Hey,
Life is nuts as you know, and we seem to be headed into a couple of McCarthy eras, one over terrorism and the other around climate change.
During the McCarthy era, thousands of Americans were accused of being communists or communist sympathizers and became the subject of aggressive investigations and questioning before government or private-industry panels, committees and agencies.
Many lost their jobs, were banned, or went to prison.–Wikipedia
They are now trying to find a way to prosecute a company over their comments on climate change. Just the other night I watched a documentary on how our planet is constantly changing and of course the universe is constantly changing, yet they want to blame everything on the car you drive, or cow farts. It goes too far when they want to sue you or put you in jail for your comments.
Plus, hang on for this. Folks in the government want to put the Terrorist label on anything that might give them more control over segments of our society, like bike clubs. Hang on.
But there is hope in the Medicine Buddha and Big Boobs. See below:
JIMS POWER FAN TEST– We did several of the same tests, with the same results.
Basically, we had a bike idle in the parking lot for 1/2 hour test cycles.
The same engine configuration, with the same ambient air temp.
We used JIMS engines for the testing (Since we have parts, and knew that this test cycle would roach a motor, not good to idle air cooled motors for that long).
We used the cylinder head temp sensor for our data input.
When idling a motor that long, without a fan, cylinder head temp would climb to roughly 420 degrees.
That same test, with the fan on, cylinder head temp would climb to roughly
320 / 330 degrees and stabilize.
We did this back to back, many times and have spreadsheets of temperature recordings. That said, all tests repeated the same results … Thus our advertising stating that it can drop cylinder head temp 100 degrees.
–Paul Platts
JIMS Machine
QUICK, OPEN THE BIKERNET BAD JOKE LIBRARY—
-Whatever you may look like, marry a man your own age. As your beauty fades, so will his eyesight.
-Housework can’t kill you, but why take a chance?
– Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing up is like shoveling the sidewalk before it stops snowing
-Phyllis Diller
-The reason women don’t play football is because 11 of them would never wear the same outfit in public.
-Best way to get rid of kitchen odours: Eat out.
-A bachelor is a guy who never made the same mistake once.
–from Jerry and Rogue
GLORIOUS TOP, FRONT & CENTER DETAIL —
The Ken’s Factory Neo-Fusion One-Piece Riser Clamp and matching Billet Dog Bone Risers are available.
Due to popular demand because it has been seen adorning Ken’s winning show bikes, these are to be available starting now. Old, tried and true meets new and improved; the Neo-Fusion One-Piece Riser Clamp with features that include:
Hinged, 1-piece billet aluminum design
Inspired by Hydroglide styling with a modern approach to style and strength.
Embellished with brass Ken’s Factory emblem
For stock H-D ‘Glide model applications with 1-inch bars.
Aluminum polished (SKU#: 2-300 ) or black (SKU#: 2-301)
The matching Billet Dog Bone Risers are available separately or bundled with the clamps. Features include:
5-inch height
Aluminum polished (SKU#: 2-200 ) or black (SKU#: 2-201)
These products are in Stock Now at Ken’s Factory USA and can be bought directly online at http://kensfactoryusa.com/collections/neo-fusion-clamp-riser
–Nelson Kanno
KensFactoryUSA.com
nelson@KensFactoryUSA.com
(562) 597-5666
1881 Obispo Ave
Signal Hill, CA 90755
SUNDAY FAMILY COUNSELING CLASS— Late-in-life divorces are becoming more common. The divorce rate for people age 50 and over doubled from 1990 to 2014, while the younger folks rate dropped.
Sociologist Pepper Schwartz said, “Do I really want 30 more years of this?”
Imagine the financial and emotional upheaval later in life, could be devastating. And beware of sharks in the water or mid-life crisis. Or, just don’t get married in the first place and watch common law marriage states.
–Bandit and the Week Magazine
INDUSTRY REPORT– Harley-Davidson’s marketing chief Richer departs at a critical time. Rumor has it he was fired.
This year started off slow. The first quarter sucked for Aeromach. The next three quarters were all up solidly thanks to their new new parts. They are hoping to have more Indian stuff next year, as well as some Sportster and Victory stuff.
Paul, the Aeromach boss, thinks H-D will continue to push the entry level bikes, he just cannot stand their Street bikes. The build quality is pitiful. Another stab will be made by ATK to sell their bikes in H-D dealers. They build a 250 and strong 650 street model, which are half the price of Harley street bikes. Harley needs an affordable entry level scooter.
Another Industry giant tried the AIMExpo as an exhibitor this year in the Made in USA section Bob Kay coordinated. “Great concept, but it just lacked V-twin exhibitors. Too much dirt bike and UTV stuff. I will not go back next year.”
–Paul Aiken, Aeromach and Bandit
HUSTLER BIKE AT AUCTION— Check it out. It was feature on Bikernet. http://www.premierauctionhouse.net/cgi-bin/mnlist.cgi?premierah28/1/2
JIMS WEEKEND TOOL SPECIAL– No. 1776 Fork Compressor Tool
Use to compress fork springs in cartridge style forks when servicing or rebuilding. The compressor can be mounted in a vice for easy hands free servicing.
Includes an adapter for FL forks to eliminate direct contact with spring coil and a special rod to pull up the fork damper rod.
For all cartridge style fork assemblies.
JIMS No. 1776 has a MSRP of $419.35, comes with JIMS® lifetime tool warranty and is made in the USA.
For more info contact sales@jimsusa.com, visit www.jimsusa.com, or call (805) 482-6913.
INSURANCE INSTITUTE FOR HIGHWAY SAFETY SKIDS– The NMA has never been shy about calling out the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) for its agenda-driven “research,” shoddy methodology and reality-defying study results.
So, we were skeptical when we read this headline in the latest IIHS newsletter: “Offering skid avoidance course to teen drivers doesn’t improve safety.”
The article summarizes a Maryland study that analyzed the safety impact of a supplemental driving course aimed at helping teens avoid dangerous driving situations. Students who had completed basic driver’s training were offered the chance to take the supplemental course at no charge. Participating students worked individually with an instructor in a car that had been modified to allow them to experience low traction at slow speeds on dry pavement. Subsequent traffic citation and crash rates for course participants were compared with those for students who didn’t complete the course.
Students who completed the course had fewer moving violations and lower risk of police-reported crashes. However, the results were not statistically significant, due to a low sample size, and varied widely depending on the statistical methodology employed.
Nonetheless, lead study author, Charles Farmer, pronounced the training a failure:
“Few people were motivated to take this course, even when it was offered for free. We don’t know whether it would have shown clearer benefits if more people had accepted the offer. What is clear is that offering the course as an option, even for free, isn’t an effective way to prevent large numbers of teen crashes.”
One wonders how Mr. Farmer could come to such a sweeping conclusion when he knew the results weren’t statistically significant. He appears to indict the training based on how few students volunteered for it, not on any safety impact (positive or negative) it provided. The fact that people didn’t sign up for the training says more about their motivation than about the quality of the training itself.
This last point ties into another dubious conclusion from the article: that driver’s education may make young drivers overconfident and therefore more likely to take risks. In this case, the IIHS implies that advanced training makes drivers less safe. This is of course preposterous. In reality, those who pursue advanced driver’s training are motivated to become better, and safer, drivers, not more reckless drivers.
The IIHS has long criticized formal driver’s education and public awareness campaigns as ineffective. In a 1997 article it stated:
Among the possible reasons for driver ed’s ineffectiveness, the report states, are that specific crash-reducing skills aren’t taught; not enough attention is paid to the importance of motivation in applying new skills or the overconfidence that may result from skills acquisition …
Read through that statement a couple of times and see if you can find any logic to it. The piece also mentioned “informal” driver’s training (whatever that is) as a preferable alternative to organized driver’s education but failed to provide any details.
A follow-up article in 2001 continued the critique but also called for more traffic laws and more traffic enforcement. It actually included a line that read “Education can be risky.” And that seems to be the point: We can’t rely on formalized driver’s education, especially advanced training, to make our roads safer; therefore, we must pass more laws and encourage ever more predatory traffic enforcement.
It’s a ridiculous argument, but intellectual honesty has never been an IIHS strong suit. If it were, the institute would stop supporting policies that have no positive impact on highway safety like red-light and speed cameras. Speaking of which, the next article in the current IIHS newsletter touts the success of speed cameras in Maryland (coincidentally the same state from which the skid avoidance study came.) The NMA and others easily debunked that analysis here.
Could driver’s education in the United States stand improvement? Absolutely. The NMA has always advocated for strong, experience-based driver’s education programs, including the use of simulators to replicate driving conditions that drivers-in-training may rarely encounter during the road time. We have also questioned the effectiveness of graduated driver’s licensing (GDL) programs (something the IIHS favors) that may actually prevent young drivers from getting the experience they need to handle a variety of hazardous driving situations.
Traffic safety experts know the importance of the three “E’s” of highway safety: Education, Engineering and Enforcement. We need more of the first and less of the last. As usual, the IIHS gets it backwards.
–from Rogue
I posted my complete story on the 2016 Roadglide.
http://www.bikernetbaggers.com/pages/2016_CVO_Road_Glide_Ultra.aspx
Harley’s collection of limited-production Custom Vehicle Operations (CVO) models, aka “big wheels, big paint, big motors, big price” with factory warranties for 2016 are the CVO Limited, CVO Road Glide Ultra and CVO Street Glide.
Harley says that owners of its Road Glide and Road Glide Special models ride the most miles per year of any of its customers.
–The Triking Viking on a two-wheeler
FULL THROTTLE SALOON MOVES TO DESTINATION AMERICA:
NEW EPISODES REV UP WITH ALL-NEW ANTICS
-Owner Michael Ballard to Address Future of the World’s Largest Bike Bar Following Devastating Fire that Leveled the Building in September 2015-
(Silver Spring, Md.) After months of speculation, FULL THROTTLE SALOON is parking on a new network this winter with four all-new episodes beginning Tuesday, December 1 at 10/9c on Destination America. The premiere comes after the “World’s Largest Biker Bar” tragically burned down in September 2015 due to an electrical fire. At the end of the four-episode run, the team will finally reveal whether the bar will be rebuilt.
Every year, the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally brings hundreds of thousands of bikers to the Black Hills of South Dakota and the Full Throttle Saloon offers them an experience that cannot be matched. The 32-acre property boasts multiple bars, beautiful bartenders, extreme entertainment, headlining musical acts and a healthy dose of fun, rebellion and mayhem.
FULL THROTTLE SALOON revolves around three main characters: Michael Ballard, the owner and operator of the Full Throttle Saloon; his wife and marketing director, Angie Ballard; and entertainment director / resident rock star as the front man of Jackyl, Jesse James Dupree. Since the Full Throttle Saloon is only open during the Sturgis Rally, Ballard has to make all of his money for the year in 10 short days, during which cameras capture the crazy biker carnival with a rare peek behind the scenes of a one-of-a-kind business.
The new episodes were filmed over the course of two seasons at the Sturgis rally, in 2014 and 2015. Not only will they address the bar’s future after the fire, but they will also see the on-air debut of the Ballards’ baby daughter. Viewers were left hanging in 2013, when Michael and Angie were expecting their first child. Now, watch them juggle the challenges of running the “World’s Largest Biker Bar” as parents.
2015 also marked the 75th anniversary of the Sturgis rally, bringing even more antics to the already high-energy Full Throttle experience. New episodes will unveil the death-defying stunts performed by Dupree during his annual Jackyl show at the bar. Tune in to see how he pulled off his grand entrance!
METZELER ROADTEC 01, the new sport touring tire which transforms travel into a cinematic experience
METZELER’s latest top shelf product ensures excellent grip on wet and dry, first-rate mileage and great stability even when heavily loaded
The “Take the Road with ROADTEC™ 01” campaign starts first with “48 Hours on The Road”, a non-stop movie marathon of the Motorcycle Film Festival’s best travel films at Deus ex Machina Milan, November 16 to 18
ROADTEC 01, the new Sport Touring radial tire from METZELER is here. Developed to offer motorcyclists a high level of grip in all weather conditions and temperatures. ROADTEC 01 offers excellent mileage in the sport touring segment, this new design provides more uniform and regular wear, and great stability both at high speeds and with the bike fully loaded.
ROADTEC 01 is the latest member of the ROADTEC family, the METZELER product line dedicated to the radial Sport Touring segment. The ROADTEC 01 replaces the Roadtec Z8 Interact. The ROADTEC 01 is connected to its product family heritage, but the ROADTEC™ 01 is a clear departure from the past, using completely different development and design criteria to the previous products. Therefore ROADTEC has been assigned number 01 to identify this tire as a completely new project: utilizing new materials, tire profiles, updated compounds and tread pattern as the key elements.
A federal judge in Omaha on Monday sentenced a woman to one year of probation for illegally buying a gun on her boyfriend’s behalf from an FFL at a pawnshop. The woman could have been sentenced to a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a fine of $250,000.
The boyfriend was a prohibited felon and gang member at the time of the purchase. He later the used the firearm to kill a police officer, Kerrie Orozco, who was trying to arrest him in connection with another shooting. At the time of the shooting, Officer Orozco had recently given birth to a baby and was working her last shift before taking deferred medical leave to care for her child. The baby had been born premature and was finally set to be released from the hospital.
The boyfriend himself was also killed in the altercation with police. The purchaser additionally admitted to investigators that her boyfriend lived out of state. Had the government chose to pursue it, that could have been the basis for yet another federal felony, transferring a firearm to a person who one knows or has reasonable cause to believe does not live in one’s own state of residence.
So to recap, a woman commits an act that implicates at least four separate federal felonies and that leads to the death of two people (including a mother and police officer acting in the line of duty). As a result, she is convicted on one count and does not serve any prison time whatsoever.
It’s little wonder that gun owners oppose further expansion of federal gun control. Gun control advocates insist that the government needs more tools to put gun owners in jail for things like carrying the wrong size magazine, having the wrong or too many features on a firearm, or failing to obtain permission from the government to transfer a firearm to a law-abiding friend or relative. Yet with all the tools at its disposal already, the system lacks the will to imprison those whose behavior actually gets people killed.
Skewed priorities and lack of common sense are problems no law can fix. Indeed, more laws would just make those problems worse.
GET THIS— Death rates for white Americans ages 45 to 54 rose significantly between 1999 and 2013, even as those of other racial and age groups continued to drop, according to a new federal study. Researchers said economic problems appear to be driving high rates of alcohol and drug abuse, smoking, and poor eating.
—Wall Street Journal and the Week Magazine
He is the true meaning of BRO/FRIEND. I feel very lucky to have met and talked with him. If there was more people like Rocky the world would be a much better place.
Besides, having an awesome trike…he is a super awesome person… he touched my life, and I’m sure he will touch many lives in the years to come.
Keep doing what your doing Rocky cause your doing it right!!!!
Big River, California
HANG ON FOR WORDS FROM THE MEDICINE BUDDHA— I get a kick out of studying Buddhism. This passage will make it all crystal clear.
“Again, Manjusri, if there are sentient beings who are habitually contrary and divisive, who engage in fighting and litigation, aggravating and disturbing both self and others by means of body, speech, and mind, these beings increase the occurrence of malevolent deeds. They call upon the spirits that reside in mountains, forests, trees, or tombs, such as yaksas, or raksasas, who in turn may slay animals and offer up their blood and flesh in an act of sacrificial worship. Then these sentient beings write the name of the person they hold a grudge against and make an image in his or her likeness, using wizardry to cast a curse upon it.
“They engage in sorcery and use magical potions to harm the subject of their evil practices. They even use spells to raise the dead who, at their bidding, harm or kill the intended victim.
“However, if in the midst of harming by such means, they hear the name of the Medicine Buddha or Pure Crystal Radiance, all their vicious intentions will no longer have a harmful effect. Gradually, the compassionate mind will arise in the perpetrators and their victims, benefitting both with the presence of peace and joy. With the mind of hatred, destruction, and harm no longer present, each individual is happy and content with what he or she has received in it’s place.”
Buddhism is full of such passages. Does this hit the spot or what. Rest and be kind.
–Ming
Da merciless
Pan-American Project Coast-to-Coast with S&S and Lowbrow Customs–
The first installment of the Pan-American Project is up in the Tech section. Follow along as we build a long-haul, bulletproof custom bike powered by a 93-inch S&S Pan motor. Super fun to build, but the end result will be even better!
–Tyler
www.lowbrow.com
SAY WHAT?— Here we go rocking into another wild week. We’re planning an industry party for the week of the Long Beach show.
I ran into a High School buddy who was big into cars over the years, but also built a few bikes. He also has the touch.
I need to work on a couple of techs and change the oil in My 2014 Indian.
A buddy of mine is being forced out of his rental property, since it was sold. Life is tough, and the city of LA is breathing on me because someone reported me for living in my building. Hell, it was a hotel once.
Never a dull moment. Let’s go for a ride.
Ride Free Forever,
–Bandit
