Letters

LETTERS

MAKE SOME LONG STORIES SHORT

Something is missing from your magazine. What happened to the short stories? I’ve looked forward to and miss them.

K.C. Stookes Albany, Ore.

Those great CYCLE WORLD short stories are alive and well. It’s just that there is such a lot that we want to put in the magazine each month, and only so much space to put it in. So, unfortunately, we just don’t seem to have room every single month for a fiction piece. But we’ll keep trying to give you the best motorcycling fiction whenever we can. By the way, did you catch last month’s story, "A Gallon of Gas,” by Richard Kalthoff?-Ed.

NEW HUSH ON FLORIDA HIGHWAYS

Just wanted you to know I enjoy your magazine. Yours is the only one I buy, except for Road Rider. I have followed motorcycle design and change since 1968 with you. It has changed a lot since then. Remember the BMW R27?

I have to put in a complaint though. On page 32 of the November issue, you saw fit to take a dig at large trucks and their “ignored” noise. I don’t know how it is in the great state of California, but in Florida, not so. The newest anti-noise act has set levels at 82, 84 and 86 dbs, for motorcycles, cars and trucks, respectively. The Highway Patrol will have sound monitors on the roads beginning January 1, 1975.

The argument for the lower motorcycle db level is 1-4 cylinders vs. 4-8 (cars), or 6-12 (trucks). Included in this rating is fan noise, blower intake, tire whine and wind resistance around trailers. Few of these problems face the greatest majority of motorcycles.

I own two bikes for my own use. I have had nothing but motorcycles since 1970. I have only been driving the big rigs for 18 months. I haul a gas tanker six nights a week, 8-12 hours a night. I am at both extremes of the traffic pattern. Enough said about that, I just wanted to let you know that everybody has problems.

Karl Wagner Jacksonville, Fla.

MONTY HALL WOULD LOVE YOU

I sent in many applications to your Win A Bike contest hoping to have a chance. I have wanted a motorcycle for many years, but have never had the chance to get one, not because I am not allowed to, but that I can’t.

I had high hopes until a friend of mine told me that no one would give a 14-year-old boy a 250 Yamaha, because he is too small. That brought my hopes down; and I would like you to know that if I do win I will trade it for something smaller.

Lee Rose Vero Beach, Fla.

OUR ADS ARE X-RATED

I just received this month’s CYCLE WORLD. It was disgusting with so many half-naked broads. I say broads because they aren’t fit to be called women. My wife reads those magazines; I had to hide this month’s from her. She is a lady and I don’t want her exposed to such filth. I’ve always thought that HarleyDavidson was a superior quality bike, but this advertisement indicates that they must have gone downhill completely. I had considered buying one, but as everyone knows, when a product is sub-standard its manufacturer has to use broads to get people to notice what they’re selling.

I feel somewhat insulted when broads are used in advertisements; do they think that men are going to overlook the quality of a product and pay money just to look at a broad? I’m sure that if men weren’t afraid their virility would be crushed, they would admit that if they wanted girly magazines they would buy them. If you feel compelled to print trashy magazines in the future, please cancel my subscription.

Gene Mitchell LaPorte, Texas

Considering your discerning eye for the obscene, Mr. Mitchell, we’re surprised that you haven’t discovered in our porno publication such other rampant vulgarities as stripped bikes, bare rims, naked frames and rear ends. And we certainly hope that your wife hasn’t read any articles in which we talk about “screwing on the throttle” or “riding two abreast.”

The “broads” in the Harley-Davidson ad to which you refer are wearing halter tops, a style quite popular among “women” for both casual and more formal wear (such as a party at which new H-D models might be unveiled), and is an article of clothing that conceals a good deal more than the bathing suits worn by women on the U.S. Olympic swimming team, Doris Day in Move Over Darling, or even by that paragon of virtue, Miss America. And we don’t see you writing them nasty letters.

Frankly, we think that the problem is yours and your wife’s if you judge arms and midriffs to be filth. As a matter of fact, we’re rather shocked that neither of you has ever seen them before.—Ed.

EAGERLY A WAITING THE 250s

Hey guys, you’ve got a great magazine and I think you do real good tests. I want to buy a new 250 MX this spring and my friends and I would like to see a good comparison on the 1975 250s.

I’m especially interested in the Montesa VR Cappra and the Husqvarna CR250. I would also really like to know about the dependability and amount of maintenance needed for the bikes. We’ll be watching.

Keith Fulks Holland, Mich.

DEALING WITH DUTCH DRIVERS

Being a now-and-then reader of your magnificent magazine (can’t afford a subscription, since I’m a student and have to keep bike and me alive), I’m especially interested in departments like “Letters” and “Feedback,” as they give an idea of what American motorcycle life is about. To me, it seems to be a lot more colorful than the Old World’s. Imagine, for instance, the Dutch BMW importer actively taking part in racing. What a laugh.

(Continued on page 22)

Continued from page 19

What I also like about your magazine is the road tests—they are extensive and objective. European magazines (especially the Continental ones), have a funny way of testing a bike: they fix a tachograph or something like that on the bike, buzz off to the nearest race track, do some test rounds and rush back to the typewriter, stating that the bike did so and so many rpm. And it made a lap time of so and so many seconds. No one seems to be interested in long-distance comfort or longevity.

Another funny tendency of the testing people is to gloss over any shortcomings of the bike tested. Even a fractured frame would be lightheartedly commented on: “Oh well, but a real bike lover wouldn’t mind, now would he?”

So that’s my praise for CYCLE WORLD. But I would also like to react to a letter in the August issue.

Michael Albert wondered whether motorcycles are accepted by cars more in Europe than in America. Well, if he means by U.S. acceptance that portrayed in the movie “Easy Rider,” then the answer is positive. However, my colleagues and I frequently discuss the possibility of fixing a handsome chromium-plated basket on the tank, filled with medium-sized stones to throw at oncoming overtakers on a two-lane road. . . .

Dual or air horns are very practical (in the South you're not considered grown-up without them), especially against our biggest enemy in Europe. . . Mercedes Benz! It seems that their advertisements about safety-cage coachworks give the drivers a sense of invulnerability, especially against motorcycles. Mark my words, in 50 percent of the cases in which you find your humble path cut off by some stupid car driver, it’s a Mercedes. And Europe isn’t so rich that half of the cars are Mercedes. Ergo. . . . And keep your headlight on day and night, Michael, even if it’s not obliged in Europe.

Happy touring from your BMW buddy.

Cees Wildervanck Groningen, Holland

THE MYSTERY MOTOCROSSER

I was hoping you would be able to settle a dispute between my classmate and I. He says that the rider in the “Slipstream” photo of the October issue is him. Could you give me the name of the rider or any information that would prove that it isn’t my friend?

Mike Warden Alexandria, Va.

Ask your friend where he was on the evening of June 22, 1974, Mike. The rider pictured in October’s “Slipstream” is a high school motocrosser who participated in the Superbowl of Motocross at the Los Angeles Cohseum on that date. -Ed.

RD350 SPURS RESPONSES

I just finished reading your road test of the new Yamaha RD350B, and I must admit that I am rather galled at this point.

In the test you state that you had received letters from some owners complaining of plug fouling, but that this was most likely the fault of the owners not knowing how to ride the machine. That really comes under the heading of chutzpah.

In March of 1973 I became the owner of a brand new RD350. The purchase was made after careful reading of all the road tests I could get my hands on, because I didn’t want another lemon like the Suzuki Hustler that I had purchased two years before. I’m picky; I consider carrying a spare transmission around in your pocket to be a drag. At any rate, I trusted you all, purchased the machine, and guess what? Right on, baby! That thing went through spark plugs faster than McDonalds goes through pickles. My dealer couldn’t figure it out; Yamaha International couldn’t figure it out; so 3500 miles and 22 sets of plugs later I sold the (expletive deleted) thing.

(Continued on page 29)

Continued from page 22

At that time I had been riding for six years. . .all two-stroke, small-tomedium-displacement road machines. I spoke to five other owners of the same model, same year machine, four of whom had the exact same problem that I was having. Now I can’t speak for them, but don’t tell me that I don’t keep an engine cleaned out; the bike that I traded in on that Japanese hunk of junk was a Bultaco Metralla with clip-ons, a full racing fairing, and a git kit.

So please, before you find out the hard way that a size IOV2 won’t fit between your teeth, look around, take a survey of RD350 owners. Even better, go out and find one of the offending machines, ride it, tear it down, and then you tell us how to make it work. I tell you now this will place you amongst the gods themselves in the eyes of hundreds of Yamaha owners.

Peter Holmes Schenectady, N.Y.

It was only after much contemplation that I wrote this letter. I have been reading CYCLE WORLD since the early ’60s and have always thought of it as being the best motorcycle magazine. But the November issue with that Cafe Racer article seems out of place.

It reads like a How-To article out of a hot rod magazine. And the end result is a ridiculous looking motorcycle that appears to have been hit with a bunch of bolt-on parts that almost fit. The fairing shakes around, but that’s too bad. Seems sloppy after spending $1800 on extras. Twenty-one pounds per wheel by drilling the brake discs, really now. And $270 worth of engine work for virtually the same performance as a Stocker, and probably not as reliable.

I am sure the list of changes would impress the motorcycle show crowd. But if a person wants a neat cafe racer, he should put his imagination and skill to better use than painting the inside of his sprocket holes.

G. Dean Newton 151 Portland, Ore.