Riveter Chapter of the AMCA Presents Chix on 66

Newest AMCA Chapter Announces First Event

September 30, 2021—Today, the Riveter Chapter became the first woman-focused, nationwide chapter of the Antique Motorcycle Club of America. The purpose of this chapter is to bring female AMCA members together in a single chapter to concentrate their talents, give women motorcyclists an increased awareness of their own history, and raise visibility of women in the sport. By doing so, we will increase women’s awareness of each other, and improve connections between women in the sport through visibility and networking. A chapter containing powerful, talented, dynamic women will give all women riders inspiring role models. The Riveter Chapter’s first AMCA-sponsored event will be the “Chix on 66” ride scheduled to take place June 11-June 26, 2022. Up to 40 women motorcyclists will meet in Chicago, Illinois, to ride Route 66, the “Mother Road,” to Santa Monica, California. This is the classic American journey on classic machines, with some women riding vintage motorcycles, and others making the trip on modern mounts. Each day the group will begin and end together, but each woman will make the journey what she wants it to be. Instead of riding in a single pack, a turn-by-turn app will allow each rider to follow the route at her own pace. There will be a list of suggested hotel accommodations for each stop. If some opt for a camping experience, they can arrange that for themselves. This ride will span the entirety of Route 66, covering anywhere from 100 to 300 miles per day. Most days will be around 200 miles, allowing for an easy pace, and ample time to stop for photos and exploration of the iconic points of interest along the Mother Road. Anyone who is interested in participating in the ride can email chix@chixon66.com. You can also find information at www.chixon66.com, and on facebook.com/chixon66 or Instagram @chixon66. We are also still accepting charter members of the Riveter Chapter through December 31, 2021. While this chapter is women-focused, meaning our activities, events and newsletters will feature and promote women riders, both contemporary and historic, we welcome anyone with an AMCA membership who would like to become a member. If you would like to join, please send your name, AMCA member number and email address to joann@riveterchapter.com. If you are not an AMCA member, it’s easy to join online at www.antiquemotorcycle.org. You do not have to own an antique motorcycle to join the AMCA, or the Riveter Chapter. For more information, go to www.riveterchapter.com or Instagram @riveterchapteramca.

BIKERNET BATTERY TENDER INVESTIGATION—How to use battery tenders? We are on the hunt. A friend kept his bike on a tender 24/7. But when he rode to his girl’s house and spent the night, the bike was dead in the morning.

So, what’s the proper way to use a tender. Many folks recommend keeping their bikes on tenders all the time. I don’t like leaving a bike on a tender overnight or for long periods. If something goes wrong with the battery, the tender or garage circuits, your garage could burn down and perhaps your house, not to mention your Prize Possession.

Jason Mook, the owner of Deadwood Custom Cycles recommends putting your bike on a charger or tender once a week, charge it and then unplug it. You may need to charge more often depending on how new your bikes is and the constantly operating electronics, like the clock or security system.

We are also looking into how to check your battery. Our ’69 Panhead just had an issue with a recently replaced battery. At fully charged, it worked to electrically start the bike, but with the slightest draw and it didn’t have the power to turn over the engine. Jason replaced the battery, but the damn things are expensive to replace once a year. The guys at Battery Tender said most batteries only last three years or maybe four.

Let us know your thoughts and experiences. I will also reach out to some of the manufactures. According to the Battery Maintenance guys a smart trickle charger will start charging your battery when is reaches about 12.5 volts. It will charge it to 14.7 volts and then back off. So, if you measure your battery and it indicates only 12 volts or less, you’re probably in trouble and need a charge.

Another tip is to keep your battery off the shop floor, concrete or steel. Don’t let it set around, unless you slip a chunk of plywood under it. The same applies in your bike. Don’t just mount it against bare metal for two reasons, maybe three. The steel will pull power out of the battery, the steel is not protected from battery acid or corrosion from the battery terminals, and I try to cushion a battery as much as possible in its container. That has several positive effects on battery performance. It slows or prevents damaging battery motion messing with battery acid or even the plates. That will kill a battery fast. Padding will prevent dangerous cracking and acid leaking, which will damage everything including your paint and frame. It will also prevent damage to your battery connections and leads. A broken wire on the road can be a serious problem, especially if it was the lead from the voltage regulator.

So yeah, it’s best to keep tabs on your battery and keep it charged. The most common battery chargers you’ll come across are trickle chargers and smart chargers. A trickle charger is constantly working and slowly trickling a small charge into the battery, even when it’s fully charged.

If the battery charging/maintenance unit you have doesn’t have an in-line fuse on the connection cables plug your unit into a surge protector to help protect your electrical system from a sudden power surge.

In addition, if you aren’t using a smart charger, it’s best practice to remove the battery from the motorcycle. That way if the charger does cause an issue with the battery (overcharging, boiling, etc.) the damage will be confined to the battery and won’t harm your motorcycle or electrical system.

If the battery side of your cable came with ring terminal ends, see if you can source a SAE 2-pin lug with open ended fork terminals. Or clip the end of your ring terminals to make your own forked ends. The benefit of the fork terminals is that they are easier to mount to the battery posts than completely removing the screws to install the ring terminals.

And if you have multiple bikes, you can swap the leads from one battery to another much faster and easier.

If you have your motorcycle dialed in with smart charger and a quick disconnect cable, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t look at your battery occasionally.

For optimum battery life and performance peek under the seat (or wherever your battery is located) occasionally, and make sure it looks normal. Make sure there is no swelling, leaking or heavily corroded cables.

This isn’t completely wise. Batteries are dangerous. The acid can blind you. Don’t peak, stand back, wear eye protection, take off your seat and check the battery area. If you notice any problem, cracking, leaking, etc. remove the ground strap first. Use a towel and or rubber gloves and get your battery away from your chopper and preferably out of your home or shop. 

Secure the battery in the battery compartment. A battery that moves around can lead to some major issues. If your battery compartment doesn’t have a brace or sturdy rubber strap you can use foam blocks as padding to secure the battery. Foam blocks are also great if your new battery is shorter or isn’t the same dimensions as your old battery. 

Jeff G. Holt brand director and editor of V-Visionary says the following about battery tenders, “I am forever in need of battery tending. From my personal bikes to the Harley-Davidson and Indian test bikes, I frequently have battery drainage issues.

I would say that personally, battery failure is the main mechanical factor in me not getting rubber on the road. I combat this by using a good quality battery tenders that both charge and condition the battery internally.”

J E F F G. H O L T
V-Twin Visionary
626.391.3143
@jeffgholt
@vtwinvisionary
VTWINVISIONARY.COM

I asked Bandit, the guy running this operation you’re now reading, if he thought you, the guy reading this operation you’re now reading, might be interested in what Lou Kimzey accomplished. He was the original editor of Easyriders magazine, and while I am not sure, maybe he was the guy with the original idea for what Easyriders staff were proud to refer to as “the rag.”

Bandit replied, and I quote, “Sure. You might make him a mystic. Only a few knew, yet he controlled the free world for several decades and didn’t care…. Go for it.”
This response actually jolted me backwards for an instant. For one thing all the words were spelled correctly. And for another, he had just written my whole article in one sentence. With more insight. But then he worked with the guy every day. In fact, he was hired by the guy. Basically sight unseen, just from an inquiry Bandit made on the phone about a motorcycle he built that the new rag might want to take pictures of. Kimzey said “You want a job here?”

This is kinda like Jesus gathering his army of 12, bam bam bam, without preliminary interviews and resumes.

This same thing happened with me. I broke Absolute Rule Number One when sending material to a magazine for consideration for publication. Which rule is, “Study the magazine first. Learn their audience. Editors cater to their audience. Their audience is more important to them than you are.”

My writing journey….isn’t that the word in use now? Journey? Everyone being on a fucking journey while sitting on their ass or fucking a goat? They’re on their ass- sitting journey? Or their goat-fucking journey?

“So, Conswallatta, tell me about your journey from failed male prostitute to Drag Queen Extrava GAN za!!”

Everyone’s on a fucking journey. Even though no scenery is actually going by. Life isn’t a journey. Life’s a fucking death sentence. It’s a journey to Hell.

Fucking “journey.”

So, I broke Rule Number One sending Kimzey a fiction tale. I had never even heard of Easyriders, forget about “studying” it. I never went to writing school. I never worked at a publication. My writing teachers were Writers Digest and the Writer, two magazines I don’t even know if they still exist or not. In fact, I decided to BECOME a writer from an ad in Writer’s Digest showing some daydreaming fool sitting on a large boulder in the middle of nowhere and pensively squeezing his chin with his thumb and index finger, wearing clown pants even David Lee Roth wouldn’t have anything to do with, and staring out into the distance like he was trying to understand why he had no life skills. The ad asked in large letters, “Is this you?”

I looked at it for a long time and said “Yeah, that’s me.”

So, I learned about magazine writing from a magazine about magazine writing. Seemed logical to ME.

I know what you’re saying: “Isn’t this about Lou Kimzey?” Yeah. But he was an editor. And I am a contributor. That’s writer jargon for someone who sends stuff to an editor. For a writer to have ANYTHING good to say about an editor…..it’s like a bureaucrat saying anything good about free enterprise. Mt. Shasta explodes more frequently than that.

Contributors have a legendary dislike of and opprobrium towards – opprobrium means, as far as contributors are concerned, relentless, usually unvocalized, disgust – they hate editors. And I have nothing but (to this day) astonished amazement of Kimzey as an editor. And he was MY editor. Who I was writing for. So, I have a unique perspective regarding his editorship. Which-editorship is what I am writing about.

I have NO idea what kind of a PERSON he was. This is about his – as Bandit very interestingly put it – his apparently “mystical” abilities to successfully defy the publishing industry AND to be immune to published criticism by them. But they all knew he was there. In fact, I am prepared to say that Lou Kimzey is in a club with only two people in it: “The Club of Editors Who Advanced America.” The other is John W. Campbell.

I know what you’re saying: “You’re just saying nice things about his editorship just because he published your stuff.”

Let me tell you something: no editor on earth would have published my stuff. It was that unprecedented for a national newsstand magazine. WHILE he was publishing it, I couldn’t believe he was publishing it. Little did I know that Easyriders was unprecedented.

The first thing of mine they ever published was something I sent in just to piss them off! I had sent in some stories – at the insistence of a buddy who said I needed to send them some shit ‘cause he was a former Galloping Goose and he read the rag.

I said, “No way this is a so-called biker rag that would even be close to representing what bikers actually are: “which is America’s Bad Examples.” So, I sent them what I ASSUMED they would like. Shit all came back.

I said to Dennis, “Fuck you, fuck Easyriders, I’ll send them something that’s actually ‘biker’ the way EYE see bikers just to AGGRAVATE their fairy asses.” I wrote a tale overnight and read it aloud to Dennis on the phone the next day.

When he stopped laughing he said “Send it. They’ll fuckin’ love it.” I said “You’re even stupider than I thought.” He said “Fuck you: send it.”
I sent it and four months later I get an envelope with two issues of May ’75 #29, a check, and a hand-written note that said “We cannot fucking believe this. You need to come in here.” I called Ousley and said what just happened. He said “I told you, asshole. Pay attention when I talk.”
I said, “ok.”

I was living in utter squalor at the time near MacArthur Park, of the song fame. I was at the bottom rung of my existence and I wrote something completely and totally WRONG for publication in a “normal” universe….but without being technically criminal or illegal, just Very Black Humor, which is a variety of comedy and has nothing to do with race and makes an effort to make death, mishap, calamities, injury, everything bad….
You have to make the reader actually laugh at all that bleakness, preferably aloud but inside their head is good enough, and which I had a natural flair for and actually WORKED at, but I knew there was no actual audience for it in the global professional publishing world. It was SO wrong, and so relentlessly so. I wrote it just to piss off whatever the fuck “Easyriders” even was. Just because fuck them that’s why.

TURNS OUT…..Easyriders was every bit as fucked up as I was.

Here’s the Unbelievable-Editor part: not only did he say to his underlings “Yeah, ok, this is fine,” not a word was altered. I said to myself, reading the story in the issue on the floor of my rats nest….”These people are crazy. You can’t put out a magazine, expect to be successful……and publish this story to the English-speaking world.” TURNS OUT….. the English speaking world in ENGLAND, where English kinda has its headquarters, and thanks to my first submission which I wrote just to offend everyone who SPEAKS English….apparently offended the QUEEN.

Because Easyriders was banned from its shores for 3 months. Because of Lou Kimzey’s decision-making. I’m guessing he PROBABLY had to publish it over the florid-faced outraged objections of his own boss, the publisher. He apparently – maybe – put his job on the line. TURNS OUT…. my little yarn wasn’t the only objectionable thing in there. Keep in mind I never even heard of this magazine. So I’m actually going through my first-ever issue and every page I’m going “….well this ain’t right…..this ain’t right…..this ain’t right……. you can’t print this…..”

The fucking thing was geared exclusively to such ilk as the Hells Angels….Satans Slaves…..Devils Disciples…..Galloping Gooses….Pissed Off Bastards of Bloomington…..Gypsy Jokers…..Boozefighters….. and of course Bandit.

You don’t create magazines for these people! That’s wrong!! It gets worse: women were nonchalantly assumed, via the contents, to be created for men first, and for themselves second; having been in prison or currently in prison was just somewhere you eventually go in America, not anything actually unusual or to be ashamed of.

NOT having a firearm was a warning sign that something was fundamentally wrong with the person; being in full and total control of your wits was, if anything, AIDED by the ingesting of nonnutritive chemicals; not ever bathing was hardly anything to criticize; AND….being a patriotic American was something you were just born with if you were normal and thus it was not open for debate or discussion. In other words, fuck your inclusivity, you stay away from us we’ll stay away from you.

There was advice to the lovelorn, or basically wiseacres, by way of a vastly overweight happy go lucky libertine broad named Miraculous Mutha with occasional hygiene issues; cartoon representations of bikers who looked NOTHING like the ones I would describe in my yarns but were instead massively muscled trim handsome human versions of Jack Russell terriers or alert border collies who OFTEN could be found passed out in junk yards or filthy living quarters or calmly allowing themselves to be brutally yelled at by a girlfriend who would be at one or the other end of human female attractiveness.

Either variety was totally acceptable to these handsome rogues on Harley chopper, which they were exclusively on. Topless chicks were the norm. Living on choppers was the norm. Violating the ingested-chemical edicts was not only the norm….it was almost not worth even mentioning. It was, like, “Um…isn’t that what you DO?”

There was a section that printed letters from guys in jail. Totally unheard of in proper journalistic endeavors. The human skull was the fucking logo. There were skulls everywhere. You would think it was a black magic mag. But oh contraire, it was parties, drinking, riding motorcycles in the wilderness, jokes, aggressive cluelessness, shaking-off ineptitude and moving on to the next ineptitude….And the magazine was its own worst critic, “Hey, yeah, we fucked up, what do you want from us, you seen our ‘office’? You seen our STAFF?”

I actually DID see the office. And the staff. I eventually showed up as requested and it was at the other end of a very short strip mall on literally a dirt road in Agoura Hills with a 7-11 at one end and Easyriders at the other. A woman named Izzy Petty let me in. Very polite, Very businesslike. Very handsome. Handsome in a woman is a good thing. Just for the record. She totally didn’t notice that I looked like what Tiny Tim had used as a guide to proper hair management. I had a white dress shirt on that looked like I pulled it off a dead hobo, some pants – as I recall – and I think I showed up on a Honda 175 four- stroke.

Izzy took me down a hall, around an old, pristine antique Harley that was in the fucking hallway, I went into a room and the only other two Easyriders “employees” were in the room, Kimzey behind a desk that had a fucking dirty Harley engine on it. Keith “Bandit” Ball was sitting in a chair near the desk, who I pretended wasn’t there because he looked like a 7 foot long fucking enforcer in the Biker Hockey League. There were David Mann original oils ON THE FLOOR leaning against the wall, which, if anyone would have been interested in buying them at the time might have fetched a hundred dollars apiece and which would now easily sell for 20-30 grand apiece.

The place was a fucking mess, just like where I was living, and these three people were the fucking staff. Lou gestured me to sit, I did and he said, “You got us kicked out of England, you know.”
My heart lit up! In MY head this was SUCCESS. TURNS OUT….Kimzey had the same attitude! Which was crazy! I mean crazy as in not at all sensible. Not for a fucking editor, the fucking whiniest, self-pitying entities on earth outside of writers.
So, he tells me “No Class Chick” got them kicked out of England and after he saw my face light up he said, “It was probably Duffy’s illustration.”

I THINK he was probably trying to communicate that I wasn’t in any trouble and this meeting wasn’t going to end with the guy at the side of the desk taking me into the desert and coming back alone. But the way I saw it, it was kind of downplaying my accomplishment. I think Kimzey noticed that and I’m thinkin’ said to himself, “This weirdo is as fucked up as we are.”

He then said “You know how many letters we got about your story? 25.”

I said after a minute, “25 letters to a national, apparently global, magazine ain’t really a lot.”
He said, leaning abruptly forward, “IT IS FOR US!!!”

I stared at him for a long time, and he was still frozen in his new position, looking right at me. And I thought to myself “….This fucker is alright. He’s telling me that whatever the fuck it is I’m doing to keep on doing it.”

That was the meeting! I spent a total of about ten minutes in the Great Easyriders Building, a building which bums would have avoided, met the staff of three and went back to LA and wondered, “How the fuck do I top what I just did.” Which I did, in order to get REJECTED. For the first time in my writing “career” I was AIMING for a reject slip. And what do I get? Encouragement. Fuckin’ Haight-Ashbury- level brain-bending.

Turns out I was involved with some strange new force in publishing that was targeting an audience that was reviled by everyone except B-Movie- makers who were making the human version of monster movies but with biker renegades with titles like “Demonic Biker Angels Eating Your Dog’s Face On Wheels!!” and “Crazed Biker Filth Bathing Your Mom!” and “Satan’s Breed On Wheels of Lust For Your Daughter On Prom Night!” and “Biker Inbreds vs Catholic Girls In High School Uniforms!!”
There were scripted biker movies in existence, which enterprise was basically scripted-wrestling only outside the arena and the fighting even more choreographed. But there was no effort on the face of the earth to take lowlife biker ilk seriously and cater to their likes and get on board with their dislikes.

Then Lou Kimzey showed up. Apparently his editorial policy was, “We will target only one audience: people who put riding a Harley first…and everything else second.” There was only one kind of person like this at the time: male American lunatics. PROBABLY in California. Because there’s plenty of places to ride and plenty of places to hide. Plus, you’re not out of commission for 6 months of the year due to seasons that don’t know that climate ‘scientists’ have declared Spring Winter and Autumn to be extinct. I’m guessing this was his thinking.

Whatever his editorial policy was it didn’t include articles of interest to guys in suits. In fact, if it wasn’t for the fact that the target audience rode extended and stripped Harleys as priority-1 and getting drunk, stoned, ripped and laid as priority.
Everything After 1……you would not be able to tell the target audience from what crawls out of a sidewalk tent these days on Colorado Blvd. in Pasadena. Until you actually talked to them. Which “normal” folks refused to do.

However, unlike sidewalk vagrants, lifer “biker trash,” as they are sometimes referred to, can be extremely coherent and, unlike vagrants, possessed of very quick reaction responses. They are also capable of figuring out not only what kind of person is talking to them, but will make responses that actually have some connection to the initial topic that was put forth.

Harley biker trash and sidewalk vagrants, in fact, before Kimzey showed up, had only one thing in common: no one had ever published a magazine directed at them. To this day no one has published a magazine aimed at sidewalk vagrants. In fact, that sounds like a funny idea. I ought to do it myself. But first I gotta take a dump, hold on.

So, my meeting with Kimzey and Bandit is over in about ten minutes, Lou gives me the first 24 issues of Easyriders to take home and I guess “study.” Writers are supposed to “study” the outfits they write for, so they know what the editor is going to at least CONSIDER. That’s a rule. You can be Voltaire, you write an article for Car&Driver about the history of the Phoenicians…they’re pro’bly not gonna read it. No matter how “well” it’s written.
So, I’m going through these magazines, lookin’ at the pictures of Deeply Dedicated actual biker trash and I’m going “…..these are the people that were, like, the Invisible Scary People that people only heard about but never wanted to see that roared through the San Fernando Valley in the ‘50s when it was empty except for the Tuxford Pit, traveling carnivals, and the feral populations of Sunland and Tujunga.”

When I was a pre-teen in the ‘50s, the “motorcycle gangs” – who parents everywhere declared to be some new kind of mental-patient society, since, as all us kids ever heard from mom and dad was that, “riding a motorcycle is the craziest thing you can do.”

This naturally translated to us kids as “then it must be fun.”…..the “motorcycle gangs” were almost phantom enigmas that everyone talked about but usually only heard very late at night.
The Ozzie and Harriet type parents at the time were terrified of them. Even though they steered clear of everyone. Kids kinda regarded them as interesting.

Parents however came unglued at the very mention of them. What they saw in photos was enough: beards and whiskers…..in Ozzie & Harriet World that meant crazed escapee from an asylum….tattoos – that meant you stabbed strangers to death 24 hours a day every day….earrings?? on men?…..that meant something from some whole new dimension of horror…..swastikas and german helmets?…..actually no one had a problem with those. Germany and the Nazis had been pulverized and Ozzie & Harrietland saw it all as trophies of war, and CERTAINLY not a looming Nazi threat.

They had enough sense to know, unlike the libs of today, that without Hitler there’s no actual Nazi threat. What passes for Nazis in America today would not be able to defeat an army of ants. But the Communists will never get over the Nazis. Which was actually one reason bikers wore the paraphernalia. Just to piss off Communists. You do not have to be a Nazi to have a problem with Communists. But you’ll never convince a “progressive” of that.

But in a way TURNS OUT….they were kinda right, our parents. These traveling-in-packs high-decibel inebriates with startling motorcycle skills were not on the fast track to anything anyone would consider respectability. And this particular VARIETY of crazy people were riding motorcycles that they went out of their way to invent new ways to make them even more dangerous by removing functional gear and replacing it with lunacy apparatus. One example being something they called a “suicide shift.”

And fairings and windscreens? No. Goggles. If anything. Helmets? You fucking serious? Wear a goddamn helmet? “I’m on a fucking Harley going 80 miles an hour most of the time, fucker. You think safety is a fucking issue with me? YOU better have put on a helmet because I’m about to try and knock some clueness into you.”

These were mega-crazy people, in other words, bikers. You don’t publish a magazine targeting the insane. These were people who wanted everyone to understand that their Life Priorities were bikes; chicks; booze; and kicks, in
that order: “kicks” being defined as anything they, not necessarily you, thought was fun, rather than, ya know, annoying or infuriating, etc. Fun things, like, for instance, ya know, urinating on your sole items clothing and then immediately wearing your sole items of clothing, preferably unlaundered, for the rest of your life. Ya know: fun stuff.

You do not publish magazines for people like this.

So, I’m going through these magazines and there’s articles about being drunk. Articles about being stoned. Articles about naked girlfriends. Articles about cops being a pain in the ass. Not “the enemy.” Just dumbass fucks, with of course a smattering of to-the-bone sociopathic monstrosities in uniform. But not people to go to war with.

People to ignore and avoid. Never challenging them. For one thing they have access to infinite backup. For another thing….it’s almost not sporting duking it out with a cop: you’ve lived most of your life wrangling a fucking Harley around and could probably beat up a bull rider, not that anyone would want to ’cause they’re really nice guys….and you’re tangling with some bloated out of shape guy who sits in a car most of his life driving around to nowhere for no reason and taking donut breaks 50 times a day.

I mean: cops are pathetic. They’re an army at war with Americans. Talk about confused. Kamala Harris is more focused. Ok, no, you’re right. She’s not.

There were endless cartoons of impossibly-fit bikers dead drunk in fly-swarmed squalor, impossibly-fit bikers drooling bulge-eyed at walrus-sized women acting coquettish and holding a liquor bottle and a steaming order of fries as enticements to romance, impossibly-fit bikers doing something idiotic in front of cops that still made the cops look like the stupid ones, impossibly-fit bikers laying in living room debris ordering to be fetched a can of beer from a cartoon chick a thousand times better looking than that particular biker deserves yet still eagerly granting his every command….

And that’s another thing: Easyriders made no effort to suggest that the women who hung around these denizens of dirt and asphalt did not consider themselves property. And that the women had no problem with being considered such.
Now you might say “That’s because they live in fear.” You go up to one of these broads face to face and tell her that, that she lives in fear of the men. You will find yourself on the ground real quick. Probably with a broken jaw. You have to tread around these broads a whopping lot lighter than you have to with the men.

You had best be nice to them: 99% of the time they don’t need their boyfriends to back them up. And there’s two ways to learn that: the easy way, reading this. Or the hard way, unconscious and humiliated by a broad.

Political incorrectness reached a whole new level with this target audience. They were America Firsters. Everyone else?….do not fuck with us.

This was non-negotiable and in force 24 hours a day, all year long, every year. Period. Even the Constitution wasn’t this patriotic. No other magazine would have dared to have as policy “America right or wrong” as a given. This was not even a stated policy. It was assumed it was understood automatically in the natural order of things.

To continue, illegal ownership of things that were illegal by decree – rather than because you stole them – was not considered anything to even remark-on much less chastise.

But by far the most uniquely insistent aspect of the “magazine policy” was “not to make converts” and not even to make new readers……but to be left alone.

The magazine didn’t care if you liked bikers, didn’t like bikers, wanted to be a biker, wanted to criticize bikers (bikers are immune to criticism) all that mattered to the publication and its target audience was that they be left alone because they sure weren’t gonna fuck with YOU.

What could be fairer? If there had been only a hundred bikers in America Easyriders wouldn’t have cared. There at least would have been a hundred bikers in America with a magazine they could rely on for addressing their likes and dislikes. Turns out there were millions of bikers in America.

My little collection of magazines on my dirty 75 dollars a month floor revealed more and more eye-popping realities of the rag. 1: Prisons are places where you make an extra effort to stay in touch with the imprisoned, rather than abandon them as pariahs against society. 2: Fuck society. 3: Tattoos are not despicable; they are an advanced art form. 4: Choppers are an advanced art form. 5: Graffiti is an advanced art form. 6: Prisoner art is a MAJOR advanced art form because if all art comes from pain, prisoners are artists 24 hours a day. 7: Women actually are the best thing there is; we’re just not saying that to THEM. That would be giving them an inch. 8: We know something you critics of our feral rag don’t: there are actually millions of us. You think there’s just 2 or 3 hundred down in the Bayou picking their noses trying to figure out what alligators are.

Lou Kimzey had a secret weapon other editors didn’t have: he knew he was hitting not just a silent majority, he was hitting an in-hiding majority. They were in-hiding not because of fear. They were in-hiding because they didn’t want to get contaminated by “society.”

These were individuals. Rugged ones. The last of the “rugged individuals” that used to be the highly valued goal for all male American youth to reach: being an individual, and having some sand. That’s what an American male was: an individual with some sand. What the goals were for American women….let one of them step up and announce them. I’m not a woman. No offense. Women ain’t my department. When they have their clothes off then I sort of know why the hell they’re here. But, hey, that’s just me.

California gave birth to two major social revolutions: the movie industry. And the Hells Angels. At some point the movie industry and the Hells Angels found each other, which was PROBABLY inevitable. And at some point, like
Darwin staring at lizards and a light going on, a light went on in Lou Kimzey’s head and he thought, “There is no magazine targeting this biker ilk as customers.”

That realization, combined with an entrepreneurial spirit and ceaseless motivation, created Easyriders and changed America. It united the rugged individuals. The Last Actual Americans looked around and said, “I ain’t the only one that’s like this: apparently there’s a whole magazine publicizing my shitty appearance and my shiny, delightful-to-look-at, spirit!”

Easyriders wasn’t created for Hells Angels to read. It was created to make the announcement that what these guys want out of life, and what the other Harley fraternities like them want out of life….is what ALL actual Americans want out of life: to be left alone to have fun….and ride like hell a death machine across the empty desert in the middle of a summer’s moonlit midnight at 80 miles an hour.

Well, certainly all THESE actual Americans, these clubbed-up Biker Americans wanted to do that. Also the Hells Angels spirit of enthusiastic positivity was 100% the opposite of what remained of the American Spirit by the 1950s after Americans having died in two world wars, one of them by decree, and achieving no new terrain, just dying defending foreigners on foreign soil just for the sake of Virtue Signaling – which is now almost mandatory for everyone 24 hours a day, then Korea, another waste of time and lives to save other citizenries, then Vietnam, another waste of time on other terrain to save other citizenries and deplete our own, then 20 years wasting time in Afghanistan such that guys in Toyotas, wearing robes and sandals could conquer the country in two days, I mean at some point it has to begin to look like, even to accountants in the offices of Meek Meek and Meek that the biker life is the last hope for sanity and relaxation under what passes for the Land of the Free these days.

Let me tell you something about the “American” government as long as I brought it up: if the “American” government detests you – like it does bikers – …..you must be eluding their tribute demands. Government is a protection racket parading around as a benign selfless guardian of the lesser beings who depend upon it for love, safety and guidance and which lesser beings treat its office-holders and appointed high chancellors as though they were saints standing around the throne of God and giving God advice.

While there were many biker clubs forming after WW2 it was and still is the Hells Angels who were manifesting whatever it was that the cowboys and the “wild west” of America had done to apparently win the hearts and minds of the citizenry not just in America but all over the world.

The American West was where you went to ….and you might want to sit down for this…. the American West was where you went to to escape the Constitution, now grown from a piece of paper you had nothing to do with in the forming of or the signing of, grown now to a Mystical Level of Worship Rivaling The New Testament. Sergei Leone wasn’t making movies in Italy with Clint Eastwood portraying Presidents and Speakers of the House. No, he was making movies in Italy with Clint Eastwood portraying American Gunslingers of the American Frontier. The American Frontier of the 1840s.

But not the American Frontier of the 1950s. Which American Frontier by the 1950s consisted of the Hells Angels, the Satans Slaves, the Galloping Gooses et cetera. Through what I am about to declare as brilliant marketing, advertising, public relations and bizarre self- promotion, the Hells Angels, via what they apparently recognized via some kind of genius wizardry as the eventual guru of lowbrow culture via something called “gonzo journalism,” they took a gander at Hunter Thompson, and someone in the Hells Angels, or maybe all of them, with astounding shrewdness, recognized the unknown Thompson as a writer competent-enough with the language and stylistically suited to “tell their story.” Which he did.

What the Hells Angels shrewdly wanted to achieve via Hunter Thompson – who they eventually beat up by the way – Lou Kimzey recognized in the whole “outlaw biker” aggregate, an aggregate more or less subconsciously devoted to achieving a cultural-icon status, for better or for worse, as that of the Hells Angels.

The name “Hells Angels” appeared a LOT in the early issues of Easyriders, as I learned, slowly turning the pages one by one of my sudden stash of the first 24 issues and it was in there with their permission. The Hells Angels sponsored their own stuff and shindigs in the rag. It was like two geniuses finding each other: the Hells Angels….and Lou Kimzey.

Other ads consisted of people no one heard of making skull jewelry, places to buy new engine parts for Harleys, places to have new redesigned creations for “normal” Harley parts in order to create new customized Harleys, detailed particulars of a monthly featured road art you could ride and wreck so that others could build their own just like it, calendars for outdoor parties in cow fields where thousands of Harley riders and their girlfriends would show up at, with upper attire on the women being generally absent.

I mean, who knew this shit actually even existed and went on? Turns out Lou Kimzey did. Easyriders eventually started creating their own rodeo events for Harley riders and their own bike shows where sculptures in metal and wiring you didn’t know whether to ride or pray to filled vast hangars filled with thousands of strolling bikers. Easyriders Magazine was like an escapist video game for a hidden audience that you didn’t have to plug in. You just turned its pages.

No journalistic entities fucked with Easyriders even though in these entities’ astoundingly cunning and yet amazingly stupid heads they could smell that something was not right.

Every magazine in the USA was already completely on board with caring and sharing and love and the, “you are not important but your neighbor is” perversion of the Golden Rule. They were all on board that America was the problem in the world, that unconditional love for everything in existence was very, very, very important.

Sure, love is important. But putting your fist into a face once in a while is also very very very important. The bikers in the Easyriders pages were revealing themselves in their huge numbers and without taking a shower first and putting on some new clothes to make a good impression.

What was already in existence in the shrubs and forests and dirt piles was now being broadcast to the planet. Over and over and over, issue after issue, with no hint of apology or embarrassment or even concern.

There was an entire magazine devoted SOLELY to people who rode Harleys….and just like honeybadger…….what you thought about it….they just didn’t give a shit.

No articles from the Butthurt Press Cabal consisting of people who don’t know shit about shit emerged to chastise this new magazine that was displaying what all other publications agreed was, “all that is wrong with America – disobedient individuals,” while Easyriders was nonchalantly declaring bikers as the only thing RIGHT with America. None of this made any sense to the journalism world. Very little does. And PLUS….. the rag appeared to be run by bikers. That was just not possible: bikers can barely read, much less write. Much less…. MEET DEADLINES???

Easyriders could not be figured out. Better to just ignore them until it vanished from the newsstands.

But it didn’t vanish from the newsstands. Don’t go looking for it NOW! Lou Kimzey is DEAD! Ok? Just like Steve Jobs is dead. Just like Tesla is dead. Ok, you’re getting the picture.

It didn’t vanish from the newsstands. It grew. Everyone wanted to be a biker. Everyone wanted to have a Harley. Everyone wanted to be in a Harley fraternity. Even cops. Talk about being too successful.

I am going to stop here and leave Sons of Anarchy waaaaaaay over there and I am not going toward that direction any longer. I’m gonna just back up a little and get back onto some sort of normally-real ground that is not an Accidental Satire disguised as Biker Life.

Today Sturgis – which the normal human public never heard of before Easyriders made it a point to relentlessly insist that it was Priority One for everyone on earth to do in their to-do list before death – is now Annual National News for being irresponsibly selfish and uncaring and recklessly cruel to others by its visitors not staying home and not wearing masks and not getting whatever the vaccine is, and not doing all the ten other million rules that change from day to day and by refusing to be “charitable” by not- attending this Existential Threat to Humanity via the flu that is not a flu but is also a super flu but is also a galactic onslaught by the Arbitrarians that has no cure and no solution and no means of escape from no matter how many times inoculated, the only known road-to-safety being total obedience to orders for eternity that have no effect on viruses but only on humans.

Or…. basically declaring humans to be a disease. Basically. And since humans are a disease, they have to be isolated from all other humans. Even though all the other humans are already a disease every human already has. Yeah: it’s about that level of comprehensibility.

The Sturgis attendees say in response to this, “Fuck you.” And then the criticism stops. Until next time. Cause Harley bikers are like honey badger. They don’t give a shit. In fact, there should be a biker club named Honey Badgers. No one would fuck with them.

In closing it would not be a crazy statement to say that Lou Kimzey was in fact the starting point of a long series of events, with him as the ignition switch, that started an engine that had as its most recent achievement the transporting of Donald Trump into the Oval Office.

And if you think that was a bad thing………I have a picture of a honey badger right here. His name is Scruffy. Tell him.

 During every Biketoberfest I make sure to attend Willie’s Tropical Tattoo Old School Chopper Show, or die trying…

The show has 20 classes and is sponsored by Bikernet.com, Hot Leathers, Twisted Tea, Blings Cycle, S&S, Church Of Chop, Renegade Magazine and Rue & Ziffra.

 

Bill Dodge got an award for his build. He generally does. 

Tony Agoso and his motorcycle Pandemic were also featured.

 

Best Knuckle                                Garret Madalone

Best Old School                           Garret Madalone

Tropical Tattoo Choice              John (no last name given)

Willie’s Choice                             Antique

Tarball’s Choice                           Tino

BD Custom’s                                 Zackery Zdrodokski

Trailer Trash Choice                   Hatch

There was every kind of bike you can think of from Flatheads with patina and refurbished, to new, to gorgeous custom paint jobs on Knuckleheads, Panheads, Shovelheads, Evos and some imports.

The show runs from 11:00AM until the Awards at 4:00PM with many people showing up early.

 All the proceeds made from this event goes to support our veterans.

www.veteranssupportfund.org.

 

 Though the Bike Show was the main feature, out back Jackson Slim put out some good sounds. There was also plenty of food and beverages, including Twisted Tea.

There are numerous T-Shirts that are interesting for one reason or another. And of course, plenty of women.

 

Some great news was announced that The SMOKE OUT will be coming back in September 2022!

Chris Callen and the Cycle Source crew were in attendance and hard at work as were numerous other publications.

 

 While it is always good to see a lot of old friends, this year especially Bill Dodge and Willie, up and about, both still healing from serious injuries from being hit by vehicles while riding their motorcycles.

 

 

 

 

 

by Todd Halterman from https://www.autoevolution.com

Tiny Triumphs and EV Motorcycle Range in Prototype Now With Indian Firm Bajaj

Triumph is now teasing the development of a series of smaller displacement motorcycles that the company plans to build with Indian manufacturing giants Bajaj.

As far back as early 2020, Triumph announced that it reached an agreement with Bajaj – one of the largest motorcycle firms in the world – to develop and build an all-new range of so-called ‘baby’ Triumphs that would fill in the 200 – 750cc engine displacement category.

While the plan called for the companies to roll out the first models in the collaboration in 2022, the project has been pushed back as a consequence of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Now that the pandemic crisis seems to be loosening its grip, both parties say they’re back on track to develop the bikes.

Triumph Head of Brand Management Miles Perkins says prototypes have already been created and plans are back in the offing.

“That’s going great guns, I have seen the development motorcycles – and the prototype for those – it’s all on track,” Perkins says. “We haven’t yet confirmed exactly what the bikes are and exactly when we will launch them but the news is forthcoming soon.”

And fear not, though Triumph hasn’t confirmed exactly which the partnership will create models, it has said the resulting bikes will be sold globally rather be sold only in Asian markets more conducive to sales of cheaper, small capacity motorcycles.

According to Perkins, Triumph found the ideal partner in Bajaj. He says the company’s large market share in India and experience working with KTM and Kawasaki were key to the deal.

“The relationship with Bajaj and conversations I have had with the team over there and the engineering team working with them are very like-minded and passionate individuals, and their focus and commitment are outstanding. They have similar leadership family principles and values,” Perkins says. “The working relationship is strong, the design development is completely Triumph, these are Triumphs and the partnership is building it and selling them around the world. What Bajaj brings is phenomenal in terms of the ability to develop quality in this volume, especially in the lower capacity range.”

Perkins also says the Triumph TE-1 EV prototype has been built and is ready for testing. It represents an electric sports bike model developed in partnership with Williams Advanced Engineering, and Perkins calls it “a blueprint for a future EV Triumph.”

Power for the TE-1 comes from an electric motor that delivers 174 horsepower at peak and 107 horses of continuous power. Triumph chose not to publish additional specifications, but Motorcycle News learned the bike weighs 485 pounds and offers up to 120 miles of range. Quick-charging technology zaps the battery pack with an 80% charge in about 20 minutes. Triumph stressed it aimed to give riders the performance of an internal-combustion-powered bike in an electric package, but what you see isn’t necessarily what will land in showrooms.

Triumph will begin testing the TE-1 prototype in the coming months, but it told Motorcycle News that it still needs to clear the cost hurdle before approving the production model. When it will do that is up in the air.

Triumph calls the TE-1 EV a prototype platform development and not an actual motorcycle available for sale, it’s a project which the company is using for “learning and developing the team’s experience but also developing the partnership of technology with several partners for a full-on electric Triumph platform that will follow in years to come.”

from https://www.businesslive.co.za

Darryn follows brother Brad to the premier motorcycle racing division, and takes over from the legendary Valentino Rossi

SA motorcycle racer Darryn Binder has signed for Yamaha’s rebranded RNF MotoGP team for the 2022 season, with an option to stay on for 2023.

He will team up with the experienced Andrea Dovizioso and takes the place of the legendary Valentino Rossi, who retires at the end of this season.

Darryn, younger brother of KTM MotoGP rider Brad, is only the second rider since Jack Miller to jump from Moto3 to the premier MotoGP class.

Darryn has competed in the Moto3 class since 2015 and became a well-known name after Brad won the 2016 Moto3 championship.

However, Darryn has since long proven that he is an exceptional racing talent in his own right. Known for his hard racing and making use of any and every available gap during a race, the 23-year-old has ridden to six Moto3 podiums, including a win at the 2020 Catalan GP.

He is sixth in this year’s Moto3 world championship with two podiums.

“I want to give a warm welcome to Darryn. We are delighted that he is joining the Yamaha line-up next year,” said Lin Jarvis, MD of Yamaha Motor Company.

“We’ve had many conversations about who would be a good match for the new RNF MotoGP Team. It’s a fresh start for the Yamaha satellite team and that makes it all the more fitting to have a young and eager rider like Darryn join them.”

Jarvis said the primary mission of Yamaha’s satellite team is developing MotoGP talents.

“Darryn has already shown on numerous occasions what he’s made of in the Moto3 class,” he said. “We know he is a fast and determined rider who has got what it takes to battle at the front of the pack. Obviously, the step up to MotoGP is significant and will take some adjusting, but we feel that he’s ready.”

Binder said: “I’m extremely grateful for this opportunity, as it has been a lifelong dream to race in the MotoGP category. I definitely didn’t expect to make the jump straight from Moto3 to the highest class, but I do believe I’m up for the challenge, and I’m ready to put in all the hard work for 2022.”

by Daniel Patrascu from https://www.autoevolution.com

Ducati to Make Electric Motorcycle for MotoE World Cup, Road Machines to Follow.

To date, despite the advances electric mobility is making in the world of motorcycles, there is only one major bike maker that has embraced electric drivetrains: Harley-Davidson, with its LiveWire. But soon, there will be more, and Ducati seems to be keen on becoming the next one.

The Italian company announced this week it is officially entering the electric motorcycle segment, but it will not be doing so with a bike that can be sold to the general public. Instead, the Borgo Panigale manufacturer will become the sole official supplier of motorcycles for the electric class of the MotoGP World Championship, the FIM Enel MotoE World Cup.

The deal between Ducati and the organizers of the competition, Dorna Sports, will come into effect in 2023 and will run through 2026. That means we’ll probably have to wait some more before we get to see official details and images of the electric bike, but Ducati tried to give us a glimpse of that by releasing a teaser rendering of the two-wheeler (main pic of this piece).

What’s more important is that Ducati promises the MotoE bike will influence “the evolution of the product range,” hinting the electric drive is something now under consideration for the general public.

“The goal is to study how to produce, as soon as the technology allows, a Ducati electric vehicle that is sporty, light, thrilling and able to satisfy all enthusiasts,” the Italians promised.

MotoE came into existence in 2019 and is presently using Energica Ego Corsa motorcycles. Sadly, the series became famous not for the achievements of these electric machines, but on account of a fire back in 2019 that destroyed all the motorcycles before racing could get going at Jerez.

Ducati promises to share the story of this new bike’s development throughout 2022, through means that are yet to be announced.

PRESS RELEASE FROM DUCATI

21 OCTOBER 2021
Ducati is thrilled to announce the beginning of its electric era: starting from the 2023 season it will be the sole official supplier of motorcycles for the FIM Enel MotoE™ World Cup, the electric class of the MotoGP™ World Championship.

The agreement signed with Dorna Sports, organizer and promoter of the most important international two-wheel racing championships, lasts until 2026 and will therefore cover four editions of the MotoE World Cup.

This is a historic step for the Borgo Panigale motorcycle manufacturer which, following its custom of using racing competition as a laboratory for technologies and solutions that then become reality for all motorcyclists, enters the world of electric bikes starting from the sportiest sector, that of the electric class of the MotoGP World Championship.

The goal is to develop expertise and technologies in a constantly evolving world such as the electric one, through an experience familiar to the company like that of racing competition. This has been a consolidated tradition for the Borgo Panigale company starting from the Ducati 851, which inaugurated the trend of Ducati road sports bikes by revolutionizing the concept with its innovative two-cylinder water-cooled engine, electronic fuel injection and the new twin-shaft, four-valve heads, deriving from the Ducati 748 IE bike that made its debut in endurance races at Le Castellet in 1986.

Since then, this endless transfer of expertise has always taken place from the Superbike World Championships, in which Ducati has participated since the first edition in 1988, and from MotoGP, in which Ducati is the only non-Japanese motorcycle manufacturer to have won a World Championship.

The crossover is also evident in the most recent and prestigious products of the Borgo Panigale manufacturer: the V4 engine of the Panigale is in fact strictly derived in its entire construction philosophy – from the bore and stroke measurements to the counter-rotating crankshaft – from the engine that debuted on the Desmosedici GP in 2015. The V4 Granturismo that equips the new Multistrada V4 was then derived from the Panigale engine. All the vehicle control software is also directly derived from those developed in the racing world. Not to mention the field of aerodynamics.

The technological solutions developed in the world of racing, transferred to the products that make up the range, allow Ducati to offer its enthusiasts extremely high-performance and fun-to-ride motorcycles. The FIM Enel MotoE Championship will also be no exception in this regard and will allow the Company to develop the best technologies and test methodologies applied to sporty, light and powerful electric motorcycles.

At the same time, the fact that Ducati forms part of the Volkswagen Group, which has made electric mobility an essential element of its 2030 “New Auto” strategy, represents the best prerequisite for an extraordinary exchange of expertise in the field of electric powertrains.

The announcement of the agreement was made during a joint press conference in the press room of the Misano World Circuit ‘Marco Simoncelli’ on the eve of the Made in Italy and Emilia-Romagna Grand Prix, the third to last round of the 2021 MotoGP World Championship. Carmelo Ezpeleta, CEO Dorna Sports, and Claudio Domenicali, CEO Ducati Motor Holding, were both present.

Claudio Domenicali, CEO of Ducati Motor Holding: “We are proud of this agreement because, like all the first times, it represents a historic moment for our company. Ducati is always projected towards the future and every time it enters a new world, it does so to create the best performing product possible. This agreement comes at the right time for Ducati, which has been studying the situation of electric powertrains for years, because it will allow us to experiment in a well-known and controlled field like that of racing competition. We will work to make available to all participants of the FIM Enel MotoE World Cup electric bikes that are high-performance and characterized by lightness. It is precisely on weight, a fundamental element of sports bikes, that the greatest challenge will be played out. Lightness has always been in Ducati’s DNA and thanks to the technology and chemistry of the batteries that are evolving rapidly we are convinced that we can obtain an excellent result. We test our innovations and our futuristic technological solutions on circuits all over the world and then make exciting and desirable products available to Ducatisti. I am convinced that once again we will build on the experiences we have had in the world of racing competition to transfer them and apply them also on production bikes.”

Carmelo Ezpeleta, CEO Dorna Sports: “We are very proud to announce Ducati as the new, single manufacturer for the FIM Enel MotoE World Cup. With their incredible racing history, it is an honour to welcome this commitment from one of the best-known manufacturers in the paddock and to take on this new challenge together. We are eager to see what the future has in store and continue to watch this technology develop and grow, with the MotoGP paddock and MotoE continuing to drive innovation and evolution in the motorcycling industry – at the same time as creating an incredible on-track spectacle.”

This first step of Ducati in the world of electric bikes will also have an influence on the evolution of the product range. Now, the most important challenges in this field remain those of the size, weight, autonomy of the batteries and the availability of charging networks. Ducati’s experience in the FIM Enel MotoE World Cup will be a fundamental support for product R&D, together with the physiological evolution of technology and chemistry. The goal is to study how to produce, as soon as the technology allows, a Ducati electric vehicle that is sporty, light, thrilling and able to satisfy all enthusiasts.

A new chapter of the FIM Enel MotoE Word Cup is closer than ever. And that of Ducati too.

During 2022, various events and collective moments will allow all fans to discover the development of the project step by step.

Sons of Speed – Biketoberfest 2021 by Dmac

Billy Lane Rocks the Vintage Banked Motorcycle Racing World Once More

2021 has turned out to be the year of the “Covid Hangover!”

Many lives have been permanently changed, but Sons of Speed has not skipped a beat and has returned to the New Smyrna Speedway breathing life into the asphalt, 23 degree banked, ½ mile track.

Originally started in 2017 by Billy Lane of Choppers, inc., the race has been held at both New Smyrna Speedway and at the Pappy Hoel Campground Racetrack, in Sturgis, South Dakota.

Click Here To Read the Race Report and Photos only on Bikernet.com

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Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Transportation released an interactive website with data from the Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS). FARS, which became operational in 1975, containing data on a census of fatal traffic crashes within the 50 States, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. To be included in FARS, a crash must involve a motor vehicle traveling on a traffic way customarily open to the public and must result in the death of a vehicle occupant or a nonoccupant within 30 days of the crash.

Fatal crash data for motorcyclists and passengers from the years 2010 to 2019 is included on this website.

Users of the website can sort the information on fatalities by a variety of categories, including:

• State where the crash took place
• Crash Characteristics
• Environmental Characteristics
• Month of Crash
• Time of Crash
• Helmet Usage
• Alcohol Usage
• Age and Sex of Victims
• Weather Conditions
• Single Vehicle v Multi Vehicle

While this information can be useful in understanding when, why and where crashes are taking place, it’s important to note that this data includes not just traditional motorcycles but also mopeds, scooters, minibikes, and pocket bikes.

The Motorcycle Riders Foundation believes crash avoidance is key component of rider safety. There are zero fatalities in crashes that never happen.

To see the website and view the decade’s long data click here.

About Motorcycle Riders Foundation
The Motorcycle Riders Foundation (MRF) provides leadership at the federal level for states’ motorcyclists’ rights organizations as well as motorcycle clubs and individual riders.

Visit MRF Website at: https://mrf.org/

Circling back to the NCOM Legislative Task Force Meeting during the recent NCOM Convention in Des Moines, Iowa, examining existential threats to motorcycling, NCOM-LTF Member Ed Schetter notified the NCOM Board of Directors that “Mercedes Benz is claiming the first Level 3 autonomous technology will be in production for their 2022 EQS equipped with Drive Pilot.”

Level 3 is known as conditional driving automation, and it uses various driver assistance systems and artificial intelligence to make decisions based on changing driving situations around the vehicle.  People inside the vehicle do not need to supervise the technology, meaning they can engage in other activities.

During the NCOM-LTF’s presentation on “The Demise of Gas-Powered Vehicles,” Schetter reported that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) is investigating 11 crashes since 2018 in which a Tesla vehicle with “Autopilot” has struck one or more vehicles involved in an emergency response situation.

Tesla currently operates at Level 2, partial driving automation, which falls short of self-driving because it comes with the expectation that a human will always be alert and ready to take over.

If you don’t know what’s happening with the infrastructure bill, you’re not alone, as even political insiders who should be in the know seem not to be.  The vote on this ‘highway reauthorization bill’ is complicated by action to be taken on another measure, a sweeping social spending and climate package, that has been politically tied to the infrastructure proposal by congressional Democrats and President Joe Biden.

Despite both chambers of Congress agreeing to extend the FAST Act deadline, H.R. 5434; the “Surface Transportation Extension Act of 2021,” Biden put the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill on hold, telling Democrats that a vote on the highway measure must wait until the party agrees on spending trillions more for his far more ambitious social policy and climate change package.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania will become the first major city to ban stops for minor traffic infractions, with a historic piece of legislation that puts the brakes on police pulling over drivers for so-called “secondary violations.”

The City Council approved a bill 14-2 that bans police officers from stopping motorists for minor violations, such as having a broken taillight or not having certain stickers displayed.  Drivers who are guilty of those minor violations will instead receive a warning or a citation in the mail.

“So that an expired license plate or fuzzy dice in the mirror isn’t a death sentence that it can be in some cases,” said Councilmember Curtis Jones Jr., who is a co-sponsor of the “Driving Equality Bill.”

Jones said the city reviewed 2.8 million stops and found that Philadelphia police pull over a disproportionate number of black drivers for minor violations.  Supporters contend the new law would “end traffic stops that promote discrimination while keeping the traffic stops that promote public safety.”

As of 2024, California will ban “small off-road engines” (SORE) primarily used in gas-powered lawn equipment, such as lawnmowers, leaf blowers and chainsaws, in a new law signed by Governor Gavin Newsom.

The legislation, Assembly Bill 1346, will apply not only to fuel-fed lawn equipment, but also to generators and emergency response equipment operated by internal combustion engines (ICE), and “other assorted categories” including golf carts.

AB 1346, authored by Assembly member Marc Berman (D-Menlo Park), directs the California Air Resources Board to adopt regulations by July 2022 that would prohibit the sale of new “small off-road engines” — a category that includes all gas-powered engines under 25 horsepower — but does not regulate the use of existing equipment, and includes exceptions for farmers and emergency responders.

According to CARB, there are more small engines in California than cars, 16.5 million vs. 13.7 million, but have not been the subject of regulation and lack adequate pollution control devices.

It seems that all vehicles, including motorcycles, are destined to become battery-powered in the near future.  Honda, BMW, as well as Yamaha, have all announced their plans to go full electric by 2050.  But for Kawasaki, their self-imposed deadline is coming much sooner, being in 14 years’ time, and by 2035 all of their motorcycles sold will be electric-powered.

To help maximize resources and increase management flexibility, Kawasaki Heavy Industries (KHI) has spun off its motorcycle division into the aptly named Kawasaki Motors, which will focus solely on the motorcycle business.  KHI, meanwhile, will continue to oversee the company’s interests in producing aircraft, ships, industrial equipment, and trains.

“Outdoor leisure activity has been popular during the COVID pandemic,” said Yasuhiko Hashimoto, KHI President, adding that “We will strengthen our environmental efforts with our sights set on post-pandemic lifestyles.”

Honda, KTM, Piaggio and Yamaha all got together to sign a letter of intent about their EV battery swapping plans, with the project’s stated goal being to agree upon a set of shared standards to which all four companies plan to adhere, thus creating the Swappable Batteries Motorcycle Consortium.

Battery standardization has been one of the key stumbling blocks to electrification, but the big issue with battery swapping has always been the cost of the infrastructure.  If there are to be enough batteries in circulation, this would require enormous investment by a manufacturer.

If every company used a different battery type, it would be both expensive and wasteful. However, if a battery in a docking station fits multiple bikes, scooters, mopeds and other small machines, it becomes more viable.

The hope is that by working together not only can they share costs, thus lowering prices both for the bikes and the infrastructure, but that they can work together to improve battery technology resulting in longer ranges and shorter charging times.

“Honda believes that the widespread adoption of electric motorcycles can play an important part in realizing a more sustainable society. For that purpose, we need to solve several challenges such as extending the range, shortening the charging time and lowering the vehicle and infrastructure costs to enhance convenience for customers,” according to Honda Motor Company Limited motorcycle operations chief officer Yoshishige Nomura.

The ACEM – European Association of Motorcycle Manufacturers – has spoken out on the noisy motorcycle debate, issuing its response to growing efforts across the continent to ban bikers from certain routes over complaints motorcycles exude too much noise.

The union, which represents 18 manufacturing companies and 20 national industry associations, is concerned bikers are being unfairly singled out for an issue that is endemic across all road users, saying modern motorcycles don’t exceed the permitted decibel levels compared with many four-wheel alternatives.

Interestingly, the ACEM also supports the use of devices that measure noise and issue fines, since it places the onus on the individual potentially abusing the regulations, rather than the industry as a whole.

The debate over noisy motorcycles has stepped up in recent years, with the issue leading to a number of measures being implemented across popular routes throughout Europe.  Germany and Austria have been particularly pro-active in introducing rules seemingly aimed specifically at the motorcycle industry, going so far as to ban motorcycles entirely from certain stretches.

However, as the ACEM points out, Euro4 and Euro5 motorcycles are already designed not to exceed the permitted 77dB of noise (on average), but, that said, these machines can be altered by various customization techniques, just as with cars.

With this in mind, the ACEM’s position is that manufacturers, the industry in its entirety and every biker shouldn’t be unfairly targeted with specific motorcycling bans since the issue comes down to individual practice and can just as easily be mirrored across all modes of transport, thus applicable to all road users or none.

As such, the ACEM has taken the stance of supporting the use of noise pollution devices, despite them coming in for sharp criticism from bikers, so long as the devices are placed in key locations, shifting the onus back onto the individual – regardless of machinery – and without using the sweeping brush of preventing all bikers from using certain routes.

The world may be getting back on its feet, notwithstanding the ongoing effects of the global pandemic, but the manufacturing sector in particular will surely struggle to go back to normal.  With mass lay-offs following months of closure, companies around the world are finding themselves severely undermanned as business begins to open up, and demand increases.

Furthermore, the already problematic shipping container shortage further aggravated by the Suez Canal blockage in March 2021, parts shortages, supply chain breakdowns, and backlogs of cargo ships waiting to dock, continues to present challenges to global trade.

As such, multiple industries — the motorcycle and automotive industries, particularly — are experiencing production delays brought about by raw materials shortages, such as with the semiconductors and microchips in recent months.  Now, price hikes in materials have hit the tire industry, with the cost of producing rubber increasing.

QUOTABLE QUOTE:

“If you have enough breath to complain about anything, you have more than enough reason to give thanks about something.”
~ Mattie J.T. Stepanek (1990-2004), Poet & Peace Advocate

ABOUT AIM / NCOM: The National Coalition of Motorcyclists (NCOM) is a nationwide motorcyclists rights organization serving over 2,000 NCOM Member Groups throughout the United States, with all services fully-funded through Aid to Injured Motorcyclist (AIM) Attorneys available in each state who donate a portion of their legal fees from motorcycle accidents back into the NCOM Network of Biker Services (https://onabike.com 800-ON-A-BIKE).