Letters
LETTERS
TRASH ON THE TRAIL
I just returned from backpacking the John Muir Trail, and the trash is so bad the rangers are handing out plastic bags and asking the people to help by gathering the cans, etc., and carrying them out.
Five years ago the trail and the desert were clean. I think the problem is just too many people, and it will get worse as the population using the area increases.
J.R. BOYD Rosamond, Calif.
THE MINORITY SPEAKS
Not many people think minibikes are hot, but can you take a mini and pull a long wheelie? When I read your mag I am a little surprised at you, because you are the leading and the best mag on earth, so show some minibike riders please. It takes guts to be a good mini rider.
TOM “CAT”PEADEN Pensacola, Fla. How long is a long wheelie? Does a minibike make it shorter?Ed.
TAKE IT FROM MILDRED
This old-time rider used to shag blueprints and tag film in the days when only airmen and racers wore helmets. Soft caps were the thing. After her children were grown, she returned to the cycle world. She purchased a dirt hike, a street bike and a helmet. She did the whole scene and did wea.r the helmet, even though it mussed her hair and got warm occasionally.
One day in May as she sat on her bike at an occupied pedestrian crosswalk, along came an automobile driver whose attention was momentarily diverted, and she was struck in the rear. Now this old-time rider heartily suggests that in lieu of an altimeter on the bike while doing snap rolls and loops, the wise precaution would be to buy another helmet, to replace the cracked one, and keep ahead. Just love your magazine.
MILDRED WILSON Los Angeles, Calif.
IN THE GROOVE
What deep and dark secret have I uncovered?
(Continued on page 8)
Continued from page 6
I have written several letters to California state officials concerning a dangerous condition recently being perpetrated by highway builders in this part of Northern California (at least as far as I have traveled).
I have not so much as had a single letter acknowledged, despite the fact that I did not include any defamatory allegations, four letter words or the equivalent. The silence seems to indicate a skeleton in the closet; what else can I conclude?
The dangerous condition is the new “safety measure” that highway engineers have discovered to prevent hydroplaning of automobiles on wet pavements. Deep wavy grooves are now being engraved in concrete surfaces and asphalt. Granted, they might help the motorist, but from my own experience they tend to be a hell scarer to me asa motorcyclist. When I hit them I get an immediate feeling that my front wheel is going out of control. I am forced to slow down immediately, and if some nitwit behind me happens to be daydreaming, then I run the risk of getting clouted, with disastrous results . . . for me.
1 wonder if you might be able to ascertain if this symptom is being experienced by other motorcyclists, or am I the only one who is complaining. If there are others, I would like for them to do as I did and write their state senator. Maybe if they get a few more complaints, they might get the road building scientists to come up with something which might benefit both types of road users.
JOHN TEA LE Lafayette, Calif.
We’re well aware of the symptom. The undulating effect induced by the grooves is quite disturbing. However, it has never put us in trouble. If you find oscillation building up in vour machine, try using the lane diagonally, crossing from one side to another, gradually. -Ed.
DEADPAN DEPT.
You’ve got a great magazine, but sometimes you don’t take your readers’ problems seriously. Eor instance, Jerold Arthur’s problem with his ’69 Honda 350. (Letters, July '70) Well, my '70 Honda 350 had the same problem, although maybe not as bad as his. After trial and error, I pretty well solved it by stretching the diaphragm springs about one quarter inch over stock. Well, it worked on my bike anyway.
But now after 8200 miles, 1 can hear a whine or whirring sound at about 7400 rpm and sometimes at 6700 rpm. Any ideas?
If you lake my problem seriously, I promise to buy your mag for ever and ever.
R. KONZELMAN Toronto, Canada
That is the sound of your engine running. If it stops, see your Honda dealer quick! Ed.
NON SEQUITUR
I must agree with your reply in Letters (October ’70) that doctors and guns are not compatible. I further agree that motorcycles, too, have nothing to do with guns. Why, if you truly believe this, did you accept the gun advertisement on page 97 of the same issue.
CHRIS DOYLE EPO New York, N.Y.
Thanks for your support, Chris. As for your question about the advertisement, it is a non sequitur. The advertisement is for a low-power pellet gun, and suggests that the gun be used for target practice on “varmints. ” It does not advocate . that the gun be used for a shoot-out with some baddies in the wrong part of town.— Ed.
(Continued on page 12)
Continued from page 8
DEFENDING THE NORTON
This letter is in answer to Mr. Richard Kennedy’s in your November issue.
Mr. Kennedy takes the Norton Commando somewhat to task, although he offhandedly mentions its power, steadiness, and smoothness as “magnificent.” And, being a Commando owner myself (a 1969 Fastback purchased new, now with 6300 miles) and a very happy one, I have to come to the machine’s defense.
I’m unimpressed by Mr. Kennedy’s complaints, as I’ve experienced them myself, and frankly, the sheer personality of the machine has worked its spell to the extent that I would call my bike faultless. Have I been fooled? I sincerely doubt it.
The Norton Commando is probably the best of the very few bikes that have that unmistakable, awesome, beautiful quality and feeling of having been made by man. I dare anyone to deny the magic in that machine.
It’s difficult for me to compare the majestic boom and roar ot the Commando with the “pocketa-pocketa” sound of the Honda 750. The Norton has the sound of a lion, the Honda sounds like it’s making more Hondas!
Probably Mr. Kennedy thinks this has little to do with motorcycles. Neither does fine Virginia in a favorite briar have much to do with a pack a day, or a glass of Spanish sherry to a fifth of cheap bourbon.
To each his own, 1 guess. I still can’t figure out why Mr. Kennedy didn’t get another Honda!
ROBERT BAUSCH San Francisco, Calif.
RINGING IN THE NEW
First, let me say that I thoroughly enjoy each issue of your magazine. Each month I find CYCLE WORLD additionally informative and entertaining. Motorcycles are finally experiencing their “renaissance” from the “dark ages.” It is my firm belief that fine publications such as CYCLE WORLD have contributed greatly to the upheaval of old ideas and opinions concerning motorcycles and their riders.
DAVID WIRWAHN Jacksonville, Ala.
COMPARING THE BIGGIES
After studying the basic layout of what I feel are the three major competitive magazines, CYCLE WORLD, Cycle Guide, and Cycle, your magazine is the best. I like to go to your road test specification sheet and find just about everything there is to know about that particular motorcycle.
LARREE CHETELAT JR. APO San Francisco, Calif.
SAD BUT TRUE
Since this year has started, I have run into a lot of crooks in the motorcycle business, and now I’m fed up with them.
During a Poker Run in Northern Virginia, my adjuster nut on the right intake valve worked loose, and messed up my valve system on that side. I turned it over to a certain Triumph dealer in Springfield, Va. to have it repaired. Little did I know that I would not see my bike until six months later. When I got it back, three days before Christmas, I was faced with a cash bill of $170 and wrote a check for the balance, about $24. The bike ran for one day. This “dealer” did not do half of the things I wanted done. Not only did they charge me $170 for replacing two valves and installing new coils, but they removed custom parts (custom rocker box caps) and replaced them with stock, with the excuse that they interfered with the tuning. And my air cleaner was missing, although they did give me a new one when I noticed it was gone . . .
(Continued on page 14)
Continued from page 12
My luck, just when 1 got things right, 1 ran into another crook.
Last Memorial Day 1 went down to Virginia Beach, Va. The morning I left to come home, I was greeted with a flat front tire. So I took my Triumph to the local Honda dealer of Virginia Beach, which is the only bike shop I could get to. I purchased a new tire and a new tube and waited 2Vi hours while they installed it. To make this long story shorter, I got 35 miles and my front tire was again flat. When 1 went to patch it,
I found that my “new tube” was the same old tube that has been with my bike for the past year and a half, with seven pinches. 1 spent 90 cents in a pay phone to hear the words, “What are you getting mad about?”
I got it patched and got home 6 hours late; 200 miles in 1 1 hours is by no means a record in my book. A closing word to anybody thinking of doing business with these crooks . . . Don 7.
JOHN TRUES DALE Ta ko ma Park, Md.
Could you please tell me if there is any way to do anything about the way the bike shops are operating in the town nearest to me? Most of my friends ride Hondas, with the exception of another person and myself, who ride Yamahas. 1 can speak for myself and anyone else who has ever needed anything from these two particular places. Both of the shops never, not sometimes, but never have the parts that are desperately needed for our machines. It also takes at least a month just to have the bike serviced, and then the job is half done and done poorly. These places charge you for things that have not been done, like decarbonizing the piston, because I pulled the head myself and checked it; and what did I find? A lot of carbon. What can be done?
MIKE BANKARD Beale A.F.B., Calif.
The parts problem seems quite universal these clays. Because of unprecedented demand for nearly every brand and model, new motorcycles are getting into owners’ hands faster than the distributors and dealers can build up adequate parts inventories.
As for service, the motorcycle boom, coming at a lime when the rest of the nation’s business is slumping, is causing a drought oj competent mechanics. 'This is not to excuse bad or dishonest workmanship, which has been with us in boom or bust, hi the last 20 years, slipshod manufacturing and service has come into style-not only in the world of motorcycling, but in the entire world oj commerce. 'To realize the extent to which every man, woman and child in this society is being shafted by the hard-sell culture, one has only to read a book like Vance Packard’s “The Waste Makers. ” It is a wonder that the uncompromisingly honest craftsmen left can survive in the inundating sea of pressure to extract the ultimate profit from a co m m ercial operation. Nonetheless, there is a plenitude of dealers who are basically honest in intent.
IJ you have been cheated, there are a few things you can do about it. If you happen to be fortunate enough to live near a Legal Aid office, you can go there for free legal advice. One of our staffers has found that small claims court is an effective way to get restitution for financial losses.
(Continued on page 16)
Continued from page 14
Court costs for Small Claims is only the price of filing your initial claim at the Small Claims office, and usually will involve a fee of only $5 or under, depending upon the county in which you file your claim. You must he able to provide evidence that your claim is a valid one, and you can only be refunded for the actual value of your losses, i.e., price of parts which you did not receive and service which was not, in fact, rendered.
If you can provide proof, and your losses are sizeable enough (but under the maximum amount, which is $300 in Calif, to qualify for Small Claims), then it may be worth your time to try this course of action and present your case to the court, as the judge is usually sympathetic to the problems of the little man. However, if your claim cannot be solidly substantiated, you’d better think twice before you lose a day's wages to spend a day in court.
in your folder of evidence, include your canceled check; it is invaluable. Always pay by check, then you have a receipt of payment. And you may be able to stop payment on it, if you feel you have payed for service or parts which you did not receive. Again, if you stop payment on a check, be able to prove that your reason for doing so was a good one and can be substantiated.
There are certain other things that you should do before entering a transaction even though you know the odds are stacked against you. The first thing is to make sure that your instructions as to what you do and don’t want to be done on your bike should be made clear on the repairman’s work order. When ordering certain types of work or parts, other work or parts may be implicit in that job, i.e., with a new piston usually goes a new set of piston rings. Find out about them. Understand them, it would be unreasonable to demand that the repairman use the old rings, with new pistons. Likewise, it would be highly illogical to expect a crankcase half to be replaced without a charge for a piston, connecting rod, etc.-if the piston and rod put the hole in the crankcase in the first place.
The above points may seem too silly to mention, save for the fact that we receive a dozen letters daily from riders who show equal lack of understanding of logical repair sequence.
Then ask how long the work will take. If the answer is more than a few weeks, take your bike somewhere else. If you have left a bike, and the shop exceeds its time limit by a week or more, demand the machine back and go elsewhere.
Next, you should examine your repair bill carefully, before you pay. Make sure there are no charges for jobs allegedly done that are unrelated to the job you asked for. Many people are actually bashful about questioning an item on a bill, just as though it were rude to do so, or implying dishonesty.
The self-consciousness to verify the fairness of a transaction extends throughout our society right down to the simple act of checking the change you have received at the grocer’s checkout stand. Checking change is something that little old ladies do, right? If you think so, then you deserve to get shafted.
Even after you have paid your bill and taken your bike home, you should check it out thoroughly. If you honestly feel the job wasn ’t proper, or that there was an oversigh t - deliberate or accidental-then you should go back and show the dealer your receipt and your evidence that the job wasn’t done. Again, many people fail to take this most important step; instead they tuck the old tail between the legs and say nothing. Ask yourself how many times you have ordered a steak rare and then failed to send it back when it arrived in medium or well-done condition. How silly! When you deal for rare, you should accept rare only.
(Continued on page 19)
Continued from page 16
So, if you have taken all these steps, and still are not satisfied, you’re pretty much out of luck. It is bad if you are a captive audience to the only bike dealership in town. In most cases you can do business somewhere else, and you should, not failing to tell the offending dealer that you and your friends will never patronize his establishment again.
There are other indirect measures you can take, in the form of informal sanctioning pressure. Call the local Better Business Bureau. Call the local Chamber of Commerce. Complain to any group with which the offending dealer may be affiliated. If you belong to a bike club, or to any group which can organize itself, chances are that you can organize and boycott a consistently dishonest dealer.
Naturally, you should have a good case. The most honest mechanics have momentary lapses. Many dealers are more than willing to rectify their errors, for, in the end, when boom peters out into plateau or recession, their livelihood depends upon repeat business. -Ed.
SHORT BUT SWEET
Comment on “The New Model,” November 1970 issue:
Pretty work!
D & D LTD. (TRIUMPH) Easton, Md.
TO RIDE OR NOT
I was recently involved in a motorcycle accident in which my Suzuki T125 was destroyed by a car, yet 1 am still interested in riding a cycle. However, 1 feel that this decision rests partly on figures not available to me. Specifically, although 1 have reviewed the pertinent medical literature concerning motorcycle accidents, 1 am still unable to synthesize an answer to the following basic question: given an experienced, helmeted driver and the need to commute five miles a day, is the use of a motorcycle significantly more dangerous than that of a car. Certain studies do suggest this strongly, e.g., The Journal of the American Medical Association 204:77(1968). 1 am hoping that you will be able to help me with this by either supplying me with data unavailable to me or by having, over the years, collected enough anecdotal information that you feel you could formulate an educated opinion.
Needless to say, 1 feel that this kind of information would be equally pertinent to a large percentage of your readers, and that it would be a significant service for you to answer these questions publicly.
A.L. BARNERT, M.D. San Antonio, Texas
As you are a doctor, you are well aware of the fact that your patients refuse to act in “statistical” fashion. Likewise with motorcycling and motorcycle accidents. Statistically, we can say that your use of a helmet will reduce the probability of your death, or of receiving a serious head injury resulting front a motorcycle accident.
But no study of statistical data, no matter how involved, can help you decide to ride to work on a motorcycle or in a car. Your five-mile commute is different than my five-mile commute. Your attitude of vigilance while riding is different than mine. And so on. Some of our staff have individually logged more than 100,000 miles by motorcycle on the road without a single accident resulting in injury.
You have had an accident in which you destroyed your motorcycle. You should reflect on that accident and analyze the circumstances leading up to it. Was it totally beyond your control? Eew accidents are. Did something basic, hopefully an improvement, in your driving habit patterns result as a by-product of that accident? Without feeling defensive about it, are you able to recognize faults in your riding habits and change them? Do you truly desire to become a smooth, calculating, calm, deliberately aggressive (from the point of view of continual vigilance) rider?
If you can answer yes to all these questions, then you ought to be riding.
As for the statistics, they have been published over and over in various forms. They do not favor motorcycles over automobiles, needless to say. But the difference in deaths per thousand between the two modes of travel is measurable in only a percentage point or two. The significance is not enough to make us want to hang up our leathers.
If you want something positive to hang on to, think how much “cleaner, ” in terms of air pollution, your little motorcycle is in comparison to the big sedan you leave sitting at home in the garage. Hell, man, you’re doing people a favor when you ride your bike. - Ed.
EQUAL TIME
May I claim the right to equal time in the Letters column? The September issue carries a letter from Allan S. Field telling of a wonderful fairyland called Japan where cycle parts are delivered in 24 hours at reasonable prices. If this is true and I have no reason to doubt it, this makes the American rider an orphan. The parts and service situation in this country borders on the obscene! After talking to many riders of many different makes, I know this remark does not have to be defended.
(Continued on page 20)
I just turned a 750 Honda back to the selling dealer after the bike sat gathering grime in his service area for the better part of two months for want of a point camshaft and primary gear spacer. The bike was taken apart by the Honda factory rep before he checked out parts availability. While the bike sat during the prime riding months of July and August with an insurance premium of S240 a year, I made many attempts along with the dealer to get some action. American Honda answered with a form letter and the factory did not answer at all. When I informed American Honda that the form letter was unrelated and impersonal, they replied by stating that it was the only way they were geared to reply since they were very busy. Funny how they are not too busy to sock all that nice American money in the home town bank.
1 am going to miss the big Honda and the money lost in selling out, but I am not going to miss all the little folks in Gardena who mail out form letters in reply to honest rider claims.
Something better be done about parts and service soon since, with all the other problems of riding a bike today, this could be the straw that sends riders through the door of the local automobile showroom.
EARL H. SYMONDS Yonkers, N.Y.
AN EXCITING IDEA
For a long time Eve tried to find a way to encourage bike manufacturers to produce machinery that is aesthetically as well as mechanically pleasing. I could think of no better way than to build The Bike myself-but I’ve neither the money nor the know-how to do that. Until your September issue I’d despaired of ever seeing design proposals in a cycle magazine, but your cover story on the Vetter Rocket III has renewed my faith in cycle publications. CYCLE WORLD is showing the way to cycle enthusiasts who want more stylish as well as better engineered machinery. Now it’s time for bikers to deluge BSA with letters encouraging them to transform that delightful prototype into a production machine. And thanks to CYCLE WORLD for discovering and publicizing an exciting new idea. Keep at it.
STEVE HARDESTY Sacramento, Calif.
HELMET “HOOPLA"
Having read so much “Hoopla” on the cons of compulsory helmet laws, I would like to say a few words on the need for this legislation.
I’m an avid cyclist, having owned several motorcycles and scooters in my lifetime. I am by occupation a policeman and have been in the business for almost 12 years. About eight of these years were devoted to Accident Investigation and Traffic work, during which I learned a great deal about causation of accidents, which is unimportant to or unavailable to most people.
My state (Michigan) enacted a compulsory helmet law in 1966. The year preceding the law showed 104 motorcyclists killed in accidents on our roads. The following year’s experience was 86 cyclists killed, a reductioa of over 17 percent, even with an increase of registrations of almost 10 percent.
A cyclist convicted of violating the 1966 Helmet Law appealed his conviction to the Michigan Court of Appeals and won, which resulted in the court declaring this law unconstitutional. This happened in 1968. The slate legislature, realizing the importance of this law and it’s effect on the death toll to cyclists, enacted a new compulsory helmet law which took effect in September 1969. I’m certain that even with the terrific increase (93 percent from ’65 to ’69) in cycle registrations, the number of fatalities can be reduced drastically as happened in 1967.
The attorney representing the state in the case that resulted in overturning the original law failed to enlighten the Court of Appeals with the most important argument, that being: a cyclist not wearing a helmet could be stunned by a falling or flying object, thereby causing him to lose control of his machine, veer over the center line of the road, which could in turn cause a motorist proceeding in the opposite direction to take evasive action leading to his striking a pole, tree, or another vehicle to avoid a collision with the cyclist. The same blow to a rider wearing a helmet might not affect his control as drastically, thereby avoiding the loss of life, crippling or serious injury, or property damage that might occur in the first instance.
It is the duty of the legislators to enact laws that will help to make persons safe or secure while traveling our streets and highways. They are attempting to do their duty. As I see it, my freedom of choice as to wearing or not wearing the helmet is subordinate to the safety of others. (1 know how hot 95-degree weather is with a helmet on and I’d like to have the freedom of choice, but the safety of others is paramount lo my desires).
WALTER L. KUSS Southfield, Mich.
