mckitterick (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mckitterick) wrote2005-07-19 05:06 pm
mckitterick) wrote2005-07-19 05:06 pm
Entry tags:
motorcycle-commute thing
Things about commuting on a motorcycle that suck:
1) Wind blast at 75-80 mph is seriously un-fun. There's no way to ride the Johnson County Speedway (aka Highway 10) slower than that without getting rear-ended. Crosswinds add excitement, too.
2) Handlebar vibration at 4500-5000 RPM on a Suzuki Bandit is like getting one's hands massaged with a jackhammer.
3) The stock seat on a Bandit was designed by the Marquis de Sade to torture boy-bits. It has a grippy surface and leans down-and-forward, making one's weight roll onto one's... well, one's 'nads. Un-fun.
4) And then I have to do it again, commuting home after class (students are doing an in-class exercise now).
The good news is that my gel modification worked: The foot isn't any more sore than if I'd driven a car. However, time to buy a car, methinks. Or stop teaching at the Edwards campus... though this campus' desire for a tech-writing program is a big reason I came to KU. Sigh.
Anyone want to trade an equivalent-value car for the Bandit? I suppose I could just sell it; after all, the Aprilia scooter is technically a motorcycle, which makes me still technically a motorcyclist, right?
Back to teachin'.
Chris
1) Wind blast at 75-80 mph is seriously un-fun. There's no way to ride the Johnson County Speedway (aka Highway 10) slower than that without getting rear-ended. Crosswinds add excitement, too.
2) Handlebar vibration at 4500-5000 RPM on a Suzuki Bandit is like getting one's hands massaged with a jackhammer.
3) The stock seat on a Bandit was designed by the Marquis de Sade to torture boy-bits. It has a grippy surface and leans down-and-forward, making one's weight roll onto one's... well, one's 'nads. Un-fun.
4) And then I have to do it again, commuting home after class (students are doing an in-class exercise now).
The good news is that my gel modification worked: The foot isn't any more sore than if I'd driven a car. However, time to buy a car, methinks. Or stop teaching at the Edwards campus... though this campus' desire for a tech-writing program is a big reason I came to KU. Sigh.
Anyone want to trade an equivalent-value car for the Bandit? I suppose I could just sell it; after all, the Aprilia scooter is technically a motorcycle, which makes me still technically a motorcyclist, right?
Back to teachin'.
Chris
no subject
5) Rain feels like big cold bullets.
6) Snowstorms.
7) Right turn. Left lane. Wrong turn signal.*
This from several months of doing it while living in Santa Fé. Hope your transportation needs work out soon.
* From a little old lady who hit her right turn signal, moved into the left lane, and then indeed proceded to make a right turn from there into a business driveway and directly into my path. She couldn't make the turn sharp enough from the right lane. Cracked fairing, but no other damage to either my faithful Honda Hawk or to me.
no subject
Not a Nighthawk...
I wish that my bike had been one of these (http://www.mid-citieshonda.com/html/cb750.htm) like my friend Brooks had, or the ever so droolicious Hawk GT (http://nsd.dyndns.org/MC/Honda%20Hawk%20GT.jpg) with the one sided swingarm in the back.
But what I had was a 1981 CB400T (http://www.totalmotorcycle.com/CB400T.htm) with a Vetter Quicksilver fairing. The bike was absolutely bulletproof mechanically, but had an electrical problem I never did manage to fix which would occasionally make the lights stop working or make me have to kick start the bike.
Re: Not a Nighthawk...
Re: Not a Nighthawk...
Re: Not a Nighthawk...
Chris
Re: Not a Nighthawk...
It was my sole source of transportation for my sophomore year. I rode that thing through two blizzards and the aftermath of an ice storm. Great little bike.
Re: Not a Nighthawk...
I know that story!
Chris
no subject
Ouch! I had an unlicensed, uninsured, old-lady driver pull out from a parallel-parking spot beside a 45-mph road directly in front of me once. Then she saw me and panicked, just stopped. I had to lay it down to avoid going over the roof. About the time I came to a stop, tires pretty much against the side of her car, she took off. Mind you, this took place right outside a biker bar in a bad part of St. Paul Minnesota (yes, they have bad parts). About half a dozen Harley guys hopped on their bob-jobs and chased her down. It was all to no avail, though, because the license and insurance info - even her car plate - was all lies. Wish the cops had shown up before she left.
It was my dad's old Honda 450 twin, a piece of crap, but after that it wasn't really usable any more. And I'd just wrecked my prized 150-hp racing bike, a Kawasaki H1 that was all blacked-out and maroon with unsilenced chambers and 15:1 compression, wouldn't idle below 3000 rpms. Dunstall fairing, single seat. H1R replica. Sigh. The dealer from whom I bought it knew the front brake had a problem but refused to replace it. Locked at over 80 mph. Scary stuff. No bike left after that. I was wearing a cast when I put down the Honda.
Ah, the joys of motorcycling, eh?
Chris
no subject
Would love an H1--at least with a working brake. Other bikes I remember with fondness are my brother's '74 TZ250 and his '82 GPz550.
Not that I'm getting another bike any time soon.