Round Up

Round Up

BIKIN’-TYPE TRUCKS

When CYCLE WORLD organized a motorcycle safari to Mike’s Sky Ranch in mid-Baja to introduce or intensify the motorcycling experience to a key industry group, we needed sweep vehicles. They had to be heavy duty and preferably four-wheel drive. With a little help from friends, they were ours.

Chevrolet provided a K-10 short bed pickup with heavily beefed suspension. It rode stiffly but was an astonishingly fast sweeper. The K-10 ran at the back, meeting Tail End Charlie’s obligation to hold a lurid pace so as to arrive on trouble quickly. In more than 700 miles of fast offroading, usually with one or two broken motorcycles in back, the K-10 bottomed only once. Equipped with full-time 4WD, automatic transmission, 350 cid V-8, power steering and extra tankage, it was an excellent open-bed chase machine. Were we to buy one, however, we’d swap the inertial-reel safety belts for a set of conventional wide no-reelers. With each heavy bump, inertial belts tend to tighten against the body until the blood stops.

Tiedown straps loaned to us by Ancra held two machines firmly in the K-10 for an off-road leg of 150 miles at bouncing speeds of up to 50 mph. Sound commercial? Doesn’t matter. It’s a good strap. One tip: Take a rope or an extra strap, run it through the back wheels and anchor it to the floor or the tailgate. This will prevent the back wheels from kicking up on the bumps, possibly to flip over on the cab roof!

Amiable Wayne Thoms, who has managed to keep various automotive magazines happy for several years in his PR function for Chevy on the West Coast, was invited along to sweep the middle of the pack. He brought a Chevy Blazer, which is the covered sports/utility 4WD, and made a startling discovery. When Bill Dutcher’s C&J-framed Harley Sportster fried its pistons on Pemex no-lead, Wayne found that one really can carry a full-sized (believe us, a Sportster for dirt is full-sized) motorcycle inside a Blazer. The trick is to remove one fork cap so only one fork spring is compressed. This allows the bike to settle below the roof of the Blazer and roll forward to be strapped against the shift console. There’s plenty of room to shut the back gate. This news should be pleasing to riders who have admired the Blazer configuration, but demurred because they thought a bike would not go in straight and standing up.

The ne-plus-ultra for dirt riders is a van with 4WD. Two-wheel-drive vans are okay, especially if they have locking or limited-slip differentials. But 4WD really does the job.

While business prevented Chuck Cook of Pathfinder Equipment Co. from coming on our trek. Chuck loaned us a Ford Econoline Chateau 4WD conversion. This is no jury-rigged affair. Pathfinder’s Quadravan is completely refitted underneath, and structurally beefed to take the extra power and body-bending loads of fourwheeling. We’ve driven the Pathfinder conversion for Ford Econoline, and for Chevrolet (“K-Van”). Both retain the integrity and good qualities of the original vehicle, and benefit from the stiffness added to take the 4WD conversion. The usual fitting includes the automatic of your choice and a hi-lo transfer case with conventional locking hubs at the front. The Chateau we took this year had the big Ford engine, a definite asset with little penalty in mileage. We needed the power, because we loaded baggage for 30 people into that lovely van and then clamped on Ron Griewe’s bike trailer so he and Bob Atkinson could pre-run part of the Mexican 1000 course when they got to Mike’s Sky Ranch.

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The weather in Baja was wet, and the road into Mike’s was steep and slippery. It would have been tough going in a conventional 2WD van. In the Quadravan it was no big deal. The price tag for 4WD vanning is impressive ... ah, impressively high. Realizing that price never stopped those who could afford or otherwise finance the very best, we recommend that you drop a line to Chuck Cook at Pathfinder to find out the procedure for ordering one of these beauts through your local dealer. That’s Pathfinder Equipment Company, P.O. Box 86, San Gabriel. CA 91778.

FIRESTONE RETURNS

After an absence of several years. Firestone is returning to the motorcycle market.

No details yet. The announcement simply says Firestone will produce and sell motorcycle tires for road and offroad use, with modern treads and compounds, to appear this spring. They are doing it, they say, because motorcycles are a growing market and thus a good place to do business.

DEDICATION

Several western road clubs had a spectacular run, from Tijuana, Mexico to Vancouver, Canada, open to all riders interested in going on a really long outing. Distance was something more than 1400 miles and the rules allowed 60 hours for the trip.

First three bikes to finish required only 34 hours and a few minutes. No rest, no food, just ride and stop for fuel.

What did these zealots ride? A Kawasaki Zl. a chopped Harley with rigid rear suspension and a restored 1940 Indian.

That's enthusiasm.

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THE OTHER ONE WAY

Elsewhere in this issue there is an article describing a practical way to finally take that cross-country ride. Not to give away the punchline of that story, at least one motorcycle dealer has an interesting and different incentive for the long haul rider.

Don Goetz, Jackson Hole Cycle in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, is in the center of the Big Sky country. Lots of parks and great riding in the summer. His sales pitch is a free airplane ticket. Buy a new Honda or Kawasaki from his agency and he’ll fly you to the agency. You pick up the bike and break it in while exploring the parks. Then the bike gets serviced and you ride it home. What a nice excuse to buy a new motorcycle and take a different vacation.

MORE OLYMPIAD

The Olympics of Motorcycling is taking firmer shape. Top riders from all forms of competition will vie in a series of events with an eye to deciding who is the best rider and which is the best bike.

Dates are February 27 and 28, at Orange County International Raceway for the drags, road races and flattrack, and at Saddleback Park for the hillclimb, Scottish trials, TT scrambles and motocross.

The rules are simple. Thirty riders, professional and amateur, will be invited. Each man can bring any one motorcycle, which he must use for all events with only minor changes. There will be points for each of the seven events and the rider with the most points takes home $10,000.

Who will be there? The invitations haven’t been finalized, but high on the prospective list at present are most of the riders you’d expect: Kenny Roberts, Gary Scott, Malcolm Smith, Carl Cranke, Jack and Tom Penton, Roger DeCoster, Jim Weinert, Marty Smith, Dave Aldana, Rolf Tibblin, Jay Springsteen, Dick Mann, Mike Bast et al.

Promoter Bob Maynard says the nice part is that all the riders who’ve been unofficially invited have accepted, partly for the money, no doubt, but equally because they like to race and perhaps are curious as to how road racers will do in motocross and vice versa.

Encouraging too is the variety of motorcycles. This event is supposed to provide evidence as to which machine is the best all around. Because the top riders are under factory contracts, naturally they’ll ride their factory’s products. But,, says Maynard, the neat thing here is that each maker’s men claim delight over the prospect. Each feels they have the best all around machine and can hardly wait for the chance to prove it.

Keep watching this space.