Kneeslider strikes again!

Last week, the Kneeslider posted an article about the beauty of Ron Wood's dirt track motorcycles. There was mention in the article that no one was building these for the street. I posted in the comments that, with a little help from Moto Carrera, you can turn a Yamaha R5/RD350/400/RZ350 into a "street tracker", combining the sleekness of a dirt track racer with the practicality of a street-legal road bike.

So they then went a did a little write up about it. Thanks for the shout-out guys!

What the heck is this?

Yet another interesting auction on eBay:

THIS IS A WHEEL HORSE NOT SURE WHAT TO CALL IT OTHER THAN A HONDA/WHEEL HORSE WITH SIDE CAR

Gotta love the piston steering cap and hood ornament. And to think, it's one of twenty!

Do we really need that much coverage of cars turning left?

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE sign this petition to increase the broadcast of non-NASCAR related programming on SPEED. There's so much more to motorsports than just 300+ miles of sponsor-stickered cars turning left. And a hundred shows about the process and drama of 300+ miles of sponsor-stickered cars turning left. And a hundred shows with people talking and analyzing the process and drama of 300+ miles of sponsor-stickered cars turning left.

I want to see more Superbike; More Dakar and WRC, instead of news clips; more F1, Champ Car, and other open wheel racing; coverage of marque-specific racing (Cooper Challenge, Spec Miatas, etc); more GrandAm, LeMans series stuff, BTC, DTM, V8 Supercar and other road racing; more shows like Victory By Design and Two Wheel Tuesday...

20364 signatures so far...

New! R5 Site Subscription Options

Hey everyone! More site updating!

After a few people wrote in about having some trouble with the old wonky subscription service for this site, and after listening to some glowing reviews of a new(er) service in action (on a podcast from the guys at White Roof Radio), I've aligned my blog with FeedBurner to bring you a new RSS subscription option. You'll see the new link in the sidebar, with a shiny orange icon next to it.

So... what's all this fancy RSS stuff, you ask? Well, it's an easy way to stay on top of what's going on here (and many other sites to which you can subscribe). Confused? Get a better handle on the whole RSS thing here.

If you'd rather not get into the whole newsreader thing, and you'd still like to subscribe, you can always sign up via email. Just enter your address is the field located below the RSS button in the "Subscribe" section of the sidebar, and that's it!

I hope this proves useful to you guys! If you have problems, let me know... I'll see if I can sort things out...

Vintage Bike Auctions

Overheard on the Kneeslider:

The Estate of Barr Ashcraft
GIANT TREASURE TROVE!
Over 50 Classic Motorcycles
Over 70 Antique Tractors
Over 170 Classic Cars and Trucks
Antiques and Home Contents
TONS OF TOOLS AND EQUIPMENT!
Everything will be sold to the highest bidder TWO DAY AUCTION JULY 6 and 7
Shutesbury Mass (North of Springfield)

Apparently, among the 50 bikes are Ariels, AJSs, BSAs, BMWs, Ducatis, Hondas, Moto-Guzzis, Laverdas, Matchlesses, Nortons, Royal Enfields, Suzukis, Triumphs, Velocettes, Yamahas, and others, as well as some basket cases, too. Visit the J. Wood and Company site for more info...

But if you'd rather just pick up a whole collection at once, check out this auction for an entire museum. For a listing of the collection, visit the MidAmerica Auctions site.

Rear Set Installation

Finally, here it is! The rearsets go on! I documented everything while doing it, getting the camera nice and oily in the process. I apologize for the picture quality, as the lighting in the garage is not studio-grade, and I was one-handing most of the shots!

• Flickr photo series of rearset install
  

Two Wheel Tuesday - Recap

The ne'er-do-wells of PRIMER did indeed attend this week's Two Wheel Tuesday at Abbaye... and we had a good time. Turns out everyone wound up knowing someone, and new friends were made.

A bunch of Ducatis and Triumphs were on hand, as well as some tasty Beemers (for the difference between Beemers and Bimmers, see here). It was all washed down with a glass of La Chouffe ($3 special!) and a big honking plate of fish and chips. After a little late summer night hooliganism on Kelly Drive (map), I retired a happy boy.

Anyways, we discovered the fine folks that put on this weekly shindig are none other than the Philadelphia Riders. These cats run the gamut, and the list of bikes represented is impressive. Check out their site, and look at some of the other events coming up. Chances are, PRIMER will be there!

Two Wheel Tuesday

In keeping with the good weather, the ne'er-do-wells of PRIMER (and some special guests) will be riding the bikes down to the Abbaye in the Northern Liberties for Two Wheel Tuesday, a weekly gathering of unique motorcycles. It's something we've been trying to get together for some time now. Finally, the weather, our schedules and my bike are all cooperating. See you there for some Yards?

Bend that Kickstart Lever!

Last night I went over to my friend Brian's house (fellow rider and business partner in PRIMER), where he graciously lent his vise, torch and shutterbugginess to my ongoing quest of mounting rearsets to the R5.

To recap, I got Raask rearsets for the R5 from friends for my 30th birthday. However, when mounted, the relocation of the rear brake lever impedes the full travel of the kickstart lever, meaning if I put 'em on I wouldn't be able to get the bike started easily. This required heating and bending the kickstart lever to clear the brake before mounting. I got a spare kickstart off Ebay a few weeks ago, and finally got the chance to start bending things into shape last night.

Here, Russ (in background, fellow Yammie rider and also a member of PRIMER), Brian and I take turns heating, bending, and swearing at the lever in Brian's basement workshop. It was quite fun, I must say. The process was well-documented by Brian himself:

• Flickr photo series of bending
  
• Video of bending action (492k QuickTime)

Stay tuned... there's more to come on the saga of the R5 rearset install...

Cleaning up...

Some of you may have noticed things are changing a bit around here. I'm in the middle of redesigning this site. It's become less of a site about my personal bike and more of a site about R5s in general, plus due to it's age I think a freshening up and a good reorganization are in order.

Most importantly, I've switched to a archived posting system, so not every single post will be visible anymore, as in the past. You'll find the archives sorted by month at the bottom of the left-hand navigation bar.

Keep an eye out for more changes coming soon!