Why Not?

All Rights Reserved © 2008 Thomas W. Day

"I have attention deficit disorder. Can I ride a motorcycle?"

Sure, why not.

"Will I be safe in freeway traffic?"

Probably not. I expect you'll get killed or maimed in your first week in traffic.

"That's not fair"

You have attention deficit disorder. Motorcycling is a high concentration activity. Get used to it. Life is like that. In fact, nature intended life to be only for the fit.

"I have dyslexia, can I ride a motorcycle?"

"I weigh 400 pounds and can barely lift a coffee cup with out experiencing chest pains, can I ride a motorcycle?"

"I am blind in one eye and can't see out of the other, can I ride a motorcycle?"

"My little (22 year old) boy is dumb as a post, irresponsible, and couldn't find his own nose with a 1x12, should I buy him a motorcycle?"

Sure, why not? All of you should take out a second mortgage and buy the biggest, ugliest hippobike you can find. Slap some loud pipes on it, for safety's sake, and slip that big monster into heavy traffic. Do your bit to solve overpopulation. Why not?

We live in a victim-based, entitlement-sheltered, litigious culture where everyone is not only "created equal" but where many believe the legal system can overrule the laws of physics and common sense. My home state once attempted to legislate pi to 3.00 (actually, 3 without decimal places to keep the concept simple), for convenience and orderly-ness sake. Pi, however, remained its unruly self and the universe remained inconveniently hostile to simple minds. The universe is a really big place and, in the overall scheme of it, we're insignificant as a planet, of no notable consequence as a species, and totally non-existent as motorcyclists. We can make all the dumbass laws we want without making the slightest dent in the effects of gravity, velocity, mass, acceleration and deceleration, centripetal forces, entropy, or mortality.

Outside of being a tiny part of a really big picture, the problem with a motorcycle is that, regardless of our distaste for the inconvenience, a motorcycle will remain a two-wheeled vehicle with minimal safety features and a high skill requirement. You can be dyslexic, ADD-afflicted, uncoordinated, physically incapacitated, and a total moron and public transportation can, probably, still help you to your intended destination. At the least, a cage will surround you in a shock-absorbent, crash enclosure that will probably shield you from your inabilities and indiscretions. A motorcycle will spit you off, fling you into fast moving traffic, and--if you time it carefully--add insult to injury by landing on top of you after other obstacles have had their way with your mangled body.

Even if you are in the prime of life, at the peak of human capacity and a nuclear-physicist-brain-surgery-performing-rocket-scientist, a motorcycle, Murphy, and Mother Nature can still find a way to maim or annihilate you. If astronaut John Glenn can practically kill himself stepping out of a shower, zipping down the highway on two wheels at 100 feet-per-second has to be pushing the limits of reasonable activities. Of course, that also applies to flying an airplane, hang gliding, sky and scuba diving, bicycling, playing most sports, running, climbing or descending stairs, jumping rope, and talking about religion, love, or politics in public.

Many high risk activities have restrictive entry requirements. To rent or fill scuba tanks, for example, you have to successfully complete accredited scuba diving training. Before you're allowed to jump out of an airplane, you have to suffer through hours of closely monitored instruction. Motorcycling is less carefully controlled. Like getting a driver's license, the state's licensing program is designed to hand out certifications in Cracker Jack boxes. If you can't meet the current requirements for getting a motorcycle license, you might not be safe outside of a padded room.

Regardless of the state's low standards of acceptance, we humans ought to exercise a little uncommon sense. If your legs are broken, don't run marathons. If you're blind, don't waste your money on computer aided design college classes. If you can't sing, don't expect Simon Whatshisface to say nice things about your voice. If you aren't physically and mentally able to deal with the demands of managing a motorcycle in heavy traffic, if you can't control your panic reactions, if you don't have the self-discipline to constantly work on your riding skills, stay away from motorcycles. Yes, you can "ride" all of the motorcycle video games you like, but don't touch real iron. You'll create even more enemies for an otherwise perfectly useful mode of transportation. You'll add to our already miserable statistics. You'll get killed. We'll end up with more moronic laws, more employment for useless lawyers, and you'll still be dead.

I've changed my mind. No, you can't ride a motorcycle.

Link to GabeUnchained

A totally cool look at the history of Buell Motorcycles. Keep an eye out for Kevin Cameron prowling the background. Many of your motorcycle journalist heroes were present for the Buell tour, which is probably a nostalgic moment for them today.

They're Back!

A blast from the 1970's past is back, Ossa is making trials bikes again. Everything on the site is in Spanish, so with the assistance of Babblefish, here's the word:

Certainly, project OSSA is very ambitious. That at time of crisis it leaves a new motorcycle with some concepts totally opposed to the habitual thing is a as dangerous adventure as brave. Those of Ossa have secured their intention with a revolutionary motorcycle.

The new TR280i has appeared today in the Hall Milán.El new equipment of OSSA Factory has chosen the Hall the Motorcycle of Milan (EICMA) to present/display its new and revolutionary TR 280i. It already was in this Hall, in 1965, where OSSA internationally presented/displayed the prototype on which first motorcycle of trial based his: a multipurpose denominated model Scrambler. Today, OSSA Factory returns to choose Milan to present/display the prototype of a motorcycle that it tries to contribute a blowing of fresh air to the sector. The new TR 280i raises an innovating and exclusive concept, a trial motorcycle that the spirit has inherited who characterized the past in the mark of the clover. After near two years of work, the TR 280i is a motorcycle technologically very outpost. With a motor of 2T with electronic injection, it breaks the established schemes and one appears like a quality alternative that, without a doubt, will conquer the fans.

This one is the first passage towards a future in which other projects and other modalities will conform the presence of OSSA Factory in the panorama of the industry international motorcyclist. The Renaissance of OSSA has been possible thanks to the effort of an equipment led by Jordi Cuxart, President of OSSA Factory, patron and defender of the project; Joan Gurt, Chief of a main directorate and impelling of the same; Alexander Laplaza, Financial Director and also patron, and by Joan Rome, Director of the Division of Motor and the person who has been able to reunite them thanks to an extraordinary vision of future. Josep Serra “Xiu” is the engineer and the soul of the new TR 280i, Director of the project and designer of the prototype. In his curriculum he emphasizes his Gas work Gas like person in charge of the development of an innovator and light motor of trial and its collaborations, through Xiu Research and Development SL. in different projects with Rieju, Dunax, Scorpa or in the Tramontana, an exclusive sport automobile of high benefits.

Marc Colomer, Champion of the World of trial in 1996 and five times Champion of Spain, is the one in charge to develop to the new TR 280i. “Very I am deluded with this project because I create firmly in its possibilities. We know that we have left work much ahead but I trust the equipment of OSSA Factory totally. We have already begun to work in some sections of the new TR 280i and the results are hopeful” has declared Colomer. Marc Colomer perfectly knows the capacity Josep Serra “Xiu” then both worked together in Gas Gas.

THE MOTORCYCLE OSSA has developed a motorcycle of trial with a new very innovating concept. Basically one has worked in the redistribution of the different elements of the motorcycle of logical form concerning the distribution of weights and other conditioners like the temperature of work of some from his components. Among others aspects the filter house in a very high position has been placed and readily accessible. Elements like the fuel tank, the box of the filter of the air or the radiator have been positioned thinking about the needs of a trial motorcycle. And one has become of rational form, with common sense and a clear objective: that new OSSA TR 280i is a reference within this specialty as were it at the time, the first SEA - Mike Andrews Replica of year 1972.

“The filter of the air in the low part of a motorcycle of trial and a high or located fuel tank next to the escape is concepts that from our point of view do not have logic” indicates Xiu responsible for the project. For this reason, the OSSA engineers considered new OSSA TR 280i placing the different elements from a motorcycle of trial on the table and with a folio in target they designed, them and they redistributed based on its needs.

THE MOTOR The fact that the new TR 280i incorporates a system of electronic injection it has allowed his engineers to redistribute different elements without being in favor conditional of the position of the classic carburetor. “Sometimes the injection system has been placed in the same space in which it was the carburetor, with the fuel tank in the high part of the motorcycle, without considering the option to look for a new positioning. OSSA Factory has let start off to me of zero and this one has been a determining aspect at the time of initiating this project” points Xiu. The situation and ideal configuration of different elements have given like result a very small motor with the inclined cylinder backwards, the intention to be able to locate in the high part of the TR 280i the system of injection and the filter house. The same logic that other manufacturers apply in specialties like cross or enduro, in OSSA considers that it is perfectly valid for a specialty like the trial. The new motor, of 2T, is very compact, with the case of a single piece. The change is extracted straight from lateral and the crank by the opposite side. Considering that the case for of chassis, for the being has been leaving resistant from the set, has been able to make a block compact. Of this form the possibility is simplified of acceding to the change relations. Another important aspect is that the maintenance is economic since to manipulate the propellent is extremely simple. A conventional motor as far as geometries can be considered or thermodynamics but has obtained an extremely compact set like concept. It is of the smallest motors of the moment.

The fuel tank of three liters of capacity has been placed in the place where conventionally the trial motorcycles mount the radiator to improve the distribution of weights. The equipment of OSSA Factory considers that the more light it is a trial motorcycle, the more necessary turns out to have the advanced center of gravity.

When placing the radiator behind the deposit and the filter house, is avoided something so habitual in the specialty of trial because the radiator is covered with mud, with the consequent problems that entail the fact that the motor cannot work to the appropriate temperature. A motorcycle without movement (stopped) has to have the capacity to dissipate the heat of the motor and to mount a electroventilador like in the TR 280i. Therefore, although in a motorcycle of another specialty it would be necessary to apply fresh air canalizations, in a motorcycle of trial no. Since the own fuel tank protects the radiator, the new TR 280i can work to a constant temperature, without being conditional to the possible dirt of the radiator.

On the other hand, to invest the cylinder has allowed to practically mount the admission in vertical after the fuel tank, and so the air intake through filter is located more in one of the elevated points of the motorcycle. Therefore, the watertightness of the filter will be superior and the access to the own filter, very simple through a cover. In the interior, under this same cover, some elements of the injection system will be placed. In this location the components will be affected neither by the temperature of the own motor, nor by the humidity. In the distribution of the elements of the motorcycle one has considered very the temperature to which will work each of them. When having the inclined cylinder and mounting the escape backwards, from the back monoshock absorber can be defined the escape, whose volume is superior to the one of a conventional motorcycle.

CHASSIS Made in aluminum and steel to chromium conditional molybdenum and to the design of the motor, the fuel tank has gotten up in the front part of the motorcycle having formed resistant part of the set. In the zones where habitually in the chromium chassis molybdenum there is many welds and therefore weight, forged aluminum pieces have mounted. The pipe of direction, the treated aluminum deposit, the estriberas and the support of the rods are also in forged aluminum. The rest is of steel to chromium molybdenum, with a very simple and welded structure in TIG.

The suspensions have been developed jointly with Öhlins (back) and Marzocchi (front). The back suspension mounts an innovating system of rods that is prote'ge' very and integrated and it is united directly to the forged piece of the chassis. System TTX of Öhlins to the specialty of the trial has been adopted, a system by which the hydraulic valves of the piston and settings have been placed in the outside. This technology already has been used in motocross contributing to many advantages concerning settings as far as simplicity and accessibility. The front suspension is an inverted bracket Marzocchi, a type of suspension that for many years that it was not applied in the specialty of the trial. But unlike other experiences in which a suspension of cross or enduro has adapted, in the TR 280i and close collaboration with Marzocchi, has designed exclusive an inverted bracket for the specialty with aluminum bars.

OSSA Factory enters with own technology the specialty of the Trial and it does with a human equipment with experience and the competitive spirit who made prevail to the mark of the clover. The components of the new motor will be finished in the month of December and the completed motorcycle will begin to try in January. Its production is predicted for the month of 2010 July.

A Little Geometry Lesson

Observed trials has always been the artistic side of competitive motorcycling. Tonui Bou's workout on this odd collection of concrete forms and natural rock seems to defy gravity, traction, and common sense. However, it is always artistic and entertaining.

The coolest thing about the video is that many of Bou's stunts are rerun in slomo in the 2nd half of the show, which doesn't explain how he does them but it does give you a great look at how he shifts his weight to maintain balance and traction and momentum.

Click on the picture to find the link.

Thanks Martin!

Stupid Motos for Stupid Times

Hardly's new ad campaign spouts brilliant prose like:

• "It's a free country, but have you felt like that lately?"
• "There's a reason they call if revolutions per minute."
• "Freedom ain't quiet. Raise your voice at H-D.com/freecountry."

At H-D.com/freecountry you can read brilliant and highway-friendly comments like,

• "Quit staring and just get out of the way."
• "Hello may fat lady may moon light in the dark I see you your sparks in may soul lov . . . you borm may live in hell of kisses."
• "If it don't rumble like a Harley it probably ain't a Harley. . . "
• "There's nothing like the rumble of a Harley beneath you and the peacefulness of the open road."
• "I m free coutry beatutifull."
• "Harley Davidson. Loud and Proud."

For a change, the above spelling errors and crazed grammar are not mine. I just wrote 'em as I read 'em. There are hundreds of similar and much crazier sentiments on the site. I'm not sure what Harley was intending, but what they provided was a boatload of justification for the general feeling that Harley owners are less-than-brilliant and somewhat unstable.

Buell's last ad was particularly sad and, unintentionally, informative: "Many people were happy Buell had a stellar AMA season. Then again, many poeple were disturbed by it." Apparently, some of the disturbed were the Harley executives who couldn't figure out how to market a motorcycle after years of selling life-style.

Buell, of course, is dead. Harley dumped the Troy, WI division in mid-November. On their way out, Buell's marketing department left an interesting mark on motorcycle etiquite with their "It’s ok not to wave back" ad from the company's 2009 October magazine campaign. Lots of motorcyclists took issue with the knee-dragging street rider who is too occupied with dangerously pretending to be a racer to acknowledge a fellow rider. To me, that raised hand might be a warning rather than a wave. As in, "Slow down, douchebag. The road is about to surprise your squidly dumb ass." The non-Buell rider is obviously armored up and at least as capable as the wannabe road racer.

I can't say I'm a 100%-waver. I often wave or nod my helmet at other riders. I usually ignore parades of motorcylces. I'm too busy trying to figure out where they are going so I can go somewhere else. I probably wouldn't wave much when I'm winding my way through two-lane Rocky Mountain roads or wrestling the V-Strom through deep gravel. Some places, motorcycles are common enough that waving gets out of hand. In Minnesota, that's rarely a problem. For me, it's a reflex more than some kind of social comment or statement of solidarity. When I started riding, I saw another bike on the road or trail about once every zillion miles. So, it just felt natural to acknowledge the existence of another nut on a motorcycle. I've been doing that for so long I don't even think about it at this ripe old age. Some motorcyclists are so far outside of the group I'd consider to be among my peers, such as the packs of gangster-posing, loud pipe, traffic-jamming parades or Buell's knee-dragging example, that it doesn't occur to me to bother waving. Folks who are risking my life or rights don't engender a feeling of solidarity.

Marketing is all about coming up with a glib one-liner that convinces the sheeple to part with their money. Sometimes glib and irresponsible are closely coupled. These days, I really miss Honda's old "You meet the nicest people on a Honda" tactic. I can't help but wonder if the boom in ridership that US motorcycling experienced during the 70's wasn't in some part assisted by the crazy idea that normal people might ride a motorcycle? In fact, a whole lot of very normal people got into motorcycling at that time and many of them are just now approaching the time in their lives where their physical abilities aren't up to the task. When those folks leave motorcycles for motorized wheelchairs, who is going to take their place?

If the industry is lucky, the kids on Suzuki's V-Strom, Kawasaki's Versys, and Honda's new NT700V sport-tourer are the future. (Yeah, and the no-dead Buell Ulysses almost fell into that bracket, the last US-manufactured motorcycle I ever considered owning. If Buell had lasted long enough to put a decent motor in the Ulysses, I'd have bought one to replace my V-Strom. I guess I'm lucky they died when they did rather than after I'd spent my money.) The future of motorcycling, I think, is in efficiency, versatility, and adventure. Look at the bikes the Big 4 are selling all over Asia and Europe and you'll see that big, fast, inefficient, and impractical are American-only engineering goals. The rest of the world wants motorcycles and scooters that are stingy fuel users, fun, quick (not powerful), practical, useful, and cool looking. We can only hope that something inspires young Americans to want something similar because, otherwise, motorcycles are going to be a thing of the past, industry-wise, here.

In fact, that segment of the motorcycle business is down more than 65% and outside of industry magazines, nobody cares. That's no formula for longevity.None of those manufacturers make anything resembling an efficient motorcycle. The closest thing to fun you can get riding a hippobike is found when you park it and step into the bar for beer. Adventure? Get serious. while it's an adventure trying to turn or stop one of these monsters, you'd never take one someplace that wasn't level, paved, and well-populated. All we're left with are companies that build huge 1950's styled and engineered monuments to the nation's past engineering skill and habits. If American car manufacturers stuck with that formula there wouldn't have been anything left to bail out. If HD, Victory, Indian, and Big Dog all went bust tomorrow, it wouldn't amount to a blip on the US economy.

(I wouldn't be surprised if I'm forgetting somebody. Since they all build the same bike, I'm probably forgetting several. I can't find the motivation to care.)

Riding Down the Tubes

This is just a depressed observation on the state of the motorcycle industry, media, and the economy that was inspired by this month's Cycle World. The first inkling that this might not be an issue I’d put in my archives came at the end of the gushing review of the $15,000 H-D Wide Glide. I skipped the article because I have no more interest in what anyone thinks of another Hardly hippobike than I have in the terrified whining wisdom of the ClusterFox characters. For some reason, I did skim over the “Editors’ Notes” and Edward’s comments reminded me of why I try not to read this stuff. The Wide Glide wasn’t noisy enough for him he wanted it to have “Louder pipes, too, though not obnoxiously so.”

Douche. Anything louder than legal is “obnoxiously so.” These damn things already get a welfare noise check from the EPA to keep them in business. If you need more noise than that, you’re suffering from 15-year-old girl insecurities. Rubrubrub, to you too dude.

CW followed that up with a “customizing” of the $14,000 Honda Fury that took a geek bike and turned it into a really noisy over-weight piece of crap that only a character like Dave Edwards would think is “cool.” This silly-assed customization job removed the license plate (completely, now you can only ride your bike in your own driveway), replaced the legal pipes with straight pipes, polished up the aluminum so that every weekend will need to be spent removing oxidation from the unprotected aluminum pieces, and shortened the fenders so that the bike will splatter crap all over the motor and rider. Of course, no one would ever consider riding something as silly as this in the rain, on a gravel road, or away from their manicured gated yuppie communities.

The only good thing about the article was the hilarious picture of Mr. Edwards posing on the Fury, looking as dorky as a stock broker on his way to the Hollywood Hard Rock Café for a designer beer and a plate full of Santa Fe spring rolls. All those shiny bits, including Dave’s half-helmet, reflecting Hollywood’s asphalt glory and the desiccated palm trees reminded me why I wanted out of California so badly. If I was dreading winter before, now I’m looking forward to the weather that “gets rid of the riffraff.” We don’t have a day mild enough to allow someone to ride a bike as useless as the Fury. As Dave says, "The $600 the polisher charges is us money well-spent." Holy crap. If that's well-spent money, I should be looking for the next Bernie Madoff to take care of my retirement funds.


Not that I like any part of the Fury, but the page 60 before-and-after picture left me with a little more respect for Honda's stylists. The finished "customized" Fury is a cluster of crap stuck together with lots of cash and Tijuana velvet painting taste. Another example of more money than sense.

It took me a lot longer than usual to read Kevin’s TDC column because of the ad for the Cycle World Vintage Memories Calendar on the adjacent page. I couldn’t get over the picture of the side-hack monkey with his chin a couple of inches off of the asphalt and his shoulder dragging on the ground. I’ve never seen anything like that. I’m not sure I’d want to see it as it happened. However, my eyes kept wandering to that picture as I tried to read about “twitchy monsters” and electronic throttle control circuitry. That is one sick picture.


Those were the good old days of motorcyclists and giant huevos (or little tiny brains). Today, the American motorcycle market is all about rich guys and their useless toys. If you aren't Jay Leno and don't want to own a barn full of bikes that you touch once a year, you aren't worth considering in this Timid New World. I guess this is all a prelude to turning motorcycles into dedicated recreational vehicles unfit for highway use and illegal on public roads outside of the occasional parade. It's hard for me to find a reason to be glad I'm old, but this gets close.

Are You Stupid?

All Rights Reserved © 2006 Thomas W. Day

Last January, outside my kitchen window, I watched three typically spoiled, unskilled, good ole' boys on ATVs bombing around our backyard lake. Normally, I'd be happy to see the lake in use, since it's barely considered a lake by the county and state and any attention is better than none. This wasn't normally.

Our lake boarders the freeway, so noise isn't much of an issue. We have a little mud island in the middle of the lake that's surrounded by Russian Loosestrife, an invasive weed, cattails, and snowmobilers usually plow it flat every winter in their search for a little uneven terrain to explore. That's no problem, either. When I bought the house, there was a collection of "No Snowmobiles" signs in the garage. My wife painted flowers over the signs and we used them as corner posts for our compost pit. I like owning a place that people can use as a path to recreation. I've told all of our neighbors that, if they own snowmobiles, our path is the route to the lake, no questions asked or permission needed. As of this morning I'm reconsidering all of that. Three morons on three and four wheel ATVs have almost changed my attitude about my property and recreational vehicles. These clowns, not content to bomb around a twenty acre lake, unimpeded and unnoticed,. decided it was more fun to add a few backyards, including mine, to their winter race track.

We've been cultivating cattails and native plants along our shoreline. The ATV'rs tore that up more effectively than I could have done with a John Deere diesel and a plow. My wife has built a wildflower garden on the hillside which, apparently, is a moron magnet, because one of the morons felt the need to rip up the hillside with his girlyman four-wheel lawn tractor. Yeah, I'm not impressed with Suzuki, Honda, or Yamaha's latest motorized wheelchairs. Let's face it, four wheels are not better than two. Four wheels are two too many wheels. Simple as that. In my opinion, ATVs are as interesting as unequipped, low-torque garden tractors.

The hill these goofballs tore up is a mild challenge for my 25-year-old Toro riding lawnmower. If that mound gets your rocks off, you'd be stimulated by the sound of a nylon zipper. As for ATVs, anyone who needs a freakin' stable platform to go off-road ought to consider bridge, canasta, or a seat in front of a Treasure Island slot machine, instead of a slow moving lawn tractor without a grass-cutting blade. Especially when that unbalanced doofus feels the urge to tear up my yard with the damn thing. Yeah, I'll admit that I'm generalizing. But I'm generalizing about a specific trio of overgrown kiddies on specific vehicles.

This is a question I often ask people who are doing unbelievably dumb things, "Are you stupid?" I really want to know the answer, so don't consider this a debate tactic or a rhetorical vehicle. If you're stupid, you have an excuse. If you're not, maybe you should consider a lobotomy so that you will have an excuse.

Any parent knows that the thing kids do is push against boundaries. Teenaged children are constantly shoving against anything resembling boundaries, and that's natural. Stupid, but natural. Sometimes, a wall is the only thing between you and a thousand foot drop. I guess my yard was a boundary and my wife's gardens were the walls.

Watching these guys pout, and shred the edge of my yard, as I ran them off of my property, I was reminded of all the vandals on vehicles I've known in my life. I'm talking about folks like the dirt bikers who couldn't be contained to ORV park trails. They waved their freedom flag high by tearing up all the private land and pristine public land possible and got the rest of us banned from hard-won ORV parks and most of the American Desert. I mean those loud pipe folks who are doing their part to get bikes banned from neighborhoods and public roads. I mean those rough-tough biker dudes who get together in gangs to torment "citizens" and rape and pillage like Viking stormtroupers, then, whine like little babies when the non-riding public stereotypes "bikers" as gangsters and works to outlaw motorcycles from society.

Most likely, all of this crowd is just starved for attention and love. Sons and daughters of distracted, workaholic parents and such. I suspect that all the terrain shredding, loud pipe, bad freeway mannered, rebels-without-a-clue types are all just overgrown teenagers looking for love. Sorry, I can't help you. If you're parents didn't like your sorry ass enough to pay attention when you tried to stand on your head, I'm absolutely the wrong shoulder for you to cry on. And if you don't get that damn ATV off of my yard, I'm going to litter the trail with shingle nails and wait for you at the top of the hill with a Sheriff's deputy. I don't like you any more than your daddy did.