ITINERARY NOVEMBER
1985
3rd YEA
via REEFTON SPUR Healesville,
Warburton through Spur, returning
9.00
KBCP through
Whittlesea approx 400km
10.30
Yarra Glen
10th LOCH NAVIGATION Ross Bradshaw leading. Run on similar lines to a
TRIAL car
trial, travelling through beautiful downtown
9.30
KBCP Gippsland.
10.45
Hallam
Weekend LAKES ENTRANCE Vince Green leading; hotel accommodation. See
16-17th
9.30 KBCP Vince for more details.
24th MARYSVILLE Tom Saville leading.
Bound to traverse Black Spur,
9.00
KBCP see Tom for exact route.
10.30
Yarra Glen
SOCIAL SCENE
The 1985
Christmas BBQ is being held in conjunction with the DECEMBER general meeting;
COST: members and kids – FREE
Visitors - $5.00
Meat, salads,
drinks and desserts will be provided.
The Committee is
putting $50.00 towards the CHRISTMAS HAMPER which will include such items as;
ham, Christmas cake, bottle of scotch.
Persons attending
the BBQ are asked to bring a small item to donate to the hamper which will be
raffled on the night. Suggestion for
things; nuts, sweets, bottles or cans of beer, soft drink, mineral water,
chips, cheezles, biscuits, chocolate, fruit, tins of
food or anything else you can think of; (not necessarily food).
Janet Towns (social sec)
PORT CAMPBELL 13/10/85
Ten Bikes: Yam 1/1 RH (Daryl Jones), K100RS (Hans Wurster), K100RS (Jack Youdan),
K100RT (Gary Clifton), GPz900 (Ken Wurster), GPz900
(Ben Warden), CB900F2 (Mark Closter), R80 G/S (Frank Bloxam),
GSX-R750 (Damon Cramp), GPz750 (Turbo Jim Davey)
Weather: even better than last week according to
Jack.
The Ride:
Laverton pick
up, first stop Apollo Bay for food and fuel.
I sat on Hans’ tail all the way along the GOR. A couple of BM’s proved harder to pass than
the rest. A blue K clung on till Apollo
Bay. He was the captain of the BMW club
leading a ride. Damon (GSX-R) riding
alone but now riding with us, was given the corner marker spiel. I put a can of sealant in my rear tyre. The previously plugged puncture was leaking
slowly.
Ken and I corner
marked at the start of the 9km of unmade road across the Otway’s. Frank arrived, the pace a little hot for the
rear rider, and soon to get hotter.
I think Ken must
have had a good night’s sleep. He was
riding like a demon. Jim and turbo saw
us coming, a tell tale puff of smoke appearing as the motor was stoked up, but
was soon out gunned down the straight.
The corners were tighter for Jim, and he quickly disappeared from view.
At the Lavers
Hill “T” intersection Ken and I marked again.
Jim arrived and Ken shot off.
Later I heard he set a new club speed record. The Nine re-lines at 10,500 rpm, and at 24
km/h per 1000rpm, I estimate he was just the wrong side of redline. In fact while I was rounding up the
“stragglers” through the gravelly, sandy twisties
running down and out of the Otway’s the pace at the front was hectic. Hans and Damon were trying to see whose bike
was the thirstiest, both leaving the throttle wide open for long periods of
time. And Jack laughingly begrudged the
fact that though he had me in sight (I was tootling along at 6500 rpm), he was not making any headway on me. But I don’t think he was really trying.
Port Campbell
must do well out of motorcyclists and tourists.
There were at least 7 efficient servers in the Milk Bar/Fish and Chip
Shop, and the place was still packed. I
forgot to buy a lobster. Next time;
While I fuelled
up (18.26km/l (51.6m/gal) Melbourne to Port Campbell) the others departed. When I passed the second turn off to Simpson,
the idea occurred to me that I would be riding the rest of the ride alone. Didn’t Hans say he was going through
Simpson? I eventually caught up with corner
markers at Cobden, some 38km away. Next
stop Colac, then down the Princes Highway to Geelong.
While corner
marking with Mark in Geelong suburbia, we almost lost Gary as he missed seeing
us, but he back tracked soon enough. We
finally regrouped on Geelong road near Laverton. I sold a few raffle tickets before heading
off to arrive “home” at about 5.30pm. a round trip of 550km sees the 44,000km mark about to clock
over. A great day’s ride;
Ben Warden (GPz900)
BREAKFAST RIDE -
KINGLAKE
The ride started at the K.B.C.P. at
8.00am, but most of the riders seemed to meet at Denny’s in Ringwood with some
late arrivals and some new riders.
Breakfast was enjoyable and after being
well fed we headed off with Ben as leader and Peter as tail rider. There were 19 bikes in all, 13 of them being
Kawasaki’s.
We left Ringwood and headed to Kinglake
and then wound our way through the Great Dividing Range to Flowerdale, (I
think), where we stopped for a short break.
Between Flowerdale and Yea we stopped
again so that Vince could try out his new puncture repair kit on Ben’s rear
tyre. A few of the bikes fuelled up at
Yea and then we proceeded at a rather fast rate along the Goulburn Valley
Highway doing a left hander at Kerrisdale and then journeying through the
sleepy hollow of Strath Creek towards Broadford. The pace was fast.
One of the riders accompanied by a
fearless pillion tried to find a shorter route to Broadford via the trees on a
left hander. Fortunately the bike, the
unsettled rider and pillion came away unscathed.
We stopped for a snack at Broadford and
rested in the spring sunshine. After
leaving Broadford we had a sedate ride along the Hume highway turning off to
the final destination point which was somewhere in the vicinity of Merriang.
At 3.00pm and after covering some 300
kilometres we all left for home.
Peter & Sure
Moreland.
OCTOBER 6 RIDE
TO WHERE
Where
is where? Bendigo of
course if you read the club green card.
Either not many read it, or did and went to a Rally or watched the
Bathurst car event on TV.
Well,
for those who watched the XJS (no, it’s not a Yamaha!) win or the Horde of BMW
(no, not K series) do their thing; they missed the best spring weather for a
ride this season.
Sometimes
bike speedos lie, as on return home you would not
believe a Melbourne – Bendigo – Melbourne trip would rack up 414.82km
(approximate).
Unless
you tell yourself that Ben’s GPZ900R was leading, then its quite understandable (plausible is the right word
but understandable is more understandable)
Come
on, how about reporting the ride instead of all this stuff!
Ok,
here comes the blow by blow details.
Four,
yes only 4 sadly, bikes left KBCP, Mark (CB900F), Gary and lady (GPZ1100), Jack
(VF1000) and Ben (everybody knows).
Supposed
to go to Romsey but went to Kyneton through error, talked to QL Club members
passing through to Maldon....funny how many 250cc bikes are around with
750/900/1100 decals on the side covers.
Oops, forgot, we did the via Mount Macedon bit before this.
Bendigo
on Sunday is still full of warm to hot cars doing the streets, as Gary said;
petrol must be cheap in Bendigo. Lunch was
in the mall, but won’t tell you who ate what, just too boring.
Returned
via Tullaroop and (forget) and (forget again) and
Mildura (I think) and Romsey – Wallan – Lalor..... No wonder we did so many k’s!
No,
speedos don’t lie but if you take into account a
76.73% worn rear tyre, we really only did 407.67km, but on the other hand the
air was warm...blah, blah, blah.
(signed VF Rear Rider)
COOBER
PEDY.....
Had 4 weeks leave recently and after
taking my better half for week touring Victoria, N.S.W and S.A. by car and
camping in motels, returned home for a few days when I again got itchy feet and
decided to go for a short run on the bike.
Thought I might have another go at Ayres Rock and Alice Springs.
Having just recently changed the oil in
the bike etc I knew the bike was OK for the intended run. Packed up a few things and on Tuesday 3/9/85
at 7.40am I headed west, with 17015km on the speedo. It was raining at the time and continued to
do so until I reached Horsham. It
cleared a little and again started to rain between Tailem Ben and Adelaide.
Between Tailem Bend and Adelaide was
forced to sit on the speed limit due to the police highway car immediately in
front of us for the whole of the distance. A slow run indeed. After Adelaide headed north to Port Augusta
and the weather steadily improved. Arrived at Port Augusta at 5.30pm (1043). Decided to camp there in
the fauna caravan park. (Didn’t
cost a cent due to certain circumstances)
Next morning was up at 7am packed up and
left shortly after for Pemba and Glendambo.
Beut weather. After coffee at both places left Glendambo (288k) for Coober Pedy. The first 150km was good road, but the rest
of the 130 plus km was horrible, red dust inches deep, gravel and continuous
corrugations, conditions which must be seen to be believed. I nearly lost the bike at least a dozen
times. Definitely not
a road for a large road bike.
Cutting a long story short, I arrived at
Coober Pedy at 1.40pm (3 hours). It is a
hot and dusty place with tourists and aboriginals everywhere. (Sober or otherwise).
There were a lot of dubious looking characters about and I wasn’t going
to leave my bike unattended for more than a couple of minutes at a time as I
was sure something would have been missing from it on return.
I checked the place out. They sell opals everywhere but not being
familiar with quality I decided not to buy any.
The prices were no cheaper than anywhere else. Got talking to some tourists and their bus driver
regarding road conditions further north and was told that they were comparable
with what I had just covered and much worse in places. I decided then that I wasn’t going to wreck
my bike and soon after headed back the way I had come to Glendambo
On my way back I came across two guys,
both on BMW’s (Boxers). We stopped and
talked for about half an hour about the road ahead for them. They decided to turn back. In the 8km they travelled into the dirt
section they had already lost luggage (recovered) due to the bumpy road, one
had blown a fork seal and both had nearly dropped their bikes a few times.
Later we camped together at Glendambo
and spent the rest of the night (till stumps) in the hotel there. The town consists only of the hotel and a
general store. When I filled the bike
with petrol that night there, I noticed that I had oil all over the back wheel
and diff. On checking the cause I found
the rear shocker had blown its seal and all the oil and gas had escaped.
Next morning, after packing up, left
there at 7.15am for Pimba and Port Augusta. Then on to Adelaide where I
went to Pitman Yamaha, who are the BMW dealers there. It was
amazing. I drove into the service
department, told the manager of my predicament, they fitted a new shocker (complete
unit) and I was out of there within an hour.
No hassle at all and on warranty.
Very impressed.
Then headed out of Adelaide back to
Tailem Ben, to Bordertown where I decided to stay for the night. Camped again for free. Had a feed and a few stubbies
before going to sleep.
Next morning 6/9 woke up early and
packed up. It was very cold and
foggy. Headed off
towards home quite slowly due to the lack of visibility. Speed increased as the weather and visibility
improved. Stopped at the various places
for petrol and coffee on the way and arrived home at 12 noon after (458) that
morning.
The run form Bordertown to Melbourne was
straight forward and uneventful.
Total distance for the run was
3215km. Fuel cost $121.37. Camping $2 and other expenses for food and
drinks were $38. Average speed for
travelling time only was 119.1k/h. fuel consumption averaged out at 15.51 k/lt
or 44.1 mpg.
Hans Wurster K100RS.
After arriving
home from the Coober Pedy run, decided to do a bit of work at home to keep
everyone happy. After about a week I
felt I had to go for just another ride before going to work again. Was a bit undecided which way to go but
finally decide to head east.
Left home 7am on
19/9/85 for Bairnsdale etc to Genoa.
It was there it started to rain and continued through to Bega then to
Cooma, where I arrived at 3pm after the usual coffee and fuel stops.
As it was too
wet for camping decided to stay at the Alpine hotel for $12 for the night with
a light breakfast. It was a good spot and the bar was naturally
in the same building just downstairs.
Had enough time in the afternoon to check out the town and sample most
of the hotels before retiring to my own dunghill. That day travelled 747km.
The next morning
it was still raining steadily and after a light brekkie headed for the Snowy
Mountains Highway and into the hills. After only about 20 or so km was high enough in the mountains for
the rain to turn to snow. I had a
strong headwind and it was very hard to see with the snow stuck all over my
visor. It was a continuous job wiping
the visor with one hand and hanging on with the other on the now very slippery
road. I also had trouble with the inside
of the visor fogging up. At times it was
slow going due to many curves, snow and ice on the road and visibility
problems. The scenery was beaut if only
I could have enjoyed it more. 4 wheels
would have made a lot of difference. I
actually was quite frightened a couple of times. Everything was white as far as one could see. I wondered what could happen if I fell off
and slid off the road or something. Over
the distance form Cooma to Tumut 183km I saw only 3, (4 wheel drive)
vehicles. Of that distance about 30km
was covered in rain and about a hundred in show. The rest was ok when I came out of the
Kosciusko National Park area on the northern side.
From Tumut the
weather improved rapidly until Wodonga where I arrived at 12.05pm. I stayed there with my mum for the
night. Visited friends and drank a few
ales.
The next day
returned home to Altona straight down the Hume.
Total distances for ride 1490km. Used 94lt fuel. All
inclusive cost $95. Aver speed for
riding time only 117k/h. Average fuel
consumption was 44.7mpg. The bike went
like a clock.
HANS WURSTER K100RS
____________________
BIKE CLEANING AS AN ART FORM
Cleaning your motorcycle means different
things to different folks, all the way form one belt with pressure cold water
to the hot water-soap treatment to the full house of some disassembly to polish
bits you can’t see.
The last approach can really take bike
cleaning into the realm of art or at least provide the owner with a form of
therapy.
You either end up with a warm inner glow
from satisfaction of a job-well-done or a deep seated frustration over it
taking so long when you –could-be-doing-better-things, even riding it.
So you think an
immaculate machine, and most bikes for sale are advertised so, is just a result
of someone buying new from the showroom floor and not riding in the rain or on
unsealed roads? well think again as
most new bikes are picked up still with some protective grease showing, see
those finger prints in it, and a total absence of chrome and paintwork polish.
For a rundown on this art form practised
at your very own drive or footpath or garage or other place, read on.
·
Find
all the oil weeps, seeps and leaks, they show up through the dry dirt, and
petrol-solvent-spirit them away.
·
Hot
water – soap the whole thing, hard scrub the very
dirty areas, hose off.
·
Looks
good when wet he? Let it dry and that
all-black engine still looks a brown grey shade with baked on dirt. Brush it over with a petrol – oil mix or
similar dust collecting fluid to look beaut black.
·
Find
all the parts you missed in the wash-and-scrub trick and re-do, especially
those wheel centres behind the brakes.
·
Go
heavy with vinyl protector on seat, instrument surrounds or anything vinyl,
rubber or black plastic.
·
Polish
the bright bits with chrome polish and wax polish the paint work, find many
chips in the paint and touch up.
·
Reassemble
those panniers, fairings and other accessories taken off to get at the dirt.
Do you know all this, practice it often,
takes more than three hours each time?
If so congratulations, you are really
into this art form.
Do you then take the bike out and wreck
all the effort on one short wet stretch of road repairs and consider the whole
thing an exercise in futility?
If so, you are obviously very dependent
on the therapy...or are an out and out masochist!
J. G. Youdan
CLUB
RIDE ON 27/1085
STARTERS: Les LEAHEY (leader) R80GS; Frank –
R80GS; Mick FAGAN R1000s; John R80; Ben and Ken both on GPz900R; Peter GT750;
Greg – CB 750K and Mans with Joanne as pillion – K100RS.
I
nearly missed this ride because of the change in time to daylight saving and at
the last minute my daughter, Joanne, also wanted to come along as my
pillion. It was a bit of a rush to get
there on time. Most of the above were
there having a bit of a natter. FAGAN
was in good form. Ben arrived last. It was a beautiful morning. Not a cloud to be seen and everything pointed
to an enjoyable ride.
Whilst
at the KBC we all had to admire one bike in particular. It was John’s red R80. With just 8000km on the clock it was
immaculately clean. As this ride was
supposed to include quite a bit of dirt, it was obvious at the start that it
would not be so sparkling in appearance when the ride finished later that
day. But little did we know of what was
to come.
After
a quick rundown on the ‘marker system’ we left the KBC with Les leading and
Peter on the GT750 as rear rider. Headed up through North Melbourne to Footscray, Braybrook, Sunshine,
Deer Park tec. Turned
off the western highway before Melton with the corner markers taking up their
correct positions.
A
short time later whilst marking a corner with Greg, we waited for quite some
considerable time and no one came along.
I decided to go back about 10km to the previous corner markers and was
told by Frank and Ken that Peter was marking the corner at the highway waiting
for Ben who had waved him on back in Brooklyn when he decided to get petrol for
his bike. (So much for the rule that tanks should be full at the commencement
of the ride)
I
then returned up the line to the leader who was now also coming back to find
the cause of the delay. I told him of
what had taken place back there and Les, Joanne and I then waited for at least
another 20 minutes before going further back thinking that surely Ben would have
caught up by now and someone else might have had some problem. Ken then came along and informed us that he
had gone right back to Ashley street Braybrook checking all the servos and
couldn’t find Ben anywhere. We then
decided to go on without him, after stuffing around for at least an hour.
We
then headed u through the back roads into the Brisbane ranges. There was a good variety of road surfaces and
plenty of bends. Sometimes quite tricky;
at Steiglitz, the locals and others had a ‘back to Steiglitz’ celebration. This turned out to be an unforgettable
function for a lot of people and it also spelled DOOM to John’s immaculate
R80. As John, followed by Mick, came out
of Steiglitz and up over a rise, an elderly couple in an old Morris or Austin
1800 decided to d a ‘U’ turn on the highway in front of the two bikes. John apparently tired his hardest to avoid
the collision which followed. He
collided with this car dead centre on the driver’s side. Fortunately he was not visibly hurt but his
pride and joy actually broke in two.
Everything forward of the steering head, wheel, forks, broken head light
and handle bars etc was now just attached to the rear section by a few
electrical wires and the clutch and throttle cables. This accident held us all up for at least
another hour before we had it transported in parts to Anakie for storage to be
picked up later. John was then driven
home by the people he ran into.
The
rest of us then continued the ride to the outskirts of Geelong where we had our
lunch at about 1.30pm. (Our first opportunity for refreshments and no chance of
the normal morning tea etc) After lunch, headed off via back roads to the Ottways
and plenty of dirt roads. stopped at a fire lookout tower (Peter’s Height
Lookout). Some of our more energetic
fellows climbed to the top and were rewarded by when they described as a
breathtaking view all round. Mick made
use of his camera there as he also did at the scene of the accident
earlier. After a smoko
headed along various tracks to Anglesea for another smoko and some refreshments. The weather was very warm once one got off
the bike.
Due
to the great weather there was the corresponding number of extra Sunday drivers
and riders along the coast road.
After
the short break we headed along the main road towards Geelong. Les turned off at Belmont, and then via
Newtown, Moorabool etc found our way out onto the
Bacchus Marsh road. Turned right and
then headed towards Werribee with the Ford proving grounds on our right, and
the You Yangs similarly so.
At
Werribee we decided to break up after a short rest and talk about the day’s
incidents. Overall the ride covered
about 350km of all kinds of roads and good scenery in the Brisbane Ranges and
later the Otway’s. It was an interesting
ride and on many occasions ideal for the two road/trial bikes present and Mick
with his dual purpose tyres. We others
had to fight a bit harder to stay upright and correspondingly adjust our speed
to conditions.
On
reflection, at the start at the KBC, it promised to be a terrific day and a
terrific ride and ended up with the time consuming muck up with Ben and worst
of all, for John it eneded up as a disaster. His bike is not insured and hopefully the car
owner is insured and john is duly comprnsated.
Joanne
and Hans Wurster K100RS.
A SUNDAY MORNING
RIDE
This
is a tale about experiences and impressions of a pleasant Sunday morning ride,
not of any one specific rider and bike but a ride typical of hundreds each
week. Any road rider into this
motorcycling scene prepared the bike Saturday and has a favourite 150-200km run
over winding roads, preferably out one way back another, at a time when the
Sunday drivers are still at home or already in churches, etc. With cars parked.
The
run’s curvy bits are close enough to the starting point not to need an hour’s
ride to get there and as the whole run is relatively short, extra heavy gear
for the cold and wet is not a must. So,
the experiences and impressions are the all-important buzz on such a ride, ones
like these.
Forget
scenery gazing on the move, must concentrate on riding. Smoothly through these esses
with braking, gear changing, throttle on.
Do it smooth means do it faster I read somewhere. Bloody fool, too fast into this curve, hell,
now in wrong gear and too slow out. Now eight cars behind a heap-towing-trailer, take two at a time in
passing spots, that’s a good plan.
What’s
this? A 60’s Brit single coming hard the other way, that’s what I should have
for Sunday mornings! Clay on inside lane
washed from cutting, just as well I’m in the outside locking the back wheel –
heavy foot ba.... Look at that bike coming through
that sweeper, leaning right over and going like stink. Don’t think I get over THAT far, do I look
like that to him-her?
Yes,
the smart go is to wave at bikes cranked over, no wave back means they are on
8-9 tenths – or just won’t let go! Great
secondary roads around here, no speed traps but rotten bumpy surface, wish the
suspension was more compliant or even slushy soft. She..., why don’t the
Council fix this stretch. Half way through ride now, getting better in curves. Confidence going up and lap times coming
down, eh? Blast, how did that other bike
catch up in this winding bit, never mind, just concentrate on these tight bends
ahead and lose it. What, it’s passing on
this curve? Hey, that could have only
been Ajay out of practice, no one else could do that when I’m going hard and
really cranked over.
Right,
now I’ll pass this obvious learner wobbling round the bends on the next good
curve. Now, now, the blow-into-weeds
treatment, heaps good for my ego. Yeah,
that HAD to be Ajay before. Back on the main road, practice that reverse
steering through this five clicks of fast sweepers, really works on these
latest bikes also. Three quarters into
run and tired of concentrating, watch it, too fast into this one. Look, now over wrong side, what if a truck comes
around this corner?...dickhead!
Cruise
on this long straight but watch for speed traps. How long ago did I check the battery
lever? Is it dry and about to
expire? Know this small town but don’t
remember the name. Look good in shop
windows real cool racer image. Look at
those bikes outside the take away, they’ll wreck their times stopping, I won’t.
Here
we are back home, must check fuel consumption but know
it will be horrendous, that’s what my speeds do. What only averaged 86.5k’s speed for
trip? That’s nearly 2 clicks slower than
two weeks ago, must go again next Sunday and really give it stick. Just a moment we hear you say, this tale
started out with a pleasant Sunday morning ride theme, not as a GP or six hour
or other fast mover contest for scratcher freaks.
Yeah
we all know, but it’s great to play boy, or girl, racer on THAT run!
J.G.
Youdan