[Clay Dowling]

I actually live outside of Flint, in a quiet suburb, but I’ll cover the whole area.

Pros

• – Friendly to anything with an engine, so no bad biker vibe.
• – Lots of bike shops, because of previous point.
• – One hour to Saginaw Bay/Lake Huron, which is great for beaches, boating, fishing and hunting.
• – Criminals are considered a game animal here.

Cons

• – Economy sucks. We’re always mentioned in the news for a reason.
• – High crime if you go into Flint proper. There’s a reason it’s easy to carry a gun here.
• – Roads suck. It’s not unusual for large stretches to consist of nothing but hot patch (in Lansing, the Capitol, there are whole streets that are nothing but hot patch).

[Clay Dowling]

Honda has their Rebel, a light-weight cruiser with a cultish following, and Yamaha has their v-star 250. Fair warning about the Yamaha: if you see it, you’ll probably want one. A couple of friends have them, and everyone who sees the bike has that reaction. Nobody would mistake it for a big bike, but it hits all the style points that made the Virago so cool to look at.

[Clay Dowling]

We’ve got a weight set in the basement that gets sporadic use at best. I’m planning on stealing the weights, shoving them in a duffel, strapping it to the pillion seat, and heading out for the high school practice lot. The full set of weights is actually about as heavy as my daughter, so that would be perfect.

[Clay Dowling]

Based on somebody’s comments here I decided to try them out. I do notice that my rides are less fatiguing. Wind noise is pretty overwhelming, but the plugs make it much less so. What I do find is that I can hear the sounds of my engine better with the plugs in, just like wearing plugs when you’re at a concert makes the music clearer.

[Clay Dowling]

That’s pretty clearly what it’s wanting here.

Have you checked that you’re not down near the reserve cutoff? That’s kind of classic fuel supply problem behavior.

[Clay Dowling]

My wife had cancer back when we were just dating. That showed me what fear is. The motorcycle does not scare me. The motorcycle requires preparation, vigilance and caution, but provided those are observed it’s a fairly safe machine. I wear all the gear. I took the class. I keep the bike well maintained. I work on the default assumption that everyone else on the road is not paying attention, for which I have ample evidence, and I treat them accordingly. I stay off the bike when road or personal conditions are averse (e.g. never if I’ve been drinking, or in the morning when there’s been a frost). I don’t ride during the peak activity hours for deer (sunrise, sunset), because they’re thicker than flies here and dart into traffic all the time (and the bike is parked during the fall rut, because they roam the roads in herds then).

But not fear. If it really scared me I wouldn’t do it.

[Clay Dowling]

That’s real bummer news. There are probably several things that could cause that behavior, and some of them might be cheap to fix. Hope you get it back without having to take out a loan.

[Clay Dowling]

The 650R is designed to be an entry level sport bike. The CBR600 has a first aid kit as one of the dealer-installed options. Red Rider in that case would refer to the color of what was left.

[Clay Dowling]

It works perfectly with people who are buying the bike for image reasons rather than riding reasons. They’re insecure about their personal image, and so they need a bike that makes them feel like a man. Then they buy all the leather and studs to improve their chances of landing one.

Definitely stay away from salesmen who use that approach if this bike is going to be anything but an ego booster. A good salesman is going to let the bike mostly sell itself. All they’re going to do is make sure you’re getting to really see the cool aspects of the bike. If they lead with a suggestion rather than a question, walk away.

I paid for my college as a soft-sell salesman for wooden toys. A customer came into my booth, I didn’t show them what I thought was the coolest toy. I asked them about the person who was getting the toy. Because the dragon pull toy/crayon holder is really awesome, but probably isn’t the right toy for the three year old.

[Clay Dowling]

but they mostly don’t come out in the light of day. If you can find a warm interior space where they’re relatively undisturbed, we get the 3 inch cockroaches. They need the protected space though, otherwise the mice eat the little brutes. This climate definitely favors mammals.

Just looked up “lovebug.” I always thought it was something that needed a good round of penicillin to clear up. Didn’t realize it was a small swarming bug. I could see those being exciting on a motorcycle as your face shield suddenly turned black.

[Clay Dowling]

I hadn’t taken the class yet when I registered my bike.

[Clay Dowling]

Some people might want more, or be willing to settle for less, but $100 will usually hold the bike. As for the title transfer, the seller can do that at his house/business when you hand over the money. He signs off on the back of the title. You take the title down to the DMV, request a new title and registration. You’ll probably have to pay tax on the bike. Note that the DMV doesn’t really have a good way to check that the price you state the bike traded for is the price you actually paid, they’ll go off the price on the title and if it seems reasonable, that’s the price you’ll be taxed on.

[Clay Dowling]

Did you get some practice in this weekend, and how did it go?

[Clay Dowling]

ride more. This is a little like explaining sex to a virgin when there’s a perfectly good mattress handy.

Go out on the streets and ride this weekend. Find some open country roads where you’ve got a little room to play without interfering with traffic. Don’t look at your tach or your speedometer to determine shifting, just shift based on the sound and feel of the machine. You’re on a sport bike, so when you’re in the right gear range you should feel like you have massive amounts of power with lots more room to go. If you don’t, shift up or down as necessary.

[Clay Dowling]

Oil changes are so trivially easy on a motorcycle, and if it’s not necessary for warranty it’s worth doing yourself. It will cost you twenty minutes and twenty bucks. About the same amount of time I’d spend driving to a mechanic and back to get the oil changed.

[Author]

Posts