Brian: Robin Dean is on vacation. Uh, I hear he's, uh, roaming around the countryside in Colorado, commuting with the moose, uh, sleeping with bears, uh, sleeping outdoors, getting snowed on, all kinds of things. Um,

Travis: and so what do people do for fun in Colorado?

Brian: I don't know. They probably just watch TV, play some Xbox, you know, stuff like

Travis: that. The rich people like, the rich people like ski or they just like own timeshares in Aspen. Is that?

Brian: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I guess they do ski. So I don't know what there is to do on a motorcycle out there. I would have no idea. I'm sure, I'm sure there's a road or two that they've found

Travis: somehow. Yeah. There'll probably be some sort of article about it that you can find at The Rotting Obsession. TRO. Bike.

Brian: TRO. Bike. Thanks, Travis. I forgot all about the required obligatory branding. Your sport

Travis: touring motorbike

Brian: fix. That's right. And on this week's episode, we have no plan, which is usual. The only plan is no plan. Um, so how's your riding life been this week,

Travis: Travis? Uh, well, it's been good. So I think since the last time, uh, our listeners heard my. Delicious voice on their, uh, on their, on their podcast feed. Um, I, uh, turned 40 and I traded in my trusty burrita, the NC 700 X and got a 2020 CB 650 R with it's neo retro styling and street tuned super sport. Motor powertrain

Brian: spicy. Yeah, that's gonna be a little more, a lot more spicy. I imagine than the, uh, NC. Yeah.

Travis: Yeah. It's, um, you know, it's, I, I was test riding. I went, I was out by the dealership for work one day and I decided to pop in and test, um, a couple of bikes after work and, uh, they had an F J O nine. That's what I have. Um, which like on paper ticked all the boxes for me. Right. It's like a little more power had all the, had all the factory luggage on it. Um, you know, didn't have, so I don't, don't know if they had cruise control as an option on those, even though there was like a, clearly a slot for it, but I know the tracers do. Um, but like, I don't know, I just didn't, I wrote it and I was like, this is fine. And then I was like, you know, I kind of want to check that. See, he's like, yeah, you can take two bikes out. I was like, let me check that CB650 out. Cause they're pretty. Yes. Oh man. I just, I just couldn't stop grinning. Like I got back on it and I was just, I was just smiling and I'm like, you know what? I'm not gonna. I'm turning 40, I get to make a midlife crisis purchase. I'm going to make, buy the pretty one that goes raw and, and put the smile on my face instead of like the practical one. Cause I, I've always bought the practical one.

Brian: Yeah. Wow. So that, that I pulled it up to look at it and yeah, that is pretty. And yeah, yeah, it's a different mission than the FGA. You know, I've got an FGA 09 and it has a different mission. Yeah. It scratches a different itch.

Travis: Yeah. And since I got kids now, like I don't do as many like big trips. I had the NC set up with, you know, hand guards and a comfortable seat and all the luggage and, you know, I could just do days and days and days on it. Not that you can't do that on any motorcycle. Right. But it's like I commute to work and then get out for like, you know, once or twice a month on the back roads. Awesome. And this is way better for that. I went out with, uh, Mr. Tim Clark on, uh, Memorial Day. No. Yeah. Memorial Day. Labor Day.

Brian: Labor Day. Yes. That's been

Travis: a while. Uh, on Labor Day. And, um, you know, I had just a lot of the driftless roads here in Wisconsin that we're more or less used to. And I was like 15 miles an hour faster through like the roads I knew. Like I was like, I was like going through these corners and being on this new bike, new to me bike, and just being like. Well, man, I'm not really, you know, I guess I'm a little rusty, I'm on a new bike, I'm not really pushing it, you know, so that, and I look down, I'm like, I've never gone through this corner that fast. I guess this is fine.

Brian: Yeah, and it, does it, um, and you probably haven't, like, you haven't done any modifications or adjusted anything, you just went out and rode it, and you immediately just,

Travis: Yeah. Pretty much. Yeah. Since then, I did get like a, a seat on it, which is just like a Chinese, like off eBay, like I mean, came from China. Um, and it's got like a quilted pattern on it and it's a little flatter than the stock seat, uh, which is, which seems a little more comfortable. Um,

Brian: and that's 70, you got that seventies quilting, you know, yeah. Back in the eighties. That's what we had on the Goldwings.

Travis: Yeah. Um, I don't know if that makes a difference or not. We'll see when I actually can get. Do some miles on that seat, but it feels flatter. So it's like a little nicer to just kind of, you know, the old, the stock seat had that thing where it always wants you pinned up against the tank, you know, that slope where you can scoot back, but if you don't keep yourself back, you're going to be, um,

Brian: yeah, I think a lot of them have done, have started doing that. Um, A lot of bikes have that complaint and I think it's because I think a lot of times they're trying to make it work for people who are, they're trying to make it work in the showroom when people sit on it, who are kind of short.

Travis: Yeah. So you have to sit on

Brian: the short part. Yeah. So, you know, they sit up there and they're like, okay, I can do this. And I get that. I mean, I understand that because we do need more bikes for short people. Um, definitely, but it also, yeah, when you're actually, you know, after you actually buy the thing and you're taking it for a ride, you're like, wow, this I'm really up, I'm really up against this

Travis: here. Yeah, so it was, um, otherwise the talk to you, I mean, we did 450 miles and I haven't been running that much and like, my butt was a little sore, but it wasn't bad. So.

Brian: Excellent. Excellent. What kind of power those things, uh, those things have, I couldn't find it.

Travis: Um, so I think in like the European market where they actually have to like list power figures by law, uh, Honda is saying it makes like 90 at the crank, um, but all the dinos are about like 80, 82 at the tire. Yeah. That makes sense. But that's all like. In that like RPM, like it's, it's got that very inline sport for kind of thing, even though it's like the, you know, they bump the displacement up to 650 and they retuned it for more like low mid range. Um, you know, you really got to get it over six grand to, to feel like the power, but even then there's one road I do that's pretty close to Madison. And there's a couple of like really tight corners and then it comes around this big left, this like, this big left and then you go up like a really steep hill. And like you can maybe only do, you know, 35 miles an hour around that corner. And on the um, the NC I would always come around that corner and then just pin it and then it would just like, get up the hill. And it's like, now I'm on a bike where I can actually accelerate up the hill.

Brian: Yeah, I was gonna say that has to just. Plain old poop all over the NC's, uh, power. Um, yeah, yeah. And you're, you're spending more for gas for a

Travis: given distance. Like, like, like, yeah. Like the, on the NC, when I would beat the crap out of it, I would still get like 64. 65 miles to the gallon. I don't think I ever dipped into the fifties. Maybe if I was like stuck in traffic, I would dip into like the high fifties and I'm getting like high thirties.

Brian: Yeah, and who cares? It's fine. Yeah,

Travis: it's fine. It's a motorcycle. It's fun. It's worth it. Um, yeah, and it's got like, you know, a show a big piston separate function fork and Oh, okay. And it's like, Oh, this is nice, but it doesn't have what I do like about it. And I didn't even think about this and it might lead us into our topic. But one of the things I did like about the NC is that it was like feel injected. And that was it. Um, it didn't have any like technology in it. Uh, and, and the CB is like very similar where it's, you know, it's got like a nice fork, but it's like not adjustable. Um, and it does have ABS, which is probably for the best. And it does have like a very rudimentary traction control that just has one setting and it's like on or off. Um, and fuel injection. And that's it. It's like, that's perfect. Like, that's, that's all I want. Like, I don't need ride modes. Like, most of the time, like in the meat of the, the rev range, like it's making

Brian: Yeah, that's not going to get away from you too

Travis: much. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, and like ABS is as nice to have, I feel like I only ever feel it kick on on the rear end when I'm on the rear end too much,

Brian: but it's awesome. So our. Are you a Honda guy? Is that kind of, I, I seem to only remember Hondas, but I, you

Travis: know. I'm, I'm a Honda simp. Yeah. I started on a Rebel 250.

Brian: Um. Started with a mighty, mighty

Travis: Rebel. Okay. I mean, I did like a 900 mile trip. Like from Chicago up into Michigan, went back home, saw some friends. Wow. You know, had a bunch of luggage on the back. There's a picture somewhere. I mean, I'm, I'm like six foot one. Um, I'm sure it looked ridiculous, but, uh, yeah, you're right. Motorcycles. It's fun. Yeah. And I just stayed off the interstate as much as I could. Yeah. I took like Lakeshore drive, which is like highway 41 down like out of Chicago and then like through like Gary and then into like the, uh, Dunes National Lakeshore and then the red arrow highway up into Michigan. And it was really nice. Um, that's awesome. So that was, yeah. And then what did I get? Then I got my B M W, the F six 50 css, Ginny, the Jackhammer, um, I almost bought an nv. Yeah, an NV 700. The Veradero.

Brian: Oh, okay. Wow. What does like a one year model or something?

Travis: There we go. They sold them like two years. Like they're like a staple in Europe. Like, like every courier, bike courier has one in Europe. But like, yeah, they only sold them for like two years or three years in the United States. Yeah. They sold like four. So they had like a demo at uh, Des Plaines Honda. Because this is when I lived in Chicago. And I test rode it and liked it. Um, obviously like coming up off a rebel two 50, I was like, Oh, this thing's, you know, lots of fun. Um, but then, you know, I was like going to sleep on it. And then next morning it was gone. Yeah. And I ended up getting the Beamer. And then I had the CB 1000, the 94 CB 1000 big one also, and only sold for two years and the United States model.

Brian: Yeah, I, we, we have no taste here in this country and I could, I could rant for hours about that. But

Travis: anyway, yeah. So that, and then, uh, and then the, and then the NC, so mostly Hondas, you know, my wife started on a, um, Nighthawk 250. Excellent. Um, which is the bike I wanted to start on, like not the rebel, but I couldn't find one. Um. And then, uh, she had a Buell blast for a little while. Um, and then in Kawasaki, uh, ER6N's like at the Z650 before they called it the Z650. And the, uh, what else did we have? We're kicking around. Um, I had a DRZ for a little while. They're not exclusively Hondas, but I'm kind of a Honda

Brian: simp. Excellent. Excellent. Well, that, that kind of poops all over my week, which was basically writing the work and back. So I'm not even gonna, I'm not even gonna,

Travis: I mean, yeah, this, this week for me was. You know, basically just riding to work and back. Uh, but for

Brian: your recent news, that's, that's good. A new, a new bike is always, and brand new too. Like that's something

Travis: I still haven't done. It was used. It was a 20 years, but it only had like 1400 miles on it. Yeah. Who are

Brian: these people that buy bikes and then just let them sit? That's wild. Judging

Travis: by the scratches on the left engine cover, uh, someone who thought that a CB650R was a beginner bike. Uh

Brian: huh. I see. So got a, got a nice little, uh, got a nice, uh, discount for that. I would imagine, but that's cool. Thanks. Interesting. All right. Um, let's see, let's do, got a segment here called stuff. Our listeners might ask, and actually we've actually had a couple of questions from real live listeners lately. Um, There's one I want to bring up that's not a real question, but I think could be a good topic, but, uh, what, what is one of your more controversial opinions on motorcycling? Like what, what can start an argument? I don't want to, if we start an argument, Hey, great. Let's entertain people. But,

Travis: um, so this may be, I, I can kind of weave this into something maybe a little more controversial. So I always tell people, like I'm an advocate of, of motorcycling. I want people to ride motorcycles. Right. Um, But I'm also the first person to say it's not for everyone. Agreed. Um, so I, you know, I've seen people in the beginner writing course just like struggle and struggle and struggle and struggle. And it's like, you know, there's, there's something to be said for like persistence and um, effort. Uh, but it's also just one of those things where it's like, man, like, I think there's people that shouldn't drive cars that get allowed to drive cars. Um, you know, like it's, it's not safe. And, uh, you know, there's some people that just, you, whatever, don't have the physicality, don't have the mentality, can't, you know, focus enough. You don't have, you know, the mechanical sympathy necessary to operate a manual transmission vehicle that you need to balance at the same time. Um,

Brian: I'm, I'm with you, man. I, I, I, I, yeah, I've had that talk with someone. I'm not a writer coach, but I've, I've had that talk with someone like maybe, maybe knitting or video games might be more

Travis: or they are true. And it's like, I, you know, I always tell people like, well, you know. Take the class before you spend big money and buy a bike. Like I've talked to so many people who've like bought a bike and then it's like, I'm going to sign up for the class. And it's like, you know, you did that wrong. Like take the class. And if like you flunk out of the class, like you finish the class and you somehow pass, but you're still like, I don't know. Then it's like, yeah, maybe, maybe it's not for you. Or maybe, you know, get a scooter, kind of get a bigger feel for it. You know, for having a motorized two wheel conveyance. Well, get

Brian: that Rebel. Yeah, start, start on that rebel, you know, a couple thousand miles

Travis: on a rebel. Cause too, like I get all these, you know, these, I see these people who like start on a Sportster and it's like the Sportster is like the worst beginner motorcycle, you know what I mean? There's like, there's not really such a like, I think, you know, not to pigeonhole. Our, uh, our friendly hog brothers. Um, you know, the, the whole Harley Cruiser culture in America is like a whole nother thing. And there's a lot of bravado and bullshit there that we don't have time to unpack all of that. But, like, you know, people are like, oh yeah, get a sportster, it's a beginner bike. And it's like, no, those suck. Like, they... There are the sports or is an enthusiast's bike for someone who wants something that like shakes in the brake suck and the clutch is too heavy and they're like the clutch is super touchy and has no lean angle. Like they're not good bikes for beginners. Like you need to know what you're doing to ride that because you have to compensate for a lot of the bikes flaws, which are charming, which are a reason to ride the bike. Like a lot of us ride bikes because of the flaws in the bike, because that's character. Um, but you know, it's like, again, get a rebel, like get a rebel 500 or rebel 300.

Brian: Yeah, and see what you see what you think of. Yeah. And I, I mean, I don't, I don't see the controversy there, but I can see where people would get upset. Um, I, I always tell people that don't ride motorcycles unless you just got to ride motorcycles and. And I don't, I don't know if you know this, but I have, I've survived 3 serious injury accidents. I've broken my leg 3 times the same like, uh, wrist, you know, and, um, and I still ride and people ask me why and I just tell them I'm not really bright. So. But if, if, so I tell people, it's like this, you know, this is, this is not playing around and so sometimes people are a little shocked and I tell them, you know, unless you just got it, unless it's part of who you are, unless you really have that itch, unless you, unless there's an itch you have to scratch, then. You know, maybe, you know, if, if you're just going to casually do 300 miles a year, uh, and that's fine. If that's what you want to do and you really do enjoy yourself, but if you're just doing it, cause someone else wants you to, or you think it's cool, or you get to wear the t shirt or, you know, maybe think, maybe think about that a little bit. I don't know. Uh, I, I feel like I have to ride a lot to keep up the level. I feel comfortable at where I feel like, like if I were not on the bike for a week or a month or two months. It'd be

Travis: tough, you know, driving insane, like I at least need to do like ride to work, you know, like, even if I can't get out for a ride ride, like I at least need to be on the, on, on. You know, the 10, 15 minute ride to work, like, um, which I do, that's not, that is a nice thing about the CV. I'll chime back in. Is that like, you can rev that sucker out to red line, like 13, 000 RPM and second gear and not lose your license. And that's cool. It makes you, it makes it fun, you know?

Brian: Yeah, yeah, it's interesting when you get a new bike and we're, we're wandering around, but hey, that's fine. We're digressing here when you get a new bike. Like, when I, I bought a 2015, I bought it in early 2020, you know, with Matt or early 2021, actually, so it was still. COVID crap, you know, it's just COVID everything and we had to be real careful and everything anyway. Um, yeah, the first, the first month I was riding that thing, uh, every, I kept, I had to, I, it took me a while to recalibrate. I kept like the front end kept coming up, you know, first, second, third gear, you know, I'd passed 9, 000 RPM and third gear. Here comes the front end. So I had to write it and write it and write it to finally recalibrate to where I'm not yanking it open like I can on my KLR, you know, KLR, you can just go, you know, nothing's going to happen.

Travis: Yeah. It's like the NC was like that too. You can just, it would just full throttle all the time, every time.

Brian: Yeah, it's more like a switch. So you have to do that. Um, I'll, I'll go ahead and give a controversial opinion and I don't know if this is really controversial or not. That was, that was a great 1 to by the way. Uh, I think most people screw with their chain way, way, way too much. Stop screwing with it. Stop worrying about it. 1000 miles and go ride. Stop adjusting it every mile. 20 minutes, you know, that kind of thing, just put on a good chain, adjust it, adjust it once, keep put something on it once in a while. I don't care why we're not going to get into that controversy and you know, just stop. People just worry about it. You know, the same thing with tires, they worry and worry and worry. Do I have the, are they rubber tires? Good. Go.

Travis: I mean, do they suck? Then maybe buy better ones next time. Like pony up. Yeah, no, that's the, um, yeah, it's like, I don't check my tire pressure. Like if there's like a big, like I'm going on a trip, are you going to do like a big ride? You know, I'll check my tire pressure before I head out and I'm going to the office, I don't take my tire pressure. And like the only other time I do is if like. Oh, yesterday it was 72 and today it's supposed to be 56. Maybe have a look, yeah. Yeah, but yeah, yeah, it's the same thing with chains. It's like, yeah, it's there. It looks dirty. I'll clean it. I'll put some grease on it. Yeah. I want to go on a big ride. I want to do 500 miles today. I'll put, I'll clean it before I go, you

Brian: know, like. I'll take a look, but yeah, I, I usually don't adjust. I just a chain once and I usually don't adjust it. Like the first time I have to adjust it. That's when I order the next chain. Uh, because it's, if it's starting to go, then it's going to, it's on its way. Yeah. Um. Yeah. Some people are like, Oh, I had to stop and at lunch and adjust. No, you don't just go. Yeah. Just ignore it all week. It's fine. You do like, if you're dual sport riding, yada, yada, you do want to keep it a little cleaner if you can. But,

Travis: uh, yeah, you want to clean it. If you were like out in the mud, you want to clean it when you get home. Yeah. Yeah. If you're on the road, if you're on a paved road,

Brian: you're fine. Yeah. And if you're using a decent chain wax, I use the, the DuPont Jane wax. It's, you know, stuff's not really not going to stick to it. Even if you're, if you're riding into rain, you might want to, it's heavy. You might want to But yeah, most people think about it way too much. And, and, and it's one of those things, you know, change tires or there's, there's some, there's some things people just think about way too much and, and instead of thinking about the things they should.

Travis: So yeah, excellent. The, on that note, I'll tell a quick story about my friend, uh, Jeff AKA Don Coyote on the, uh, ADV rider forum who was riding a, uh, F650 BMW F650 Dakar. All through the winter here in Wisconsin, started tires and he had gear and he, uh, buzzed me up one night and he lived out 30, 40 minutes west of Madison on like the road, like you really like turned off a highway onto a side road, turned onto a more side road and then rode that till it ended in a valley in the hills and the driftless and then you walk down a path to a cabin and that's where he was living. So, um. So he, he called, phoned me up one day and he was in town like working or whatever. And he's like, Hey, my chain's making a weird noise. Can I stop by your garage and take a look at it before I drive like out to the sticks? Um, I was like, yeah, sure. So, so he comes in on his, on his, uh, BMW and he, uh, he popped me, I popped He's got a clip type master link so I pop the master link and it literally like just dissolves in my hand. Like the road salt had just like eaten like the bushings on the inside like it just cracked apart in my hand. Um, and I luckily I had the DRZ at the time which took the same size chain and we threw that in there and he got home just fine. Um, but uh, You know, don't, don't let it get that bad, but yeah,

Brian: yeah. If you're riding in road salt in fricking Wisconsin in the winter, first off your, you know, hats off you're, you're a better man than I am, but, uh, yeah, yeah, that is true. Yeah. Motorcycles don't have the corrosion protection that, uh, cars do. Uh, uh, they, they just don't, that's a little outside the label usage. Cool. Let's see, do we want to do a. We want to do a reheat rehash go, uh, I'll do the next segment of, uh, yeah, I think we'll go ahead and wrap up this article actually. Yeah. Do you want to go ahead and read the, do you, do you have it in front of you? The, the intro you want to read the excerpt of this, the intro and I will read the excerpt.

Travis: Uh, let me see if I was in the calendar. Where is it? It's in the, uh, Tiara weekly. Is that the one?

Brian: Yeah, and it's, uh, yeah, if you look under reheated rehash and it's, I don't know, about a little over halfway

Travis: down, uh, tasty leftovers served hot and crusty. Yeah.

Brian: Yeah. Just read that, read that intro and then I'll read the article and then we'll talk about it.

Travis: Read a rehash tasty leftovers served hot and crusty in this segment. We'll read an excerpt from one of Brian and Robin's past TRO blog articles on sport, touring motorcycles and discuss doesn't hold up. Do you. Brian and Robin disagree, fight, fight, fight. What will we

Brian: change? Thanks for the intro, Travis. All right. Uh, this week's riot, this week's reading is, uh, we're going to wrap up the, uh, 10 commandments of the sport touring to, to lead an insanely fun sport touring ride. There's an article written by yours truly Brian Ringer on TRO. bike. Um, and we're going to, we're going to blast through commandments nine, 10, and then we have a bonus at the end, a bonus commandment, which is going to. It's going to blow your mind. Take that Bible. We

Travis: got bonus commandments. That's

Brian: right. Yeah. It's like, you remember Moses coming down in the, in the movie with the 15 and then he drops it. The 10, 10 commandments. Anyway. Yeah. What's so special about 10? All right. Um, we are going to start with. Let's do it. Commandment 9. Thou shalt freely offer and encourage tap outs. This is a short one. As the route allows, make sure you mention possible shortcuts to the night's lodgings whenever possible. Maybe you're crossing an interstate, or you're just about to start a loop you could cut off. If a rider or the whole group decides to tap out, Applaud their wise decision, give them directions on a map, or maybe assign them the beer shopping list. We all hate to miss good riding, so when a rider decides they're done for the day, they have a damn good reason. Um, and I, I think this is an important, important one is to kind of make it okay to do your, it's part of riding your own ride. It's okay to ride your own ride. It's okay to tap out and say, you know, I'm shagged, I'm done for the day. Where's the hotel? And that's something I always try to keep in mind when I lead a ride.

Travis: Oh, yeah, for sure. Like maybe you caught a bug along the way, or, you know, you're just not feeling it or you had a butt clencher, you know, 10 miles back and you're just kind of ready. You know, that kind of took, took, took the wind out of your sails. Yeah.

Brian: Yeah. And there's, I mean, some of the, some of the absolute best writers I know are just like, okay, I'm done. I'm a tapping out, you know, and, and like, you know, where, where are we or. Whatever. And again, it goes back to the last. The last commandment was about keeping an eye on your block, your followers. And so you can tell when someone's kind of like, man, I'm kind of glazed over him, you know, or

Travis: Yeah. Or it's like, if they're like, you know, normally a pretty exuberant rider and they're really not. Yeah.

Brian: Where'd they go?

Travis: Yeah. And it's, you know, better they cut out and, and head to the end, then make people sit around for four hours while you wait for an ambulance. Right. Yeah, yeah,

Brian: yeah. That sucks. Yeah. There was 1 time a guy was like, uh, we were stopped. We're looking for a place to be, I think. And we start and he was, uh, he's like, man, I, you know, I know we got like 100 miles ago, but I is I'm like, turn around and behind him was a sign that said. You know, the city where we're staying 14 miles, like I was like, just go that way. You asked at the right time, dude. Enjoy. We'll see you later. All right. Uh, commandment 10 commandment, the 10th thou shalt keep thy flock informed. Some people want maps, GPX tracks, turn lists, and prefer to know exactly where they are and how far they're riding. Some prefer to bliss out and just enjoy the zen of the moment, trusting you to lead them wisely down twisty paths. Most are somewhere in between, so gauge what they want to know and adjust accordingly. After a few hours, most riders start wondering when and where lunch will be. And later in the day, most will want some idea when they'll reach the hotel. Um, I normally also carry a few copies of old fashioned paper maps. Uh, they're handy for giving directions if someone needs to tap out. And showing a map sometimes is also a good way to make riders more comfortable with where we are and where we're going. It's best if every rider has at least a paper state map and some basic ability to get back to the barn. Great riding often means poor cell coverage, so don't count on your phone to navigate. But yeah, there, there are people I ride with, uh, and Robin's often want, Robin is kind of somewhere in the middle. Like sometimes he just wants to bliss out. Oh yeah. And then sometimes he's like, okay, where are we going? We're going, here's the track, whatever, and so forth. You know, he's, he does, he does, he rides both sides of that. And there are people I know who just, Hey, we're right. I don't care, man. Uh, just wherever, man, I'm happy, you know, they're just, you

Travis: know, where we're going on and that's good enough for me. Yeah, I don't care. Yeah. Not everyone's got their own style. I know like Robin likes to run the like turn by turn in his headset and stuff like that. Yeah, that would make me crazy. And yeah, no, I just, I want, I, I have a line on a map and that's, and that's it, you know, that's enough.

Brian: All right. We're going to wrap up with the bonus commandment 11. Bonus commandment 11. Lawyers gotta eat. What in the world does that mean? Lawyers gotta eat. So here's a handy rapid roll writing pro tip. Time for lunch and you're in the middle of nowhere, scan the horizon for the largest water tower. Nearby you'll find a town, often the county seat. At the center of that town will be the town square and the county courthouse. So you're with me so far. And then across from the county courthouse will be at least one excellent local restaurant that has been catering to the legal profession for many years. I guarantee you every County seat has a courthouse as a restaurant. It's full of lawyers. So that's your, that's your commandment 11. So

Travis: it was time for lunch. Simple fashion space chicken. Yeah.

Brian: Space chicken. All right. We'll do another article next time. All right. Well, Travis, do you have a tale from planet that guy? You probably have some that I've never heard.

Travis: Oh,

Brian: um, tales from planet that guy. We've all been that guy. We've all ridden with that guy. Let's talk about that

Travis: guy. Do we want a, someone else was that guy or do we want him? I was that guy. I've, I've only, I've not been that guy very often.

Brian: Um, it's, it's dealer's choice, man.

Travis: Uh, I feel like, you know, with Robin not here to defend himself, it's hard to throw him under the bus. No,

Brian: no, no. He's, he's out. He's out farting around, uh, sleeping with

Travis: bears. I mean, it's the common, you know, it's the same old one. I think I'm like the trip seven store. He's run out of tire at least three times. Um, but that's not much of a story. I think we talked about that all the time. Like if you're going to go do 1500, 2000 miles. Just put new tires on your bike, do it before you leave, like you can always put the old ones back on after the new ones wear out, but you don't want to be the guy who does it in the middle of the trip who misses a whole day of riding because you got to be aligned to some city to get to pay some stealer ship, 600 to put tires on your bike. Um, otherwise, the only time I can think of myself kind of being that guy, again, it was Trip7's tour. We had rolled into Maysville, uh, Robin and I were getting gas before we got to the hotel, and, you know, it had been a long ride, and, um, I was filling up my tank, and usually, I was on the NC, and usually, like, I could put the, the, the filler, like, all the way in the tank, and just hold it down, and it would click off like a car does. And then I would like, you know, pull it out and kind of top it up. Right. Well, you know, I was like chatting with Robin. I was kind of tired. Wasn't paying attention. It didn't do that. And I just like dumped gas all over the bike, all over my riding pants, like soaked through gasoline. And, um, and those are like my only like riding pants, right. Cause I got on a trip. So like for the next eight days, I just reeked of it. Like I tried to wash them. Like it didn't work. Like you get gas and clothes like that. And like, Yeah, it just, it just, I just reeked like gas the whole trip, so always, always watch your tank when you're filling it.

Brian: Yeah, that might have impacted your future fertility too, man. That's a rough one. Good thing I'm done. Yeah. I already got kids. I'm going to, I'm going to talk about that guy. And this has been a couple of that guys, to be honest, uh, that guy who. Left on a trip with a dying battery and just used a jump pack over and over and over until the jump pack died. And that's happened a couple of times.

Travis: Are these like dual sport guys? That sounds like a dual sport guy thing. No,

Brian: no, no, this, this one guy is, uh, yeah, one guy was Robin and the other guy was another, that guy, you know, on street bikes. And it's just like, come on, you know, if you're, if you got to use the jump pack once just. You gotta bite the bullet, save your pennies, go get a battery, And so

Travis: yeah, I mean it's, it happens

Brian: twice in the same

Travis: year. It was the worst. You get like a $10 core fee back, so there you go. It's like a 10% discount. You just get a cheap battery, they're like a hundred bucks. It'll get you to the trip.

Brian: Yeah. Yeah. And on, uh, on Robin's bike, we actually, we found at O'Reilly, a, uh, like the BMW comes with like a tiny battery and a foam spacer. And so you can, or plastic spacer. And so you can take out the tiny battery and the plastic spacer, and you can get in like a real battery. And it's like almost frightening how fast it spins the bike.

Travis: So it's like twice the cold cranking. Yeah.

Brian: Yeah. And, uh, And yeah, instead of, you know, instead of fumbling around with a jump pack, repeat, you know, Oh, it'll, it'll be all right. The rest of the day. It's like, let's just, you know, let's, let's eliminate this worry from our

Travis: minds. Yeah. It's like if you, if you keep it on a tender, like you should, and it starts getting weird, it's, it's done. Like that's what happened to my, the battery on the NC is, it was like the original battery had been in there for like five or six years and you never had any trouble with it. I always kept on a tender, never had any trouble with it. And then it just started acting funny, getting weird, electrical glitches, the dashboard got weird. And I was like, what is going on? And it was like, Oh no, the battery is just toast. Like it just doesn't hold. The battery tender says it's charged, but it's not charged.

Brian: Yeah, yeah, I mean, their batteries are consumables. They're not heirlooms, you know, just let it go. Let it go, you know. Yep.

Travis: Get a new one.

Brian: All right. Well, I say we, I say we talk about, uh, we, we put it down here as Travitron's tech takedown, but, uh. Let's, uh, let's, let's, let's talk about some different technologies. I wrote down a bunch of ideas. Maybe you've got some other ideas too. Yeah. And we did some of this, uh, last time, uh, we talked. So, all

Travis: right. Yeah, no, that one, like I've talked about a little bit with the, uh, you know, I, how much I enjoy the simplicity of the, the CB and the NC. Okay. Um. All right.

Brian: You want to read the intro or you want me to go ahead, man? It's your, it's

Travis: your, it's your take down. What's the motorcycle tech we can't live without. What's a great idea with poor execution. What's just a bad idea all around. What's a great idea that no one is producing yet or taking full advantage of. We got a little list of check items that we can discuss. So, when you say LCD or do you mean like the, what do they call it, uh, the color screens? There's a word for that that they keep. Uh, the TFT

Brian: is what they usually say. Yeah. Yeah, I, just LCD screens in general is what I had in mind. Uh, basically the whole. You know, the old school was the, you know, the two round instruments, you know, you got your speedo, you got your tack and you may have a few lights in them and so forth. And that seems to have just been thrown out the window in favor of putting a screen on the bike. Of some sort. Yeah. And I think there are, I think there are some that are doing it right and some that are doing it wrong. It's kind of where I land on it.

Travis: Yeah, I mean, it's funny too because there's still a couple like the Kawasaki RS models have like real analog gauges. And

Brian: they're probably just electronics underneath. Oh yeah, it's

Travis: all electronics underneath. There's no like cables driving that stuff. They're just faking it, yeah. Which is for the best anyway, because like those cable drives are always wonky. Yeah. Um, there's a cable drive on my moped. And I can bury it, like, so it goes up to like 40 and then it stops. I took the speed regulator off and so if I'm on a downhill I can just bury it like way past 40 and I'm only doing like 35. Um, you know, like the little magnet inducing, it just doesn't. Um, I mean the, so the, the, the CB has like the reverse LCD. So it's just like the black and white, like liquid crystal display. It's not like a color display, but it's like where it's mostly black. And then the, the, the information is white. That's like the reverse style. Yeah. Uh, and that's really, I really like it. Um, the NC had just like a regular kind of like your, did you have a KLR with the digital display or is this just a new one that has that? That's the

Brian: new one. Yeah. I've got the, I've got the first gen. Yeah.

Travis: Um, and again, too, it's like that, that one was pretty good. Like it had everything on there. You need it. They had a clock and your odometer and a tachometer that was easy enough to read. Um, there was, so the ER6N, we had like a 2009 ER6N and I think like the ninjas and the other Z bikes of that like era had this where they just like did it backwards where it had an analog speedometer and a digital tachometer.

Brian: Yeah. Yeah. There, there's some bizarre combinations going on.

Travis: Yeah. And it's like, no, like the, the sweeping of the revs should be a needle. And then I just, there's numbers for the speed, like that's how it should be like. Yeah.

Brian: Yeah. I think I, and then I think there's, I mean, there's, there's some of the LCDs that are done better or worse. One of the, one of the kind of the buried issues that I think is, I think it's really kind of almost malpractice, but one of the buried issues here is that a lot of bikes, the. The screen unit is where the odometer lives. So basically if you have to replace that, then you have an issue. You know, you have, you have a potential issue. Yeah. Um, and then some, and, and also the, in general, and especially with newer vehicles, uh, sometimes the parts and, and sometimes some of the parts are VIN coated or they're hard coded to the E C U, and that's, I think that's kind of a problem too, because. 20 years from now, you know, when I, you know, 20 years from now, the LCD fails on my F J O nine, I find one on whatever's left of eBay in 20 years. Um, am I going to have a problem plugging it in? You know, is it going to, is it going to just plug in and work and the mileage is going to be wrong? Or is it been coded? I don't know. Yeah. You know, so that's. That's, that's, and that opacity of the knowledge of what's going on in there is, is kind of an issue too. Oh yeah.

Travis: There's a lot of, you know, right to repair kind of stuff concerns. Yeah. And I feel like a lot of this, the screen, like, um, what did I look at the other day? I didn't test ride it. Oh, the, um, the FTR, the Indian FTR. And like, I think if you get like the premium one, you get like a six inch or seven inch, like square screen. Right. But on the like base one, you get like a little four inch circle screen. And it's like, what am I just, just put gauges there. Like just put a speedometer in a, like a little tachometer line. That's all we need. Like, why is this a screen? This shouldn't be a screen.

Brian: Yeah. Sometimes. And I think. I think it's getting to the point where screens are just cheaper as, as part

Travis: of it too. Oh yeah, for sure. Definitely. Then like a mechanical gauge. Now, what one thing is anything wrong with LCDs if they're, if you do it, right? Yeah. Yeah.

Brian: Like one, one bike, I think is doing it right. Is the, uh, is the Yamaha Tenera seven.

Travis: Let's say like the vertical

Brian: screen, right? Yeah. It's got like a vertical screen. It's really basic. It's black and white big numbers. Like you can. You can see what's going on at a glance as you're, you know, going a hundred miles an hour through the woods or whatever they put in the commercials. And when you're doing what you're supposed to be doing on this dual sport bike, um, that one is kind of, I like that one because it's just almost brutally simple and it's a big, easy to read display. It's kind of oriented and it's kind of out of the way. So no matter how much you fall off, it should. Be okay, as far as whether it's been coded or anything like that, I

Travis: don't know, but I mean, probably not, they might have the odometer in it or maybe I don't know why I just had that problem with my Toyota car where I have to, I have to replace the gauge cluster for. It's a whole thing. Um, and I've got one on eBay, but it is like, you know, 10, 000 miles ahead. And it's like, well, I could ship this to a guy in Colorado who can like reprogram it. Or I can just wait 10, 000 miles and then swap it. And that's what I'm going to do. Cause otherwise like the interior dimmer doesn't work. Oh, that's like, I'm just living with it. But yeah, it's like, why is it, why is this not just in the ECU so you can replace the part? Yeah.

Brian: Yeah. And there, there are a couple of things we got on this list, I think are almost. Like, admit it, you know, they're, they're all good, other than... Perhaps the expense, like for example, ABS, I, I really, if it's an off road bike, I think it does need to be switchable ABS,

Travis: um, I mean, at least on the rear, but probably all around or have an

Brian: option. Yeah. I have an option to do that. Uh,

Travis: even if it's like a vaguely off road bike, like a V

Brian: Strom. Yeah. Yeah. It'd be nice to be able to shut it off. Um, Uh, but like on a street bike, I mean, that's why I finally bought a newer street bike after all those years of writing old stuff, uh, traction control. I didn't think I would like that. Um, and then I experienced, you know, I've played around with it some and I've actually, you know, I've put it to use on the F J O nine and it's actually pretty. Like, wow, this is, this really works. This really works well.

Travis: Like, oh, that's slick. Or you didn't, there's, you know, there was a shady corner that was still damp and he didn't, um, uh, on the other hand of that, though, I think sometimes they put it on bikes. I don't need it. You know, like if the bikes make in 50, 60, even 70 horsepower, it's like, or you don't at least need like modes. You just, you can have it on or off. Like the CB does, though I think the switch on the CB is, is an annoying place. It's like, you know, where like your, your, your high beam flasher usually is on the trigger on the left hand. That's what the switch for the traction control is.

Brian: Okay, that's very strange.

Travis: Yeah, it's like, it's too easy to turn off on accident. Yeah, I think there's... On like a street bike.

Brian: Yeah, yeah, because, yeah, that's true. Nobody can get their, nobody can get their poop in a group about where they put controls other than like, even turn signals vary way too much. Anyway, if you're hopping around, um, and there's, there's some others that are really, like, I think have been pretty much to the good, like AGM batteries. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, who the hell wants a puke tube battery anymore? I mean, the old wet cell.

Travis: No. Yeah. Why would you even, I don't, I mean, on my, I'll get on the CB. The battery goes in sideways. Like it goes down on its back. Like you couldn't even put a liquid battery in there.

Brian: Yeah. And you know, I've talked about this before. Tires are ridiculously good compared to what we had in this eighties and nineties and so forth. Yeah. Stuff is good. Yeah. Yeah. Even, you know, even the cheap stuff's fine. Uh, chains are amazing. You know, X ring chains are ridiculous and how long they'll last. Yeah. Um, so some of these things are like, just that that's, it's just going to be good no matter what. Yeah. Fuel injection,

Travis: like fuel injection. Yeah. It's it's, it's so such an old technology at this point. Like it's, it's always going to be good. Right.

Brian: Yeah. Well, it should be. Yeah. Um, and something associated with that, though, is is something I'm less sold on is a throttle by wire, or I think I think on bikes with throttle by wire, like the F. G. O. nine is it's a twenty fifteen, but it was an earlier one that had throttle by wire and. Um, they're not making the most of it. Um, you have to have it retuned in order to get decent throttle response, you know, especially down low, which, so Yamaha kind of mess that up from the factory. And the other problem is, I think you mentioned this earlier when you test wrote an FTO nine, there's a switch pod with three blank switches in there where they took out the cruise control. So they have cruise control on the super tenera and on the, uh, FJR, but they took it out of the FTO nine. And, you know, with Throttle by Wire, all you need is a little programming and a few switches, you know, you need software.

Travis: Yeah, like any, any bike, whether it's like a 300 or a 1200 Super Adventure Tourer, with Throttle by Wire, it should just come with cruise control.

Brian: Yeah, I mean, you know, new, new law when I'm king, you know, that, yeah, so it's one of those things that is a potentially wonderful technology, but it is implemented not. It wasn't quite there at least. And now I think in later bikes, you know, it's getting there. And I think, I think in the last several years, most of the manufacturers have kind of gotten throttle response figured out. Um, yeah. You know, up to 2015, 2017, 2018, you were getting some bikes that were really pretty crappy. Like light

Travis: switchy on the end of the on off, you know? Yeah.

Brian: But they're getting that figured out. I think, um, like for example, stuff like, um, like on some bikes, like on my V, like on my, when I used to have a Vstrom, when you hit the rev limiter on that, it's like. Pitting a brick wall. I mean, it's a,

Travis: it's a very rude event. Just like ease you into that red line. Right. Take the last 500 like really start. Yeah.

Brian: Yeah. Like if you hit the, yeah, if you hit the red line on a V Strom, it's like hitting a brick wall, it's a very rude and the B that's because they don't have throttle by wire. So the only tools they have are, uh, interrupting spark and I mean, it'll. Yeah.

Travis: It's like you close the throttle all of a sudden while you're. Yeah. Yeah, it's at the peak of acceleration, .

Brian: Yeah. And on and on a throttle by wire bike. It can be management source smoothly. And really, I've been really impressed. It's, it's a, you know, it's a, it's a, it's a fairly primitive on or off traction control, but I've been pretty impressed by how well it works. You know, I really haven't, I mean, you don't go out on someone else's bike and experiment with the traction control. So , I had to buy a bike in order to experiment with traction control, but I, I didn't think I would be, but I'm a fan of that. Um,

Travis: Uh, what was got electronic suspension? I'm not sold on. No, I mean, unless you're like GP racing where you need it to like adjust itself. Like, oh, this is a bumpy section of the track and adjust itself like, like you know what you're doing, right? Like, oh, just like turn, like adjust the suspension. Sure. Like turn, adjust the compression, rebound damping. Maybe you're not doing some more bumpy stuff or you got a passenger, you got more luggage or something. But yeah, I

Brian: think.

Travis: The need to press a button and have it change itself or change itself on the fly for road use seems unnecessary. Uh,

Brian: yeah, when I, when I see electronic, the words electronic ignition, what, what I hear is expensive and prone to breakage. However, the one use of this, I have seen that really. Does make sense, although it is expensive is on the Harley Davidson, Pan America, where they actually have an option where the bike, when it comes to a stop, it'll automatically lower itself a little bit. Yeah. And it'll kind of adjust itself for off road or on road and stuff like that. And it actually. Like it's one that actually works by all accounts. I haven't written one of these. I'd like to, I'd like to beat the hell out of it. Give me a call, Harley. T I rode a bike. Um, but by all accounts, like they're, it, it is expensive technology and I hope it's not delicate or anything like that, but they're at least they're, they're putting it to use to do some useful things for a street and off road rider. And that's, but most of them, you know, have electronic suspension. It's not. You know, where, where's the benefit for the expense?

Travis: I mean, I guess like, you know, on like a gold wing or whatever, if it's like a solo rider, passenger, luggage, you know, got to tear a bunch of plastic off to get to the thing to, to manually adjust it, you know?

Brian: Yeah. But why not, you know, why, what's wrong with the old hydraulic preload adjuster, where you just. You know, twirl a dial, you know, give a

Travis: couple of cranks. Yeah.

Brian: Yeah. But yeah. And Nick, it's, sometimes it's a little gimmicky, you know, and like there are a number of BMWs that have all kinds of electronics on the suspension. And it's, I don't know, a little suspect there.

Travis: It's like, just build a good suspension. It seems like there's some, some bikes out there that just have like good suspension. That's not all that adjustable. That just works really good. No matter what you do with it, you can. Engineer this, yeah,

Brian: you can get it working and so forth. Yeah. And I think another one that's kind of an unmitigated good is, um, uh, heated grips. Oh, uh, it's not even technology, you know, it's a hot wire in a circle, but why don't more bikes come FGA and I, I didn't, I didn't even know this before I bought it, but it came with heated grips

Travis: that they're just, yeah, it's like, but you have to go to like the menu. There's not like a physical switch. It's like in the menu, right? Well,

Brian: no, you have to, you have to pull one. There's, there's one button on the left handlebar. That's all it does is it switches your display from heated grips to back to normal. So you switch your, that, and then you have

Travis: other things if you're in like a sub menu and you're not moving, but I think when you were driving, yeah, it's just your heated grip switch.

Brian: Yeah. It's the weirdest. Anyway, that's not even technology, but come on, you know, more bikes need heated grips from the factory, I think.

Travis: Now the CB and the NC could get like, you could, you could. It's get the official Honda accessory heated grips, which are like 300. Yeah. Um, but they do nicely integrate the control into the grip. So like the, like the inside part of the grip has like a little switch on it. Like where the, where the grip flares out, you know? Um, that's like where the controls are. So I guess that's where your money goes. Yeah, yeah. But they, they, they wire in, they come with an accessory harness, like the fuse box has a slot for a relay and a fuse that go to a pigtail that isn't connected to anything that connects to the heated grip unit. Like they built it in there, but you still have to buy it.

Brian: Yeah, some of the value engineering can be a little odd.

Travis: It's like, How much is that saving you at the factory? Just like put an extra hundred bucks on the, um, the bike MSRP and include it.

Brian: Yeah. I, yeah, I, I consider heated grips mandatory. I mean, I put them on all my bikes if they don't have it already. And it's. It's just, I think it's a writer safety thing. I mean, even if you're a fair weather writer, you're going to get caught out when it's 60 degrees or, you know, 60 degrees and you have, you know, you know, mesh gloves, you, you, you should, you have heated grips. So you can, you know, I think it's, I think it's a safety item, but you know, eh, whatever. All right. Did you want to go through anything else on this list or save some for later?

Travis: Uh, I mean, we can save some, yeah. Some of this stuff too is just like, well, you know what, since I got the moment, I do want to talk about Bluetooth.

Brian: Let's talk about Bluetooth. Let's talk about Bluetooth, Travis. Take it down. Tell us how it sucks. No, it all sucks.

Travis: Like why am I strapping this battery and all this crap on my helmet? Right? Like someone, and I mean, if anyone's out there listening, wants to go in on this and has the means and the knowledge to like get stuff built in China and marketed, like they just need to make a box that you put on your bike and you hook up to your battery and then you're like, you run a little antenna out to like the tail light and then you run a little wire up to your handlebars with the controller. And it's a, it's a Bluetooth communication unit. Like it does everything that like a Sena or a Cardo or a Euclid or whatever does. It's just, it's, it's, it runs off your bike battery. So you don't have to plug it in at the end of every ride and charge it. And it doesn't attach to your helmet. And you don't get this big thing on the side of your helmet, making wind noise and probably invalidating all the safety features of your helmet. And then, yeah, and then you just like, it has like one wire that comes up and you do like earbuds or like the in. Helmet speakers and a microphone and just, you know, it's all there and it's like one little connector or you, you can even do like, Oh, the, the headset and the microphone are like wireless, but they don't need the transmitter. They don't need the controls, they don't need as big of a battery, so you put those on your helmet and they're all on the inside and then they just pair with the unit that's in the bike that doesn't need recharging and then you control it like off your handlebars. Like, why doesn't that, that exists? I don't understand.

Brian: Somebody built this. Yeah. Right. And on a related note, I think building Bluetooth into the bike from the factory is a problem because it's going to be obsolete. Like whatever version of Bluetooth that is, is going to be obsolete in five years, you know? Yeah. So I, I, there's some bikes I've seen that have that, you know, like where you can connect, you know, oh, it's got my app where I can see how many miles I've ridden and, you know, how many, how many times I've stopped to pee and, and, um, yeah, who's going to maintain that app at the manufacturer? Nobody, we'd be able

Travis: to get a new little box that. Yeah, it's updated with Bluetooth five or whatever growing up.

Brian: Yeah. So I have seen some features of Bluetooth come from the factory and I'm like, that's a little scary. Now to add on box, like you're talking about, that sounds like a great idea. That way you can, you know, use it as long as you can. And then. You know, something does change, or you can move it to another bike, or you could, you know, get the updated version for Bluetooth 12, whenever that comes out, that kind of thing. Yeah,

Travis: exactly. Like, and I mean, again, like, I just don't want a big thing on my helmet and I hate, like, here's another thing I have to recharge at the end of the day. Like, why not just like put this thing on the bike? It seems like it belongs there.

Brian: Yeah, that, that's a, yeah, that's a good, yeah, it's kind of the whole, how are you going to power all this stuff? You know, we're, we're still, I think we're still in early days and all this battery technology. And so there's all this, you know, some stuff, oh, this lasts, like let's last for a week. And then some stuff lasts two hours, you know, it's just, we're still figuring it out. I think,

Travis: yeah, and it's like. This isn't a thing that you have a giant generator between your legs. Yeah. Why are you running something off a puny battery that has to like, sit on your head?

Brian: Well, there's an excerpt. You have a giant generator between your legs. Excellent. Excellent. Some good stuff there. I think we're, I think, got anything else you want to talk about? Anything stuck in your craw today, Travis?

Travis: No, I don't think so. Other than, uh. You know, the usual stuff, you know, turns out three year olds can be really annoying sometimes. Um, I love them. Nobody told you this, huh? Right? I love them, but sometimes, sometimes, um, Well,

Brian: that's our episode for this round. Tune in next time for more discussion and all things specific to sport touring or universal to motorcycling as a whole. For Radio TRO, I'm Brian Ringer.

Travis: And I'm Robin Travis Berleson.

Brian: Safe travels, everyone.