Its been a long, lonely time. I sold my GS back in summer 09 and have not ridden since. There is a glow of light on the horizon.............and it is shaped like a ninja.............

Winter on the Island

For most of Canada, the start of winter is about putting away your motorcycle, putting on snow tires and possibly readying your shop for a winter project. For those of us in BC on the lower mainland and Vancouver Island, its about putting away your summer motorcycle, and getting out your winter ride. This year I am sad to have only a project.

On Thanksgiving day I was headed downtown and rear ended a white Mercedes SUV that had stopped at a cross walk. My fault. Stupid mistake. Anyway I did a stoppie and dropped the bike on the left side cracking the stator cover. Oil was everywhere. I also smashed the gauges to bits, wrecked the mirrors and scraped paint off the fender.

I walked away relatively unscathed, save the indignation and the Mercedes had the color keyed receiver hitch cover pop off. Nothing serious. I had to JB Weld the cover to get the bike home. Yeah I rode it home. These early bikes may not have the speed and agility of the new repliracers, but they certainly are built tough.

So now my winter will consist of scouring ebay and salvage yards for parts to get the old girl back in shape for the spring. Oh well, there are worse pastimes.

New on the Island

We moved to Victoria from Southern Ontario two years ago. I had the itch to get another bike, but life had been pretty chaotic until then. It had been nearly three years since my pride and joy, a 1987 FJ1200 had been stolen by some useless turd and written off. That bike was a dream. Dark pearl blue, candy apple powder coated frame, Kerker white tip, Dynajet stage 1, K&N Filter. It was big, it was heavy, you had to ask it politely to turn, but it was comfortable and it was STUPID fast. I am talking 280 Kph plus. I am always looking for my next FJ. I will have one again. guaranteed.

When we first got here I was working in Vancouver and commuting once a week from Vic. The trip was too long with transit, and too expensive to take the car, and commuter coach left me without wheels for the week in Vancouver. Bikes are cheap on gas, cheap to get on the ferry (relatively), earn a place at the front of the lineup, always get on, even when cars would not fit, and allowed me some wheels on the mainland.

I didn't have a lot of dough (what else is new) so I picked up the local bargains weekly and started looking it over. I came across a bike that was cheap, so I went to see it. It looked like it had been built by Mad Max. I didn't even really know what it was until I got the hand hammered aluminum home made fairing and bags off of it. It was 1976 XS360 twin. It had a seat made of two by fours and a couch cushion. It was RIDICULOUS! But my heart went out to it. It was an S model after all. REAL old school sport/standard. No cruisers pls! So I bought the old thing for 400 bucks. The guy agreed to remove all the homemade "accessories" if he could keep them. NO PROBLEM! I said. So I had my first Vancouver Island Bike project.

I spent the summer of 06 painting that bike, finding parts (including what I believe was THE original seat, matching paint and all) and putting her back together. She was a great little bike. But too little. The Pat Bay highway is a four laner from Victoria out to the ferry terminal. About half an hour at 120 K. That XS would hit 110 comfortably, but beyond that, it was working really hard. I'm a 260 lb chunky lad, and that sight of me on that little bike was something out of a Barnum and Bailey show. After careful consideration and deliberate selection, I found the old girl a new home with a young lady who was just getting her license. I doubled my money on the bike, and found it a good home. Satisfaction. Then I went looking for the next project. King Kong Hyperbike!!.....TBC

1983 GS750ED

I found my 1983 GS 750E on UsedVictoria in the spring of 2007. I quickly saw from the pictures that the old girl had some potential , but needed some love. So I went out to look at it, the exhaust centre pipe was shot, the tires showed signs of UV wear (cracking). The headlight was missing. After Ibrought it home, I touched up the paint and bought a few parts. Gave it a round headlight (like the 750 EF) ........

and on ....

At lunch on Friday I left work to get a sandwich. I swung by the Suzuki/Triumph Dealer here in Sidney (Near where I work at the Victoria Airport). It had been a long while since I had been in a dealership. Strangely I don't get excited looking at row up on row of multicoloured neon repliracers and wanna-cruisers. But in I went. I was curious about a couple of things. I am always interested in second hand items dealers may have, but a brand new Suzuki BKing had me in a trance. It was quite a elegant looking monster. Self said "Now this I like!." I only wish the marketing folks at the Japanese manufacters would get input from the NA market. BKing? What do you ride? its an 08 Burger King! I know its probably short for 'Busa, given the 1300cc link, but come on.....

But lo at 14000 bucks, its about 10 fold my working price range. I also saw a Benelli machine without a price tag. If you have to ask....you probably can't afford it. But it sure was nice.

The really eyecatcher for me was a silver, o3 SV1000. I have always liked the SV1000. I like the SV650, but at roughly 260 pounds, I am a big man and I need a big bike and the 1000 surely could carry me.

My 83 GS 750E is my project and a darling old girl, and I hope to keep her forever, but just the feeling of a hydraulic clutch on the SV got me interested and intrigued (sad hmm?). I can't justify the 6000 bones with our young family......so I will continue to look and like for a while longer......

Old school part one

I like old sport bikes. A lot. Don't get me wrong, I am not stuck in any decade or anything, and there are some new bikes I would kill for. Its a feeling and a style that I find trancends generations of motorcyle enthusiasts from the early days to now, that hooks me. The biggest bubble of production motorcycles that get my heart going are from those from the early 1970s until the end of the about 1992. I love em.

The beginning of the end of motorcycles with style came in 1993 or so with the introduction of the CBR 600F2. Every squid with a testosterone overload rides some version of that machine now. Its a formula. Get a license, get an bike too powerful for you and become a statistic. You see them coming down the road, and hear them too. They give our passion a bad name. The only good thing is, they are rarely in it very long befor they are broken, disinterested or miss the Nintendo Wii too much.

Its not the bikes' fault, I don't hold the machines or the companies at fault. The machines are technical marvels. CBRs, ZXs, YZFRs and GSXR's at the forefront, with the non-Japanese brands following suit. The companies are merely doing business. Supply and demand, and demand currently is for race replicas. In essence these are the K cars of the motorcycle world. Huge production numbers of flashy race replicas targeted to the 20 something adolescent market.

They need to be stopped....