Many of you know, my red supercharged bobber was built by George Jackson about 20 years ago. George was a perfectionist, ya might say "anal" on his bikes - and otherwise in his life. A fabulous, altruistic man. He had asked me to build custom pipes for it back then but I considered it, then declined as it seemed a poor business decision. I had a 3 month backlog on pipe builds and to let him jump the line to build a one-off custom exhaust with the prototyping issues would be unfair to those waiting, as well as my business - prototyping cost not recoverable if not taken into production. This was for a blown bike, a very narrow market. George put Super Trapps on it. Then cancer killed him quick in 2003, and we, the High Country Cruisers - did a ride to his life celebration. Big turnout, and the epitaphs were fabulous. I knew George as a sometime co rider but didn't know him closely as a friend. I really regretted that - and regretted declining his request.
George Jackson at Inzane I, Zanesville OH 2001.
None of us in the club had the spare money to buy it from his widow - it was quite pricey. The bike was sold to a squid and he abused it. Stored it outside among other things.
A decade later a friend who had laser engraved some of my guns, called and said he had come across a blown bobber and someone told him I might know something about it. Chuck described it and I said that could only be George's bike. I told him all about George, what a great man he was, some of his friends and sent him pics. He said "well then I'm gonna do George right and restore his bike." In the process of that, a year later he asked me to build custom pipes for it.
Wow. The 2nd time I've been asked to build custom pipes for this same bike by unrelated people and I regretted not doing it last time. This is Karma. And my chance for redemption.
"Yeah I'll do it." So I did. The sexiest pipes I've ever made, with hand made hybrid curved stainless steel wool / glass straight-through packs. And a crossover. Sized to egress the blown bike perfectly.
George is smiling down on us.
Chuck joined us for the Great Brisket Ride I set up about 5 years ago. The bike was truly stunning.
A year or so later I was surfing facebook - I never did that, I hate their data mining and privacy violating - on a Valky FB page and there was a pic of "George" at the Colorado Motorcycle Expo - and mentioned it was for sale. I called up Chuck, said wazzup with that - He said it's time for someone else to enjoy George's charms - "I shoulda thought of you - you get first dibs."
Now why does Karma want me to have the George bike? I never surfed FB but something made me do it this time. Is there some mystical reason I don't get?
I made an offer and he accepted. George was MINE!
I've had George for 4 years now. I've done a few tweaks to him. Added some graphics on the side cover and the new VTX bucket. Finally got a Dyna3000 which George desperately needed - had a bad hesitation that both George J and Chuck had simply got used to. No. I said I think I can tune that out. I heard that blown Valks NEED a D3000. Added a Ball pressure switch to ground the retard wire at 4# boost so I wouldn't blow it up. Added an Autometer Boost gauge, a diode, a relay and an LED to tell me when the retard was happening. Added more powerful VTX coils to fire a spark the blower wouldn't extinguish. Fab'd a linkage to the Pingle as you can't get your fingers past the big coils.
Entered George in the CO Motorcycle Expo again this Feb. Took a trophy but it wasn't first. ARGGH! Beat out by a Honda with custom painted titties! Hey he cheated.
Decided a week before Asheville Inzane to attend as a vendor. Which meant I would be trailering to haul product and 2 bikes Jade and George, to be entered in the show. Expected to do well. On Monday I detailed both bikes where I was parked at the south end of the lot - where I had been told to take my truck and trailer. I finished Jade and parked him by the other bikes. Detailed George - then decided I'd chase around the parking lot to see how he's running. I had never run him below about 6,000ft elevation.
HOLY POOP! Did somebody install NITROUS when I wasn't looking? George is so fast he's SCARY!!! Rolling on the throttle, I was scared I was gonna flip over! Some of you saw me checking George out.
Put George back in the trailer and closed the back. Then Don comes up and says you have to move to the other side of the hotel, by the semi truck over there. So does David Wilders and Big BF. The hotel doesn't want us there. Like move now. OK, no biggy. I moved the truck & trailer. BigBF pushed back, said NO and they didn't make him move.
DISASTER. It wasn't until the next day I remembered, I didn't tie George down as I wasn't expecting to move him. Went to check. Yep George is laying on his side. Custom mirror broken off. I couldn't pick him up. Got a couple friends to help. The gas had been leaking out all night.
Chuck had hired Gunslinger's in Golden to paint George. That's the shop Harley uses for their CVO bikes - pack up the sheet metal, ship it to Golden and they ship it back. Premium paint.
The paint on the tank is ruined. Big old blister from the leaking gas. Such that I couldn't enter it in the show, the reason I brought it.
I cleaned up the gas stain as best I could and was going to ride it to the Joe Boyd ride.
Crank - THUMP.
Hydrolocked. CRAP. When it rains it pours.
OK nothing to do now but fix it. And make an insurance claim. Nothing to gain crying over spilt milk.
The drive home pretty much uneventful. Except. Along the way, 3 lanes going west, I'm center lane, woman passes me on the right, pulls immediately in front, the light turns yellow and she SLAMS on the brakes. WTF. We should have both gone through. I'm towing 2 heavy bikes in a box trailer at max GW with no brakes, with a 4Runner. With no escape lane I manage to stop but the trailer jacknifes a bit. Great truck, probably would have hit her if I was driving the Explorer. Where do these bimbos learn to drive?
Detoured to Alabama to visit a friend, a gearhead with an impressive CNC shop -
www.vtxtreme.com. Had FABULOUS catfish at this great restaurant/saloon overlooking a lake. Hotter n Hell, I'm not used to such heat and humidity since I moved to the mountains. But great cat! Daryl said he doubted I busted the gears with the hydrolock. So did I as it didn't make any crunching sound and I stopped immediately. His opinion is, hydrolock won't bust the gears if it doesn't fire. A piston firing puts out a LOT of torque. I agreed until I thought about it more. The gears that break are the starter gears, driving & driven. Don't see how that relates to the engine firing. However if it IS hydrolocked and a piston fires and THEN another piston hits the gas - wow I'm sure that would bend a rod at least.
Anywho, made it back Sunday at sundown. 1700.4 miles including the detour. Had other catch-up stuff to do, then today put George on the lift to get the news. Pulled the plugs. Raised the back wheel, put it in 5th and bumped the engine over using the wheel. Nothing left in the cylinders, but I could smell gas at the plug holes. The plugs look wetter than usual. The gas had drained down into the crankcase. Changed the oil - it's only been 900 miles since the last change. Didn't see much evidence of gas in the oil but then one cylinder full in a gallon of oil wouldn't be obvious.
Cranked it over - it fired and started when the first cylinder turned over - glad it didn't do that last try!
GREAT!. Karma is working for me again! Now just to fix the paint & the mirror & George is good to go! And insurance is paying for it, except $100!
Update. Gunslinger's won't fix it. Won't even talk to me. They now only do work for custom Harley shops, not individuals anymore, and won't tell me the paint codes they used - TUFF TITTIES. If they even have them on record. I'd say, boycott Gunslinger's for their poor CS, but they already are refusing YOU. So I'll have to have a custom paint shop match the paint, or have all the sheet metal painted. Already been refused by my local body shop, Bender Menders - said I'm too particular after I had them repaint the luggage cover on Jade and didn't rave over their job but said I'd accept it and pay their price significantly higher than their estimate, at $324 - color was slightly off even with the correct paint code given them - accepted because I know the sun can shift colors a little. Not returning work to them anymore either, if they require raving kudos over their work when it's not deserved - ego problem.
I've been thinking about having a shop take it back to Kameleon paint like George J had it back in the day. Like this. Pretty spendy, frankly. But GEORGEOUS! (pun intended) But it was made with Bondo filling a depression where there's a weld on the back fender - and it's cracked. It needs to be redone with metalwork; I am not experienced at sheet metal body shop type work like this and have not chased down a shop which is. I would like the same shop to do the Kameleon paint and there's a limited number of House of Kolors dealers listed on their web site, local to me in the Denver / Co Springs area.
Didn't make an insurance claim as I haven't had it painted yet and it's probably too late.
