Motorcycle Stuff

Cycle World in their weekly e-mail had a write-up about this electric bike. The Voxan Wattman is to be piloted by Max Biaggi in an electric motorcycle land speed record attempt. They're looking at something above 205 miles per hour. The bike has an interesting front suspension design - there's more detail in the article. The article also states that the frame is some type of aerospace steel tubing. I'd like to know more about that just to satisfy my own curiosity. In this country most frame construction of racing vehicles and aircraft is with 4130 chrome-moly. The English use Reynolds 531 tubing for similar applications. For bicycle construction, anything from plain carbon steel to proprietary high strength alloys like Reynolds 853. Whatever it is they are using, it needs to be strong but light weight since this rig is going to be pretty heavy due to the weight of the battery pack. I hope they report on the outcome and that it's a safe and successful one.

Moto GP started back up Sunday. I had received an email about it but didn't take the time to read it. However, the Missus was looking for something to watch on TV while I was reading the paper and came across the race on NBC. I quickly set the paper down and watched in awe at the skills of those guys. As the race was drawing to a close, Marc Marquez was moving up to challenge the leader when he high-sided and took a nasty spill. After the race was over they reported that he had broken his arm in the fall and was scheduled for surgery on Tuesday. Tough break, no pun intended. Glad to see some motorcycle racing on television again just the same.

My buddy the Ducati specialist came down yesterday morning to pick up a gas tank he dropped off for me to repair. I wasn't able to do anything with it in the present condition, so he's going to try and clean out the inside so I can repair the leak. It has some type of sealer in it that's flaking off. I assume it's flammable or would melt when I try to weld it. Because the tank is such pristine condition on the outside, I don't want anything to compound the difficulty in making the repair. Plus, since the sealer is already flaking off, it'll need to be removed before putting it back into service anyway.

This was in the table of contents of the current issue of American Motorcyclist as a lead-in to a retrospective piece on the movie Take it To The Limit. Besides being one of the greatest photographs of motorcycle racing ever, it's also a reminder that I didn't make it to Terre Haute this year for the flat track race due to the damn cooties. That's a pisser - just like a lot of other things we're all putting up with this year.

Back on the projects this week. I've been slacking a bit with the hot weather but it's supposed to be a bit cooler this week. Need to get a little something done for myself and my boss.