This is a strange one. I didn't plan to attend Laughlin this year, been there 10-12 times, done that. Then Joe Zanelli, the Primm Casino mob boss called.
“I gotta contact for you in Laughlin; give Sin Wu a call.”
That was the first of several Twilight Zone encounters leading to the Laughlin Run.
Can you imagine somebody named Sin Wu, actually Sydney Wu? So, Sydney represented the boss of the Aquarius Casino, formerly the Flamingo, in Laughlin. They wanted some promotional help with the River Run, and of course, Bikernet could help on a moment's notice. As part of the deal, the boss threw in some rooms for the riding Bikernet staff. Suddenly, the real Sin Wu was hot to hit Laughlin.
We were initially going to drive the Ford 150, right up until a week before the event, and unexpectedly Sin Wu bowed out. I could ride, but the King hadn't seen any miles since I was struck down with vertigo, and we faced a problem with the valves. I found myself at a crossroads. It was time to test my 61-year- old body and the performance make-up of the King. The experiment before me: Figure out what was going on with the King's valves and see if my fleeting balance would handle the desert winds.
My first quandary was late model valve adjustments. I ran the King up onto the lift and called Eric Bennett at Bennett's Performance in Long Beach. When you adjust late-model hydraulics for the first time, you pull the plugs, and roll the cam over, with the rear wheel in 5th gear, until both hydraulics (on one cylinder) are on the bottom of their strokes. Then you take all the up- and-down slack out of the pushrod, and lengthen the adjustment by 3.5 or 4 turns. My question was, “What the hell do you do, to check the adjustment of previously set-up pushrods?”
Before I answer that question, let me finish with the original adjustment procedure, since it reflects on my greasy dilemma. After you handle the 3.5 turns, and tighten the locking device properly, you walk away from the motorcycle for ten minutes, to allow the hydraulic lifter to settle or bleed down. The reason you take a walk-about break is to prevent turning the engine over prematurely and damaging your valve train. After 10 minutes, you should be able to spin the pushrod, but there should be no more up-and-down play. In fact, the pushrod will drag slightly, but still turn. “I usually use one pushrod to tell me when the other one is ready for adjustment,” Eric told me. “When the front intake is all the way up, the rear is down.”
I followed Eric's lead, but asked him what his code for adjusting pushrods is, which is unusual today, except for bikes with solids. He told me to loosen both rear cylinder pushrods until there was up-and-down slop, then leave them for a 10- minute break, then return and start the process all over.
Let me back up for a second and tell you why I was in this position. Gene Thomason of Gene's Speed Shop helped me install an S&S gear drive system with new mid-range cams, a Zippers EFI replacement module, a Screamin' Eagle air cleaner, and a set of 2-into-1 D&D performance pipes. Gene did a fine job, but tightened the rear pushrods against the adjuster and not the pushrod, so they loosened up.
I discovered that my rear exhaust was still loose, so I re-adjusted both of the rear cylinder valves, then went for a ride. The next test involved my aging self. I was hit with a bout of vertigo about six weeks prior. Vertigo is a severe motion- sickness attack, which causes everything you look at to spin. It's like a severe drunk. After the first night, it began to subside, and improved daily. This was a first for me.
Vertigo is coupled with dizziness and balance disorders. Vertigo is at the top, most severe of the list, so what causes this bullshit? No, I wasn't drunk. I immediately filed for research grant from Sin Wu. Vertigo, dizziness, Mieners disease and balance disorders are caused by anything that messes with your inner ear, your vision, the muscles in your neck that could impact your neuron functions or sense of touch and feet connections to the earth. Almost anything can cause these problems. I had my ears checked.
Okay, so I read a book on Dizziness by Dr. —. It's good, if you have any of these issues. He even promotes exercises to enhance your balance. Seems us old farts don't test our balance like we did when we were young, so we lose the edge and fall off it. I investigated the issue, worked out, and next, I needed to ride. If I was going to die in the desert, so be it. I've always wanted to live there.
I suspected Sin Wu was having an affair with our gardener and wanted to stay home, except we have no garden or gardener. Maybe it was the meter reader. Fuck it, I was going to get to ride, and I needed it. I spoke to the boss of D&D exhaust recently and he expressed something that answered another question about our economy. Don't watch the news and the financials ain't bad. I noticed that all the shops in our Southern California vicinity were doing better than ever. I visited Todd's Cycle, Chica, and others and confirmed my findings.
Dave Rash put this spin on it: “I've been through several economic downturns, and motorcycles always survive. Motorcycles are the only mechanical Valium. When a brother needs to escape the ol' lady, the bad job, you name it, he rides.” That said a lot and is now entered into the Bikernet Code of the West.
Then the phone rang. It was Ray Wheeler from Brass Balls Bobbers and W8less rotors. He's a short 65-year-old and rides like a madman on an R&R hopped-up Dyna. He just staggered out of his doctor's office after a heart and artery test. “There aren't enough stints on the planet for you,” his doctor said. “We can't help you.”
Ray needed to ride. He jumped on the Dyna, with a new performance metric car muffler fastened to his R&B header system and hauled ass to Los Angeles, to the Bikernet Interplanetary Headquarters in the Port of Los Angeles ghetto. I could see death in his eyes as he dismounted and we discovered his busted ugly muffler.
Talk about life and times. Life is an interesting, fascinating, ever-changing, always dodging place. I grappled with writing about some of the following, because no one goes there. It's as if someone wrote deftly in some codebook that age and sex should never be discussed, although many die trying to figure it out. The older I get, the more life comes into focus. I suppose just as I figure out the meaning of life, I'll keel over, so I can't share my vast unrelenting knowledge with the younger set–so they are forced to endure the same prospect period without knowledge or guidance.
So should I tell you, or leave you to stumble through life making an ass outta yourself, until you end up shot, in jail, or old like me? Unfortunately, we all get old, or die young and dodge the pain. I swear, when I was 58 I noticed a change. I quit getting stronger, tougher, and meaner. I was suddenly heading down the other side of the hill. The question is, was that age or a premature clogged artery. I'm going to look into that, but the key is that someday, if you don't get run over by a truck, you'll begin to feel your age and it's not fun.
So, what's any of this to do with a ride to Laughlin? Let's see if I can make any sense outta of this supreme juncture in life. Ray was hurting; I could see it in his eyes. The grim reaper was lurking, and he needed to spit into the bastard's hollow eyes and fly down the highway. Me, I needed to test my ability to ride, ignore the downside, roll the dice, and go for it.
Age is an evil specter, but we all need to avoid it like the black plaque or the swine flu and keep dancing. No matter what happens to you, you don't die until you stop trying to dance. So we welded, patched, fabricated a strap, lightened his mounting place, and added sex to Ray's muffler system, with a one-off Bikernet exhaust tip.
I checked over the King and tried to understand the new digital dipstick. I finally read the directions completely.
Do not use this dipstick when the bike is upright.
Do not use this dipstick with the motor running
Do not use this dipstick when the motor is cold
Incredible, no wonder the damn thing didn't do anything but blink at me. I checked the oil manually and could only figure that I had over-filled the tank, but the manual check looked right on the money. Fuck it, let's ride.
I've had a code about riding in LA. If you don't want your ride fucked with, get up early and roll outta Dodge. We scrambled to our old feet at 4:00 a.m. Ray didn't sleep a wink. He was up and packed. We rolled to the gas station at 5:00, after one cup of creamy coffee, then we peeled onto the quagmire of Los Angeles freeways.
Hang on for this: We hit the 405 to the 710 north, to the 91 east, to the 60 and finally the 10 east, out to Marengo Valley, where we caught the 62 into Yucca. We hummed into town 127 miles away from the port of Los Angeles. We immediately called the gangsters from the Chop n Grind.
“Revelry, let's eat.”
We refueled; 3.9 gallons, so I was peeling along at about 33 miles per gallon. We ate with the notorious Bob T. and Palm Springs H-D Larry Petrie, over burning coals and eggs scrambled with chunks of cactus, rattlesnake, and tortillas. That's about the time Larry eyed Ray's rear tire.
“That tire is in bad shape,” Larry said. “Roll over to my place. I believe I have a replacement.”
So we followed the Chop N Grind team into the desert hills to Larry's home.
For several years, Larry attempted a desert performance shop in the sands of 7 Palms, but ultimately was forced to shut his doors and head to Palm Springs H-D, owned by a Hamster, for a regular job. Now, that job is fading as the economy hassles dealerships all across the country, especially locations in small tourist towns. Now, Larry has a completely equipped bike barn behind his house, including a tire-changing machine.
He went to work on Ray's rear wheel while we counted the tarantulas roaming through his sandy yard. No green shit there. Larry pulled Ray's rear tire laced with a line of cord showing throughout the entire circumference of the Metzler tire surface.
Ray was beginning to perk up. I remembered what Doc, from Australia said: “Some people have therapists; I have a motorcycle.” The open road has an aromatic effect on us adventure dogs, who need to escape the trapping norms of society from time to time. We rolled out of Yucca Valley with an ardent message from the Chop and Grind crew: “Gas up in 29 Palms. You can't trust the Amboy station.”
For the knowing riders of that desolate region surrounding the highly secret alien military base, that must be an accepted code. The gas station was packed with riders on late model Harleys at 29.9 miles, in 29 Palms. The weather was warming and we peeled off a layer before we rolled farther inland past some horrible chloride chemical gathering facility, next to bleak dry lakes and into the one gas station town in one of the oldest towns in California, Amboy.
This time, the station was open, but the girl out front selling Route 66 t-shirts didn't know how far anywhere was from her location in the Mojave Desert. We stopped for water. Amboy is also one of California's oldest towns, dating from 1858[4] and even has an unused, unrestored one-room schoolhouse dating from the 1900s. Its population rarely peaked over 700 after WWII (1945), usually not considered a place for permanent residence, but a rest stop for lost travelers. It's as bleak and the surface of the moon.
We didn't even grapple with the old gas pumps, but hit the road, along Route 66 toward Needles. We were given the hot shoe short cut, but it was a bullshit, slow, winding road along the Colorado River. At least it pulled us off the 40 freeway before we hit Needles, the truck stop town on the California- Arizona border. As we followed a small pack of bikes, I thought back to the times when nothing held me back. I passed anything in my way and held the throttle pegged to whatever destination lay ahead. Now, I hang back and ponder the world around me. I actually look out beyond the emergency lane for a view of the valley, the twisting river of water several states fight over, and thought about a girl I met in Bullhead City, for a wild weekend in paradise, between the sheets.
Laughlin, for years, had a wonderful distinction unlike any other bike run in the world–beautiful women. The girls scrambled to the desert Emerald City once a year from Los Angeles, Las Vegas, and beyond. The heat and blistering sun forced them to peel layers of clothes off until half-naked shimmering bodies slithered up and down the isles of vendors. It was a sexual nirvana on the Colorado River.
We rolled into town on fumes. The Chop N Grind guys were right. If we hadn't gassed up at the last Palm, and Amboy had been closed, we wouldn't have made it to the river on the Arizona Border. My King had never run better as we pulled off the road leading into Laughlin into a gas station and refueled. We covered 137.4 miles and I took 4 gallons, for 34 mpg. The 88-inch King had plenty of pull and torque and the True Track under the transmission dialed in my handling.
We rolled up to the Aquarius Casino and told security that we were checking in.
“Park over there,” she said in uniformed fashion and pointed at a parking lot 75 yards from the front door. “If you want to pay $199, you can park next to the front door, have your own spot and high security.”
I thought to myself, if this was an off-week, I could pull up to the front door free, a bellman would help with my gear and my room would cost one-fifth of the River Run rates. We passed on the special parking spot.
One-fifth, the term reminded me why I was there– Jack Daniels, good food, and pretty women. Which brings me to another 60-year old topic, since we're talking life and times. I've been so fortunate, through my life. I've never been addicted to shit, marijuana, cocaine or booze. Knock on wood. I've always been able to walk away. My evil weak spot was always the opposite sex, and it caused me more troubles than anything else, even motorcycles. On the other hand, I encountered five wives, another five or six long-term relationships, and innumerable encounters. All these smiling faces made for the best adventures of my life. Each woman represented a turning point or another episode in Bandit's outlaw existence.
So there's a couple of things to ponder here, and I'm not professing to be an expert or an excellent example of the facts, but maybe I'm a love-crazed mystic who can tell you now how I read my own tea-leaves. I remember watching a news program on cable about prostitution, which I'm in favor of legal sexual clinics. One of the gentlemen interviewed pointed out that some clinical study proved that we lose our chemical attraction to our partner in about five years. That hit a cord with me, since I was never with any woman more than five years.
So what the fuck is the righteous solution once the 5- Ball deadline is passed. I discovered it with my current squeeze of nine years, Nyla Olsen. I discovered that if your relationship is going to survive, you must replace the sexual element with something more, maybe deeper, like friendship and respect. So, what about the sex? The answer: Don't get married goddamnit, or have kids for at least 5 years. There's another life-saving rule for the Code of the West.
I'm concerned that it's not good news for us bastards who rank sex with heaven on earth, but if you follow the above code, you can move on without blowing up another life, or your own. Plus, the five-year notion supports legal prostitution and marriage. If a guy needs a fix, but doesn't want to destroy his family, he could get laid, pay the bill, and go home. Unfortunately, the women's movement forced the issue out of our hands. So, what happens? You fall in love (or lust) with your secretary, blow up your business, your family, and start over. The solution is easy, don't get married or have kids for 5-years.
Fortunately for me, my sexual urges faded after 58, and I didn't need to find a new chemical union. I also recognized that if I allowed myself to get intimate with a new squeeze, it might trigger that infatuation gene once more, and I would be out the door. This time I won't risk it. At this time in my life, I understand and respect the pitfalls. I won't roll those dice, again.
I can now ride down a street, see a broad so fine the enamel paint on my King begins to melt, and not find myself sucked off the saddle into her tempting arms. I'm lucky, once more, to have found nirvana and true love on the coast, and I'm not about to fuck with it. Not now. So, what the fuck? I thought I would spill my romantic guts to you, in hopes that it helps someday, when you're about to blow up your family for another woman.
We checked into our green rooms in the Emerald Castle, grabbed a drink, and began our vendor trek to see what mysteries might unfold in Laughlin. As it turned out, unlike the Smoke Out this coming weekend, Laughlin is predominately a new bike event. The vast majority of the bikes were modified late model Harleys, almost a HOG event.
We noted that the custom creation metal-flake factor meter was aimed at modified, chopped and channeled dressers. The Bagger Nation from Paul Yaffe was in full swing. Brian Klock was proud to see his components installed on several touring bikes. Sinister Choppers raked and installed wild 26-inch wheels on baggers, and Jim Nazi highlighted his stretched tanks, contoured seats, and slammed bags. These guys know how to turn a factory sled into touring style.
Thursday night we hit, the Aquarius Italian restaurant on the river for dinner with the Bikers Choice gang, Ray, and Joe Zanelli from the Primm State Line Casinos. Joe's a hot rod bike builder and he came to check how I was taking care of business with the Aquarius gang.
The dinner was fantastic, so we hit it again after vendor wandering on Friday for our first annual Bikernet Business Seminar with Hiway, Canada Marc and Ray from Brass Balls and W8Less Rotors. What a terrific time, but as I sat at the center bar in the Casino and had a final Jack on the rocks with Paul Yaffe, Brian Klock, and the guys who install Trask turbos on Harleys in Phoenix (we hope to bring you a tech in the near future), I could smell the desert air over the cigarette smoke. The road was calling.
Ray was scheduled to roll out to Strokers, Dallas, in Texas to pick up a Brass Balls Bobber and haul it to the Smoke Out. His son would drive the truck and he would act as the Indian guide on the hot rod Dyna. I felt my Laughlin mission was accomplished. I could blast back to Los Angeles, work on the 5- Ball Factory Racer for the run to Sturgis, and tune my Sturgis Shovelhead for the 10th anniversary of the notorious Smoke Out in Cottonwood Arizona.
The next morning, I packed the King and hit the road. This time, I cut due west out of Laughlin 25.5 miles to Highway 95, where I topped off and checked my hotshot digital oil gage. It blinked at me, then hollered–Low Oil. I yanked the dipstick and checked in manually. It was perfect, dead center of the plastic stick markings. I replaced the stick and hit the button, low oil.
So what was a poor boy to do? I could head out into the desert, maybe 150 miles from no-where and burn up my engine, or buy a quart of oil and top it off. I bought a quart, added just a half, and replaced the factory digital dipstick. What did the bastard tell me? Too much oil. Fuck it. Let's ride.
So what's next? First, there's the ride to Cottonwood for Smoke Out 10, then I'll finish the 5-Ball factory bike for the Badlands run, and next year, we're returning to Bonneville. Hang on. There are more adventures ahead.
