Autopsis » Motorcycles

Criteria Model for Overland Expedition Vehicles

Doug — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 15:57:35 +0000

Model is located here: http://www.hackneys.com/travel/docs/oevcriteria.xls

Intended use for the model:

Document the general parameters, priorities and specific requirements for a proposed Overland Expedition Vehicle (OEV).

The model is intended to improve communication between potential OEV owners and their dreams, fabricators, subcontractors and manufacturers.

In practical use it can help potential OEV owners identity disparities between their stated priorities / requirements and the characteristics of available platforms / vehicles.

Used together with the OEV Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) model a potential OEV owner can have a much better idea of the type of vehicle they require and what the total ownership experience will cost.

To use the model:
   1. Download the model spreadsheet to your computer
   2. Open the model in XL
   3. Perform a File:Save As operation and change the name of the model to preserve the original version
   4. Enter your data into any cell that is colored green
   5. Perform periodical File:Save As operations as you load the model. It is a good idea to increment the file name as you progress, i.e. myOEV-criteria 01, myOEV-criteria 02, myOEV-criteria 03, etc.
   6. Save the final version of the model

To Print:
7. Select File:Print

To Tell the Truth

Doug — Sat, 29 Mar 2008 19:31:37 +0000

We were westbound on the Chile Chico road when we saw them.

We’d been through the rough stretch from town to the mine and the subsequent narrow, single lane portion that clings to the cliffs along the south side of Lago General Carrera with its stunning views.

The huge lake, deepest and second largest in the continent, is plopped down astride the Andes as if a challenge by God to the Chileans and the Argentines to share something amicably. I’m not sure how God would evaluate them on that score since, in typical Chilean – Argentine fashion, the lake has one name in Argentina, Lago Buenos Aires (literally, “good airs”), and another in Chile, the aforementioned Lago General Carrera.

Having grown up fishing on the commonly named lakes that straddle the United States and Canadian border, this seemed strange to me. It was as if Lake Superior was called Lake McKenzie north of the Canadian border or Lake Ontario was named Lake Jefferson south of the U.S. border. But, if nothing else, travel teaches us to work hard, every minute of every day, to view the world not as it is most comfortable for us and best fits our cultural norms, but as it is, where it is.

Consequently, I tried hard to envision a big red line across the lake’s shimmering waters as we crossed the border. The best I could come up with was a mental image of signs floating on large rafts saying Welcome to the Land of Good Pizza facing Chile and Welcome to the Land of Amazing Fruits and Vegetables facing Argentina. It had been a while since lunch so this may have influenced my perceptions.

Click here for the rest of the story: http://www.hackneys.com/travel/chile/totellthetruth.pdf

The Second Quest

Doug — Thu, 03 Jan 2008 02:32:27 +0000

One of the little known upsides of foreign travel is exposure to obscure movies subtitled in the local language.

We’re holed up in a hotel in Santiago, Chile, waiting for our expedition truck & motorcycles to arrive via ship in Valparaiso.

One of the ways we’ve been killing time is watching movies in the hotel room. We specialize in English language films while reading the Spanish subtitles to help us learn the language.

Steph stumbled onto a wonderful film yesterday titled “Un Segundo Intento” about three young English lads seeking adventure, fun, but mostly girls, on the Isle of Man in 1960.

Sound OK so far? Wait until you hear about the BSAs and Nortons they are riding. And the steam trains, inter-urbans and other things of English mechanical nature decorating the landscape.

The sequence of two of the guys chasing after a couple of young lovlies riding little two strokes down tiny Isle of Man twisting blacktops draped across the hills and vales like bands of black spaghetti is enough to melt your soul.

The original release English title was “The Second Quest.” It was a made for TV film and the second of a three part trilogy (aren’t they all?).

The films were:

The Quest – 2002 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0316462/

The Second Quest – 2004 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0374983/

The Final Quest – 2004 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0438028/

I cannot confirm if the period motorcycles from The Second Quest are featured in any of the other films, but I guarantee if you’ve ever so much as looked twice at a 50’s British bike, you want to see this film.

Your challenge?

Find a copy of this film.

No motorcyclist will ever again be able to claim possession of a moto film collection without it.

Emergency Beacon / GPS Tracker

Doug — Fri, 30 Nov 2007 15:12:48 +0000

I just came across this company and their product launched 1 November, 2007.

Small, lightweight and portable, it combines EPIRB type emergency beacon functions with a general purpose GPS locator tracker and simple “I’m OK” message functions.

It looks like it would be great for hikers, skiers, climbers, mountain bikers, off-road motorcyclists, near-shore sailors and overlanders. Another potential market is paranoid “bubble child” parents letting their progeny out of their eyesight for the first time.

Coverage limitations - no coverage in the following areas:
- Far southern South America
- Sub Saharan Africa
- Indian subcontinent
- Ocean passages. (Some coverage in the North Atlantic)

Cost: $170
Basic Annual Plan: $99
Additional Tracking Plan: $49 (send and save location, track via Google Maps)
Additional global extraction / rescue plan: $7.95 initial, $150 thereafter

Available online and at REI and Cabellas.

Company web site: http://www.findmespot.com/default.aspx

We’ve already got a couple of EPIRBs and we’re just pulling out, so I don’t think we’ll have time to implement these.

Heath Aeroplane Company

Doug — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 20:57:37 +0000

File this one under “you learn something new every day.”

While at the Evergreen Aviation Museum in McMinville, Oregon (highly recommended) I noticed this small gasoline engine on display.

It combined several of my lifelong interests: aviation, historical aircraft, motorcycling, historical motorcycles and something from my youth, Heathkit.

When I was nine my dad, at the behest of and only as a result of the constant cajoling of my mom, and I assembled a Heathkit AM radio. That project was where I learned how to solder, what a resistor and a transistor were, and how, if you followed the directions carefully, you could make just about anything from a Heathkit.

And typical of a Heathkit, that AM radio had the best reception of any radio I’ve ever been around. From its perch on top of my night stand I carefully turned the analog tuning dial in as tiny increments as my small hands could muster. Late at night, as the rest of the neighborhood slumbered, I wandered the airwaves, seeking out frequencies from far away. While WHO, “1040 on your AM dial, The 50,000 watt clear channel voice of Iowa; Coast to coast, border to border, and then some,” being only 50 miles away, came in loud and clear, the far away stations from Cincinnati, Little Rock and even Pittsburgh would drift in and out as they bounced their way to me off of the ionosphere.

Directly below me in the basement was my paper mache model of Cape Canaveral and the projected Apollo mission landing craft touchdown area of the moon. They were connected by an overhead string so the various Revell plastic models of the mission components could fly back and forth. Thus, using the astounding power of young boy rocket sounds, each step of the mission was played out hundreds of times with my best friend, Tom Jones. My Tom Swift books and that diorama were as close as I could get to space, except for my radio, where the magical sounds and voices came floating through the ether, bouncing off the lower edge of space itself. Each scratchy, static filled song, each wavering announcer’s baritone voice, each late west coast baseball game carried with it a tiny bit of space travel. My Heathkit AM radio was my connection with the cosmos.

Those many late nights scanning the AM dial, searching for far away places, fed directly into my lifelong search for discovery, exploration and adventure.

And there, on a sunny day in September, it all came flooding back. Who would have ever guessed that long before he made radios, Edward Heath was making airplanes. And using motorcycle engines for power.

Another circle closed.

Money Creek, MN rally site destroyed by flash flood

Doug — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 19:33:46 +0000

Message below from our Milwaukee friend Bob Grambling.

I met Bob at a sushi bar down the street from my apartment when I was living in downtown Milwaukee. We later attended many BMW rallies together, along with his partner Bunny.

Bunny was the key element and one of the prime instigators of the now legendary Rally Sacred Sake Ceremony. As rare and holy, in its own way, as a Sun Dance, it was first performed at Money Creek, MN, the site of this disaster.

When I attended rallies at this location I pitched my tent in all of these areas that are described in the story as being destroyed.

Read this firsthand account: http://www.bmwmoa.org/features/guzzi_rally.htm

The photos that Bob references below begin on page 2 of this thread: http://wildguzzi.com/forum/index.php?PHPSESSID=7e82ec1ac08b72213c4b678652a57639&topic=13162.0

——————————————————————————–

From: Bob Gramling Sent: Monday, August 27, 2007 11:48 AM
To: BOB G
Subject: Wet Camping…..

To all of you who don’t already know the story…..

I don’t know if you’ve heard the news, but the MN rally is held at Money Creek the first weekend in JUN.

The Moto Guzzi club had a rally there recently and got badly flooded out. (See the article at http://www.bmwmoa.org/features/guzzi_rally.htm Kind of scary.)

If you can get to the fotos, you will see a black pickup with it’s trailer up in a tree. This is exactly where we (The PORT Club) camp when we go.

Thank the gods nobody died. No more whining about a bit of rain. Those of you that were at the last Trail O’ Tears rally know how this almost happened there, too.
HB.