Dark Side

Update 5-16-06

Web Site Links

Home

Contact Me

Network Mang.

Mookies

Pictures

Bicycling

(Here's the original writeup.)

A couple of years ago, I tried driving the 'Wing across the sand at Lake McConaughy.  I did alright until I turned into some softer stuff.  I sank to the frame after about ten feet.  I've wanted to try again with the car tire on back.  Near the shore in Mississippi, I had a chance.  I left the dirt road a few feet to get into a foot-deep sand drift.  As I expected, the front got pulled around and was very hard to control.  I had to stop to regain.  When I restarted, I simply let the clutch out and applied a bit of throttle.  The back tire started a slow, grinding spin, dug down a couple of inches, and pushed me through!  Someday when I've got a few people willing to help me retrieve the thing, I'll try deeper, longer sand.

More importantly, I did try out the run-flat technology.  The valve stem failed me between New York and DC.  The tire went flat at about 75mph.  I thought the road was wavy.  The bike got a little squirrelly so I shed about 20mph fairly quickly.  It took a few tries to figure out what the problem was.  I'd fill up the tire and ride fine for a while but as soon as I got on the highway, it would go flat within a mile or two.  A highway worker told me about a shop down the road so I went about three miles at 60mph on the flat to get off the highway and to the shop.  The bike was a tiny bit squirrelly and took a little effort to get into a corner, but it ran good enough to get me to the shop.  The shop owner would not work on the tire but let me use his air to refill it.  When I put in 45 lbs of air, I found the problem.  I puttered around until I found a Honda shop and got the valve stem replaced.  The tire is fine.

Further down the road, I hit the broadside of a major rain storm.  Cages were pulling over.  The traffic came down to around 25mph.  I did not stop.  The bike had no problems. 

The tire has about 30K on it.  It has burned up two front tires and a set of brake pads but still has not worn smooth with the wear bars.  I did the Tail of the Dragon in about 18.5 minutes.  It has only failed me once trying to ride at an angle through a four inch high pile of snow between lanes of traffic.  (The back tire was fine but the front tire picked up a huge shimmy and when the back tire got off the pile, it had nothing to grab on to so the bike went down.) 

The only other thing I want to do is video the tire in action.  So far, I have only captured the back of the tire.  I need to get the side as it flexes.  I have some ideas but have been riding too much to try them out.