Back to the workbench

I don't know why I do it, but every few months I insist on pushing my skilled labor to its limits. This usually results in extreme frustration and disappointment. I mean, I don't know how to weld, and really, my ability to work with metal is limited to hacksaws (cutting), files (making up for bad cuts), drills (making holes), and JB Weld (gluing metal, if you will).



While most of my attempts result in failure, sometimes I succeed. This usually happens when I design a solution that's crude, simple, and does not require tight tolerances. Hell, our Honda Element is still roaring along with our homemade intake bracket.



So my latest endeavor consists of mounting a Pelican case to the SV. I looked at the Givi top case rack, but it's just way too expensive. I also considered buying a spare passenger seat, and mounting the Pelican case directly to that. Unfortunately a used passenger seat will set me back about $60. On the other hand, five-or-so feet of angle aluminum was $12 at ACE Hardware, so here I go again.

I'll post back with more as I get further, but I'm already under way on a bracket, made solely of angle aluminum. Said bracket will mount to the bike in place of the grab rail. And as soon as I'm done, I'll have earned the reward of shopping for my Pelican case!

Update #1

I've created 4 pieces of my 5-piece design so far - 2 pieces bolt directly to the subframe (where the grab rail originally mounted).



The other 2 pieces are take-offs, if you will, from the pieces that mount to the bike. I'm joining each piece with JB Weld (what else?) to hold them together so I can complete the bracket. If I decide JB Weld won't cut it, I'll have to figure out some other way to sure the connections...



Update #2

*sigh* - after many design discussions with my wife and my father, I was convinced that a much better design was to mount the case directly to the passenger seat (for stability reasons among others). So I've got the seat off and I think I've decided on a way to make it all work. I'll be picking up a Pelican case tomorrow @ lunch and hopefully I'll have it mounted for our Shenandoah trip Sunday!

Barber Motorsports Park

We did a track day with STT Southern at Barber Motorsports Park a few weeks ago. I've started this post three times since then, and I'm still having trouble getting my raving lunacies under control. So I'll use a few images this time in place of words.



Unbelievable. Where other tracks simply provide an area to park your rig and some decent asphalt to carve, Barber invites you into a gated community of golf course-quality grounds, an unmatched collection of motorcycle history (see their museum), and a crash-friendly, jaw-dropping race course.

I have a lot to learn about road racing (only my 4th track day), but the STT staff at a venue like Barber rewards you just for trying. I definitely got my money's worth on this track day -



- and of course the great company didn't hurt.

Thanks to the beautiful photographer, who plans to be on the bike next track day!

Route planning

Ask me what I'm doing this weekend, and I'll tell you visiting family. Ask me what I did last weekend, and I'll tell you the same. Ask me what I'm doing next weekend...you get the point. I love visiting family, but this way of life wreaks havoc on my motorcycling time. I know, why not use the bikes to go on these trips? No reason.

And so this weekend we're giving it a go - visiting my father-in-law on the SV650S and Ninja 250. The idea seemed simple and appealing at first, but then when I thought about the Interstates we usually use to get there, I decided we needed to find a back-roads way of getting there. This trip usually takes us about 3.5 hours using 66, 495, 95, 476, 76, and Pennsylvania's SR-422. How can I possibly come up with a route anywhere near that simple if I stay off the highways? Oh, I forgot to mention one little thing...

...friends of ours recently shared their Mad Map with us - theirs was a map outlining large weekend loops to drive in the Smoky Mountain area. Mad Maps seems to focus on twisty and/or scenic roads for their weekend loops. When our Economic Stimulus $$$ rolled in, we bought 3 Mad Maps, and one of them covers New Jersey and Pennsylvania. We tested this map out a few weekends ago when we aimed the Civic for Northern New Jersey - instead of our usual early morning sprint up 95, we swung West and came in on 78. Before the PA/NJ border, we branched off to drive a 30+ mile portion of one of Mad Maps's Pennsylvania loops (which ended up putting us on 80, and we entered the Garden State that way).

We were not disappointed.

This was 30 miles of windy roads with constant elevation changes and banked turns. Speed limits would drop to 25 as you pass through a 4-block ghost town, and before you knew it, you were back up to speed carving asphalt you may never have found otherwise.

So, what I haven't mentioned, is that we aim to fit a portion of a Mad Maps loop into each trip. Now keeping the whole trip off the freeway and getting a taste of Mad Maps in the same trip to Perkiomenville, PA has proven quite challenging. I admit, route-planning is a very new activity for me. But with Google Maps and a AAA membership, I should have the tools I need to come up with a decent line.

While the jury is out on the decency of my line, the fact remains that it's a 210-mile route with over 70 turns - all of which GMaps estimates will take us 6.5 hours. It's quite a price to pay if this is the cost of using motorcycles to visit family. We'll see how we feel about it when we reflect upon the trip on Steve's wooden rockers...

Update:

Well, it basically took us about 8 hours. We did everything from ferrying across the Potomac to sliding through gravel roads with our sport bikes. The scenery was great, some of the roads were totally cool, but this is no way to get from point A to point B. Needless to say, we took a much simpler route home.



No regrets, though!