Well, it's been a hot minute. What have I been up to since then?
ORP was...a trip of extremes. Got the bikes prepped, 890 in the box, mototote on the E350 with the supermoto on the back:
Rolled out with the box van, van was feeling a little down on power in stop and go traffic - right up to the point where I lost the brakes on the freeway in stop and go traffic. Managed to limp it to the shoulder, saw this:
Of course, being an old Ford 460, once it stopped while heat soaked, it didn't want to restart. After letting the brakes cool down, wailing on them with a pipe wrench for a bit (what, it is what I had), I got the brakes reasonably unstuck. Finally it started back up, and as I got prepared to carefully proceed back on to rejoin the freeway, the engine died again and I ended up rolling backwards down the shoulder with no brake booster. Slammed it into park, fully engaged the ebrake, and after a heart stopping few seconds, it came to a stop with a giant hop of the rear wheels. I wondered if in that moment I lunched the transmission, but when I got it restarted again, it moved forward and I was able to limp it to a local auto parts store, where a combination of mechanical persuasion, grease, etc, managed to get things unstuck and running again.
Proceeding up the mountains towards ORP, everything was pretty fine, although I stopped at the top of the grade to check the brakes were still fine, which they were, and it wouldn't restart again. After a bunch of coaxing, I managed to get it to the freeway onramp, when one of my friends calls me, asking if he'd just driven by me on the side of the road. I mention what's going on, he waits a little ways ahead, and I get it rolling down the hill and cooled down enough to run normally again. With the two of us in caravan, I'm feeling okay about things, and head onwards to the racetrack.
Day saved! I've been delayed by a few hours, but so goes it. Except...about 60 miles from the track he calls me and says the truck is smoking. I don't notice any loss of power, all guages are normal, everything seems fine. He couldn't quite tell what color the smoke was, so I was thinking maybe it was running a bit rich, perhaps sucking some gas or oil past the rings? After about 15 seconds, the smoking dissipates, so I just cross my fingers that I only need to go a bit farther and we'll be all good.
Another 20 miles or so later, another big puff of smoke. It again, dissipates after a bit, and so we just decide to try and make it to the track as is, because stopping means it probably won't restart for awhile again, and I'd really like to make it to the track.
And then at about 35 miles from the track, I apply the throttle, and the revs climb but the truck doesn't go forward. I pull over into a convenient turnout, and ATF is pouring out of the transmission. Fuck, I can't fix that on the side of the road. I call my friends, and we start pulling stuff out of the box van so I can get to the track before they close.
Did I mention it's the weekend where the Aurora Borealis is showing up? Pretty surreal to be pulling your stuff out of the back of a van and swapping everything to another vehicle under the lights:
With my friends showing up, we tow the box van to a better spot, and sprint towards the track so we can get there before the gates close at midnight.
Bonus image from my friends at the track, while I was dealing with a blown up box truck:
Anyways, I figured I'd just deal with the box truck when I got back. From here on, it's trackday time.
First day, everything goes pretty well. I don't love the CW configuration of ORP, but things are going pretty smoothly. Then my buddy's SV650 makes a weird noise, and suddenly doesn't want to idle. Because I've spent too much time screwing with SV650s, I figure it's running on one cylinder - because they're even firing V-twins, one cylinder cutting out at idle doesn't create a super obvious problem, it just won't idle. I discover it's no problem to grab the front exhaust header when it's running, so that's the cylinder that's not firing. Injectors spray, spark plug fires, maybe lost compression for some reason? With the spark plug pulled, blocking the spark plug hole with my finger causes it to get blown out under compression, so we figure the next thing to check is timing. Maybe the cam hopped a tooth somehow?
Ahh, yes, it hopped a lot of teeth. Our assumption is because this motor was in a pretty severe front end crash, with the front valve cover being damaged, and we think it's quite possible that it actually caused a break in the cam chain that eventually gave up the ghost. But hey, it still ran, and if the valves are shut, and the motor hasn't seized, the front cylinder is just an airspring now, right? Rip the cam chain out, crank the idle, and let's ride the SV325:
Totally worked just fine, honestly, just extremely down on power. If you'd like to see what an SV325 can do on track:
After a productive day, time to enjoy the sunset:
Can't argue with round two of the Aurora:
So, on to Day 2, in my favored configuration. Things are generally going pretty well, when our other friend takes his 675 offroading, and when getting back on track, it is smoking heavily - he gets black flagged, pulls off, parks it in the dirt. Figure we've lost that motor too, but we can sort that out later. Managed to do reasonably well for myself at Superpole, 5th fastest overall for the day, and the fastest 600 class bike:
I also had a great time looking at my data traces on my friend's Racebox, so I figure it's time to invest in some proper datalogging, more on that later.
We go to drag the 675, and discover that it has converted itself to a drag bike:
In his offroading session, it snapped the lower linkage, and all the smoke was from the rear tire eating itself alive on the exhaust. But hey, he didn't crash it!
So after all that, it's time to sort out the box truck coming home. After some significant arguments with AAA as to what is a motorhome vs what is a box truck, they finally agree that it is what it is registered as (a motorhome), and they'll tow it...except that it is mothers day, and that means a $3300 tow, of which they'll cover $500. I decide I'll work my local network instead and see if I can get someone else to tow it back in. Finally, the next day, we manage to get that sorted, and at 2AM it arrives home:
What a weekend. After all of this, I also realized I wasn't going to be able to make it to COTAH, so canceled my registration for that, unfortunately.
Went to spectate a buddy at Oregon Trail Rally, was super fun. Loved this little Ford:
Can't argue with the famous Ferrari swapped Subaru:
And a quick break for some dirtbiking in the woods:
for your track bike