Adam writes:
Kid bought it and while riding on highway tire decided to let go. Bike went down but not bad. Kid’s all right. That’s all I have now. It was a OE Dunlop D205. Not the best tire Dunlop ever made………
Sorry for the blurry pics. Blame Adam actually!
If you ever see these guys getting anywhere near your motorcycle, run the other direction.
Halloween 2005
A friend of mine was loading his FLHR Road King® onto a trailer for a long trip. He is “vertically challenged” and his Road King is necessarily lowered. A lowered motorcycle and a motorcycle trailer with a short (read: steep) ramp is not a good combination when you are trying to load your motorcycle by yourself.
So, he starts the bike up, and takes a running start at the trailer. He makes his way up the ramp until the front tire clears the top, and starts to level out in the trailer. This makes the frame closer to the point where the ramp connects to the trailer. The frame bottoms out on the trailer at the same time the jiffy stand spring catches the trailer.
I wish I had a picture of a normal spring. Let’s just say it’s typically shorter than this. This one measures a full 10″. I think normal would be about 3″.
He left the bike on the trailer, supported by the frame and the now-loose jiffy stand. I brought him a new spring, and we quickly installed it. We found a better place to load the trailer and loaded him up without further incident. I got to keep the spring for my efforts.
A man walks into a Harley-Dealer. He buys a new FXDB Street Rod. He mentions that he is signed up for the Rider’s Edge New Rider Training in a couple of weeks, but he wants to ride his bike home before taking the class. After a 60 second introduction to the bike, he takes off. The bike is cold. If you’ve ever ridden a new H-D, you KNOW how much they pop and spit right off idle. It’s spitting and popping, and wanting to die. So, the guy revs it up - to 5 grand - and dumps the clutch.
The bike takes off across the parking lot, with the guy aboard trying to gain control. He goes about 80 feet in first gear. He’s headed straight for a bunch of parked bikes, a fence, a curb, a brick post and a guardrail. He grabs the brake, and simultaneously opens the throttle wider.
He hit the curb going about 20 MPH (best guess), and narrowly missed the post on the right, but hit the back end of a bike (not shown) that was parked where the bike with the flags is in this picture.
The forward momentum and hitting the curb caused the front end of the motorcycle to raise up and land on top of the guard rail (shown), denting the guard rail with his frame.
Thankfully, the new owner was not seriously injured, suffering just a bruise and a cut finger. The bike was not so lucky.
Word has it that he completed the New Rider Training soon after……
