Despite my technical job, I often find myself “behind the curve” of technology. I don’t subscribe to spending copious amounts of money on new phones and gadgets, I’d rather buy motorcycle parts and food. I don’t have a need for a gigabit ethernet switch, multi-function scanners, printers and fax machines, or cameras that toast bread.
But this week, I was forced to make a change towards technology. After fighting with my phone company over the costs associated with fixing the excess line noise, I gave AT&T the proverbial middle finger, and switched to VoIP (Vonage). Despite a scheduling mix-up that left me without a home phone for three days, I must say I’m impressed.
I was paying 27-35$ a month for local-only phone coverage on a line so noisy that I often had to press the phone hard to my ear, and plug my other ear, just to hear what the party was saying on the other line. I now pay 24$ a month to call anywhere in the US. I get voicemail service for free, and they get magically delivered to me via email, so I can keep up on correspondence, even if I’m not home. If I need to travel on business, my home phone can come with me if needed.
Most of you know I’m not big on telephony, but this has me pretty jazzed up. VoIP is here to stay. With the internet more proliferate than aging telephone technology, its only a matter of time before the telephone line as we know it, simply fades away like VHS tapes, and Cassettes.
Last weekend I vowed to myself while gazing through the window in the door to the garage, I will get in there and make something right next weekend. Saturday turned out to be that day, and I took the SS off the lift, and put the Monster up on the lift to see what I’ve been neglecting. I considered firing up the bike to let the oil warm up, but thought about the 50W sludge pumping around and decided to drain it as it was. Apparently it was a good call, as the garage mice are saboteurs. (time for a shop-cat?) I found this little stash of winged food inside the air-box. I doubt a sunflower seed could stand up to the power of a stainless steel valve, but I don’t believe that Fabio Taglioni designed his demo’s to run on birdseed.
Sunday was a cool forty-seven degrees and sunnier than any summer day. I left my driveway and was off. Up through Litchfield County into the backroads of Winstead and Colebrook. I shifted into high gear with a margin of throttle and just listened to the motor rhythmically propel me through the country at two-thousand revolutions per minute. Left, right, straight, who cares? I fully enjoyed being “lost” for an hour before the shadows of the trees got longer and my gloves weren’t feeling as warm as when I left.
I stopped by a friends house to beg for a cup of coffee, but nobody was home. On my way back, I noticed Walt’s truck at his shop, so I pulled a u-turn and stopped in. Turns out not only did he have a spare cup of coffee, but he had a few minutes to kick tires and trade lies over a few smokes. A light breeze reminded me that it was colder still, so I thanked Walt for the coffee and struck out for home.
It was really nice to get some helmet time in.
Where have I been? I’ve been skiing, making extravagant breakfasts with Cyndi, breaking big stones into small stones, sleeping as many hours as the workload allows. Where I havn’t been, is in the garage. Since this blog is mainly based around motorcycles, when there is no motorcycle news, the blog goes widely un-updated. So, I leave you with a picture should you ever wonder what I’m doing. Anytime you ask yourself that question, this picture will give you the answer.
Cyndi handed me a box Saturday evening and cheered “Merry christmas!”. The box was small, yet surprisingly heavy. I could feel the smooth laminated cardboard through the wrapping paper. Electronics! I tore open the wrapping paper, and found a new, smaller, faster, better digital camera. My camera had developed its own personality of malfunction on Day 2 of this years Hatfield McCoy trip, and started drawing strange icicles coupled with a blueish hue on every photo. I was elated, and during the grins and shutter sound of my new toy, she said “Now you can take pictures of stuff and blog about it, right?”.
Last night I found myself thinking about that while I was standing in a very fancy looking datacenter, and had to pull out the camera. If anyone has been wondering what I’ve been doing for a solid two months? Your looking at the general theme. You’ll notice nowhere in the picture is there even a motorcycle! Sadly this photo speaks truths about that sector of life as well. The Italian hussies in the garage are likely crying oil onto carpets and floors in protest, while the tools freeze to eachother.
Why do I always think I’ll have all this beautiful free time in the winter, during the summer when I also think I’m busy?
Sunday Cyndi and I both piled on the Monster and rumbled off down the road to the local italian resturant named “Pags”. An hour later we we’re both clutching our stomaches groaning trying to figure out how we’d fit back on the small italian rocketship. I commeted that the Italians probably designed these machines to transport small-framed italian men and women from cafe to cafe, and not large americans filled to the brim with italian food. We rumbled back home with an extra five pounds of manicotti and chicken marsala preloading the suspension.
Cyndi would call it dinner. I call it a celebration of italian technology and culiniary perfection.
More on that “monster” soon.
Turned twenty-five today. Today is a Monday, so I’m at work. An added plus? The coffee machine is broken. Since my motto is “adapt, overcome, and prevail”, I switched to tea. Its not quite the same, but it gets the job done.
Unfortunately, there was no triumphant ride into work on my 900SS. With some serious cylinder mis-match going on, I have a good deal more work to do before its running in a road-worth condition. I’m ok with this, because my second motto in life is “expect the worst, and you’ll never be dissapointed”.
There was however, go-kart racing and a plethora of apple pies baked by Cyndi. This fits perfectly into my last and final motto “everything is always better with pie”.
So I sat in the garage this morning with a cup full of coffee and a large slice of apple pie looking at my motorcycles in various stages of disarray and thought “I sure feel better about my busted motorcycles with a peice of pie in my hand”
I hope my car insurance rates go down now.
I was sitting outside work last Friday on a smoke break, admiring the bright flashes of colors throughout the trees around our building. While I was gaping at the leaves (something I get furious at out-of-state drivers for, there’s a time and a place!) I heard the low whizzz of a motor. I looked up and saw someone pull into our visitors parking lot on a bright yellow Honda Goldwing. For a moment, my heart pounded fast when I heard the electric sounding goldwing motor into the entrance, but as quick as it came, it ended. Paul Rossi wouldn’t ride a yellow Goldwing. That wasn’t his style. He would pick something black, or silver. Something that blends in.
I met Paul Rossi a year after I started my current job. I was nineteen years old, in the middle of the corporate environment, and still pretty dazed with it all. Paul Rossi is a rather relaxed, laid back 56 year old italian from New York. He had curly salt and pepper hair with a moustache that flaired up slightly at the ends, and big round straight-bar glasses that sat at various stages on his nose throughout the day. I would see him outside smoking throughout the day, but being a rather introverted young lad, I’d simply sit somewhere else and study mountians of paperwork.
It was the start of summer in 2003 when I bought my 1999 Honda Nighthawk 750. I was just coming to terms with the differences between riding a 30 year old rust-bucket dirt bike, and a modern 750cc motorcycle. My knowledge of gear and protection didn’t go much beyond a helmet, some workout gloves and a dress leather jacket. One day I pulled into a parking spot at work on my CB750, shut off the ignition and started clawing for the release on my helmet strap. When I looked back down, I saw a rather large man swoop in on a volkswagon-bus of a motorcycle, complete with 5′ antennas, American flag hanging off a pole on the back. The helmet flipped up, and I saw Paul grinning. I shot him a grin back and fired lit a cigarette. I pointed to his Goldwing and said “Man, your driving the cadilliac of motorcycles!”. He flipped his lighter closed and took a drag, thought for a second and said “Yea, but your driving the Ferrari” as he exhaled.
From that day on, every time I’d go out for a smoke, I’d sit with Paul and talk about bikes. He’d tell me stories about riding in the late 60’s and 70’s. Road stories. Dis-assembling carbs on the side of the road in Arizona with a swiss army knife, making his own tools for a collection of old motorcycles out of turkey basters, gear oil and pepper shakers. The stories went on and on. Often times we’d talk for damn near an hour about everything from motorcycle maintenance, to good roads, good eats, or even our outlooks on life. When I started working on my own bike, Paul always had the answers to my bike problems, and he had the background theory for his answers.
But Paulie also has the italian temper. His job wore him ragged, as he wasn’t the type of person who dealt well in backstabbing corporate environments. Paulie lives on the practice that any man or woman is only as good as their word, and he found it increasingly more frustrating to work in a place where your word doesn’t count for much. When he was in foul moods, I’d give him distance. Once (while I was in a particularly low point in my personal and professional life) I mentioned to him that I was thinking about joining the army. Oh boy did I hear it from Paul. He never told me he was drafted, and I learned quickly it wasn’t a good subject.
But in the end, it all just brought us closer. One day I got a call at home, and heard Paulie on the other end. “Whatcha-doin buster?” a low voice grumbled. Nothing at the time, and he asked me if I’d like to come up and hang out in his garage for a bit. I rode my new 2003 SV1000S up to his house in Simsbury, and entered the holy-grail of raised-ranch garages. A CB400T, CBX (six-cylinder), Triumph 650 Bonnie, BSA’s, parts time forgot and a few more projects he was working on. We sat in his garage, smoke cigarettes end after end listening to Pink Floyd and Led Zepplin while gazing at the bikes. It was dark and cold by the time he and his wife wished me well and I wheeled my bike out of his museum and thundered off down the road.
Over the next year we got together once or twice more at his place. He gave me a air compressor from the 30’s he had in his garage. I still have it, and use it on a daily basis. Despite all of our kicking tires at work, and our occasional get togethers at his garage, we never went for a ride together. We’d both come in Monday’s and tell eachother about our rides to Granville Mass. for their famous “room-temperature-cheese”, or to Adams Diner in Dutchess County for the best blueberry pancakes. Thinking back, I wonder if we just both enjoyed talking about our passions for the open road, but preferred to be alone while actually doing it.
That winter, Paulie quit his job, and decided to move out to PA. He and his wife had found the perfect house, and he had found the perfect job, right smack in the middle of motorcycling nirvana. A day before he was set to leave for PA and start his new job, I found myself sitting in his garage, now half-packed for the move, smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee with Paulie. We talked for half the day, about friends, life, jobs, changes… As I left, Paulie and I hugged and shook hands and he said “I don’t like saying goodbye, so I’ll just say, see you later..” I grinned and said “Hopefully sooner, rather than later.”
A few weeks after Paulie moved to PA, I got an email from him. Paulie never liked computers much so the email was only a few lines. The most important ones we’re on the bottom. “Beautiful women, curvy roads, many greasy diners. Life is good, this is heaven“.
I hadn’t heard much from Paul in a good five months when I got the news. Paul had a extremely serious stroke which had Paralyzed the side of his face, and taken almost all of his memory with him. He would recover, and be able to walk, eat and dress himself again after years of therapy, but it was immediately clear that he’d never ride a motorcycle again. I talked with his wife, who sadly informed me that I was welcome to visit, but Paulie wouldn’t know who I was, or have any recollection of our weekends in his garage, or our hour talks outside the smoking bench at work.
Yesterday I found myself sitting outside in my driveway on my 900SS after a quick run up and down the street, gunning the throttle to keep the poorly adjusted carb running. I thought to myself “Paulie would know how to fix this”. For a moment a wave of sadness knowing the world has lost the mind of such a unique individual came over me. But as quickly as it came, it past. Paulie would have definitly given me an earful if he knew I was kicking cans feeling sorry for myself right after I got my twice rebuilt bike running. Yea, the best thing I can do for Paulie and me, is to get it running right, and get out there. Who knows, maybe I’ll run into an italian with curly hair on a Silver Goldwing.
I walked back inside from the garage and shivered a bit. Its full-on new england autumn, which means pleasant windy days, but cold nights. Its warmer in the garage than it is in the house. Filled up my coffee for the fourth time and glanced at the clock. 1:30am. I should be sleeping, but whenever I glance at the Ducati through the door, I feel compelled to put parts on. I feel bad for the dog with the house so cold, so I bring her out into the heated garage with me. She settles down near the stove, and I light up a cigarette and just gaze at the 900SS on the lift.
The JE 11:1 drop-in pistons went together and in much easier than the MBP 966 pistons. I only had to file the top rings a little bit for proper gap. I assembled the top end with OEM base gaskets to set squish, and came up with .065″ at the extreme edges on both pistons. Compared to last time where I had to change base gaskets 3 times to get a good even number, it was nice to do it once, and then just pull off the wax. The second circlip went in on each piston, and the heads we’re bolted down for the last time. Getting the motor back in the frame is a two person job. However, if you have a piece of old fencepost, a 2×4 and a basic understanding of levers, it becomes a one person job. I bolted the rear mount in, and left it loose. I levered front cylinder up, using the rear mount as a hinge and slid the last mounting bolt through.
On went the carbs and the airbox. What used to take me 30-40 minutes now takes me 15. This poor bike has been taken apart and put together so many times in the past 4 weeks, I could do this part in my sleep. Before I knew it, I looked around and had no more parts to bolt on. I drained the oil, filled it up with Shell’s best 10w30, and spun on a brand new K&N filter.
I took a long gulp of my coffee, put my cigarette out and stood up. I flipped the key to “On”, and switched the ignition to run. Pulled out another cigarette on Steve Munro’s advice. “You forgot the inital start up cigarette! Thats critical to engine break-in!”. Choke on halfway, thumb the starter. Ka-thump, ka-thump, ka-Brabump-brabump-brump-brump. With the engine idling I pulled out a 100W shop light and looked for leaks while the engine idled. Despite searching for 5 minutes, I couldn’t find one. I gave the throttle a slight tug and the revs climbed quickly. A big stupid grin formed on my face. I threw my leg over the bike and sat on it while it idled on the stand. I whacked the throttle a couple times and listened to the motor sing that deep Italian opera it was famous for. My neighbors outside lights flipped on. Uh-oh. I killed the motor and the lights in the shop and laughed quietly to myself.
Apparently he’s not an opera fan.
Took a personal day from work yesterday to dedicate to rebuilding the Duc. I very rarely have a empty day where I can sit down and get things done in one shot, so I figured I’d make one. I got up early, put on a fresh pot and got to work.
I detailed my spare cylinders, checked piston-to-wall clearance with a feeler gauge (as I lack the telescoping gauges to do it correctly). I cleaned them up, and then used a scotch-brite pad (the kind that scratches) for a home-made quick light hone. It came out much better than I was expecting. The rings should seal very well. After I set the gaps, and labeled each piston, I put the ring compressor on the forward piston, and put a circlip in, and then installed the piston onto the connecting rod. Then I attempted to do the same rather simple procedure for the vertical piston.
Two hours, and a bunch of jammed up fingers later, I was getting very frustrated at why the circlip wasn’t going in correctly. I pulled it out, and compared it to the remaining cir-clips. Sonovabitch. JE sent me two correct-sized clips, and two clips that are much to big for the piston. No wonder I couldn’t get them in.
Sometimes I do feel there are cosmic forces at work trying to test me. But for now, I wait for a replacement set. My new goal is to get a ride on the 900SS by my birthday. If anyone needs me, I’ll be in the garage filling up my lamp with some of that midnight oil.
Lola and I woke up at 3:00am on Saturday morning. I gave Cyndi a kiss and was out the door. Back home I loaded up the KTM and all my dirty gear. One nice thing about racing, is packing for any moto-trip becomes second nature. I almost always pack everything I’d need to tear the bike apart, and put it all together. I never want to be miss a minute of riding because I forgot the right tool. By 5:00am I was cruising down I-84 to meet up with my uncle Ed and cousin Roger for a day of moto. (For those that don’t know, my uncle Ed is responsible for getting me back into dirtbiking. after a six year hiatus)
Several traffic delays later, and I arrived very late at 11:30am. I was too excited to be tired. I’ve never been on a motocross track, and any time myself and the big Austrian boat-anchor have ever gotten airborne, was usually by accident. When we arrived at the track, Ed and roger informed me that it was completely packed. Thankfully the intermediate track we had slated ourselves to ride wasn’t busy. The first few laps around, I followed Ed and just got dusted. It was all I could do to keep him in sight, and the more I tried to go fast, the more mistakes I made. The bike felt like I was riding on stones and was jarring my fillings loose. Got back into the pits and checked the tire pressure. 35psi. Whoops! I asked what Ed was running and set mine to that.
The next time out the bike felt better, but I was still loosing Ed around every corner. He’d stick his leg out like a flat tracker and just pin the throttle around turns roosting dirt. I tried to emulate this, but the bike just kept sliding out from under me. The only way I could keep him in sight was to try and bounce off the berms with as much power as I could get to the ground. I would gain on him through some of the jumps, only to come to a corner and watch him take off. I was expecting this. Ed is very reserved about his talents, but the pictures of days gone by tell the truth. (See picture right. Hardcore dudes ride in vests and glorified football helmets.).
The third session out, Ed and I were completely feeding off eachother. Breathing down my neck around every corner, he was back there pushing me faster and faster. I made mistakes and he’d blow by me. I’d follow his line through the dirt and try to dip back in to get past him, only for the door the close again. Its a god-damned blast riding with someone who’s right at the same skill level as you. Ed and I are both pretty competitive people, so we feed off eachother. Unfortunately while he was chasing me, he went over a berm and bashed up his knee pretty good. It looked damn painful, but after a quick icing he was right back out there chasing me down. He said I got faster, but I know how much it sucks riding with a injury. Still we pushed eachother faster and faster around the track.
We rode until they chased us off the track. Packed up and headed back to go eat dinner with Ray. Ray bought my basket-case YZ250 that I blew up shortly after I got it. (See a trend yet?). Ray and his wife day really rolled out the red carpet. I wasn’t there for more than two minutes before I had a cold brew in my hand and was talking garage with Ed and Ray. Burgers, dogs, chicken, salad and everything you could want. A warm fire pit on a cool autumn night with good friends and family doesn’t get any better. Thanks for a great time Ed, Sara, Ray, Day and both your families. I can’t wait to come back, but this time Ray, lets get your whip running!