Okinawa R&R

I got this email from Hale Irwin (not the golf pro on the Senior Tour), a customer and friend of mine. He "beat the air into submission" flying helo's during his time in the US Marine Corps.

We brought these Yamaha's in from Japan to Okinawa in the back of CH-46 Helicopters after the birds were overhauled in Tokyo:



Looks to me like he's wearing his flight helmet. Which is appropriate, 'cause he's flyin'!

Check Hale's blog out;

http://checkmysix.blogspot.com/

YZ134....Version 3.1?

Actually, it's hard to figure which version we're looking at right now. It started out as a motocross bike. Then it was lowered and raced as a flattracker, with a 19" spool wheel on the front. We bought it in that phase, with the original 21" front wheel and brake as spare parts.



As Scott grew, we raised the suspension a little, but he still grew out of the bike, and it became a little obsolete as a flattracker, so we thought we'd try some Super Motard racing with it. I pieced together some 17" rims and hubs, sent them off to get laced up and reinstalled the front brake. It became a fun little supermoto bike. I guess you could call that phase/version 3. We raced it successfully in both supermoto and some indoor shorttrack events.



But that only lasted for a little while before we realized that we wanted to use the bike for some woods/moto riding. On went the 21" spare wheel and a proper pair of dirtbike tires, the suspension was returned to full length. Back to phase 1, but with some mods.



After that I got interested in ice riding/racing, so a spare set of wheels was obtained through ebay, and ice tires built. I tried a few different tires, and in fact I'm still working on that set-up. The engine was due for a top end, and I decided to go with an overbore kit from Eric Gorr's Forward Motion. We'll call it phase/version 4.




As you may see from previous posts, this has been the most difficult phase in terms of jetting and performance. I've managed to blow the top end several times, whereas previously the bike didn't seem to care too much about what it was doing. Riding/racing in cold temps requires much more attention to jetting, and I'm afraid I wasn't attending to the finer points as much as I should have been. Live and learn.
Anyway, after the last episode, Eric Gorr very kindly honed the cylinder for me, and sent it back with a fresh piston and gasket set, and some sage advise about proper jetting. I put it back together and decided I'd mount the S/M wheels for now, since we may want to race it in June with that set-up.

New lid

I got a new helmet. It's a Fly Racing. My old helmet was pretty beat up.




Here are some observations about my helmets (and snowboards, come to think of it).

I'm fairly certain that I've never seen anyone wearing the same model and design that I have.

I have a habit of buying a new helmet and going out and crashing the first time I wear it. Since it's new, I can't live with the thought of replacing it as the manufacture and magazines all suggest, so I keep wearing it until I can reasonably justify it's replacement. That can take anywhere from a couple more rides to a couple seasons, and I'm happy to say the last one was a couple seasons.



Here's my Simpson, it's an early 80's Bandit. I raced Karts in this helmet.




This is my first Bell, it's an M1. It was my street and racing helmet for a few seasons. I don't think I crashed this one.




This is my 3rd Bell, back when they were made by Shoei (I think). I raced this for a few years, then crashed pretty hard at a 1/2 mile race in Brockton Mass.



I was concussed.



My last Bell.




My first KBC, which originally stood for Korean Bell Corporation until Bell Helmets found out about it and told them it should stand for something else. So I don't know what it stands for now. This helmet got wrecked at Square Deal Riders in NY.

Gas Gas

I rode at Hunter Farm today. Started out on Hannah's XR200, just plunking along, setting up some singletrack lines to ride. Fred joined me on his Gas Gas trials bike, and we had a nice ride, stopping to ponder some of the possibilities for routes. We completed a circuit of the farm, and I parked the Honda and hopped on the Gas Gas. What a blast! Such a different type of riding that calls for a different approach, and opens up some completely new lines to the terrain that you thought you knew.

This is a rock face that I hit a few times. Super fun.

Airshow!

I don't like to lift photos from other people's blogs, I'd rather use my own, but a friend sent me this link, which had another link embedded in it, etcetera etcetera...you know the drill.

Anyway, pretty incredible shots, mainly because we "Westerners" didn't/don't get to see this stuff too often. The Soviets had three flight demonstration teams, two of which flew the contemporary fighters, the Mikoyen MiG 29 flown by the "Swifts" and the Sukhoi Su 27 flown by the "Russian Knights"....

Here are the "Swifts"


The "Russian Knights"


And here they are together, which is cool because you get an idea of the size difference between the two jets, as well as some of the similarities of design.


I guess they don't have a "Navy" flight demonstration team the way we do. It would be cool to see the Blue Angels and the Thunderbirds fly together though.

Here's the link;

http://www.richard-seaman.com/Aircraft/AirShows/index.html#Maks2005

YZ134

One of the reasons I haven't been posting much is that I got really sick of anything to do with motorcycles. I know, I blaspheme, but hear me out. I siezed the YZ 134. Again....

I thought I had the jetting pretty well squared away, and I probably was close, so I went out to just do some more testing. I was riding a road course on the south side of the sandbar, it was about 10 degrees out. I took a couple slow practice laps to let the engine warm up, then I picked up the pace. Too quickly. The engine sized just as I shifted into 6th.

So this is what a "cold sieze" looks like.






I have to mic the cylinder to see how bad it is. Maybe I can clean it up and just put a new piston in...probably not though.

I went into the garage on Sunday, looked at all the bikes, turned around and walked back out.

When it actually gets warm, maybe then I'll be inspired.

Making Tracks...

Sorry to leave the blog on hold for so long. It's been an interesting month or so since my last post. Been to Spain. Been to Montreal. Been hanging around the house, and I've been doing some cross country skiing.

I'm guessing this is a Bobcat hoping to catch the Turkey that wandered here.


This is what it looks like when a Turkey takes off in a hurry.


I'll get back to motorcycles soon.