Speaker 3: Opening banner, corrections and website updates. Robin, was there a correction, a misstatement maybe? Just an honest mistake? For like 10 years.

Speaker 4: I've been getting this wrong for 10 years, since the podcast even began. Derp, my mention, regular mention of the Honda CB500T being banned from racing, that doesn't go with the 500T. Now, this is again, one of our other new segments, Jordan Liebman. He was the one that's been texting me with all kinds of history. I'm like, we're not even recording. He's just texting me all this stuff. It wasn't the 500T. It was its predecessor, the Honda CB450KO, known as the Black Bomber. The technology in that bike was straight from Honda's racing super bikes, including the RC166. It had torsion bar valve springs, constant velocity carburetors, which was completely unheard of at the time, double overhead cams, and probably a few other features that made the governing body of racing in Europe at the time. They were like, no fucking way. That was the FIM, or Federation Internationale Motorcyclisme. Sounds dirty. Back in 1965, they rolled this soon-to-be mass-produced bike into stock racing and they said, no, and then they produced a whole batch of them and they sold great. Also, I forbid, this is weird. Buell's Super Tourer. Buellmotorcycle.com forward slash super hyphen touring. Got it. It's new. It's weird. It's obscure. But they announced it and have been announcing it for years. So it seems almost like this regular return to the April Fool's prank. They're never going to release it. Or you kind of ask them for pricing with a pre-order request. So we're going to get deep with it and explore the whole situation with this bike. It's a good looking machine. It's the first time I've personally ever seen top-loading saddlebags that look sporty on that machine. Nice. I don't know. It's a strange thing. It's a beautiful sport bike. You take it off, it's definitely sport. They got a little bit over the top with the trellis tail section. But all in all, it's like, are they going to release it? Is it $11,000? Is it $50,000? What's the deal? They also are still going with the reverse brake system with the reverse rotor, which is kind of designed to help with the cooling and such. But yeah, whatever. Good enough.

Speaker 3: Call up your buddy, Eric. Ask him what the hell, because Buell Motorcycle has a website with motorcycles on it. Yeah. Quadrant Motors. I'm doing it now. I'm muting my mic. You talk. I'm emailing him right now. How many questions a week, Robin, from listeners? Dozens, hundreds, thousands, one or two. Anyway, we can promise that you'll get an answer. It may not be the answer. I don't know. But anyway, if you'd like us to field your questions, email podcast at tro.bike. We have a couple here. I spotted in the wild. Here's a quick one. I'm looking at a bike that has a lost key and no title. Does this mean it's stolen 100% of the time? Yes. Next question. Don't buy that bike. I mean, someone traded it for math or something. Track bike? I don't know. I mean, you know.

Speaker 1: That's fair. What could be salvaged?

Speaker 3: You could get some parts, but make sure if you're a new rider, no, don't buy that kind of crap. You don't need to deal with title issues.

Speaker 1: Yeah. I guess only a track bike would be the only reason that might be okay. If it was a track bike and you know.

Speaker 3: And only if you're in a different neighborhood and you're never going to see the person and like they don't know where you live. Yeah. Somebody traded that for crack, you know.

Speaker 4: There's a great Craigslist ad for a motorcycle, which I could read now, but I'm not gonna. Another time.

Speaker 3: Got all the cliches.

Speaker 4: But I never crashed. I mean, ended up in the front hood of a Ford F-350, you know, that kind of thing.

Speaker 3: It's rough. So next question is, I thought was really interesting and kind of fun was, is $2,000 fair for 1987 Honda Goldwing? Aspencade. I don't care. That's not an appropriate bike. Yeah. If you're new to riding, a broken vintage Goldwing is not where to start, is it? You have to buy a bike that works. That's what we've said many times in the past.

Speaker 1: I have to Google that. What is it?

Speaker 4: A 1987 Honda Goldwing Aspencade.

Speaker 1: Oh, wow.

Speaker 4: Yeah. And I've got engineering friends who love that stuff.

Speaker 1: Wow.

Speaker 4: Yeah. They love the process that went into it. It's the gaudiest. The friend of mine that bought one, he pulled the bags off and he noticed that some of the wires were connected using wire nuts.

Speaker 3: Yeah.

Speaker 4: Like from a Home Depot for your house.

Speaker 3: I've seen that. And to think, so this is a bike for someone who is retired and has a lot of time to sort out a lot of spaghetti.

Speaker 1: Who was 15 in 1987.

Speaker 3: Yeah.

Speaker 1: The question came from a new rider.

Speaker 4: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Who was asking, do we know their age? Do we know if maybe they're older?

Speaker 4: These questions, I try to reshape them into questions that are from experienced riders so we don't have to deal with the newness of it.

Speaker 1: Yeah, not the best choice for a brand new.

Speaker 3: And the price is fair. Like there are people who like these bikes. It's $2,000.

Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, of course.

Speaker 3: And it was otherwise isn't cosmetically is okay.

Speaker 1: Totally.

Speaker 3: And I guess it runs. The cruise control doesn't work, which means you're getting into a vacuum tube nightmare.

Speaker 1: I would say it would be miserable learning.

Speaker 3: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Like the learning would be misery, not fun. Yes. Which defeats the purpose of riding motorcycles.

Speaker 3: Yes. Well, if they're like eight feet tall and like.

Speaker 1: Maybe.

Speaker 3: If they look like that guy on Game of Thrones, it's like.

Speaker 1: Okay. Okay. The mountain. All right.

Speaker 3: Yeah. And they can pick it up a lot. Sure.

Speaker 1: It's the wrong match.

Speaker 3: It's the wrong one.

Speaker 1: It's like a bad date. Yeah. This is a bad swipe left.

Speaker 3: Yeah. Keep going. Yeah. Find something else.

Speaker 1: Really neat looking, though. But. Oh, my God. Is there one with wood paneling?

Speaker 4: Yes. I mean, they all kind of have that.

Speaker 1: You're too young for this. I just call it now.

Speaker 3: You're too cool for this bike. You can. You can.

Speaker 1: Everybody's too cool for this bike. Just.

Speaker 3: Yeah.

Speaker 1: Swipe again.

Speaker 3: Brian, how can they reach us? Just email podcast at TRO.bike. Destination proclamation brought to you by twistedroad.com.

Speaker 4: Visit twisted.tro.bike. Sign up today and then get the discount. I think that's the normal order.

Speaker 3: It's wintertime. Let's talk about if you have the time and a few bucks, winter is a great time to fly somewhere warm and rent a bike. We talked about this before. And even a few days or just a weekend can work wonders for your mental health. And you can probably get everything you need into a backpack and fly pretty light. So about as far south as you can get, San Diego, California, right on the border with Mexico, like every place in Southern California, they've got a lot of bikes. There are 56 bikes for rent in San Diego. And there are all kinds of really interesting roads up in the mountains and hills nearby, or you can go over the mountains and get into the desert. Now, Joanne can probably tell me a little bit more as a California person, but I believe it gets pretty cold at night in San Diego and it warms up during the day because you get that coastal fog and you get some of the coastal stuff coming in and it'll warm up later. And then, of course, if you want a different climate, you can go over the mountains to the desert. Is that about right?

Speaker 1: Well, it depends if you're on the coast or if you're inland. So it's definitely much cooler if you're inland on the east side of the state because then you're away from the marine layer.

Speaker 3: But yeah, there's plenty of hills, plenty of mountains, plenty of great roads around there. One of the things I saw was a brand new 2025 BMW F900GS, and the base rate is only $64 a day. And the reason that caught my eye is last year, I rented an older, I think it was a 2016 BMW 800GS. It was the 700. That thing was spent. The bike was great in a lot of ways, but it was slow. I mean, I just, I'll just throw it out there. It may not have been fast, but it sure was slow is the way I put it. I didn't expect a leader bike or anything, but this thing was kind of a dog, but it was also kind of fun to ride a slow bike fast. Oh, yeah. Which we kind of did. And the suspension was great. With a Walmart bathroom mat, I was able to fashion a seat that worked. But anyway, I'm just really curious because the new model, it's lighter. It's got a lot more power, 90 horsepower, a lot more torque, you know, and this one's just new. So I think it'd be really interesting to get out to San Diego, you know, put on, get that three season jacket. You know, it's got some warmth to it if you need it. See the coast, see the mountains, see the desert, you know, see like some different climates and ride around for a couple of days. It'd be a lot of fun. It's easy to get to on any airline to San Diego airport is very busy.

Speaker 4: There's a lot of nods to the Honda NC 700X with this machine. Yeah, definitely a beak bike. This isn't my kind of bike. This is a Brian kind of bike for sure.

Speaker 3: Yeah, I've had bikes like this. Yeah.

Speaker 4: Lightweight ish, but I mean, 900 is no small number, but on-road off-road, I feel like this could do it. It's kind of got a more subtle touch into the Africa twin territory to some extent.

Speaker 3: Yeah. The color scheme anyway. Yeah.

Speaker 4: But also just the overall profile, it looks like I get to handle a lot of good times on road and off.

Speaker 3: Great for visiting all kinds of terrain, all kinds of weather, all kinds of climates and nothing that's anything like Indiana right now. Is that your only bid? Is that your main bike? Is that the one? Is that the one Brian? Is that if you put a gun to my head and sent me out there, that's the one I'd have. I'd have to rent all the suffering and the motorcycling. That's right. Yeah. I mean, there's a 2017 FJ 09, but I've got one of those. Then there's several BMW GSs, the 1200, 1250, Super Duke. You know, there's a whole variety here. The other one that really caught my eye was a BMW R9T Scrambler.

Speaker 4: Oh, now we're talking.

Speaker 3: Yeah. It's kind of the naked scrambler version with the RT engine. Yep. That seemed kind of interesting too, just for the pure style of it. Just cruise around and enjoy yourself.

Speaker 4: Enough of this. It's time for one of our newest and most incredible segments, The Armory, brought to you by Joanne over at GearChick.com. What are we talking about today?

Speaker 1: Thank you for the radio entry.

Speaker 4: I try.

Speaker 1: I can tell that in another life, you were a DJ.

Speaker 4: This is how I order my burger at McDonald's. Hello.

Speaker 1: As I have said before, there's some compromise that will have to be made. I already, I'm already just going to be really transparent and say, I cannot duplicate for you what you're looking for, except digging deep into eBay to see if there is something, somewhere somebody's selling for you. So you can just buy the exact same thing you had before. I'm not going to do that work, but you can. And then that's an easy solution. And if that's what you want to do, then by all means. I know how you feel when you find a piece of gear or an accessory, or even like regular casual clothing. I have absolutely hunted on eBay for some boots that I bought 10 years ago because I love them so much. So I understand the passion and the need to, I really want this same jacket. Just to catch people up, Robin threw me a curve ball of, hey, I have this older jacket. It's a CDG cycle gear jacket. And I really love it. And I want a similar same features. And I want basically the same thing updated. And I told them very politely that it's going to be very difficult and some compromise is going to be needed. And that's just my two cents. And that's my professional recommendation. And based on all the products that I know of and what I recommend, I cannot give you exactly what you want. I can come close and there are a lot of things I can deliver. Compromise is something that we all have to do. I feel in motorcycling, whether or not it's gear or buying a motorcycle or planning a trip, there's always compromise. And if you're married, you know this. So you have no excuses, Robin. Compromise is something you know very well.

Speaker 4: I am prepared to compromise.

Speaker 1: Listen, and these are just my recommendations for what I think. And now we've not met in person. However, I have a pretty good idea of what I think will fit you correctly. And what kind of fitments will be best for you just based on some of the photos I've seen. But please, please call out, hey, I always have trouble because my shoulders are wider than my waist or whatever. Or, you know, my arms are longer, blah, blah, blah. Definitely throw on any unique kind of challenges that you faced that you think have really made it difficult. Because those are things that will drastically change your ability to find gear. My thing is I have a very short torso. So everything I put on is just down to my knees. With motorcycle gear, I have to be really particular about how long things are. Otherwise, I sit on my jackets. And I don't like that. Now, looking at the kind of riding you do, my number one choice for you, which I think will fit you really well, and it is a meshed outer jacket with a removable rain liner. So it is not a four season. It's a spring, summer, and I'd say fall. It's a Revit jacket called the Control Air H2O. Buy that from anybody you want online. But if you go to RevitSport.com, they have it on their website. And it's a really nice, sporty mesh. There's two things about it that I very much like. One is the fit is nothing like previous sport mesh jackets. So if you are a Revit fan and say five years ago you bought or tried some sport jackets, they're all pretty slim and they're cut pretty much the same. But this is the first one that I'd ever seen that was developed and designed very differently. And it has a very different fit. It basically fits the person who could never fit one before. Roomier all around. It has more space to allow for the rain liner to fit inside. You could squeeze it over the top if you wanted to. But it's a finished destination liner. The perfect summer coat. Desert heat, you know, New Mexico, Southern Cal, anywhere hot because it's a fully mesh coat. So the fit is the first thing I really love. But the second is the protection because this is not a city coat. This wasn't designed for you just to ride around Albuquerque or, you know, just from one side of town to the other. It has what we call a AACE certification rating to it. So it has a slide and impact rating for highway. So it's designed for someone, maybe you have an hour long commute. Or maybe you're going to do some cross country. You're going to do some distance riding and you want a mesh coat that has more protection than just, you know, the city limits. It has shoulder sliders for that's a little more style, but it does offer more protection. But the abrasion resistance on it is designed specifically and intended for people who are riding more than around town and more than a five minute city commute. So the protections there, it's like I said, the fit is more neutral. So I like to think of it and I always like to describe gear fitment as like T-shirts, right? You can buy a slim fit T, a regular fit and a loose. This is definitely a regular. And if you take the liner out, it really moves in the direction of a looser fit. Because anytime you have liners, you take them out and I have half a size up, right? You know, the only reason this might not be good for you is if you are a more of a slim cut person. If you do need a narrow shoulder and you need a narrower waist and you need that narrowness, then actually you might find this to be too big for you through the body and through the arms. Like the ladies version is cut really curvy and I am not a curvy girl. So I'm borderline a little too loose in the sleeves for my liking. Not so much that the armor isn't stable, but I like my gear very fitted. So I like all the comfort zones, you know, the areas that you're not sliding, like your inner bicep, you know, that's not a slide zone. But I like those zones to be more fitted to my body because that's just my clothing preference. I like it that way. Generally speaking, as long as you're armor, you're not losing your armor. Look at you in your wind jacket.

Speaker 4: This is my summer jacket.

Speaker 1: Oh, that's awesome. So it actually fits a little looser than that. That's where your preference, you know, would kick in. And so the other one you showed me, though, was a mesh outer, wasn't it? Or am I mistaken? That CDG one I thought was a mesh with liners.

Speaker 4: It is. So the CDG is an all season three layer.

Speaker 1: Because it has two more layers.

Speaker 4: Yeah, but I could always substitute that with a good fleece.

Speaker 1: You could. I mean, the other option for a lot of people layering and layering a mesh jacket, it's a way to push your seasonality right into the fall. But they're not really great as winter coats. So something else for you to consider is maybe a waterproof shell coat, where it's just a waterproof outer. There's no extra layers. And then you get the wind block, and then you can layer less. You know, that way, all you have to wear is like a long sleeve shirt and call it a day. So there's the waterproof version called the Control H2O. So that's just the waterproof version. It comes with a removable, actually, the liner is full sleeve. So you wouldn't even need to really layer very much. If you already have mesh in your closet, I personally don't think you need another mesh jacket. If you do like to ride in cold weather, you just might be more comfortable in something like the Control H2O. So basically, without the word air, it's the waterproof one. If it has the air in it, that means it's layered. So the H2O might be better for you because then you get a fall coat. The pockets are on the inside. So sorry.

Speaker 3: That's the rub, right? That's the compromise. Yeah, nobody makes those pockets. Yeah.

Speaker 1: Look, I did hunt and I found one coat, but it is not a sport specific jacket.

Speaker 4: Eh, then no. You pulled all the right levers because you were talking about basically the belt cut, the sport cut. I appreciate that you relate to that.

Speaker 1: Absolutely. There are certain things that are really hard to wear on sport bikes. And there are certain things that are really hard to wear on adventure bikes. It's really hard to mix the two. But I did find this Icon jacket, actually. Icon has a really unique aesthetic to it because they're trying to do some adventury things. And it's really interesting, the design that they approach. Look up this jacket called the Raiden. R-A-I-D-E-N. Icon Raiden.

Speaker 4: Right out of Mortal Kombat, Raiden.

Speaker 1: It's interesting because Icon's point of view is always going to be sporty, even with some of the adventure things they're trying to make. Yeah, this doesn't have flashy red and blue and Kawasaki green colors. It has a really cool look to it, but it is a three-layer waterproof all the time. You take this liner out and you have a lighter coat, but it does have two fancy pockets on the chest.

Speaker 4: Those are air vents. I almost guarantee it.

Speaker 1: I thought those were mixed.

Speaker 4: Those are probably not pockets. They're going to open up to a very shallow level of mesh that's immediately on the inside of the zipper. And they work really well. I mean, they do have side pockets.

Speaker 1: Every jacket has a side pocket, hand warmers, and then interior, right? But you're right, those may not. Some of them can double though. Sometimes brands will do a pocket that can double as a vent. It's a vent that is pocketable.

Speaker 4: It might do the job.

Speaker 1: Maybe. Adventury jackets usually are pocket heavy.

Speaker 4: Yes.

Speaker 1: You know, that's kind of the thing. You need a bunch of pockets. So is there a chance that it's actually a pocket? I don't think so. Because they're not touting a lot of ventilation in this one. So that's the only thing I actually found. And I'll give you a couple more. But honestly, the recommendations I found were other Revit mesh options. And you already have a wind.

Speaker 4: I love that jacket. I really do.

Speaker 1: Yeah, you already have a wind. I mean, you can still buy them.

Speaker 4: The trick is, and with my silly ceviche, is that that breast pocket, I wear earbuds in my helmet. They're isolating. There's better audio. All the stuff is just more pleasant when I'm riding and I've got tunes going. Some people loathe that. Some people need that. I'm one of the people who needs it. The cable for my earbuds. I'm not going to go batter. You know, I've got a Sena to the earbud connection. The Sena SMH-10 from like 99. But the cable from my earbuds is not short. So I have it wrapped, tied off. I lengthened the slack point so that it is the perfect distance to that pocket. And that's one of the ways that I'm able to be ready to go so quick. Earbuds in. Helmet on. The pocket. Zip it up. We riding. What's my other jacket called? With the wind, that is like, keep the zipper down. Drop the cables in. Zip it up. Carefully tight. Make sure get the button on. And it's just a little bit more like I got to do it again. It didn't go right this time. It takes more time.

Speaker 1: So your earbuds are in and then the cable, it's like a Y, runs down. And then it's plugged into the headset. So you're just talking about the extra. So basically the extra volume of cable, you're just trying to manage it. And you manage it by tucking it in there. Okay. How is that different from, is that any different from tucking it and managing it into the Napoleon pocket on the inside? Pretty much every jacket now has a Napoleon pocket. We'll have an interior pocket.

Speaker 4: The only thing that can get in the way there is if I am moving around using a lot of chin over wrist, digging in as I typically do, then the cable can start to slack down and start to impede my ability to look up or down over time. So having it out and about leaves the slack there. So it's free flowing. And that way I can turn in any direction. The cable is free to move as necessary.

Speaker 1: Conceptually, I'm not understanding how that would limit you because whether the pocket is inside or not, if you're just gathering the wiring on the interior pocket, you don't have to zip it up all the way, but you should still be able to tuck it and still allow it to move freely because the Napoleon is on the left side and you leave it open. You should be able to.

Speaker 4: It does work with my Revit jacket. The only thing that's a hard process is the act of getting ready to ride. But then there are moments if I don't get it right, that yes, my own body will pull the cable down. These are just things that happen.

Speaker 1: That's a tough one. I mean, that's where like I find too with a lot of folks who have issues with gloves are a good example. Some people have a stock lever with zero adjustability. Mm hmm. They're stuck in one position. So then in turn, then you have to find a glove that works for that specific position. Well, if you just get some shorties, then you don't have to worry about this. Things like that where you just kind of decide what you camera on. But that's I understand. I totally understand what you're trying to accomplish. I get it. I don't think I ever did earbuds. I just relied on, you know, I relied on headsets for a long time. But to that effect, the fact that you're using a classic SMH10, I guarantee you the minute you upgrade to, say, a new Cardo Packtalk or even a newer Sena, the sound quality is so much better.

Speaker 4: Similar banter at higher revs can be heard via the GearChick podcast. Visit GearChick.com and check it out.

Speaker 3: The whole idea that they just discontinue stuff I love has happened to me a million times. Happened to all of us. It's just annoying.

Speaker 4: So I got the chance to sit down with Jordan Lehman and the one session, much like this episode that was supposed to be blocked out into 10 minute segments, turned into a 30 minute sit down with Jordan and an onslaught of information that I've had to break up over multiple episodes. Fortunately, he's in Florida riding a bike from Twisted Road at I don't know if it's a funeral or a wedding, but either way, he's there. We're just going to pick up right where he left off last time. I'm going to fade him in. But I do know that we're talking about what he calls the Devonian era of motorcycling in America.

Speaker 3: Moments in Motorcycle History with Jordan Lehman.

Speaker 2: The DD-ON was one of the most popular engines that you could buy or a manufacturer of motor was buying to install in their motorcycles. A lot of companies didn't make their own. Some did make their own. Literally, you saw companies that lasted three years, born and died the same year, same thing. So companies that survived and made their own engines had a leg up, especially in America. In Europe, it was far less so because it was so easy for them to get it. They were being made in Europe, in France and Belgium and the UK and Germany and Austria. There were many companies making them there. America technically didn't have a motorcycle in the 19th century, except for one that I know of that would be debatable whether it was actually a motorcycle. Because Hendy and Hedstrom from India in 1898 put an engine in a bicycle. And at the time, that was a motorcycle. Between you and me and Defense Post, all these motorcycles, so how do you start them? Kickstarter hasn't even started yet, invented yet. Pretty much your bump setting where they put it on a rear stand of some sort and they spin the rear wheel. And I haven't lifted up yet, but I imagine these are very low compression engines. The cheapest lawnmower with a gas engine you could buy at Menards or wherever you shop is going to have four times the horsepower of a standard engine back then. Now we have machines and now we have companies that are trying to make a name for themselves. Advertising is, you know, newspapers and the town crier. And if you read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, they had Chautauquas. They had people that came through town and gave you the news. You know, you come into town and they have a town square or whatever. You could also see your neighbor bought one. You know, you're feeding your horse and some guy rides by on something that's a major pollutant and kicks gravel up and it'll get your attention. But these were the old days. Now, here's why I think this is relevant. You have a program based on sport touring. What was sport in the turn of the century, 1900? When the second motorcycle was made was when they had the first race, right? And they weren't fast. I mean, we're talking 7 to 14 miles per hour. That was the speed of things back then. And they didn't have roads. I mean, they might have had a road, the one street town, packed mud, gravel. This is going to derail the whole thing, but I'll tell you anyways. This guy named George Wyman, a guy from, I believe it was from Washington or Oregon. And he bought a motorcycle in California called the California. Basically, it's a DD on clone strapped to a bicycle. And what does he decide he wants to do? He wants to cross the entire United States. Now, you go sport touring. You have bags, you have something to sleep on, a couple tools, maybe a chase vehicle, 124 horsepower, AAA card, whatever they call it. Got your credit cards and the next town is 15 minutes away or whatever the hell. This guy had nothing. As a matter of fact, he did most of his trip on railroad tracks. They built them tough back then. The metallurgy was a step above garbage. You literally have to rebuild your engine and route multiple times. In 51 days to go from, I believe San Francisco to New York, I believe it was 1903. And that makes the news. Yeah. March 26th, 1903. That was, that was Daytona. But anyways, this is, this is what people were doing back then. The brave American guy that's been across the country. It's just like the guy that went to the Arctic. He broke down in Chicago. Crankshaft broke. That's not something you can fix on the side of the road. And had to have a telegram, but they didn't have telephones yet. Telegram to get a crankshaft shipped to Chicago so that he could finish his trip. And so that added, I think, five or seven days to his 51 days to get across America. Most places you can't even use a map for. I'm trying to go to the next town. There isn't even a road. There's maybe a horse or a cow path that you have to follow and hopefully not get lost on. You can only do it during the day because we don't have incandescent lights yet. There are so many things that we take for granted that all motorcycles have. My bikes have incandescent lights on them. Some people went to LED, halogen, whatever they call the stuff these days. But back then you had to do it during the day. This is something that happened in the early days. Let's talk about some of the other things that they did. I already told you about the one model that ran the rear wheel off of a camshaft. For me, that's an absurd thing to do. There was one from Scotland that they had different ways of driving the wheel, right? We have chains, belts, shafts. I would say 90% of all the technology that you have in your bike besides electronics was invented in the first 10 years of motorcycling. We had water cooling in the first 10 years of motorcycling. We had internal expanding brakes. That was a late thing. Bicycles didn't have those. Somebody in some country came up with it and later on it caught on and everybody says, that's how we should be doing it. It didn't happen all at one place at one time. There's one that I can't remember the name of the company. I think they were from Scotland. Their rear wheel drive. Imagine a saw cutting for a piece of wood. Instead, the wood is a gear and the saw is a gear. They ratchet drove the rear wheel. You have to think about it. It is a linear gear or whatever you want to call that. It's gear on gear and then when it hits its maximum, somehow it comes up or maybe the gear itself is rounded on top or whatever, undercut in one direction and so that it can slide back and go back over that again, like a Honda kick and go or something. This was a solution to driving a rear wheel back then. This is why these, I'm calling them species, did not survive. We're getting all kinds. You look at the fossil record. There are hundreds of kinds of trilobites and this is what we see here with what's going on in the motorcycles. Like I said, we had two-stroke. Scott in England had a vertical twin two-stroke engine that was water-cooled in the first 10 years of motorcycling. You got that? Scott. They're famous when we call the flying squirrel and you can Google it and it looks like some kind of abomination between a Vexpart and something else, but I think it had some sort of bakelite liner on the cylinders and it circulated water. It had a radiator and everything and they were fast as hell for the time. It was a water jet like you'd expect. They did not have fins, which is another thing. Fins didn't happen immediately either. You have cooling fins on your engine. Nowadays, it's expected if it is a water-cooled, somebody had to come up with that idea. That didn't happen immediately. In the UK, James at first typical in the 1908, they had stub axles, hub center steering. Have you seen a bike with hub center steering? It's a little different. A 600cc single. Oh, this was new. Concentric inlet and exhaust valves. Okay. What does a valve look like? To you and me, it's a stem with a mushroom on top. That's the idea, right? They were the first ones to do that. As far as I can tell in 1908, they did that because there's a lot of ways to make a valve. You have finger valve, you have poppet valves, you got these F-type valves. So they were the first ones to ever use cooling fins on a cylinder in 1908. So before 1908, what were they doing? It was just a block of metal that had to somehow conduct heat to the atmosphere without fins. Fins would crease the surface area, right? This is something that had to be invented. And it was invented in the UK by James, who I think they lasted a long time. So there were literally hundreds and hundreds of companies that threw their hat into the ring in the first 10 years of the Devonian period. It drops off by about half in the next 10 years. Injection, 1905 to 1907, a company called Howard in the UK pioneered fuel injection on a two and a half horsepower single cylinder engine, 1905 to 1907. That blew me away. They lasted two years. You can have the best idea in the world, but without marketing or whatever, you fall flat on your face. These guys figure out they have something that's spinning. They put something, a cam on it or whatever, and they do the math because they had the math. And I wanted to do this. There were a lot of attempts at a transmission. Mostly they didn't have them because these were mostly single speed motorcycles. It was basically a bicycle with an engine strapped to it. Barely more than that most of the time. Telescopic Forks, 1908. Minneapolis is the name of the company. Proprietary single, and they made their own engine for the single. And they also purchased V-Twins with chain drive and Telescopic Forks. There was another company that had Telescopic Forks front and rear. They had a front swing arm. I'll flip my notes here.

Speaker 3: So one of the things we talked about last time that we kind of teased a little bit and I wanted to bring up and talk about was something I'll call childish bliss. Like what was, what are some of your earliest two-wheeled memories? What kind of made people go, yeah, that kid's going to buy a motorcycle when he gets 50 cents to his name. He's going to start buying, he's going to try to buy a motorcycle. What's kind of your earliest memory of that? Freestyle BMX.

Speaker 4: Being a rural kid raised in rural Ohio with a flock of BMX bikes and just ruling all the dirt paths and the local properties. Because all the neighbors knew everybody and they knew the kids were going to get together and sneaking out at night. And we'd all ride 20 miles away. You know, nobody knew. It was just living, experiencing childhood with a little bit of risk. Nice. And you're broken bones, man. Broken bones. Not that I want any of that anymore, but it was always like, okay, I know that hurts. Let's see if I can do that with more responsibility as time goes on, right? One thing did happen though. In my thirties, when I finally got my motorcycle license, I had a realization. I don't have to answer to anyone.

Speaker 3: I'm a grownup now.

Speaker 4: Right. And I realized, holy crap, that like hit me in the back of the head. Came out of nowhere. I'm allowed to do this. And I did.

Speaker 3: And here we are. Nice. Yeah. I was also very much into bicycles as a kid. You're a few years younger than me. You're just a little bit younger than me. But yeah, BMX was a little bit after my time. Like I had a little Schwinn, red Schwinn with tassels and all that stuff as my first bike. But nice, it's long lost, but there's an eight millimeter film of little five-year-old me after Christmas, just zooming around in circles over and over and over again on a, it's a little electric mini bike I got for Christmas. It was like this light blue plastic, just this crappy little electric mini bike. And I was just, oh yeah, a motor. This is where I belong. I was five, you know, a little blonde kid, just, and then later on, I like worked and worked and worked all summer and paid like $150 for this little gas powered mini bike. Had a go-kart motorized stuff. But up until all the way through college, I was heavily into bicycles and heavily into mountain biking, long distance doing centuries, doing 60 mile rides, doing week long tours when I could get away, you know, that kind of thing. Went out to Utah, did the slick rock trail, Moab, stuff like that. Wow. Did lots of really cool big things on bicycles. And then later on into motorcycles, bought a GS 400 from a guy in my band, a KZ 650 from a different guy in my band later on, and then GS 850 and off and on. The two wheeled thing was, I think you'll find a lot of people who are really into bicycles discovered that adding an engine really enhanced the enjoyment.

Speaker 4: It's like, I've still got my breath. Yeah. I'm not exhausted. I can go up hills. I still love bikes. I just, I haven't gotten on a pedal bike in so long. The first thing I do remember the last time I stepped over a pedal bike was, wow, I'm really going slow. Yeah. This is, I'm very slow right now.

Speaker 3: And the cornering and some of the things are the same, you know, the, a lot of the cornering techniques when you're really, you know, falling ass on pavement and on dirt, you know, there's some of the dynamics are the same. Two wheeled vehicles are much the same, but like, I don't even have that memory. I just remember seeing the film of me going around in circles and then pass that. I remember saving up money to get a banana seat. Cause that was really cool in 1976 or whatever.

Speaker 4: Cause then you could double.

Speaker 3: Yeah. I got a gold sparkle banana seat for my little dorky Schwinn. Rode that to school and I was just king turd of shit mountain, you know, I was tassels, you know, all the, all those, all the silly stuff. I remember those days.