of leaving the States for the Asia/Australia portion of their trip.  Lisa showed me around her F650GS and all the various crazy mods they've done to it...it sorta looks like my old thumper, if my old thumper were on steroids.  A 39-liter gas tank!! Damn.  

We talked F650GSs for a while; I was really glad to hear that she hadn't had any serious mechanical troubles with hers, despite having over 120,000 miles on the bike.  In fact, the only trouble she'd had were a couple of blown fork seals.   My theory stands that my thumper just hated me. ;)

Eventually I figured I had to let these poor people move on with their lives and I should stop following them around the shop like a twitterpated schoolgirl.  

Fortunately though, they were giving a presentation back at Cal last Friday, so Peter and I could go hang out some more.

The "90 minute" presentation would up with us being at Cal for almost 4 hours.  Their talk was awesome, the pictures and stories just fantastic -- even Peter thought it was cool.  :)  You can read their diaries here on their site -- very very very worth it.

After the talk, we bought a couple of their photo prints and had them signed.

If you don't already read RoadRunner (which is an awesome magazine anyway, btw), definitely pick up the next few issues to read some stories from the Thomas's trip.  

2009 F650GS test ride

I didn't have much to do today and I was curious about the 2008-09 parallel twin version of the F650GS, so I made an appointment at Cal BMW to take a test ride.

Pros:

• I really loved the engine.   The extra horsepower (~70 as opposed to my thumper, which has ~50) is very apparent as I could actually accelerate on the freeway and other crazy stuff like that.    
• There are next to no vibrations from the seat or footpegs and only verrrry slightly from the handlebars.  Bar end weights would get rid of the bar vibes, no question.  
• The transmission is very smooth and shifting is super duper easy.  Finding neutral is not the hunt-and-peck that I'm used to on my thumpers. 
• Handling is very good -- I didn't get to take the bike to any twisties, but I did do a few U-turns and played in a small cul-de-sac.   
• Braking is also excellent...or perhaps my standards are just low as I've been riding the XT with its drum brake. ;)  
• In non-riding news, a lot of the strange Bulgarian placement of parts seem to have been relocated. The oil goes directly down into the crankcase now (so you don't need to remove the oil cap to take off the fairing), the oil return line is not blocking the clutch cover, the front sprocket nut is accessible, etc.   

Cons:

• The engine is incredibly twitchy.  The teeeensiest input to the throttle would either kick in a bunch of torque or engine brake like mad.  I'd probably get used to this quickly, but it was really disconcerting on a 30 minute/15 mile test ride.  I would also be very wary of this off-road.
• The standard "one turn signal button per hand grip" Beemer indication configuration was clearly designed by someone with longer thumbs than I.  Canceling the turn signal required me to shift my hand on the throttle, causing bullet point #1 to appear.  It was "fun" to suddenly be lurching while just trying to cancel my blinker.
• The "low seat" is for short giants.  The bike I test-rode had the low seat on it and I was on my very tiptoes (like, the fronts of my boots sort of tiptoes).  I would definitely need the 30.4" low frame version for an extra $175. 
• Speaking of extra, the bike's MSRP is $8995, but there are apparently a lot of non-optional "options".  When I told the salesman that I didn't really need $60 white turn indicators (as opposed to the stock amber) or $250 tire pressure monitors, he said that that's what BMW ships, so that's what they sell.  Adding up all the non-optional options gives a "total suggested price" of $11,420.   

That's all off the top of my head.  It was a really fun bike to ride and, if it weren't for the engine twitchiness, I would have probably had a much longer conversation about pricing with the salesman.  As it is, though, I have to do more reading up on it and perhaps do a second test ride with the low suspension model sometime. 

Catching up

Hey, remember me? I have a blog and sometimes I even post to it?

Let's see, what's going on...

Hockey: NCWHL
I'll start with hockey since no one but me cares. ;)

The Puck Ewes had our last game last week, in which I didn't play due to a respiratory infection. Boo! But I watched the game and took a lot of photos, so that was cool.  I enjoyed the Puck Ewes this season -- it was a great team and it made my first time captaining smooth and easy (though I think I gave Jeannie a few heart attacks when I'd forget to send out the game Evites...oops).

I'm trying out for the Maroon division of NCWHL this coming weekend.  Evals are Friday night and Sunday afternoon. I'm a little nervous since I haven't been on the ice in two weeks (that respiratory infection again) but all I can do is go and have fun and do my best.  My fingers and toes are still crossed, though. ;)

Hockey: Ice Oasis
Team Danger has one more consolation game during the Stanley Keg playoffs at Ice Oasis.  It will surprise no one that we came in last for the league, but we had a lot of fun. 

I think I'll still be on Team Danger next season, along with Peter, Tony, and Steph.  I don't know who else will be on the team, since the hockey director wants to shuffle the teams up a little bit.  I still want to buy bright orange jerseys for the team but am finding it hard to justify the cost.  I might tweak some things to make that happen...orange jerseys with the old-skool Danger logo would be fantastic.

Motorcycles: BMW
Well, the good news is that the Beemer is back from Ted Porters and is running great.  The bad news is that it's developed a pinhole leak in the rear brake line, so no rear brake workee for me.  I have a replacement stainless steel brake line; the trick is getting to that damn front banjo bolt.  I hate the Bulgarians.

Motorcycles: XT225
So, not surprisingly, I'm back to commuting on the XT.  The good part about that is that I just put brand new Metzeler Saharas on, so I have buttery smooth tire happiness.

Take action against the OHV ban!

In case you hadn't heard, on August 14, 2008, Congress passed the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act of 2008 (CPSIA).  The act went into effect on February 10, 2009.  The intent of the act is to reduce the amount of lead found in kids' toys.  Sounds great, right?

Well, the problem is that the act specifically prohibits items with more than 600 parts per million by weight.  The Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) has interpreted that to include various OHV parts including engines, brakes, etc.  Because of the weight of OHV motorcycles and ATVs, they exceed 600 ppm of lead.

Thus, kids' OHV ATVs and motorcycles are being pulled from showroom floors.

WTF??

To quote the American Motorcyclist Association, "In order to assure continued availability and access to youth OHVs, the Motorcycle Industry Council (MIC) and Specialty Vehicle Industry Association (SVIA) submitted petitions to the CPSC asking that certain vehicles be excluded from the final rule governing the law. "

Please write to your senators and representatives about this issue, asking them to approve the petition to exclude OHV motorcycles and ATVs from this ban.

The AMA has already filled out a letter for you at:

http://capwiz.com/amacycle/issues/alert/?alertid=12661926

It takes 10 seconds to fill out the form and send it off.  Printing it out and physically mailing it is likely most effective, but even email helps.

Best kind of cross-country ride report

I found this on ADVrider.com and had to share it.

Phil's Journal: I've Seen Everything is the journal of Phil Gooding, a 20-year-old who rode his Indian Scout cross-country in 1924.  

Motored to the Pacific is the accompanying article about the ride, published in December 1924 by the Baltimore Trolley Tropics (the company newsletter for the Baltimore Transit Company, where Mr. Gooding worked).

Kevin Jolly, Mr Gooding's granddaughter's husband, put together this fantastic website to showcase the cross-country ride.  It's definitely worth a read.

2009 starting mileage

Another year, another "starting mileage" post!

Beemer:

XT (the white one):

The Beemer started 2008 with 16,119 miles, meaning that I rode 17,949 miles on it in the last calendar year.  Not bad! 

The 2008 starting mileage for the XT was for the black XT, which I pretty much stopped riding once the white XT arrived back from Seattle.  The white XT did about 3000 miles in '08, but not all of that was me (Colleen and friends rode it in Seattle, too).

So, I estimate that I probably did just about 20k miles in 2008.  Can't complain about that.

Hope everyone had a great New Year's -- welcome to 2009!

Critters of 2008

OK, I'm having too much fun with this "....of 2008" theme.   Here are some of my best critter pics of '08, all taken on rides, of course.

Lots of these guys where we live:

Coyote near Mammoth, CA:

Of course, there were tons of friends on the cross-country trip. 

Javelina along Texas Hwy 116:

Lake Fausse Point State Park, LA:

Lizard at Homestead, Florida's Coral Castle:

Prairie dogs in southern MN:

Lots of friends in South Dakota:

 

Wild horses in WY:

No ride to NV is complete without Mormon Crickets:

I have a tendency to take photos of kitties.  We met this fierce hunter on our last day of the summer road trip:

This one was in Fricot City, CA:

Roads of 2008

Someone posted this over at Sport-Touring.net and I liked it so much that I'm stealing it. ;)  So, without further ado, here are my favorite road pictures of 2008.

March:  NF-56 near Seattle, WA

April: Santa Rosa Creek Road, CA

May: Apache Trail, AZ

June: Roger's Canyon Road, WY

 

July: Our new street!

August:  Dirt road by our new house

September: A forest road I was happily lost on near Mammoth Lakes, CA

October: Fricot City Road, CA

November: Highland Springs Road, CA