Up Front
UP FRONT
Allan Girdler
HOT TO SWAP
Her voice hooked me. She spoke with warmth, authority, control and modulation. To my untrained ear it was a trained voice, a voice that could have given Queen Elizabeth lessons to Glenda Jackson. She had a cascade of red hair, a skimpy costume and tattoos in places not even doctors know about.
Her primary audience was two man mountains, bearded, with jeans held up by maybe 50 inches of primary chain. She was expounding on the virtues of handgrips made from miracle, natural, spaceage something. With these grips, she said, your numb hands are forgotten. Not even a motocross bike’s vibrations can come through.
The big guys were as much in thrall as 1. Speaking softly and politely, one ventured that they didn’t ride motocross. Without losing the beat she said the grips were invented, nay, made in Heaven, for Big Twins. Ring up two sales.
Welcome to the swap meet.
Eve been going to swap meets since before they were called that and I've always enjoyed them in a non-involved way. Whether club or commercial, the booths and tables and stacks of stuff usually divide into three general groups:
Trivia. No offense intended but a fair share of the merchandise offered in these get-togethers is not required for survival. There are unprintably clever T-shirts and halters, mirrors with various brand names and slogans, decals and so forth. Sometimes there is talent involved—my favorite was the license plate frame that said “So Many Women. . .So Little Cooperation’’ but as a rule you can glance at most of the stuff and know you’ll go home just as happy without it.
Bargains. One step closer, in that you can benefit. Or play the part of yokel at the fair. Bargains are the stacks and boxes of things, as in parts, accessories, tools and so forth, that you actually buy in stores. Most of the time they sell for less here than they do at the store. There is a reason for this, wait, there are several reasons. It may be that the man behind the table got a deal, made a winning bid for the stock of a dealership or parts store going out of business and the tire that sells for $50 elsewhere you get for $30 because he got it for $10. Bargains are worth your attention. One Saturday 1 finally got fed up with stripping the heads of Phillips screws in my engine and I sprang for a $12 impact driver. On Sunday 1 saw' the same tool for sale for $6. Across the aisle was a man selling bags of alien-head bolts, with exactly the right number, size and length to replace all the Phillips-head bolts in a wide variety of bikes. Mine included, so I’d spent too much for something 1 could have been better off without.
The other side is the other reasons these wonders are cheap. At one stall on the same day I found the perfect tai 1 light, looked as if it would fit perfectly on the bracket I’d already installed, and it did. The same guy had throttles just like I wanted, half price but when I tried to install it lo, the cable wouldn't fit and the barrel wouldn’t turn because all the castings were filled with pot metal that leaked through worn places in the mold. Slightly imperfect, as they say. If the money I saved is compared against the time spent with rat tail file, I work mighty cheap. Come to think of it I don't have the wiring done yet so I don't really know' about the ta i 1 light, either. Can you trade back? Does Khomeini pray in Latin?
Parts. This is the serious business. The other categories came later, with the beer and hot dog vendors. When swap meets began they were a place for packrats eager to trade for each other’s treasures, and for those in need of that . . . one . . . vital . . . part.
People like the present me.
The former me used to wonder about the old bits crowd. We all have a touch of packratbits for the SL70 my daughter sold in 1974 still float to the surface of my wooden crates, the ones jammed under the workbench and filled with nuts and bolts and spare ignition coils and petcocks and fork seals that leaked enough to be replaced but not enough to let me throw them away.
One can understand the principle, but the swap meet sellers go as far in the packrat direction as one can go. I used to walk past trucks piled wfith rusty frames, barrels, wheels, sprockets, tanks, instruments, cams, carbs and so forth and wonder why anybody saved all that junk.
Now I know. My XR750 project began with I’d guess half the parts needed to make a runner. They were the big parts, i.e. frame, cases, barrels, wheels, tank, suspension, so filling the gaps didn’t seem difficult. Then I began pricing early 900 XL heads, 6-volt generators and so forth and not long after that I was hitting every sw'ap meet for 100 mi. around.
it's been a learning experience. Where I used to see piles of old bits I began to spot and separate Norton from Triumph, old Honda from new Honda, Harley from> everybody else. Then—my focus naturally was Harley 1 could tell Panhead from Knucklehead from Shovel from Sportster, culminating in being able t*i look at a chopper and tell its astonished owner, who doesn’t expect expertise from a man on a Yamaha, that he’d put a Shovel top end on early Knuckle cases.
We swappers also get tough. I spotted just the sidestand I wanted. The perfect stand. The owner wanted $10 and I heli back; maybe $5. The next thing I knew some other guy leaned over my shoulder and met the asking price. Damn. Nor have I seen one like it since.
But that’s how it works. Eventually I learned to spot parts. There are heads, rockerboxes and barrels, for $100. The next seller in line w'ants $1 50, my offer of $70 for the heads alone is turned down, by which time the $100 parts are gone and 1 end up paying $150 and then the valves aren't right for the heads and it’s $50 more at the local machine shop.
There’s also salesmanship. One warm Sunday 1 was wearing the T-shirt Cork\ Keener made famous, the one that says “Harley-Davidson, First Choice of Yamaha Racing Team’’ and up rushes this man who asks “You ride a Harley, right?’’
"Well, uh, I don't actually ride it yet
“Then you gotta buy this. Look! A com plete electric start system for an Electra Glide!”
Not quite what 1 had in mind, 1 mean 1 don’t even have a working kick start yet.
Leading into gamesmanship. One seller has a complete early Sportster engine, which I don't need, nor will he sell it in pieces. I have been looking for a distributor and not getting anywhere. But Looki Another packrat has a magneto and it’s lovely, a great big thing, just bristling with power, never mind all those stories. Except that he doesn’t know how it installs and 1 can tell the base of the mag doesn't match the top of my gearcase cover.
Hm. Back to the stall with the complet engine and aha! there's a collar that goes atop the gearcase and another sleeve with slots and some studs that align the sleeve with the mag's base. So that’s how' it’s done. All I needed to do after that was lurk in the shadows until the man with the mag began to pack up, then 1 sauntered out an¿ casually noted he still had the $100 mag. Would he take $70? Yes, and now it’s sitting on the shelf of my office, next to the generator that needs some bolts and the clamps for the exhaust pipes 1 can’t put on until 1 find the lower brackets and the dealer tells me those pieces between the gearcase cover and the magneto base aie no longer supplied ... ha! I care not.
Another week, another swap meet. 0
