sorry - this is long...
I've been sitting on it since july 15.
T-boned a Prius when the nitwit tourist at the wheel decided to make a fast and completely illegal U-turn from the parking strip along the side of a divided 4-lane highway that had TWO double yellow lines in the middle - implying a solid "island" that should never be crossed. No lights, no blinkers.. she just popped out and was perpendicular to me and her front wheels were on the first of those double yellows when I hit her. She was about in the middle of a long line of head to tail parked cars (maybe 30 in total?) on the northbound side of PCH just past Topanga Canyon Blvd. I was northbound en route to Malibu. It was 7pm, still bright out just a couple mins past sunset and there was really light traffic. I was in the #1 lane -- and she just popped out maybe 10-15 yards in front of me - wheel hard cranked left instantly perpendicular entering my lane. I got on the brakes.. I SAW her see me, I perceived her slowing, thinking "she's gonna brake" so I recall trying to steer left and into the median, but she didn't stop, so now my tires are on the damn strip, and I prob had only a few feet left and recall trying to change direction to get the bike aimed behind her. I almost made it... i could see past the back of the car and nearly slipped behind her and would have if she had kept going, but THEN she hits the brakes, and I hit her just behind the left rear tire. All this happened in a very long second or two - like BRAKES-HORN/lean left/more brakes/oh-#$%*-LOOK-right-go-right/wham/launch/flip/bang.
She later admitted to me and the cops that she was pressing hard on the throttle and cranking the wheel fully left because the gap she saw between north and southbound traffic was closing quickly and she wanted to "make the turn"...the traffic was closing a lot quicker than she estimated, obviously. I was only a few car-lengths ahead of the vehicles behind me - as we had all just been waiting at the redlight at Topanga and I pulled ahead of them when it went green, I think I had just snicked up to third - was in no rush - and hadn't even reached the speed limit when it happened, so I was prob still doing 30-ish at the point of contact. Played it over in my head countless times already...
I've been at this since 1974... I don't know how many 100k miles I've ridden but it's a few at least... and this is the first time this ever happened. If you were setting it up a s a stunt for a movie where you wanted viewers to believe there was no way any rider could avoid hitting the car that intentionally pulled out to cause the accident, this would be how you would time it. Maybe a modern bike with bigger contact patch, ABS, 4-pot Brembos, better forks, stickier radials etc coulda been stopped sooner? I dunno. Maybe brighter dual headlights instead of the single h4 bulb would have caught her eye and gotten her to not do this? I dunno...
Destroyed the front end of my bike (pix below) - it's the one that was placed on the cover of the sohc4 2015 calendar (#2)... Except that I had since added dual front disks and a different exhaust pipe treatment and a better seat cover and a few other finicky fun things...
I was able to stand up right after the crash, flip up my helmet, limp over to the shocked looking middle-aged woman at the wheel of the Prius and yell so loud (with what I am sure was a nasty diatribe of epithets) through the window at her, that I could see her husband in the passenger seat start to cry. She was from Holland... was very apologetic and in shock herself. Admitted full guilt/responsibility. CHP report pinned it 100% on her for violating a couple CVC statutes and causing the accident... and the good news is she took out the max available liability insurance from budget rentacar (supposedly -- am still waiting for conf on that), so my med and bike and all will be covered. And yeah, I got a lawyer to make sure I wasn't gonna get screwed (he happens to be a friend despite his lawyer-ness because he is also avid motorcyclist who is part of a group of guys I meet up with and ride with once a month or so on Sunday mornings. I hope none of you ever need this, but if you do, message me and I'll pass on his info. This is the kind of situation where you want at least one of the sharks in the water to be on your side.
I've been offline recuperating. Mostly soft tissue stuff - looks like I am gonna need knee surgery on at least one of em and maybe a wrist thing too. Time will tell. The eyewitness said he was "sure" I was launched 20 feet high in the air. I know I landed at least a car length past the sideways Prius...On my hip, which when I stood up I thought was busted but then the joint seemed ok so I thought it was pelvis. But (and here's a tip) lots of bicycling and a fair amount of ice cream -induced assfat helped cushion the blow sufficiently that it's "just" a gigantic hideous hematoma/bone bruise that still hurts all the time (accident was nearly a month ago). Ha.
Anyway, I'll heal, but regarding the bike- I am now in a quandary... to rebuild this bike or to sell of the good parts (and there are many). If you have a couple mins... look this over and tell me, what would YOU do?
THIS frame (that had been measured and straightened, blasted and powdercoated) is now garbage - the vin is now an insurance company triggered salvage title, so it's worthless, as are the trees and snapped fork tubes. The tank that i meticulously smoothed after removing the logo brackets, lined with caswells (still the best imho) and multicoat painted with a copper/rootbeer color and 6 semigloss clear layers ... (get the picture?) is garbage now -- there's huge hole on the left side of it - almost able to put my fist through it). Also gone is the front brake switch, one of the three steel slingshot cycles brake lines (banjo ripped out), the handlebars, the left side bar switch (signals/horn/perch that i got from Yamiya in Japan), the mirrors, the headlight bucket, bezel/rim that i had powdercoated, grill and bulb. Wrecked also is the aftermarket speedo (partsnmore $60), alloy headlight brackets, front and rear LED turn signals, grips. The front rim is gouged-out and bent (trash), prob some of the buchanan's stainless front spokes need replacing, It needs side covers, left rider peg, left cyl head end cap, stator cover.
The 4-1 Carpy-sourced Yosh-style exhaust maybe could be repaired - only one downtube is dented in, so maybe I can pull and patch-weld?
Partially ok: The custom upholstery on the seat needs a re-do ($100-150) but the stock pan onto which my homemade aluminum cowl is bonded, are fine). Lower fork tubes with machined bosses on the right side for the extra caliper set up seem ok, as do the powdercoated axle clamps and related hardware.
What is still ok (prob) : The rebuilt perfect-functioning carbs matched to this engine (605 kit with MLS gasket, ported properly, fresh seals everywhere and valve guides and springs and clutch pack etc etc... I overdid it.... but i got lots o power, well over 40mpg consistently and no oil leaks). The 520 chain conversion sprockets and chain, The entire rear wheel/hub/tire/fender/taillight etc and the swingarm (with brass bushings) and stands are as new. The entire harness - already tested and working perfectly with headlight and starter switch relays, Hondamans ignitor box and related goodies, the tach and custom gauge bracket/dash panel I machined from aluminum with microLED idiot lights, It's possible the polished lower fork legs are ok. The rotors and dual caliper set seem to be fine, but I need to double check true rotational flatness before being certain. The powdercoated front hub with allballz bearings appears ok, but I need to disassemble and check to be sure none of the spokes have gored out their purchases etc. The throttle and right handlebar switch are as new. the throttle, clutch, tach and speedo cables are fine. The shorai batt is fine too.
So what i could do is sell off all that good stuff... and then sell the rest for scrap.
OR
find the parts i need, piecemeal here and fleabay, with a clean frame and register that as a new bike for me...
OR
find a cheapish donorcycle that has the parts I need (and prob some others), strip it, and just re-create my exact bike per the previous template I created *and sell off the parts I don't need to help cover the services I will need and don't do myself -- powdercoating, paint, upholstery.
It's as much an economics issue as a time/energy/emotional issue. This bike is a little bit special, to me anyway. It made the cover of the 2015 sohc calendar and was featured on a tv series (season long storyline -- character on a tv drama got a beater 550 to use as part of his undercover work, and other characters had it customized/fixed/restored as a "gift." I provided the before and after bikes for this show -- my brown beauty here was the "after" and all the characters did appropriate big happy reactions to it when it was unveiled. :-) So there is some nice "provenance" here, but every time I walk out into the garage the anger and nausea kind of well up inside me, so (as much as my injured hands/wrists will allow), I gotta get started doing something soon.
