Twisted Road Free Day

Back in September, the Re-cycle Garage in Santa Cruz, California announced a contest on their facebook page (See here.) To participate you had to go to twistedroad.com, find a listing for an electric motorcycle, email them with the city the bike was located in, and they would add your name to a drawing held while doing their Motorcycles and Misfits podcast. The prize for this contest was a free motorcycle rental day with Twisted Road. So I found a listing for an electric motorcycle, emailed the Misfits with the city, and the morning after their podcast, I got an email saying I won! WOOHOOO!

In case you don't know already, Twisted Road is an online business that allows people to rent out their own motorcycles to people who want to ride them. For those who own bikes, this might sound kinda scary, but the folks at Twisted Road go through a lot of effort to make sure the rental experience is excellent for both owners and riders. Their site explains this much better than I can, but they're definitely legit.

So last week, I decided to use my free rental day. I searched for bikes close to me, and saw a few good choices. My first choice was a Victory Octane. Before the Victory brand was killed off, I was strongly considering buying an Octane. Hell, one of these days, I might still. I made my selection and waited for confirmation.

Well, there was a complication with owner confirmation. I'm not sure if he simply rejected my rental. Owners get to do that if they aren't confident in a rider for whatever reason. This protects the owner. It's also possible the owner just simply didn't respond. I'm not sure why I would be rejected, but who knows.

But that's ok. Austin from Twisted Road contacted me to help me find a bike. He told me to give him my top three choices, and he'd talk to the owners to get me confirmation on a rental. I emailed him my three choices, and I was confirmed for a 2008 SV650.

After the confirmation, I contacted the owner. I noticed that I had setup the pickup time for 7:00 PM, but as I thought about how traffic can be in the Orlando area, I thought perhaps 8:00 PM would be better. I checked with him telling him I could still drop the bike off at 7:00 PM if he preferred that. He was cool with that arrangement.

When the time came, I met the owner at a location near his house. He described the bike, went over the controls, etc. He then told me about the existing blemishes, dents, etc. and uploaded photos of these to the Twisted Road site. The blemishes were very minor - just what you would typically expect from a bike that is actually ridden on a regular basis - minor scratch here, minor dent there. No biggie. The bike was very clean, and you could tell it was well maintained.

We talked for a few minutes, and he mentioned that he'd ridden the bike across the country a few times. It was clear from the conversation that he was a very experienced and knowledgeable rider. I asked him about his experience with Twisted Road, and he said that he had just listed the bike, and this was his first time renting the bike out. After the conversation, he walked back to his house. I went to start the bike and .... nothing!

I called him back and told him that I couldn't start the bike. He walked back to check out the situation. He told me I needed to pull in the clutch lever, and..... I felt like a huge idiot. Of course it has a clutch sensor - it's a modern motorcycle. But when you're used to riding old bikes with Harley technology, you forget that modern bikes actually have such things.

So I started the bike, and off I went. I originally planned to take a minor highway home to give me a little time to get used to the bike, but I was instantly comfortable riding it. SV650's really are easy to ride. I jumped on the interstate, and it felt like this was a bike I had been riding for years.

This is a very different bike than the ones I own. Comparisons with other bikes would be more appropriate, but I will compare this bike to what I know. And what I've got the most recent experience with are my current bikes - a 30 year old Sportster and a 20 year old Buell M2 Cyclone.

This bike did not feel as powerful as my Buell. It shouldn't - my Buell has a 1.2 liter engine which has almost twice the displacement of the SV650. But I can tell you this - the Buell definitely has less than twice the power of this bike. Also, I didn't come anywhere close to pushing the SV650 to it's limits. I was very mindful that this wasn't my bike and that it wasn't my place to flog it. The power delivery is very different between the two bikes, and had I pushed the SV close to it's max, I might have a different impression.

I can say the SV650 had all the power it needed. It didn't struggle to get to or maintain highway speed, and it felt like I could easily pass someone if needed. The throttle response was better than with the carbureted bikes I'm used to riding. The engine was smooth. I'm not sure it's the smoothest bike I've ridden, but it's much smoother than the paint can shakers I'm used to riding. 

The SV handled well. Now, I can't tell you that it's better than my Buell. I honestly dont' know. Like I said, it wasn't my place to flog the bike, but I sure didn't see any indication that it was any less nimble. And, of course it's more nimble than the Sportster, thought the Sportster isn't as bad as many may think.

It definitely had better brakes than either of my bikes. To be fair to my Buell, it is an old bike, but I think the breaks on the Buell are in good shape. I think the comparison is valid. But the SV has dual front disk brakes while my Buell has only a single rotor up front. My old Sportster also has dual front disk brakes, but .... well... should I bother describe it's braking? It's not bad, but of course it doesn't stop as well as the SV

The next morning, I got up and began my morning ride just as the sun was rising. I decided to take the Sugarloaf Mountain Ride described here. Sure, it's laughable that anything in Florida is called a mountain, but Sugarloaf Mountain is Florida's most prominent hill. At a whopping 312 feet (some moutain, huh), it's not much lower that the highest spot in Florida. It probably is the highest spot on the peninsula.

The route named for the mountain doesn't actually get to the tallest point, but it's still quite scenic. On the west side of Lake Apopka, it's a rural area with little traffic just outside the Metro Orlando area. While there's better twisties in other states, this route provides a nice break from the usual flat-n-straight roads typical in Florida. If you don't mind being slowed down by an occasional group of bicyclists, it's a fun ride.

At the end of the route, I turned around to go back North. I wanted to go to the actual "peak" of Sugarloaf Mountain or hill or whatever it is. I was actually surprised at how steep the road to the top was. It's not the steepest road I've ridden a bike on, but it's been a while since I've seen a road this steep. Of course, the SV didn't struggle at all on the way up. Once at the top, you could easily see across Lake Apopka. I've heard if the weather is right, you can even make out the space cost from there.

After that, I rode up North to highway 19 up through Eustis and then on to Ocala National Forrest. Ocala National Forest isn't quite as nice as the Sugar Loaf Mountain area, but it's still a nice enough place to ride. I've hiked out there just a little bit, and I get the idea that it's more scenic on foot. Part of the problem is that you've got tall trees right up to the side of the road. You can ride right past lakes and not know it.

Still, there were good things to see. I enjoyed riding through the small towns. I saw a dude on a tricycle dressed like a homeless version of Santa Claus. I'm not judging the dude - he seemed happy enough. 

It was while I was going through the forest that I started to needed to take occasional breaks. After a while, my left shoulder would hurt a bit for some reason. While the SV seat was very comfortable, I still needed to stretch my legs after a while. With each break, I'd get off the bike for about 10 minutes, walk around, maybe grab a snack if I was at a store, etc. Afterwards, I felt just fine, and could go for about another 45 min. to an hour before needing another break.

Somewhere around the North side of the forest, I rode over a tall bridge going over a barge canal. If there was a walk way, I might have stopped to take pictures. As I glanced down at the canal, I imagined being down there in a canoe. Maybe one day, I'll do that!

When I reached Palatka, I decided to make my way to highway 17 and then go south. As I got close to highway 17, I noticed the cooling tower of a nuclear plant in the distance. I didn't know we had one there. It was oddly scenic and beautiful in a way that I just could not capture when I pulled over to take a picture. So you might ask how the hell a nuclear plant's cooling tower might be scenic. Well, with the lighting, and the way it dominated the horizon and..... well, maybe you'd just have to have been there.

Going down 17 was actually nicer than going through the Forest, despite the fact that the area was more populated. Before actually turning south, I crossed a long bridge over the St. Johns River. Looking over the river was nice, and I regret not stopping to take my time seeing it. Maybe that's something else I can do on a future trip.

As I got to Crescent City, it was time for another break. I found a not-so-nice park, but it did have a cool pier going out over Crescent Lake. I walked out to the end of the pier and looked around. It was a nice relaxing place to rest. 

I noticed increasingly more motorcycles as I went farther south. Why not - it was a great day to ride! I was in such a great mood that I even waved to the guys on the Can Am Spyders. When I got to Highway 40, I turned back west towards the forest and started to see more folks on dirt bikes. One day, I should get a DR650 that I can ride to the forest and check out the fire roads.

Once I got back to Highway 19, I decided to turn East on Highway 42 and take the back roads back through Mount Plymouth and through the County Road 435 twisties just north of my house. I got home at about 1:30, so that was about 6 hours of riding with about 30 min. of breaks. I was drained but had a blast. The SV650 did very well.

So now for the not so great part of the day. At about 5:00 I decided I should ride round a bit before turning the bike in. My wife went to the store, and was going to meet me there to pick me up at 7:00. I started the bike, got to the intersection at the corner of my property, and waited for traffic to pass before turning right. When I got my chance, I started to leave when it felt like the bike was being yanked out from underneath me. At the same time, I was hearing what sounded like either gravel or dirt. I landed in a way that made a few of my ribs really hurt, but was otherwise ok.

Some guy in a van stopped to ask if I was ok as I picked myself up off the ground. I was dazed just a bit as I picked up the bike. The guy in the van kept asking me if I needed help, and I told him I was ok. If I wasn't still dazed a bit, I might have appreciated his offer to help more, but at the moment, I was just wanted him to move on. Then the "oh fucking hell, I dropped this dude's bike" feeling set in. I've made this same turn every work day with rare exception for the past three and a half years on either my Sportster or my Buell, but the one day I'm riding someone else's bike is the day the back tire slides out from under me thanks to some loose dirt and gravel at the corner of the turn.

So I decided to go directly to the drop off area near the owner's house in time for him to have daylight to see the damage. At that point, I really didn't feel like doing a whole lot more riding than that anyway. When I got there, the sun had just set, but there was still enough light to look the bike over. I called to see if he was home, and he walked over to survey the damage.

Luckily he had installed frame savers on the bike, and the right side frame saver took the brunt of the fall. It was easily scuffed up enough to justify replacing. There was also some scuffing on the muffler, the break lever was bent a bit, and there was some scuffing on the front. The function of the bike was definitely not impaired, but I clearly had some damages to pay for. We both talked to Austin at Twisted Road about how to deal with the damage. Austin asked if I was ok, and I told him I just had a couple ribs that could feel better, but was ok. The owner and I negotiated an amount, and arranged to have that paid out of the required credit card hold for the rental. During the negotiations, the owner was fair. And while I'm sure he wasn't thrilled to see that his bike was damaged, he didn't freak out about it. I think I was fair in the negotiations, too. At least I hope I was.

After I filled the bike up with gas and returned, we talked for a bit about motorcycles while I waited for my wife. Considering I scuffed up his bike, it was a friendly conversation. He seems to be a really good guy, and I feel so bad about dropping his bike. I know this was not a good rental experience for him, and I hope this doesn't deter him from continuing to rent out his bike through Twisted Road. I literally lost sleep that night thinking about it. Of course, the pain in my ribs didn't help with sleep either.

After my wife picked me up, I told her what happened and I told her how much the damage was going to cost us. She wasn't happy but she didn't freak out.  I thought she was going to give me a hard time over this, but she didn't. She was mostly just glad I was ok.

She did ask if I thought it was worth how much it cost me. This was supposed to be a free rental day, but through no fault the owner or Twisted Road, it ended up costing me more than it would to rent this bike for a few days. Obviously, if I could somehow know for a fact that this mishap would happen ahead of time, I wouldn't have gone through with the rental. If I could have known ahead of time that there would be no mishap, but it still would have cost me as much as it did, I probably wouldn't have rented the bike simply due to my tight budget. That's money that can go towards tools and parts for my own bikes. However, if I could know ahead of time that there would be no mishaps, no monetary cost, but I'd have to let someone punch me in the ribs really hard at the end of the ride, I'd go for it! 😝

The rental day may have cost me more than I anticipated, but a life without risks is a life without rewards. As motorcyclists, we take risks every time we get on a motorcycle. We are mostly rewarded for it, and on rare occasion, we're punished for it. Over all, the rewards outweigh the punishment. While I feel bad about the bike, I don't regret the rental day at all.

I don't know if I'll rent again with Twisted Road simply because it's not often that I need to rent a bike. But then again, I might! If I decide there's a bike I want to buy, Twisted Road offers an excellent opportunity to find a similar bike that I can test ride for a whole day. Had I done a test ride on an SV650 at a dealership, there's no way I would have gotten to know the bike like I did with the SV I rode yesterday. Also, I might see a bike that I'm simply curious about.

I might also rent out a bike through Twisted Road in the future. There's no way I'm renting out my old Sportster or Buell. They're a little too quirky, and need a little more maintenance than would be appropriate for something you let someone else pay you to ride. But if I buy a newer bike in the future, I could use Twisted Road as a way to help cover the costs of owning the bike. In fact, I could see myself buying a bike for the purpose of renting out through Twisted Road. An SV650 would be a great choice for this due to its flexibility, but the same could be said for many bikes.

In any case, whether you have a bike to rent or feel like renting a bike, I highly recommend using Twisted Road.

By the way, the owner said it was ok for me to put a link to his Twisted Road page here. So if you're going to be in the Orlando area and need a bike to ride, I recommend talking to this guy here: https://www.twistedroad.com/public-profile.php?user=21044

Buell Exhaust Repair

About two weeks ago, I thought I heard an exhaust leak around the lower front port side of my Buell Cyclone. (I'm using the navel term port here - in this case meaning the left side of the motorcycle from the perspective of a rider sitting normally on the bike.) I also noticed that the bike started to sound more like a Sportster. Heheh, go figure. When I investigated, I noticed what looked like a crack in my exhaust where a mounting bracket was attached to the exhaust pipe going into the muffler.

I think what happened was a stress fracture formed along the outer edge of one of the welds holding the bracket to the exhaust pipe. After that, the vibration of the engine simply caused the crack to spread. Then, at some point, the other weld was supporting more weight than it was originally and formed it's own stress fracture which grew in a similar manner. The edges of the weld are a natural place for this to happen, as the wall of the exhaust pipe is much thinner than the weld itself.

The weekend after discovering this, I pulled off the muffler to weld up the cracks. When I unbolted the front mounting bracket, it simply fell loose to the ground. The cracks had spread all the way around the original welds. Two holes were left on the pipe where the mount once was.

Fitting the bracket back in place was quite simple. When I put the bracket back in place, there were no large gaps, and gravity simply held it in place while I added a couple tack welds. I almost used no filler rod at all - I simply melted some of the excess metal from the weld beads and flowed it into the puddle I had formed along the crack.

Here, you can see where I stopped part way to show how I was using the existing weld material to fill in the crack.

Here's a pic from pretty much the same perspective after completing the welding on this side.

I also noticed a few stray cracks in the pipe leading away from the welds. I wonder if those were originally there, or if the thermal stress from welding caused them. I simply went over those with my torch to weld the cracks closed. After letting everything cool, I grabbed the bracket and tried to move it back and forth to see if there were any obvious weak points in my welds. Nothing broke apart, but I did see a very large crack in the bracket itself where it mounts to the frame. I simply went over that crack as well, welding on both sides of the crack.

Here's an example of where I welded up a stray crack.

Well, I think this should hold up. After riding around a bit to see that it stays together, I should probably paint it, since there's a lot of exposed ungalvanized steel there now. Below are some more pics at different stages of the repair process.

The weld repair from another perspective.

Weld repair of the crack in the bracket. Almost missed this crack.

The other side of the repaired bracket..

Here's the exhaust after reinstalling on the bike.

Shadow 500 Project

Back in April, I noticed an ad in Craigslist for a free Shadow 500. The ad described the bike as a scrap bike, and mentioned that the frame was badly rusted in one area and may need to be replaced. So after a few email exchanges, one of my sons and I went to pick the bike up.

We met at the owner's apartment complex, and the bike was in the parking lot next to his newer bike. He said he got the bike to fix it up, but didn't have the time or anywhere to work on it. He was moving, and really couldn't take the bike with him. Before I talked to him, he had called a metal scrap yard to see if they'd pick the bike up, but they would not. We loaded the bike in the back of the van, and he threw in some brand new carburetor parts. Originally, I wondered whether the van had enough room to hold the bike, but I probably could have fit three in the back.

The bike has definitely seen better times, but hey, it's a free bike! I think I can get it working after quite a bit of work. The plan, some of which I've done already, is to strip the bike down to the frame, assess whether the frame is salvageable, repair or replace the frame, paint the frame, get the engine running, and then reassemble, replacing parts as needed. I haven't checked but I bet the tires are old. Probably a good idea to replace the break lines.

One thing I get to look forward to is pulling the heads from the engine. The spark plugs were missing, and, of course, the bike had been sitting for who knows how long in a parking lot. When looking in the intake ports, one can see plenty of rust on the valves. An endoscope through the spark plug holes show crap on top of the pistons. Just to be safe, I think I should take the top end apart and clean things up.

The badly rusted part of the frame was fairly visible before disassembly. Where the rust holes are at, I think the frame is plenty strong enough to support the swing arm, but might be questionable for supporting the center stand.

So far, I've disassembled the bike to where essentially everything is stripped off the frame. I've also begun to repair the badly rusted portion of the frame. I've got some 1/8" (or close to that) steel from which I'm cutting small pieces and welding in place of sections of the rusted area.

 The rust repair has been a lot of fun! At first, I thought I'd be using my stick welder, but aside from a few initial welds, I'm doing a lot of work with my oxy-acetylene torch. I'm also getting some experience shaping the steel strips by heating with the torch and hammering into the shape I want. When the steel is hot, it almost seems like working with clay.

If I am able to successfully complete the frame repair (at this point, I'm pretty sure I will), the next step for the frame will be to remove any remaining fasteners, strip off the old paint, and then repaint with a good urethane paint. After that, I'll proceed with getting the engine going, and then decide what's next from there.

Here's some pics at various stages of the disassembly process:

The disassembly process has been started. You can see the green trunk I'm storing parts in at the top of the pic.

The engine had just been removed. The bike is almost stripped to the frame.

Here's pics of the rust damage:

Looks pretty bad doesn't it.

Here's some pics of the repair process (which has not yet been completed):

I'm holding a piece of flat steel that I've shaped to fit right about where I'm holding it.

As thick as this steel is, the repair should be plenty strong.

This is that same piece welded in place. You can see where I accidentally blew threw the edge.

Another patch in place!! I love welding!

I've welded over a couple bad places and filled in some rust holes using just a bit of welding rod.

Here, you can see where I've hammered the patch around the back.

I just didn't feel like cutting that tab off the patch before welding it on. This is on the other side.

I heated that tab and the edge of the patch on the other side and hammered them around. 

Here's the other side again. Basically, this is looking from inside the frame. You can see the tab hammered around. 

Why a Buell M2 Cyclone

 

Recently, I decided it was time for another bike. I quite regularly check out the ads on Craigslist, and I weighed many different options. For a while, I almost had my mind made up that I would finance a new DR650. I thought about riding the fire roads around Ocala National Forest, and maybe one day even going on a long adventure up to the Rockies. I though about getting an old ran-when-parked bike that maybe only needed the carbs cleaned or had other minor issues I could easily fix. I came across several candidates, including an '85 Goldwing, a couple of CB900c's, and a GS800. I definitely kept my eye on 5-speed Sportsters and even well-priced Ironhead Sportsters in good shape. But I've wanted a Buell for a very long time. When I saw a '98 M2 Cyclone with 16k miles priced for what Buell Blasts are often priced at, I had to get it!

One might ask why I even need another bike. My old '88 Sportster has held up pretty well over the last three years. But there have been mechanical problems I've had to deal with - transmission issues, shifter lever issues, electrical issues, etc. I've been able to handle them just fine, but when my bike is down for repairs for several days or even several weeks, sharing the van with my wife is challenging. It's not just that I would rather be riding, but my wife has to take kids places, has medical appointments, grocery shopping, general errands, etc. Having a second bike not only gives me a spare bike to commute on, but also allows me to split the wear and tear of commuting between both bikes, which increases the time between break downs and required maintenance. My Sportster isn't getting any younger, and who knows when a catastrophic failure might occur.

One might wonder how a Buell could be a practical choice of motorcycle. They're no longer produced, and when they were, they were manufactured in limited quantities. But consider the engine is essentially just a hot-rodded Sportster 1200 engine. Almost every part in the engine or transmission can be replaced with a newly manufactured part, and there's quite a few used parts available. Other parts, like the brakes, wheels, etc. are not as easily replaceable, but I think I can manage. Also, both the engine and transmission should be easy to work on. No valve adjustments or coolant changes are needed. Any major mechanical repairs shouldn't be complicated.

This bike is a lot of fun! It has roughly double the horsepower of my old Sportster, and is about 60 lbs. lighter. At 70 mph, you can tell my old Sportster isn't too far from its limit, but the Cyclone can effortlessly handle highway speeds. So far, I haven't felt the need to push the bike to its limits, but it does accelerate quite nicely. I think it might be the most nimble bike I've ridden so far, which honestly isn't saying a lot - I haven't ridden that many different bikes. But it is quite nimble. I wish Central Florida had some canyons to carve!

The bike feels very reliable - like maybe I could ride it to California and back so long as I took enough pain medication to deal with the discomfort of the seat. It is actually more shakey at idle than my Sportster. This is probably do to the lighter fly wheels and because the frame has less mass to dampen the vibrations. But once the engine is at 3000 RPM, it runs quite smoothly. I love being able to put my bike in neutral from 1st gear at a stop every time, which is something I can't reliably do with my Sportster.

Time will tell whether I still like this bike in a year, but I'd bet money I will. In fact, I think I'll likely still be riding this bike many years from now.

Another Throttle Cable Replacement

Last week, I had yet another throttle cable breakage. Luckily, I've got two cables going to my carburetor, so I was able to get home. But I don't like riding with just one good throttle cable. I wasn't sure how long I could ride like that, and the good cable seemed to get a little too loose. That left me taking the van to work for a couple of days. 

With my first breakage a while back, I replaced the inner cable with 1/16 wire rope from Home Depot keeping the same cable housing. For this, I created a mold from pieces of aluminum flat stock for the carburetor end barrel fitting, and did what this guy did, more or less: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PV3XLAG3jx8. Additionally, I soldered a small bead on the control end to act as a cable stop to fit inside the ferrule. 

Later on, the control end of the cable broke. I had trouble soldering on another bead, since my silver-soldering skills kinda suck, so I just welded a bead of RG45 on the end. This seemed to work quite well, but I didn't think about the lack of corrosion resistance. I think this may have lead to last week's cable break, which happened right below where I welded on the end of the cable. I bet I burned off the zinc coating from the wire rope right below the weld, allowing it to corrode.

Without enough length left for a repair, I replaced the inner cable with some more wire rope from Home Depot, but I did things a bit differently this time.

To start with, I decided that instead of trying to fool with another molded solder barrel fitting for the carburetor end, I decided to just use a piece of 1/4" rod. I was initially going to use steel, but I worried about rust and wear. Luckily, I found some 1/4" zinc rod at the local Tractor Supply store. Using Zinc should take care of corrosion, and I can use grease to deal with wear.

After grinding a small flat spot on the side of the rod, I used my drill press to drill a 1/16" hole through the rod. Then, I used a larger bit (can't remember the size, sorry), to drill roughly half way through to provide space for a cable stop. I then cut the rod to approximately the length I needed.

Next, I brazed a bead of bronze on the end of the cable. After feeding the cable through barrel fitting, I compared the size of the bronze bead to the opening. I ground it down until it was about the right diameter, and lightly tapped it into the opening with a hammer. Next, with the bead tightly in place, I ground it down until more-or-less flush with the surface of the barrel fitting.

The assembled carburetor end of the cable already looked nicer than the old cable with the molded solder barrel fitting, but the new barrel fitting needed to be trimmed down a bit. Grinding with the grinding wheel on my drill press seemed too slow, so I used my angle grinder to speed things along. I did, however, use the grinding wheel to clean up the edge a bit.

After confirming that I could hook up the cable to the carburetor, I moved on to the control end of the cable.

I knew from past experience that feeding the cable through the metal portion of the cable housing with it's 90 degree turn was difficult and often lead to the cable end fraying. To prevent that, I brazed the end of the cable a bit. I still had quite a bit of difficulty getting it through. I tried a few different tricks without success, but finally had luck by welding a copper wire to the bronze coating on the cable end. (I say welding here, since I joined copper to copper-based alloy). Feeding the copper wire through the metal part of the housing was easy, though I did have to grind down the sides of the brazed end a bit to pull the cable through.

Once I did that, I cut away the copper wire. For whatever reason, I was having trouble getting a nice bronze bead on the control end, so I trimmed the bronze section off, and welded a bead of RG45 to the end. I then brazed over that for corrosion resistance.

With minimal cleanup, this fit into the ferrule quite easily. I did do just a tad bit of grinding to shape the brazed-over bead flush with the surface of the ferrule. Then, it was a simple matter to install on the throttle control. After making a few adjustments, I took the bike for a test ride and could not find any problems.

Hopefully, this holds up better than the last cable. After looking back at the pictures, I am concerned by what looks to be some unprotected cable below the bronzed bead cable stop on the carburetor end. Hopefully, just keeping both ends of the cable properly greased will prevent any corrosion. Time will tell.

Just Scored Cheap Parts From an Auction!

So let me tell you about my experience with an auction advertised on Craigslist! It was very different from an Ebay auction. The post-auction was much less convenient, but on the flip side, there was much less competition. After it was all over, I spent just a little over $100 for a complete, almost mint condition 4 speed transmission for my '88 Sportster and a set of very-good-condition turn signals!



I habitually rummage through the motorcycle parts listings on Craigslist, and I ran across two different links to an auction closing in about a month. There was quite a variety of parts listed with considerably low starting bids - low enough that I was somewhat suspicious. Among the various items were headlights, gas tanks, tools, exhaust parts, and one mostly-complete motorcycle. These parts were being auctioned as a part of liquidating the assets of a motorcycle shop in Pompano, Florida.

I saw quite a few things I was interested in. I liked a few of the tanks - though the ones I liked weren't Sportster tanks, I thought I might could make them work. I saw a set of turn signals that looked nice. I plan on making some, but at an initial bid of $10, I thought they might be good to use in the short term. If they were nice OEM turn signals, I figured I could eventually sell them for much more. I saw speedometers and tachometers that looked interesting, but there was no indication of whether they worked.


One thing that really caught my attention was a "mint condition" four-speed transmission for a late-model Sportster. At a glance, I was certain it would work for my bike. Now I couldn't tell if it had a late '84-'86 gear ratio or a '87-'90 gear ratio, but that's ok. There's only two gears that actually differ between the two. For an initial bid price of $50 - about the low-end cost for a single gear - there was a complete transmission. With a few of the gears and the shifter forks in my transmission being beat up a bit, I'm sure a spare transmission will eventually come in handy.

I would periodically check to see if there were any bids on the parts. I would notice a bid here or there, but most of the parts had no bid at all. Maybe folks were just waiting till the end of the auction? Luckily, I saw no bids on the parts I wanted, but I knew that even with the extremely low initial bids, I could only afford a few things. And who knew whether they would be bid up dramatically on the day the auction closed?

So during the week leading up to the auction, I narrowed down the list of things I might bid on. I saw a couple of welders at a bid prices that almost amounted to theft - except who knows if they work? I decided that while a nicer tank would be good, there were more practical things to bid on. I decided to bid on the transmission and the set of turn signals. I figured that if I were outbid on the transmission - and I wouldn't go much beyond the initial $50 due to my low budget - I'd bid on some other things like the large rack with spools of electrical wire or maybe the heavy-duty looking bench vices.

So I followed a link to register as a bidder. This felt a little spooky. I had never heard of the auction site before, and had no idea whether to trust it. I did a little research to see if it was listed in relation to any scams, and decided to take a chance. I bravely entered my information and credit card number, and ... jumped through a few hoops, the details of which I don't remember ... and I was registered.

So I placed my bid on the transmission, and then had trouble finding the listings for the initial auction. "No problem", I thought! I went back to Craigslist to find the link and ..... and.... hmmmm, this site said I wasn't registered!!! WTF! So I registered again, and the site seemed unfamiliar. I felt like maybe I was a fool, but I then bid on the turn signals. Turns out that two different sites posted two different links to the same auction. That's kinda weird. So I ended up registering for both sites, and bid on each item on a different site.

So on the day of the auction, I checked and checked and NO ONE AT ALL bid on the transmission or turn signals! While I didn't see anything explicitly saying so, I got the impression that this was some sort of hybrid internet-live auction. Maybe there were bids on site? If these were on auction on Ebay, there's no way in hell I would be without competition. But sure enough, I got emails declaring me the winner for both the transmission and for the set of turn signals. I looked at the other listings, and so many very good items had no bids at all. I don't think I saw any listings with more than one bid.

So was this a scam? I got an email from yet another guy working for another business. He didn't seem to be affiliated with either of the two auction sites, and based on his name seemed to be the owner of his own business. Despite having provided credit card information, he emailed a form for me to fill out giving authorization to use my card as payment. He also said "for some reason you have 2 invoices." He had a very pretentious sounding name, which made me wonder even more if this was bogus.

But I did some research on him and his company. There was nothing negative about the guy. I got the impression that he specialized in auctions where businesses or estates are being liquidated. There was a YouTube clip with a segment of "60 Minutes" showing him conducting an auction of some crooked lawyers assets in that lawyer's former office. I guess he was actually conducting the auction and simply used the two sites as a means for allowing online bidding. Then the two sites posted the redundant listings on craigslist.

There was a lot of going back and forth with this guy regarding payment and shipping. I totally missed this, but after the auction I saw clearly in the information about the auction that neither the seller or auctioneer would be responsible for shipping, and that buyers would have to make their own arrangements. So it looked like I needed to take a day off for a road trip to get the items in the time available.

After my initial email exchange with him, he told me that he was going to ship the items as a favor. How cool! It still seemed kinda confusing. Through out our exchanges, his responses where quite brief, and I wondered if he actually read my emails close enough to know all that I said. And you know what - that totally makes sense. I got the impression that he was juggling arrangements with many different buyers. He was no doubt quite busy. Going ahead and shipping despite the original plan to have buyers make their own arrangements no doubt made him that much busier. All things considered, he was providing good service.

So he sent another form asking to either be sure my card info would clear or to please give authorization for another form of payment. Granted, I told him to wait until the last pickup day to run my card. I kinda bid knowing that my paycheck would be direct deposited before the deadline for payment. So maybe telling him to wait spooked him a bit.

Much of my concern about this being a scam would have been alleviated had PayPal been an option for payment. It seems to me that it would likely have been much simpler for him as well. But then again, I don't know much about these kinds of auctions. He might just not be tech savvy enough to setup PayPal payments, or maybe there are very good business reasons not to use PayPal for these kinds of auctions? It's hard to imagine what those reasons might be, but who knows?

So on the last day of the pickup window arrived, everything went to plan. He confirmed that he took everything to the UPS store, they sent me their invoices, and I paid them online. I got tracking numbers for both shipments..... both shipments? What? I asked for everything to be shipped as a single shipment! I paid about $40 for shipping in total. That's what I would have paid for gas to ride my bike down there to pick up the items myself!



Still, I know the guy was really busy. Everything to be shipped was probably grouped by invoice, and I had two. And I had to keep in mind that originally, the deal was for buyers to pick up the parts on their own or to make their own shipping arrangements. And while I kinda half-way looked forward to the ride, I also kinda worried about my 30 year old motorcycle breaking down on the side of the road.

I was very happy when on the very next day, the transmission and turn signals arrived. They were as good as I expected! I had nice turn signals with metal housings for less than the cost of plastic Chinese ones that one can find on Ebay.


The transmission wasn't quite mint, but very close to it. I could see just the slightest indication that it was once in a motorcycle. The part of the mainshaft that sticks out of the housing showed the surface rust you'd expect from a used transmission. The inner bearing race showed just the faintest indication that it took a few turns inside the mainshaft case roller bearing. If they had said that the gears themselves were brand new, I would maybe have believed them. It wasn't mint, but it was damn good, especially for the $50 plus fees, plus sales tax, plus shipping, etc. which was still only about $80. I bet it would have sold for at least a few hundred on Ebay. I doubt that if it were a never-installed, NOS transmission that it would be any more reliable.

So moral of the story - look for these kinds of auctions! They're not quite as convenient as an Ebay auction, but if you do your research on the folks conducting the auction and they seem to be legit, you can get some insane deals! You can not only get parts you need for your bike, but parts you can sell on Ebay for much more! Actually, I really wish I had enough to do just that!