detonation

the detonation event was today in brooklyn, 14th and wythe in williamsburg. nyc vintage moto put it on. went with robert, photo included of him and jim checking out jim's really cool cb750. sooo many cool bikes. it's also still fairly local and low-key so hasn't gotten lamed up by any one crowd. that's a benelli 200, '65 i think, above. pretty sure the guy rode it there.

vinmoto event had everything from triumphs to two-stroke kawasakis (nice h3, no photo), to benellis and ducatis. there was a very boxy seeming 80s era honda vfr 750. stuff you don't see too often. and stuff you see all the time that had been tweaked just enough to make it interesting. few photos included. there was also a very weird performance art thing where someone played guitar, another guy played sax, another guy carved wood with a chainsaw, another guy splattered paint on a canvas on the ground, all while someone else synced their carbs. there was a huge crowd, not knowing what the hell to make of it. nor did i. the bikes were great though.
robert's 1974 suzuki two-stroke 550. cool bike.

electricity needs timing

last weekend i spent saturday in the garage. here's what it looked like. it was a beautiful day, so very tough to make myself go spend it in a garage. but it turned out to be an awesome day, because my bike now runs extremely well. before it was misfiring and running rough. it was very hard to tell what was wrong. could have been carb/fuel mixture issues, or electrical. luckily james, who is also in the garage, was on-hand and he knows brit bikes (and bikes) very well. it turned out to be two-fold, as both things needed to be addressed. the timing was off, because the magnets on the rotor (this bike has a boyer electronic ignition) had moved and the rotor was also now loose. that means the timing would sometimes (rarely) be spot on, but also would often be way off. occasionally it didn't start. so we reset the timing and boom, it immediately it ran right. but the carb mixture did need sorting. with that also sorted, it's now running very well. starts FIRST kick when cold. pretty cool for a bike 37 years old.

arguably the most amazing part about this day was james willingness to dig into my bike with me for a few hours when he had been working on his own. i will remember to return the favor to someone else down the line.