Cycle World Letters
CYCLE WORLD LETTERS
Heartfelt highways
Simply put, Heartfelt Highways was beautiful. The South is really little changed from what it was a few years ago. The people are slowly getting more cosmopolitan, but it is still mostly the same.
I was raised in California but left there some 25 years ago. My home town now is little more than a bedroom community for L.A. Yeah, home is where the heart is, or as Roberts put it, the heart is where home is. I guess mine is still back in the mid-50s in California. Too bad.
Larry Dickerson Picayune, Miss.
I loved Heartfelt Highways. Is Wade Roberts single? How old is he? What are the odds of him coming to Colorado?
Kathy Lewis Univ. of Colorado Boulder, Col.
Yes. 31. Pretty good, after receiving your letter.
Congratulations on Heartfelt Highways. He turns a tale with phrases that belie the normal motorcycle magazine fare.
Doyle Harden Shreveport, La.
Give Roberts a bike, turn him lose on the highways of America and let him send back stories. Give me more tales like this one and you'll have a reader for life.
Tom Jannings Chicago, 111. I gotta ask: Did Wade Roberts ride from Alabama to California with no driver’s license? Did he ever get it back? Did he ever pay the fine?
Larry Jones San Diego, Calif.
Yes. Yes. Reluctantly.
Like Mr. Roberts when I'm feeling homesick, I take a month off, load up the bike and take a slow trip back to
familiar surroundings. I only
have one question. Does he eat a late breakfast or
^does he lose track of time
when he’s with a pretty girl? Doyle Coleman Hallettsville, Texas
When is Wade Roberts going to visit the rest of the country? Send him back on the road.
Steve Thompson Cleveland, Ohio
On his trip through the south Roberts gave “wide berth to Tampa-St. Petersburg, the selfproclaimed Gold Coast." He is an ignorant fool. This is the world-famous Sun Coast. In passing us by he missed something special, but on the other hand, we got to avoid him. Must have been our lucky day!
R.K. Mostecak
Tampa, Fla.
Laguna Seca turnoff
In March I sent my check to SCRAMP and received my race tickets and stickers for two motor homes. When we arrived the evening of July 1 5th the rangers turned us back because the park was full. They said everything was reserved. I told them differently. Both SCRAMP and the AMA literature stated absolutely no reservations, strictly a firstcome, first serve basis. The rangers said if we had gone through a ticket agency they would have given us reservations. We were also told that all SCRAMP sales were overflow' and tried to send us to the infield.
A friend arrived after we did, bought his tickets and was told to find a camp spot and they’d collect later. He wasn’t sent to the infield either.
Their control over tickets sales are terrible. Two different selling tactics both contrary to each other. I got my tickets in April and almost had to leave.
I’ve been pushing the sport for 48 years, but now something stinks.
Harold Hillman Pittsburg, Calif.
No knocks, please
Why is it that people get judged by what they ride? I own a Honda 750 with lots of chrome and it's a sharp looking bike. Some call it a rice burner and worse.
I also own a Harley Low Rider and it's a real goodlooking machine. People call it a oil leaker and ask me how far I have to push it every day.
Let’s enjoy the sport and stop knocking each other's choice of motorcycle.
Joe Bowles Wytheville, Va.
Magna bars
I am a proud owner of a new V65 Honda Magna. It's got all kinds of power and is as fast as they proclaim. There's only one foul-up, the handlebars. As a previous owner of a V45 Sabre I liked the ride position and I applied it to the V65. I found some Honda 250R bars (33 in. wide, 2‘/2 to 3 in. rise) and they're perfect. You might laugh but you’ll blow away the competition on the curves.
Lee Barnes
Simcoe, Ont. Canada
Well traveled
I’m just over in Siberia looking around (minus motorcycle). How does Armand Hammer fit in or is this a Zen question?
Anyway, the April edition of Cycle World has been to Russia after every page was examined by the border guards.
Leonard Taylor Somewhere in Siberia
No kick
It does happen. I purchased a new GSI 100GK Suzuki. At 541 mi. on the odometer, I was out in the boondocks in Montana, miles and miles from nowhere. I pulled off the highway and when I started to get back on, you guessed it dead battery.
How I wished the person responsible for the elimination of the kickstarter on the modern motorcycle was there helping me push start the beast. 'Nuf said.
Steve Bebich Shelby, Mont.
The broken string
You crack wise about dumb, uninformed and bigoted writers when they refer to motorcyclists as outlaws, perverts, or just bad seeds. Then you ride beyond the speed limit and snicker about it in every issue. Or you take your cutesy 250XL with > all those miles and all that misty-eyed history onto private land without permission and write in contrite banalities about how wrong you were.
Reader information
Editorial offices are located at 1499 Monrovia Ave., Newport Beach, Calif. 92663. Editorial contributions are welcomed, but cannot be considered unless sent only to Cycle World. Not responsible for return of unsolicited material unless accompanied by self-addressed, stamped envelope. Rates on request.
Letters cannot all be answered. Nor can all Service inquiries be answered. We appreciate correspondence sent to the editorial offices and will use the most interesting and appropriate letters in the magazine.
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All this we can forgive in the face of your status as the man with the best bike job in the world. But when you
close the column with the shabby stance that if you can afford to pay the fine, everything’s okay; then you strain your readers' good feelings toward you.
Go ahead and break the law if you're prepared to pay for it, but please don’t whine. It’s boring.
Steve Kohler Bonne Terre, Mo.
Dual purpose reading
Please stay a dual purpose magazine (street and dirt). One of your competitors split their magazine up and while I like them both, it's not the usual cover-to-cover-as-soon-as-I-amthrough-the-door-and-dinner-can-wait. Riding just street or dirt isn’t enough for me. I want the whole package.
Ted Beers Arnold, Mo.
We agree. This is a motorcycle magazine, for people who like motorcycles. We think the touring crowd enjoys the motocrossers in flight and the motocross kids appreciate the Vincents and Hendersons. We hear from lots of people who want more; more sports, more touring, more enduro and motocross, more technical and history. We don’t hear from people who want less. Nor from people who resent the inclusion of forms of the sport in which they aren’t active.
The name on the door is Cycle World. We have no plans to change it to Half Cycle World.
Starstruck
I’ve been content happy even with my music, art and Miss Tizzie cat. Then I moved into a household which also has a classic 1973 Ducati 750 GT. She pulled no tricks just worked her way in to my heart with her subtle charms.
Thanks to Starstruck Stella for exhilarating night rides and my introduction into your fascinating world!
Pamela Clark Minneapolis, Minn.
Suzuki GS550ES fix
I agree with your Suzuki GS550ES test in the September, 1983 issue. My GS550E had the same cold-blooded tendencies and I thought you might appreciate the remedy.
After checking every nut, bolt and > screw on the engine and stopping just short of tearing down the carbs, it occurred to me that the fuel line wasn’t fitting the petcock tube as snugly as it should. Given the pitifully weak tension provided by the factory spring clip, I reasoned that fuel line vacuum might
just be pulling a little gas and a considerable amount of air through the line.
I spent 45 cents for a screw clamp and 5 min. to replace the factory clamp and the engine has not stalled at all. Now I don’t even have to keep adjusting the idle speed setting. From cold engine to fully warmed up, off-choke idle speed never varies more than 200 rpm.
Benjamin King Springfield, Mo.
Down under opinions
In Australia we always look upon your country with different emotions.
For instance, when you think that America and Australia is almost the same size, yet you have 17 times the population. And you have beautiful scenery such as the Grand Canyon and Yosemite Park. Then we read your motorcycle magazines and feel sorry for you. You don’t get any Honda CB1 lOORs or the Yamaha RD/RZ 2strokes. And we hear you are gradually downsizing your superbikes for racing to 750cc.
The final blow was reading about the C.A.R.B. planning to have catalytic converters installed on your bikes. But just because the law has been deferred for a year don’t relax. Come on, you great country of independents, stay organized because they’ll find something else to hit you with.
C.A. Lee
Melbourne, Australia
Sidecar reverse
I ride a Honda 750 and would, as an old sidecar enthusiast, like to fit a chair. However, as the weight of a decent outfit can sometimes be comparable to a light automobile, I am deterred because of the absence of a reverse gear. Why can’t large companies offer as original or optional equipment, an easily engineered reverse gear for suitably sized motorcycles?
Robert Fienberg Sydney, Australia
Motorcycles don’t have reverse gear for sidecars because the demand isn’t there. Harley-Davidson is the only factory offering a sidecar as optional equipment, and for years Harley big Twins had reverse listed in their catalog. It was dropped because nobody ordered it.
Missouri rider education
After a late start in establishing our Motorcycle Rider Education Program for 1983 we hope to have all winter to plan our '84 Rider Education season.
We have developed new training sites in Kansas City, Springfield, Columbia and St. Louis. We offering the MSF-20 hour novice course for riders of less than one year or no riding experience. Also available is the MSF Better Biking Course for experienced riders.
Contact me at the Missouri Motorcycle Rider Education Program, Missouri Safety Center, Warrensburg, Mo. 64093, (816) 429-421 1.
Dennis W. Jones Project Director Warrensburg, Mo.
Aspencade XII
I find it time to write a word of thanks and compliments to the organizers, staff, and sponsors of the Aspencade XII Touring Convention. Everyone I spoke with praised the rally and most were looking forward to next year. Let’s all mark our calendars for May 16-20, 1984 and make next year’s event even bigger and better.
Alice Jean Swink Henryville, Pa.
For style
I can’t resist taking issue with your comment in the Honda Ascot test, “fins on the water-cooled engine are for styling.” I tend toward the opinion that surface area has a direct correlation with heat transfer capability. Thus, removal of the engine fins might necessitate a larger radiator, more coolant, possibly more weight and a less graceful design to achieve the same degree of cooling. We should not forget that all water-cooled engines are air cooled both directly and indirectly.
Wesley J. Eldred Shelburne, Vt.
Right. That’s why the Gold Wing, CX500 and CR motocrossers have fins. Sorry, we say it’s for style.
Cloning
In cloning their ersatz replica of the Harley-Davidson XR750, Honda seems to be telling us that: 1 ) the XR750 Harley really is the ultimate flat tracker, 2) if you can’t beat one, build one, 3) Americans will never notice the difference anyway.
As to why they have chosen to humble themselves by building this unabashed copy, one is left only to guess. To Honda, victory at any cost seems to have become corporate policy.
Thomas Gipe Edwardsville, 111.
Camera protection
In your Compac 1500 tank bag evaluation you mention that it can be tailor-made to protect a camera. Depending on your camera and your motorcycle it may not be protected all.
On a 8000 mi. cross country trip, my husband and I packed our 35mm Fujica into a Vetter tank bag. It was after several rolls of film were developed that we discovered a problem. The electronic ignition of the Yamaha wreaked havoc on the electronic circuitry of the camera and the light meter was reading incorrectly.
An $80 repair bill fixed the camera but nothing can replace the photos of our honeymoon that were lost.
Sandy Bouchier Buffalo N.Y.
More likely it is vibration that damaged your camera. We take great pains to insulate cameras carried on motorcycles.
Ride fast
Do you think you know how to ride fast? Do yourself a favor and find out that roadracing takes more concentration and finesse than balls or insanity.
We spent a day at Penguin Racing School (166 Cullinane Dr., Marlboro, Mass.) learning that riding fast can be safer if you use your head instead of your wrist. Our experience was both exciting and educational. We loved it!
Roger and Juliette Cosh Olive Bridge N.Y. ¡3
