Wowee.

I’ve sure been using that word a lot lately.

I woke up at 3:30 this morning and just knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep any more.   Too much exciting stuff happening.   It started with assembling the new 250cc dual sport bikes on Friday…our good buddy Duane stopped in on his P-51 250 CSC and helped us (thanks, Duane!)…

I talked to Big John (my long time Baja riding buddy) about the new 250 dual sport CSC bike.  I’m already planning a Baja ride on this machine!   Big John wanted to know what the bike’s redline is.

Hmmm, good question, I thought.   I had so much fun on that first Friday ride I didn’t notice, so I checked some of my photos and whaddaya know…it’s 9,000 rpm!

That instrument cluster is really nicely laid out…a big digital speed display and an analog tach.  It’s perfect!

One question that popped up on the ADV board…is the new bike water or air-cooled?

It’s water-cooled, baby!

Boy oh boy, am I pumped up.   I have two rides this morning…the first one is a quick 14-mile jaunt with Susie, her sister Tina, and my buddy Greg on the bicycles.  It’s a tradition…we ride along the foothills and grab a cup of coffee at the turn-around point.  Those rides are always great, and we like to go early before it gets too hot…I’ll be on my old-school 1-jp two-wheeler (that’s one Joe Power)….

7 miles out, a cup of coffee, and 7 miles back…a quick shower, and then I’m back on the road with the new 250 adventure bike…and it has a lot more guts than my Bianchi bicycle for getting up the hills!

I’ll be posting more stuff on this exciting new motorcycle in the coming days, boys and girls…so like we always say, stay tuned!

I finished another Youtube video of my incredible ride on the new CSC 250cc dual sport motorcycle, but it’s been processing for the last two hours.   You might have noticed that the video I posted in the blog below this one doesn’t show anything except a field of gray until you run it (then it works normally).  So, I plugged into Google to ask what was going on, and it seems quite a few folks are having Youtube issues with their uploads.

So, my apologies, folks.   Hopefully this Youtube nonsense will sort itself out in the next day or so.

In the meantime, let me change gears and talk about Mosin mania a bit.   My buddy Jim and I went out the range yesterday and we had a ball with his new Mosin-Nagant…new to Jim, that is…his Mosin rifle was manufactured in 1942!

Jim shot ammo that I loaded for him, and because I had nothing better to do a week or two ago, I played with my Flip video a bit and made a movie showing how to reload ammo.   The music is from Enemy at the Gates.  It’s one of my favorite movies.

Our next Mosin match will be next weekend, and I know a few of you will be out there, including my good buddy Duane with his Mauser.

Tommy M, I know you’d enjoy this match as much as you’ve enjoyed riding with us up on Glendora Ridge Road, so if you want to tag along, let me know.   You can use my Mosin if you’d like.

I’ll be on the road this weekend with the boys, and I’ll riding my new orange CSC 250cc dual sport.  I plan to grab a whole bunch more photos, so stay tuned, my friends.

Just got back from 35 miles on the new motorcycle.

The title of this blog says it all.

More to follow…

Folks, you may remember a blog I did not too long ago that I titled “My definition of the perfect bike….”

You can read that entire blog by clicking here…and when you do, you’ll see the last part of it, which I’ve copied for you….

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So, where is this going…and what would my definition of the perfect touring/dual sport bike be?

Here’s what I’d like to see:

• Something with a 250cc single-cylinder engine.   My experience with small bikes as a teenager and my more recent experience with CSC has convinced me that this is probably the perfect engine size.  Big engines mean big bikes, and that kind of gets away from what a motorcycle should be all about.  Water cooled would be even better.  The Kawi KLR is water cooled, and I like that.
• A dual sport style, with a comfortable riding position.   No more silly road racing stuff.  I’m a grown man who likes to ride hundreds of miles a day.   I want my bike to have a riding position that will let me do that.
• A windshield.   It doesn’t have to be big…just something that will flip the wind over my helmet.   The Kawi and the Triumph got it right in that department.
• Integrated luggage.   The Triumph Tiger got that part right.  The KLR, not so much.
• Light weight.   Folks, it’s a motorcycle…not half a car.   Something under 400 lbs works for me.   If it gets stuck, I want to be able to pull it out of a puddle.  If it drops, I want to be able to pick it up without a hoist or a road crew.   None of the current crop of big road bikes meets this requirement.
• Something that looks right and is comfortable.   I liked the Triumph’s looks.   But I want it to be comfortable.
• Something under $5K.   Again, it’s a motorcycle, not a car.  My days of dropping $10K or so on a motorcycle are over.   I’ve got the money, but I’ve also got the life experiences that tell me I don’t need to spend stupidly to have fun.

The question is:  Who has such a bike out there?

Right now, no one.

But who knows what’s coming down the trail?

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Well, I know.   And now you do, too!

Much, much more to come on this exciting new venture, folks!   Suffice it to say, Steve and I will have our knees in the breeze this weekend!

One of the best moto adventure books I’ve ever read is Emilio Scotto’s The Longest Ride.   I’ve never met Emilio, although I have corresponded with him via email.   So when I saw this video, I knew I had to post it on the blog…

The video is cool, but The Longest Ride is better.   The photography and the story, in my opinion, make The Longest Ride a “must read” book for any motorcyclist.

Well, this cup of coffee needs to be refreshed and the sun is coming up, so I will talk to you later, my friends…

Hey, who would have guessed?

An update from the LA Times…

LAPD finds motorcycle cop’s missing shotgun; man arrested

That lost shotgun story got me to thinking about another motor officer…

That episode was a classic, and I can remember watching it the first time it appeared on TV.   Different times.   I spent the morning on the rifle range and I think I’ll go fire up the Baja Blaster.   Life is good.   See you on the road…

Ever had a bad day on your motorcycle?

Folks, we love our law enforcement officers, especially the ones who are out there on motorcycles.  The weather has been oppressive here in So Cal, and it’s got to be doubly so for motor officers, bundled up and carrying 35 pounds of gear every time they go out.

This poor guy (an LAPD motor officer) lost his shotgun in what is arguably one of the roughest areas of LA.  Seems the motorcycle gun lock broke and it fell off his motorcycle.   During a search (with an intensity that can only be imagined), one of the police dogs (a shotgun-sniffing hound?) turned on an LAPD officer and bit him so badly he required surgery.   Yikes.  Not a good day.

The story was in the LA Times this morning, and I found it online (grammatical mistakes and all)…

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An LAPD K-9 has been suspended after attacking an LAPD officer that was part of a frantic search for a LAPD motorcycle officer’s missing a loaded tactical shotgun.

A search for an officer’s loaded shotgun turned up empty Thursday night nearly 12 hours after the weapon fell off a police motorcycle in South Los Angeles.

The search temporarily shut down streets near W. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard near South Normandie Avenue in South LA, according to the Los Angeles Police Department.

An officer noticed his loaded shotgun had fallen out of its motorcycle holster, prompting dozens of officers to scour the area in search of the weapon.

The LAPD motorcycle in question was supposed to be equipped like this…

… but instead, it looks like this.

Authorities are claiming that the motorcycle was equipped an older horizontal carrier, and the lock on the carrier appears to have failed, possibly from age and wear. The agency is transitioning to vertical carry systems which should offer better retention.

Area residents interviewed by NBC-LA essentially laughed at the efforts of police who were searching for the shotgun. They suggested that it was likely snatched up immediately after hitting the pavement by area residents and that chances someone will turn in the weapon are slim. The area where the police search focused is just five blocks from the intersection of Florence and Normandie, the epicenter of the 1992 Los Angeles riots that saw more than 2,000 people injured and 53 people killed.

This is the second serious incident involving a long gun scabbard on a police motorcycle within the past nine months. In late October, 2013, an Ar-15 attached to a Chino PD motorcycle unit participating in a drug prevention rally at an elementary school wasn’t properly secured and a student fired the rifle into the ground, causing several minor injuries.

The police officer who was bitten by the K-9 during yesterday’s search required surgery, and is recovering.

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A tough day, indeed.   We hope the officer who was bitten recovers quickly.   As for finding that shotgun, somehow I don’t think so…

Wow, it’s hot and humid out here this week.   We’ve been having temperatures in the very 90s and low 100s, and it’s been humid.   Not a good combination.   Several folks were struck by lightning in So Cal this weekend, which has never happened in the 30+ years I’ve been in California.

The bottom line is me and the boss (the one I have at home) have been laying low and trying to stay cool.   We took a ride out to the plant today and I grabbed a couple of photos…the first one includes three bikes from Steve’s stable of super sleek Mustangs…

….and the next one is the one you all keep asking about…a photo of our magnificent Mustang model and manufacturing maven, Miss Lupe…

Sunday night Steve and I and our two bosses (you know who I’m talking about) had a great dinner, and on the way home one of the new Dodge Challengers passed us, and then within a minute a new Shelby Mustang passed by, too.   That morphed into a discussion about great American cars.   Steve likes Mopars, and I’m a GM man.   I had wanted a Vette all my life and 11 years ago I finally pulled the trigger.    I’ll never sell that car.  In fact, I may write into my will that when my time comes, just find a good taxidermy man and stuff me.   Put me on display in my Z-06.   If you can get that guy to stuff me with baloney and motorize my fingers, I’ll keep writing the blog, too.

Anyway, my comment to Steve was that the most beautiful car ever made anywhere in the world was the ’67 big block Corvette.   Wow, I used to drool over those things.   I could have bought one new in ’67 for $5K (of course, to me in 1967, $5k was an inconceivable amount of money).   Those same cars trade hands today for well over a quarter of million dollars.   Ah, who knew?

Well, whaddaya know, when I got home and tuned into Facebook (the greatest time suck in the history of the world), one of my friends had posted this video…

That is pretty cool stuff, folks.

One last thing…staying inside with the air conditioning running full bore 24/7 in all of this heat has been boring.   With a bad case of cabin fever and my Mosin-Nagant antique rifle fascination, I started a new website focused on those magnificent old Russian infantry weapons.  I bought my own domain name (www.Mosin-Nagant.us) for the princely sum of $4.99, put it on line, and within the first few hours I had over 1,000 hits!   Owing to the synchronicity of interests (lots of shooters ride, and vice versa), I think I’ll add a link to the CSC motorcycle site, too!

That’s it for now, folks.  Ride safe, stay cool, and watch out for the lightning bolts!

…on the news, I suppose.   Hmmm….

Folks, do not try this on your CSC motorcycle!