All right asshole, I’ll get you for this . . . mild winter, my ass. It was damn cold in Cincinnati. I don’t know how you ever talked me into going to the V-Twin Expo. Oh yeah, you said something about me getting to visit my Mom while I was on that side of the country. Well it was cold at Mom’s house also, even had a lot of that wet, white stuff that falls from the sky and covers everything. I think the movies call it “snow”. Well, there was more than enough of it to go around. Did I mention that it was damn cold?
I flew into Baltimore, Maryland, and then drove up to Cinnci with Larry and Don from MF Motorsports, We were motoring along somewhere south of Columbus when I happened to glance at the thermometer on the ceiling consol of the truck to discover the outside temperature was 3 degrees, that’s just not right.
As we swung south on I71 headed for Cinnci, I watched that same thermometer slid all the way south to a –9 reading. Nothing can survive in that freeze. They had to pull me out of the truck at the hotel.
I told Larry, “This is a diesel, leave it run all night. I’ll sleep here.” As luck would have it, I didn’t die as they drug me screaming into the warmth of the hotel lobby.
The next morning, Saturday, the first day of the show it was –7 outside. Fortunately, the hotels and convention center are connected with enclosed walkways. It reminded me of those rat mazes. Rats look for food, we were looking for heat. So, after negotiating this carpeted labyrinth in and out of these hotels and galleries we were faced with the big one. The last 50 or 60 feet of the forced march to the convention center was outside, I mean with no roof overhead or carpet underfoot. There was even ice on the walkway. I froze, literally. If it weren’t for the throngs of people coming up quickly behind me forcing me over the frozen precipice, I'd still be stuck in the doorway.
Once thawed and inside the show, I scoured the isles for the best, newest or most innovative products for 2004. Here's what I stumbled on:
Chopper frames, rigid or softail style were sprouting out of damn near every booth.
The Chopper Guys booth towards the back of the building was showing off their new chopper frames constructed to handle the new crop of big tires.
Sharing the booth with Chopper Guys was Efrem from Kustom Kulture showing of a new model of complete bike from his South San Francisco shop. The new model is bobber style, with the same high quality fit and finish as his retro bikes that use all late model H-D components.
I waved at the Zipper’s Performance Products booth, where we could see their new ECM for late model EFI models, we just couldn’t reach it.
Buzz from Cycle Shack was showing off new pipes and mufflers for the new 2004 rubber mount Sportster and nearby was Perse Performance with a wild set of new rocker boxes for the twin cam engine.
We noticed an in ornate amount of bikes from the Klock Werks shop out of Mitchell, South Dakota. We saw Brian Klock in the bar later that night and he told us he brought six or seven bikes down to the show for a number of different vendors.
One of the real attention getters in the show was the huge 150 plus cubic inch engine over in the R&R Cycle booth.
Not far away was Keith Terry of Terry Components spreading the word on his new fuel injection management system.
Following the carpeted path we found ourselves in front of the Barnett Engineering booth where we exchanged words with Pat Dunn before we moved a couple isles over to the Chrome Hardware Supply booth and checked out all the new sparkling nuts, bolts and washers with the help of Taylor Anderson.
At the Revenge Cycle booth we saw Rick Doss, Nace Panzica and Bob Deiss, Bo showed us their new display of LED bulbs for direct bolt-on for stock bikes, he also showed these slick new slip over pads for the front wheel clamp on table lifts to prevent scaring the chrome on the wheels rim.
At the S&S booth, they were handing out their new catalog on DVDs, on the table they were showing a new tool designed to accurately measure the intake runner on you engine, we’ll have something on this subject in the future.
After two days of wandering up and down the isles looking at new motorcycle parts led to sensory overload, luckily we brought back close to 40 pounds of catalogs and brochures, for further study.
So there Mr. Bandit, I hope you stayed warm and cozy in your ocean front shack. I hope it snows on you, when you least expect it.
