CSC Blog

I stopped by my Subie dealer today to get the oil changed in my Cross Trek and I spotted a Limited Edition STI…it sure was sharp!

Solid colors are in this year, I guess.   I really like Nevada Mike’s Porsche green RX3, and the Subie you see here is similarly coated in a solid blue.   It works for me.

A few more photos…this is Subie’s STI model.  It’s a real hot rod, and I guess they don’t want kids coming in spinning the tires on this one…

That dealer is really proud of this car.   Check this out…

A $10,000 dealer markup!   It made my day…it was good for a laugh.   You sure won’t see any of that at CSC.

Keep an eye on the blog, folks.    I’ll be sending lots of photos back from the Long Beach IMS show.  Both yours truly and the Nikon will be working overtime!

Our good buddy Nevada Mike ordered his new RX3 in a custom Porsche green paint with 19-inch front wheel, knobby tires, spotlights, the aluminum skid plate, and many other tasteful touches.   The bike is stunning.   The solid colors really work on an RX3 (we do more than a few with custom paint).   It’s stunning.

I like this bike.  A lot.

You might even say I’m green with envy…

Folks, we’re really looking forward to seeing all of you this weekend at the Long Beach International Motorcycle Show!   We’re in Booth 1565, so do stop by to see the RX3, the TT Special, and the RC3!  I’ll be there on Friday and Saturday if you’d like to pick up a signed copy of 5000 Miles At 8000 RPM.

My good buddy Tom sent this one to me, and it’s impressive…

I do those kinds of stunts all the time. They usually aren’t intentional, though, and they frequently end differently…

We had about 50 entries in our most recent caption contest, and the winner is our good buddy Arizona George.   Many of the captions were just outstanding, but we liked the one sent in by George the best.   Here it is:

I didn’t realize who George was initially, as he did not include his last name.  Then I learned it was none other than Arizona George, who accompanied us on parts of the Western America Adventure Ride!  That’s just outstanding!

George, as soon as you email your address to me, your autographed copy of 5000 Miles At 8000 RPM will be on its way!

We’re at 15 folks right now for our 2nd CSC Baja Run, and that’s where I’m calling it full.   If you want to go, let me know and I’ll put your name on the waiting list.  If we get enough people, we may run a second group.

The dates are going to be 13 March to 19 March (a Sunday to a Saturday), which gives us a full 7 days in the Land of 1000 Aromas and gives each of you a day to get out here and a day to get back home after we return.

I’m working out the detailed itinerary now.  It’s a bit of a challenge, because you can’t just figure you want to do a certain number of miles per day and then find a hotel.  Things are spread out in Baja.  I’m going to keep this one to a max 250 miles per day to allow more time for photos and stops, and that’s a challenge because sometimes things are a couple of hundred miles apart in Baja.   I’ll post the itinerary sometime next week.

I’ve had lots of questions, and here are some answers:

• We don’t want you to take your buddies along on other bikes.
• We don’t want you to meet up with us along the route, so please don’t ask.  You need to be in at the outset.  It just takes to much time trying to meet people along the way.
• We’ll be staying in hotels all the way (no camping).
• You’ll need a valid US passport.   Things ain’t like they used to be.
• You’ll need the registration for your bike, current plate(s), and Mexican insurance.  Your regular motorcycle insurance won’t get you into the country, and if you get stopped without insurance, it will not end well for you.  I’ll post where you can get Mexico insurance online.
• You’ll need about $800 to $1000 in cash.  US cash is fine.  A lot of places where we’re going won’t take credit cards.  We don’t charge anything for the guide (uh, that would be me).  You will have to pay for your expenses (hotels, food, fuel, etc.).
• No drugs and no guns.  Seriously.  Get caught with either in Mexico and you won’t be returning with us.  Or any time soon.  You will get to learn Spanish, I suppose.
• There are local hotels in the CSC/Azusa area and we’ll be posting info about them in the future.
• If you want to park your truck here, give Steve a call at 909 445 0900 to make sure we have room.
• I’ll post a blog on what you need to bring, but keep in mind you aren’t relocating.  Riding gear, helmet, gloves, rain gear, a few tools, and a single change of clothes will work just fine.  Most folks bring way too much stuff (their bikes look like the opening scene in The Beverly Hillbillies).  The really important things are a camera and a positive attitude.  More on that later.
• We won’t have a chase vehicle and I won’t be carrying spare parts.  I’ve always had more problems with chase vehicles than the motorcycles.  If you want to bring spare parts along, you should buy them now and pack them in your panniers.

That’s it for now.   Much, much more to follow, my friends.

In more ways than one, too!   Check out this nice note and these awesome photos from our good buddy Jay up in Washington!

Good evening, Joe.

Couple cool pictures I took today on Chinook Pass in eastern WA. Snow can’t keep the RX-3 in the garage. First 200 miles and I love it!

Take care,

Jay

Awesome photos, Jay, and we’re glad you’re enjoying your new RX3.   Your photos are dramatic…some of the best I’ve seen.

We sure are getting some magnificent photos and videos from our riders.   Keep ’em coming, folks…we love seeing these!

So, here we go…our first maintenance tutorial on the TT Special!  One of the most basic maintenance actions is changing your oil.   This one was easy to do (easier than the RX3, even), partly because the TT Special only has one oil strainer/filter (the RX3 has three), and partly because the TT Special’s engine is essentially a modification of our tried and true CSC-250 engine (and those things are bulletproof).

Let’s first consider the key parts of the TT Special and how we’ll use them when changing this motorcycle’s oil.   These include the oil (we use a 10W40 oil designed for motorcycles, and we sell both non-synthetic and synthetic oil), the oil dipstick (on the right side of the crankcase), the oil viewing port (on the right side of the crankcase), the 17mm oil drain plug (underneath the crankcase), the 24mm oil strainer cap (on the lower left side of the engine crankcase), the oil strainer spring (beneath the oil strainer cap), and the oil strainer (held in place by the oil strainer spring).

The first step is to put an oil drain pan underneath the motorcycle to catch the oil as it drains from the engine.

Remove the dipstick from the engine, as shown below.

Remove the oil drain plug underneath the engine and allow the oil to drain.   Hold the bike in the vertical position so all the oil drains.

Remove the oil strainer cap on the left side of the engine. 

When the oil strainer cap is removed, there will be a spring inside of it, as shown below.

Usually, the oil strainer remains in the engine when the oil strainer cap and spring are removed.   You’ll have to reach into the engine with a pick or a screwdriver to get the oil strainer out of the engine.

When you remove the oil strainer for the first couple of oil changes (as the engine is breaking in), you will see more than a few metallic particles and probably some plastic adhesive material (the green stuff) on the strainer.   This is normal, so don’t be alarmed by it.   When I’ve done the first oil change on most of my other motorcycles, it looked like someone swept up the floor in a machine shop and dumped the sweepings into my crankcase.  It’s normal.   When the engine is breaking it, wear occurs, and what you see in the photo above is the result.

Clean the strainer.   WD-40 works well, because you can direct the spray into the strainer from the inside and blow the filtered particles off.  If you wipe them off with a shop rag, take care not to deform the strainer.

After all of the oil has drained from the crankcase, insert the cleaned strainer into the spring/cap assembly, as you see below.

Reinstall the strainer, the spring, and the strainer cap.

Reinstall the oil drain plug.

Pour 1.2 liters of oil into the oil fill port on the right side of the motorcycle.   On the motorcycle you see in the photo below, we were doing lots of other stuff, so don’t think you need to remove the tank, the seat, the body panels, etc.    All you need to remove during an oil change are the things described in the preceding paragraphs.

1.2 liters is about 1.3 quarts.   If you’re like me, you don’t have a graduated beaker in your garage, so the best way to get the right amount of oil in the engine is to pour in a quart, and then pour that last 0.3 quarts in at a slow rate keeping an eye on the oil viewing port (on the right side of the engine).  When you have 1.2 liters, the oil level will be between the L and H marks when the bike is vertical (off the sidestand), as you see below.

Start the engine, let the bike warm up, and then check the oil again.  You can also check the oil with the dipstick.  The proper way to do this is to let the engine warm, shut the ignition, remove the dipstick and wipe it clean, wait one minute, hold the bike vertical, and then reinsert the dipstick without screwing it into the engine.  The photo below shows that last part.

Withdraw the dipstick and check the oil level.  It should be at the upper level of the cross-hatched area on the dipstick (the oil should come up to the upper red arrow shown in the photo below).

And folks, that’s all there is to this one.  After you’ve done this a couple of times, you’ll find changing your oil to be a 10 minute job.  It’s easy.

Our good buddy Lee in upstate New York just posted this, and folks, it’s one of the best RX3 videos I’ve ever seen!

Lee, our compliments to you. Well done, my friend!

Almost no motorcycle content in this blog, folks, but I had mentioned the Mosin Fun Match we were going to have this weekend and I thought I would follow up with an after action report and a proposal.

About a dozen of us met yesterday morning out at the West End Gun Club for our match.   It was cool.  Literally.  The temperature in So Cal dropped this weekend big time.  But it was also cool as in way fun.   We had a good time shooting our match with simple rules and fun targets…zombies, bullseyes, military surplus rifles, and handguns…

I’m always worried that when I post gun stuff on the CSC blog somebody will get their BVDs in a knot and start whining about it.   The fact is, though, that many of you have written or otherwise told me that you like seeing this stuff.  So, every once in a while I’ll continue to throw in some shooting stuff.

The motorcycle content first:  My good buddy Duane, who helps at CSC when we get backed up, is also an avid shooter.  Duane rides an RX3 (he did the Flagstaff run with us a ways back) and he, like me, is a range regular.  Duane shoots an ultra-collectible K98 Mauser, and he’s very, very good with it.

Here’s good buddy Rick, one of the Mosin boys, with his M44 Mosin.   Rick is into the shooting and reloading thing big time…he shoots cast bullets in his Mosin (as do I), which is a relatively advanced reloading thing to do.  It’s way harder to get good accuracy with cast bullets, and Rick is right there.   He even casts his own bullets.   Amazing stuff.

Incidentally, if you want to see what goes into reloading cast bullets in a rifle, check out this video..

A shot of my good buddy Jim, who shoots the Mighty M1 Garand.

The boys, yukking it up during a line break…

My buddy Paul’s Mosin.   Paul and I go back a long time.  We’ve been friends for over 60 years.

My Mosin.   It’s a 1934 rifle.   The thing is 81 years old, and it still shoots into an inch.   I refinished it and glass bedded the action.  It’s awesome.

Good buddy Jim was at the bench just to my left, and his Garand was throwing brass all over the place.   One of those big .30 06 cases dinged dinged my Mosin stock (it’s that little scratch just to the left of the spent .30 06 brass).   It’s no big deal, because it has an oil finish.  I’ll just throw a bit of TruOil on it and it will be as good as new again.

The boys downrange, checking their targets.  It was a great day to be on the range.

We shot rifle targets at 50 yards, and then we switched to handgun targets at 25 yards.  It was grand fun.  A couple of us were shooting .45 ACP Model 1911s, a couple of us were shooting .357 magnum revolvers, and the rest were shooting 9mm automatics.   Good times.

There’s something about Mexican food and rifle matches….the two just seem to go together.   Part of the tradition with this crowd is a great lunch at our local Mexican restaurant, and yesterday was no exception.

I had albondigas soup.  I don’t what an albondiga is, but they sure are good in soup.  One of the younger guys had this burrito.   You’d need to use scientific notation to denote the calories in this thing…

We don’t score the targets until after lunch (it’s also part of the tradition).   Here’s Tyler at work on one of the pistol targets…some of these guys are really good.

These matches are a ton of fun.  Everyone who participates is a winner, and there are no losers.  It is a really fun thing to do.

So, the proposal I mentioned earlier….we’ve been talking about a local Scoot and Shoot event…the same sort of thing as described above, but your ticket in is riding your RX3 to the match.   It would have to be handgun only (it’s kind of hard to carry a rifle on a motorcycle).    If you’re interested, let me know (write to me at info@cscmotorcycles.com), and I’ll set it up.

Hey, one more thing…if there are any more entries for the RX3-U photo caption contest, get them in to me by midnight tonight.   First (and only) prize is a signed copy of 5000 Miles At 8000 RPM.   We’ve received about 40 entries so far.   We’ll announce a winner here on the blog tomorrow!