What did you do on or to your CB 1100 today

[Nachodaddy]

Wow! Clean, simple and powerful. Thank you for making my (Father's) Day! 

[Gone in 60]

I share your love of nostalgia and movie cars. But your CB1100 remains the most impressive picture you've shared today! David

I dunno... Bullitt made '67/'68 Mustang Fastbacks a premium over coupes, but the 2000 version of Gone in 60 Seconds with Nicholas Cage permanently drove prices up too high for me to consider.
But, if someone offered to trade me a clean '67 Fastback with at least a 289 for my CB1100, it would be a tough choice.

[pdedse]

Set out to ride to the coast today; planned on hugging the northside of the Columbia River on the WA side and then head back across the river at Astoria, follow the coast south for a couple of hours and back east to the Portland area.  With an expected high of 85 today, I figured my mesh jacket and liner, a short sleeve and long sleeve shirt would be enough.  

It wasn't!

I got over halfway to the coast on hiway 4 and the 15mph winds coming off the waters of the Columbia felt way too cold for late June.  


My teeth were chattering and I was shivering...just didn't seem right.  But as I neared Cathlamet, I remembered there was a ferry crossing that would take me to hiway 30 and then head home with my tail between my legs.  

Waiting for the 10am ferry crossing


About 10 cars, 4 cyclists and one cb1100 rider.  $4 for me, $3 for the others two wheelers and $6 for the cars.  It would take 1.5 hours to ride from the north side to the south side of this point, 15 minutes on the ferry


A heavier liner or sweatshirt, or if I had left 2 hours later I would have been fine.  But today...was just not mentally prepared for a cold ride when I was expecting different.

[Gone in 60]

Hey, at least you made it a very interesting journey!

[Cormanus]

And took a couple of nice pictures too.

[Nachodaddy]

In the Phoenix, Arizona, area this morning, it was 88F when I awoke at 4:00AM, but it warmed up quickly after that. Of course, the traffic is also very heavy and there is no place to ride that is as beautiful as where you are. Thanks for the pictures. 

[Gone in 60]

My CB1100 has been on a ferry a few times... from Balboa Island to Newport Beach. It's about a 5 minute ride and saves about 15 minutes of riding around to the bridge on Balboa. More of a novelty than anything else, but hey, your bike is on a boat!

[Gone in 60]

On Friday, my CB1100 brought me some mental solace, along with a bleeding skull and visual distraction for work.

Friday started out as a an easy run with an anticipated early end, which would have ended with a long bike ride to the beach. But, an emergency call right after I finished my sandwich around the corner from our drop-off point at a medical research center kicked the day into a 350 mile, eight-hour stint in the saddle. Along the way, I saw something my mind couldn't shake loose.
A few locals will know where I'm talking about, but The 134 freeway narrows a bit and forms a chicane where it swings under The 5, and it's a magnet for accidents. I imagine cars going too fast in the middle of the night are caught unaware by the quick right turn and lose control. More than once, I've been stopped by CHP in that spot as they hold up all traffic to let a tow truck drag a wrecked car away. But Friday the sight was horrific. A low-boy flatbed and a crane on the shoulder, reaching for something that must have crashed hard enough to have gone into the bushes away from the roadway into a shallow ravine. One lane on the left side was open, and as I crawled past, concentrating on the cars to either side of me, I caught a glimpse of a mashed up wad of something dark blue being brought up by the crane. For a solid 1/8 mile past the spot pushed to the right shoulder was a strewn mess of suspension parts, wheels, shattered plastic and other bits.

Moved on past the mess and made my delivery. The emergency call turned me around to head back in the other direction, and I started rolling. When I was about 15 miles East of the accident site, I came up behind that low-boy flatbed truck from earlier, being escorted by two CHP cars, one in front and one behind. On the truck was a twisted mass that, to my best guess, was once a pick-up truck. I'm a truck guy and I couldn't tell what kind it used to be. I could tell that resuers had peeled sheet metal away from what was the cab to extract the occupants. I used to be an insurance accident scene investigaor many, many moons ago, and am a bit jaded when it comes to car crashes, but this image shook me.

Got home at the end of the day, and all I wanted was some garage therapy to clear my mid of that image. What better way than to polish the headers on my CB. I hadn't since the DGR, and the gold tinge was starting to give way to those tiny little black dots. Grabbed a rag and my Blue Magic, leaned over, and thunk. Yup, banged my head into a fin on the cylinder head. I have the worst up-close depth perception. I bang my head a lot. But 20 minutes later, my pipes looked sweeter than ever, and I felt pretty good!

I don't consider myself an entertainer, but when I give a two-hour tour at the museum, I realize that a group of people will be staring at my bald head for most of that time, as noise comes out of that head, spewing car stuff. If you are in a position where people stare at your head, and it does not have hair on it, it's probably a good idea to avoid activities that damage the head. Or heck, just wear a hat. The Petersen dress code specifies "no hats or headgear are to be worn with the provided uniform". But, I wear a hat. My head usually features some sort of distracting scratch, scrape or gash. Nobody has ever told me to remove my hat. They know that there's probably something nasty under there. Five out of 10 times, it's come from my CB1100. Whacking my head on the engine polishing pipes, detailing, or doing maintanence. The other five times are from the combined fleet of cars and bikes. I get bit by the CB1100 most frequently.

I selected a fine Goorin flat cap for Saturday morning's tour, kept my wound under said hat, and all was well. It is imperative to keep a collection of black hats if you're going to wear them over a head that might give it a drop of blood or two. Won't show.

My cat loves me. We play and he'll bite me in the process. I know he doesn't mean to harm me. We have a level of trust, and when we spend time playing, he knows he can give me a bite every now and then and not be punished for it. I hope my CB1100 thinks of me in the same way.

[emptysea]

Hey, Gone In 60 --  your last post shows in "Recent Posts" column (for me, at least) as: "On Friday, my CB1100 brought me some men..."   

Not that there's anything wrong with that...



It is interesting that so many riders I know find solace in motorcycling, whether through riding, maintenance, or just posting on a web forum about motorcycles. Glad you found yours in cleaning your pipes. If you're ever feeling down and are in the Chicago area, feel free to look me up -- I have rags and sponges and polish enough to brighten you right up!

[Gone in 60]

Hey, Gone In 60 --  your last post shows in "Recent Posts" column (for me, at least) as: "On Friday, my CB1100 brought me some men..."   

Not that there's anything wrong with that...



It is interesting that so many riders I know find solace in motorcycling, whether through riding, maintenance, or just posting on a web forum about motorcycles.  Glad you found yours in cleaning your pipes.  If you're ever feeling down and are in the Chicago area, feel free to look me up -- I have rags and sponges and polish enough to brighten you right up! 

Ok, now that is funny. Reminds me of the SEMA (automotive performance industry) trade show many years ago. I worked for Holley Performance, and our booth was an aisle over from Firestone. Firestone's booth was promoting their heavy truck suspension air bags. There was a big elevated sign over that area that said "TRUCK STUFF". In front of this sign, at the same elevation, was the Firestone signature letter "F" rotating on a pole. 

I noticed, as I spoke with people in our booth about our products, that I was frequently distracted by what I thought was some kind of profanity in my peripheral vision. Didn't know what it was until I stopped and stared at the Firestone display. When the "F" rotated to a position parallel with "TRUCK STUFF", the "F" covered up the "TR", making the sign read "$UCK STUFF".

As more people noticed, there was some audible snickering in the area, and it didn't take long for the visual to show up on Instagram. From that point on, the "F" stopped rotating, and was in a position that was perpendicular to the rest of the sign.

And thank you for the offer to come clean your pipes, but now that I am Mentally Retired, I no longer travel to the greater Chicago area on a regular basis.