Topic: 24 Rides in 2024, Frank's New Years resolution that we can all enjoy.

[RAFster122s]

Two of ya with white wings, are they the same year and equipped similarly?

[Kevin D]

Ride #32  76 miles

I made it out today for a 76 miler, and glad that I did as the day was gorgeous and the colors are peaking.
I didn’t have to go very far to find color. The sledding hill on Hines Drive AKA Cass Benton park is popular with  hikers, disc golfers, sledders, cross-country runners, and leaf peepers especially. Just beyond is an always nice 1/4 mile tree tunnel, usually green except for this time of year when it is yellow. This is the north end of Hines Drive, a 14 mile winding road through the western suburbs and a favorite of motorcyclists.
 The horse track conversion project is underway, and I was distracted from my color tour for a bit, and I spotted the log cabin jacked up on cribbing and presumably near its final resting place, at the southeast corner of the development, and here’s a photo of the first paved street.
 A little further on and I had to detour around this hot car, an oldie conversion van.
It was smoking as I approached, then the driver bailed out, and didn’t look back, I detoured around the block, did not drive next to the van as others did. The van was consumed by flames before the first police car arrived and blocked the road. I don’t know where the fire station is in Northville, they weren’t lickety-split on site and I didn’t want to be there if the tank popped so I beat it down the road and didn’t hear any boom behind me.
 The colorful countryside begins just west of Northville. There is some residential, manor/estate homes giving way to the horse farms. At the end of Seven Mile there were just a few boats in the water and the marina was totally empty. I motored on to Dexter, enjoying the day, the sun, the color, the ride. I have been housebound out of commission for a week, losing sleep with a nasty cough and today was my breakout day. Central Street in Dexter is lined with colorful maples and that was my last photo and last stop for the day. Maybe I’ll try again tomorrow.

[lash]

Two of ya with white wings, are they the same year and equipped similarly?

All three wings are 2018 and have different equipment. Mine was the  only one purchased new but we all have fairly similar farkles. The white ones are just under 100,000 km each and mine is at 125,000.
I would be around 200,000 but I have all my other bikes I ride too. My blue 69 cb750 seems to be getting the miles this year as its closest to the door and is running great!

[BenelliSEI]

#31 today and the ride was fantastic. Leaves are really starting to come down, but the roads were dry and blown clear. Gary’s ‘75 wing reminded him why he will never sell it and the old K3 performed flawlessly. I’d replaced the RHS bar switch and bypassed the starter motor safety switch after the bike displayed some really weird electrical behaviour and it’s all back to normal. I used the style of switch with ON/OFF for the lights and must have got it all right. The K3 is the bike that I bought for the first Ganaraska 250 Moto Giro almost 15 years ago. Darn thing just keeps on running. It has a bit of clutch judder that I assume is the snubbers in the clutch basket. It’s never been apart and not likely to be anytime soon.

Old photo because Gary forgot his phone and I still don’t have one. Here’s hoping for a few more days like today! Life is GOOD!

[PeWe]

Still very green, John!
Fall with orange, golden and red leaves has not arrived in Canada yet?

[lash]

148 mi. for #117 today. Rode around trying to find some 20/50 oil but no luck so I stopped for a burger at Wendy’s. Best of the fast food stops around here.

[BenelliSEI]

Still very green, John!
Fall with orange, golden and red leaves has not arrived in Canada yet?

We didn’t have a camera or phone! Old photo.

[BenelliSEI]

148 mi. for #117 today. Rode around trying to find some 20/50 oil but no luck so I stopped for a burger at Wendy’s. Best of the fast food stops around here.

Is that the Gold body set I swapped for red? That bike looks awesome!!

[lash]

That’s it! I think it’s needing a carb sync but it’s too late in the year to get that ambitious…

[BenelliSEI]

That’s it! I think it’s needing a carb sync but it’s too late in the year to get that ambitious…

I still have a photo of it. If I ever buy a Yamiya body kit it will be that gold for my K1.

[PeWe]

I could have all their colors. Many tank, cover sets to use like clothes

[willbird]

Saturday 11-19-2024, #77 129 miles. Rode to Roche de Boeuf near Waterville, OH and then on into Maumee, OH.
 Some time in the near future they will blow up this old Inter Urban bridge and it will be just a memory.


On a somber note as happens too frequently I found out that an old friend had passed away in 2019, this is the house I presume he grew up in and then he lived there after his parents passed, no family left to even do probate on the property by the look of the records on the County Auditor pages. This guy was an accomplished gunsmith and I knew his phone number from memory, referred a friend to him and he said "the number is disconnected".





Sunday 11-20-2024, #78, 138 miles. Went East to Delta, OH, North up into MI and and then back West in MI, dropped back into Ohio near Edon, OH. Lots of Amish fields full of ripe pumpkins, acres and acres of them.

[BenelliSEI]

Speaking of “ripe pumpkins” it seems this is a good year for them, here in Southern Ontario. They are for sale at the end of almost every farm driveway and the planted fields seem to be bursting at the seams with huge amounts of produce!

[Kevin D]

Here you go John.
Hope you like it.
 
I removed the power lines from the original photo.
That mod didn’t quite make it into the collection.
Getting all the motorcycles into the collection can be a challenge.
Hope I haven’t missed anything important.
I’m limited to 9 photos in a collection.

[BenelliSEI]

Here you go John.
Hope you like it.
 
I removed the power lines from the original photo.
That mod didn’t quite make it into the collection.
Getting all the motorcycles into the collection can be a challenge.
Hope I haven’t missed anything important.
I’m limited to 9 photos in a collection.

Kevin…. Looks great. Thanks! J.

[lash]

No pics from yesterday but 125 km for #118. Rode to the Guelph Air Park for breakfast with an old flying buddy. Great catching up with him after a couple of years. Really trying to get to 124 rides before it snows!

[Alan F.]

Ok, I guess ride #8.
This afternoon 55.6 miles of twisty backroads in southern New Hampshire.

First ride with the 21" front wheel I built for it earlier this year, no ABS issues at all. It rides like it was designed to have a 21.

[willbird]

That’s it! I think it’s needing a carb sync but it’s too late in the year to get that ambitious…

I still have a photo of it. If I ever buy a Yamiya body kit it will be that gold for my K1.

If that color went to 1972 it is the color my CB750K2 was OEM. Somebody stole the tank and side covers off that bike in the 70's.

[budman]

Ride #53, 283 miles.

I changed the oil in the Scout this week.  Was supposed to do the air filter, but Revzilla is taking their sweet time getting the new one to me.  Had three online chats with them this week.  It should be here Monday.

I gave the Scout a wash before I put it on the lift, so while everything was accessible it got a good detailing and inspection.  Didn't need anything else except for some air in the tires and some leather conditioner on the saddlebags, making them look better than brand new.  I backed it out of the shop at sunrise this morning and it looked so good in my dirt driveway I had to take a pic.

I took off at 8am, heading north to O. H. Ivie Lake.  First stop was in Eden for some gas, coffee and snacks.  It was cool this morning, bordering on cold.  I should have worn a jacket, but opted for multiple layers instead as I knew it was going to get warm later on.  I rode through Paint Rock, TX again.  Stopped on the other side of the courthouse for another photo it and spotted a coffee shop across the street.  I think next time I ride that way I'll plan to stop there instead of partaking in the convenience store coffee I had this morning (blek).  Most of the time I usually make my own coffee for the road.

A few miles north of Paint Rock I turned east to the lake.  It's a dammed-up section of the Colorado River, which most of the lakes in Texas seem to be.  Very pretty country up that way.  Sparsely populated.  Stopped for a few pics including the dam, and then kept rolling.  I didn't get any good pics of the lake.  I didn't get close enough.

Went through a couple of near ghost towns, heading back south.  I guess they're technically not ghost towns due to the active post offices.  Lots of abandoned homes and buildings, slowing being swallowed up.

Next stop was the Brady Creek Reservoir.  They have a road on top of the dam so I checked it out from both sides.  Stopped at the park there and had my snacks.  It hasn't rained in a couple of months, which it pretty typical for this time of the year in Central Texas.  The water levels in these lakes and reservoirs is pretty low.  Lots of dried-up creeks.  I hit Brady for a tank of gas and then zig-zagged my way home.

Really beautiful day and a fun ride, seeing some new stuff.

[ofreen]

Very nice.

[Kevin D]

Nice driveway Bud. I had to look at the boat ramp for a bit, I had visions of launching bicycles into the drink.


Alan, c’mon pal, you have a ways to go but you can still get in.
I laced a 21” wheel for my dirtbike many moons past.
Do you go off-road?

[Terry in Australia]

Well I'm back again, and God knows I'm dragging the chain here, with only a couple of months until the end of the year I only did ride #29 today. I've been busy doing non-motorcycle stuff on my weekends of late, but today I took a break from fixing cars and fired up the K0. The throttle assembly on the bike is missing the throttle lock screw and spring, so while I'm waiting for the NOS assembly to arrive from Germany, I spent 5 bucks for an M5 x 30mm "Wing bolt" and a spring that Spotty gave me, and used it today to warm the bike up.

K0 Sunday 27 October 2024 3 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

I rode in almost 80 degree weather, and I have to say that riding in warm (not hot) weather is much more pleasant than cold. I found many new potholes on the backroads I chose to ride today (Freeway inbound was crawling, must have been a crash, so I avoided it on the return trip) and I'd cranked up the spring preload on the OEM rear shocks, which work much better than the Ebay cheapies I had on it, but I still managed to jar my back a lot. There's no real fix for it but to try to avoid them when I see them, if I can. Regardless, the old red beast was running like a Timex watch and I'm still surprised that the Yamiya pipes are so loud, it actually is louder now than when I had the Delkevic 4 into 1 on it, but it does sound good. I stopped for fuel and worked out that I'm getting around 40 MPG (US gallons) which is pretty good.

K0 Sunday 27 October 2024 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr

Anyway, I did around 80-odd miles before deciding that my back was sore enough, and parked the bike in the storage unit, and drove to the pub for a couple of cold snacks, and won 300 bucks on a poker machine. All in all, a great day. Hopefully next weekend I'll get ride #30 on the books.

K0 Sunday 27 October 2024 2 by Terry Prendergast, on Flickr   

[newday777]

Terry the K0 is looking great. Good to hear you are getting back to warm riding, I had my K5 out yesterday afternoon for only 25 miles, it warmed up to @ 60° f so it wasn't too bad but was 4pm when I arrived home and it was cooling down already and the sun was in the long shadow arch so I didn't stay out any longer so I wouldn't come across any of the big road rats that like to move about in the late fall afternoons with the hint happening now. I won't get many more rides in before the white stuff sneaks in.....so my 28 rides may get 1 or 2 more at best hopes 🤔

[Alan F.]

Alan, c’mon pal, you have a ways to go but you can still get in.
I laced a 21” wheel for my dirtbike many moons past.
Do you go offload?

Thanks! This was the first ride out with that wheel so I wanted to go easy just in case, plus forks are still stock with who knows what oil and mismatched levels lurking inside.

I did find a nice dirt parking lot where I rode a few 75 foot circles in each direction at probably 25 mph just to see how the front end behaved. Grip was solid and encouraged confidence, as I left the area I twisted the throttle a bit and the rear roosted and fishtailed just a little bit for maybe 5 feet, it felt good and probably looked really cool.

I took this coming Tuesday and Wednesday off to ride, Tuesday will be low 60°s F and Wednesday will be low 70s so they'll be good. I've found a couple of areas I want to check out, New Hampshire class 6 dirt roads unmaintained and possibly impassable in parts, I've seen videos of 4x4 drivers crawling through the hard parts, could be fun to at least have a look. The easy parts should amount to a mile or three of dirt, gravel or who knows what on each end of the impassable area.

Today I'll drop my fork tubes flush with the top triple, 9mm above is factory spec so I'll put that where it does the most good. I'm always on call so starting what I can't finish can get frustrating, convincing myself to go riding isn't easy sometimes but I'm working on it.

[Kevin D]

Terry, good to see you riding not wrenching, and on a gorgeous red K0. I’m sure Frank would approve, don’t you think so?
There’s 10 riders in the barn with 24 rides or more, some a LOT more, Ofreen is getting close, Kelly too.
My own season is winding down, I hope to get a few bonus rides.
Your season should be taking off, you have a chance to double up.
I’m sending fair skies, open roads, smooth asphalt.