Scotland Trials

A couple of weeks ago I was up in Scotland with MD Racing Mike and Trials Trickster Al for a bit of trials trail riding.

It was minus 6 ovenight... open ground stayed frozen for the wholes day... but the sun was a shinin!

Getting ready in Al's uber-shed...

A 3 minute drive up the road...

"Welcome to my garden!"

Stop for a snack...

A old Beta was a champ. Since the top-end rebuild she is super-strong and will pull me up anything. Only downside is higher compression now makes kick-starting her a bit more difficult. Small price to pay :-)

A wee dram on top of the world!

There was a bit of snow as we got higher up...

Cleaning the bikes up after...

As always, the 'Socttish Trials' was an awesome trip. Great riding with fantastic guys. Thanks Mike and Al!

Classic Rally Cars

Some delicious classic rally cars brought to you by Petrolicious...

Lovin' the 131 Abarth - Mirafiori!

The Bully

Another great looking bike from Deus Ex Machina

Thanks Cafe Racer Culture for the link...

Wee Monster Work

Had the Wee Monster up on the workbench for the last few weeks... need to find that lost horsepower...

First time I am ever working on a motor-sickle engine proper.Thought I'd start my initiation with the simple 2 valve Desmo heads.

Belts off... not too difficult...

Heads off. Loss of compression on front cylinder. Leaky valve. Must have been knicked by a stone she swallowed in the gravel trap back in April.

Gave the valve a spin... thought it was bent. Sourced a complete 620 head to rob the valves off it. Turns out the valve wasn't bent - it was just my crap drill-press. Oh well... now got a complete spare head.

The world of Desmodronics...

Lapping in the valves... that's all that was needed.

With only 59bhp (before the gravel trip), we are a bit below the average for the class. Should be in the low 60s - 65bhp is the class maximum. Need more power! Took the barrels off and removed the base gasket... this'll give me 0.4mm more compression... should bump it up from 10.5:1 to around 11:1... and give an extra horse or two.

Now... to get it all back together again...

Classic TT Onboard

Finally managed to get my Classic TT onboard footage uploaded...


...and part 2.

Travis Newbold - a legend!

Newbold's Motorbike Shop from Waylon Trostel on Vimeo.

Porsche Guy

This guy is pretty cool...

URBAN OUTLAW - THE MOVIE from Tamir Moscovici on Vimeo.

Christmas is Early!

I've been looking out for new gloves for a few years now. Found these at a knock-down price from a bloke in Australia - gotta love eBay! Power-rangers are go!

 

I love my old Nankai gloves... but been racing in them for 8 years now. They've been down the track many times, kept my little handies safe and I've only had them repaired once in that time. Faithful servants. They will now be rested in the kit bag as the 'backup' gloves.

 

 

Great Curves

Just love the way the seat curves up to meet the tank ;-)

 

Thank Café Racer Culture for some sweet pics...

 

Harley-Davidson 883 by TJ Moto

Here's a sweet Harley by Tushar Jaitly, of TJ Moto based out of Delhi, India.

 

Thanks for the link Silodrome.

News from Africa

Some news from my brother Nic in South Africa...

Off to visit some peeps in Graskop on Saturday. The St4 did not get the nod for the job, with intermittent fault ,no chancing it.
Might have worked fine, might have not. Confidence in the machine is important.
So went on the st2. Super little motorcycle.

So I ride some other routes go through some road works for about 15k's. slow, mud sand, all the stuff you do not like to ride a Duke over.
Anyhow, all good, road opens up, open up. Back end don't feel good, feel again. No good.
Pull over.
Sheeeet.
Flat.
Rear.
Back road somewhere.
Hmm.
Bag off bike on stand. No wurries. Out with the kit.
OOOh!, on inspection there appears to be a couple of possibilities.
Send the Auger mujob into one, and give it a clean. Dumbass shitty Chinese products. Rubber cement tube has about 1 10th of a gram of cement in it.
Chinese, you don't want that.
No wurries, we don't need that. plug in. 1x CO2 bomb, 1 x can tyre weld. Pffffffffffffffsssssssssssst.
Spin tyre. Pfffsssssffffsssstffffsssst. nuther hole.
Quick.
Auger.
Plug.
Rest of tyre weld.
Sooper.
Wait 5 minutes. Check pressure. all good.
PAck up . Ride on.

Decision.
Back home or onward. there was time.
No, rather back home. I do not have total trust in these things.
Besides, I had used all the repair kit up.
So back home it was. 160 k's. in the car, and back .

All good.
It was pissin doon, and all misty, so being in a car was great.

yeah! tyre repair kit lives under seat.
Yea never know.