How do you get from here,

to here.

With a crane, of course.

Oscar’s Ohlins shock is ready. The tall forks are for Art’s SuperMoto Bike. Both get a free trial subscription to Roadracing World.

My TZ is in a crate ready to travel to her new home, far away from my land of endless sunshine, to a new land full of rainy skies and gales.

What do you do when you sell your old race bike that you did lots of neat things to? You want the new owner to know and appreciate your work but some of it’s subtle and might be missed. You put notes all over the bike before you ship.

This is a rear view, you can see one note hanging near the foot peg.

Check out the rear rotor on my ‘90 TZ250. The counter sunk screws weigh less than the stock bolts and give more space when changing wheels. The stock holes have been enlarged. The outside edge of the rotor has been rounded to fit between the pads easy.

Tony has been racing my TZ with the old body work, just in case. Now it’s time to install the new Air Tech body work and ship the bike to it’s new home. One more good bath before it goes.

The spring on top in this photo came out of the F2 front end on my ‘88 CBR 600F1. Back then springs were long. Now days, springs are a lot shorter. I saved 300 grams in each fork by replacing the long springs with shorter springs of the same rate and longer spacers.

Yes, the rate increases the more you compress a spring but not by much. I think the advantage of less weight is greater than the problem caused by a slight rate increase near the end of the forks travel.

A Gun Case is a great way to ship forks, you can even take them on a plane to a race. Jim had a bunch of gun cases here and there in the shop. I put them to work shipping forks back to customers when I didn’t have a good box. Turns out most of the cases have some kind of magic because they keep coming back with new jobs. The case in the back is on it 3^rd round trip and the case in front contains a 2^nd set of forks from the same person. Or maybe it just the good work…

“Here’s me on the TZ-based bike (Ed hates calling it a TZ) at Vegas. It was my first race on the bike, and I was uncomfortable and tentative. Although the lap times dropped as Ed tweaked things, when I got worn and felt I’d hit my limit for the weekend, I packed up. When I learned to ski, I was told by a Ski Patrol member that people got hurt when they’d say, ‘Just one more run.’ I’ve never forgotten that. I ride within my limits and come back to race another day. We had identified some areas (on bike and rider!) that need work, and we have a plan to do that. Success in racing, track days or street riding starts with a plan based on evaluation and feedback, and sticking to that plan pays dividends.”

8 happy LE clients at Willow yesterday with MotoYard.com

One of them, with bug like eyes, shows off his new 675 in front of my new signage.