How I spent my summer vacation..

[RS Thornton]

I promised a write up of my Iron Butt 5000 ride and while it is mostly typed up I haven't figured out a good way to post it. In the meantime I am posting a summary of my 2010 travels and a few pics.

There were three main trips, the Mason Dixon Rally out of Hagerstown, MD. The MN2010 out of Minneapolis, and the IB5000 that started in Denver and ended in Spartanburg, NC.

IMG]http://i284.photobucket.com/albums/ll16/rstmichigan/2010trips.jpg[/IMG]

There was a lighthouse theme to the Mason Dixon Rally so leaving Hagerstown I went north to Oswego NY and then along the lake crossing into Canada at 1000 islands. I went to this lighthouse about 5 miles from Picton, of which a mile or so is on gravel roads.
IMG]http://i284.photobucket.com/albums/ll16/rstmichigan/oswegoNY-1.jpg[/IMG]
From Picton I headed back to a lighthouse at Prescott, Ontario crossing on an iron grated bridge that was all kinds of exciting to ride over. The ride continued to Lake Champlain, then south to NY/NJ area before ending in Hagerstown.

Rally 2 was the MN2010, this rally is usually called the Minnesota 1000 but as it was the 10 year anniversary the organizers upgraded it to a 2 day 2000 mile rally. My ride went southwest to Niobrara NB, then to Carhenge near Alliance NB


I take my rest bonus in Casper, WY before winding my way along secondary roads up to Buffalo via Thermopolis. This rally had a 1 hour mid rally checkpoint in the Black Hills, after which my route was a Northern Loop that included the Little Bighorn Battlefied


From there a stop an Teddy Roosevelt National Park and finishing up back in Minneapolis.

The final ride was the biggest of the trips; a 5 day rally. My rally miles in this one was about 5700 miles, plus 1300 out to Denver and 800 home from Spartanburg. Leg 1 took me over familiar roads and I went back through Thermopolis Wy again spending the first night of the rally in Butte. Day two ended back in Denver by way of Salt Lake City. Leg 2 of this rally had me heading to Vegas
IMG]http://i284.photobucket.com/albums/ll16/rstmichigan/vegas.jpg[/IMG]

From Vegas I looped down to Palm Springs where there is a life size statue of Sonny Bono and finishing the day in Yuma. Day 4 of the rally had a big point stop in Phoenix followed by a long Interstate ride to Texas where I dropped South to Big Bend National Park, then Del Rio before heading to another big point stop just north of Houston. Final run was all intersate, Houston to Mobile to Atlanta to Spartanburg.

A great riding season

[Rickrod3]

Awesome

Wow Scott:

how did the bike hold up?
Did you have to make any repairs on the road?
How do you prep your bike for this kind of riding?
I would like to try a ride like that.
Rick

[RS Thornton]

Map

Looks like the trip map did not upload and I do not see an edit button on my first post, so I will try again.



and the Vegas pic

[slow mo]

wow! that was some kinda ride! i getting on in years and i think i,m doing pretty good to cover 1000 kms in a weekend,, ,i respectfully bow to your ability rookies as i am should not be mentioned in the same breath as professionals,,that was some kinda ride i,m impressed thanks for posting,,,ride safe ,,slow mo!

[RS Thornton]

how to build a mile eater

First start with a bullet proof bike like the XS.

Rick,
In answer to how the bike ran it was solid. I bought the bike last November, found it when FIX posted that there was a bike for sale in Davisburg MI on craigslist. I went through the bike and serviced all the typical things for a barn find and added a few upgrades like a Geezer regulator and a TKAT fork brace. I did take the wheels off my 81 special and swap them as I wanted tubeless tires and the slotted brake rotors. It came with SS brake lines and a Lockhart oil cooler which I would have put on anyway. Suspension is all progressive and I have 30w oil in the front forks as those Pacifico fairing are heavy. If you look at the pics you can see a set of HID lights up front, the headlight is also HID and the brake and signals are LED. The only other mod I would like is to get ahold of one of those larger Venture tanks as rally bikes are limited to 11.5 gallons and between the 5 gal aux tank I mounted and the stock standard tank I am at 10.3.

There were only 3 items I had to service on the road. The speedo cable came of at the top under the speedo, clearly I did not tighten it up properly after I lubed it. One of the clamps on the oil cooler either loosened off or again I did not tighten properly when I put new lines on it. The last one was that the front brake master cylinder got stuck partway down after I and I had to pull it back out by hand. The brakes still worked but I had lost about 1/2 the travel on the lever. I had rebuilt the brakes and this was after ~12000 miles of riding so not sure what caused that one.

I've got another $400 gem that I am building into another mile eater this winter. My hope is to ride one of them in the 11 day/11000 mile iron butt rally in June 2013.

[DGXSER]

Wow, impressive!!! You have seen more of the USA on your bike than I have period!!

Next time your through Cincy, Ohio, let us know. We have a small group of XSives here, happy to share a beer or two.

[3Phase]

Way to go, Scott!

I did a few 3K milers in 3 days this summer but was spaced over a couple of weeks. Unless you get a couple of breaks in between the 'days', 11K in 11 days on an XS would tear me up.

[Rickrod3]

Thanks

First start with a bullet proof bike like the XS.

Rick,
In answer to how the bike ran it was solid. I bought the bike last November, found it when FIX posted that there was a bike for sale in Davisburg MI on craigslist. I went through the bike and serviced all the typical things for a barn find and added a few upgrades like a Geezer regulator and a TKAT fork brace. I did take the wheels off my 81 special and swap them as I wanted tubeless tires and the slotted brake rotors. It came with SS brake lines and a Lockhart oil cooler which I would have put on anyway. Suspension is all progressive and I have 30w oil in the front forks as those Pacifico fairing are heavy. If you look at the pics you can see a set of HID lights up front, the headlight is also HID and the brake and signals are LED. The only other mod I would like is to get ahold of one of those larger Venture tanks as rally bikes are limited to 11.5 gallons and between the 5 gal aux tank I mounted and the stock standard tank I am at 10.3.

There were only 3 items I had to service on the road. The speedo cable came of at the top under the speedo, clearly I did not tighten it up properly after I lubed it. One of the clamps on the oil cooler either loosened off or again I did not tighten properly when I put new lines on it. The last one was that the front brake master cylinder got stuck partway down after I and I had to pull it back out by hand. The brakes still worked but I had lost about 1/2 the travel on the lever. I had rebuilt the brakes and this was after ~12000 miles of riding so not sure what caused that one.

I've got another $400 gem that I am building into another mile eater this winter. My hope is to ride one of them in the 11 day/11000 mile iron butt rally in June 2013.

Again really cool.
These bikes really are great!
If it not too much trouble do a build thread on the $400.00 gem.

Rick

[CatatonicBug]

Very impressive! I wish I had the kind of time and $$ to take off and ride like that. Any thoughts on Vetter's seat board to help with long-distance travel?

[dpotter58]

A-mazing. Truely amazing. I did about 2800 over a week and that was way past enough for me. Congratulations. I know lots of guys that have done 1,000s on nice wings and beemers but to do it on one of these is really a feat.

When folks talk to me about these "old" bikes, I just grin and say yep, old POS huh?
I'm going to print out your map and carry it with me.

[g15usmc]

11000 mis...its a good thing tires aren't too expensive for the XS...that suzuki i got would cost too much...that'd be about $700 for both tires to be thrown on halfway through riding...and prolly back surgery afterward...crazy AWESOME!!! GOOD LUCK!