7-1-09

Summer ride

My friend Colorado Ken brought me up a project bike to work on in my spare time. It is a 1980 Harley Davidson Sportster that needs a little motor work as well as some reconfiguring to make it a sidecar hauler. I had one of these older Sportsters that I pulled my sidecar with many years ago. This motor has had the cylinders, heads, pipes and carburetor removed and are missing in action. If anyone out there knows where I might find an engine and or parts for this project, let me know.

Back before I turned the cows in to graze this spring I went up on the dryland and rototilled a spot that was an old feed ground area. It always grew some mighty fine weeds and I thought I would try to see if I could grow some dryland spuds in that area. I planted them and when the cows came in they loved this area as it was  just so nice and soft they camped out here and used it as a lounge area. After they left I went up and I couldn’t see any indication that any of the seeds had sprouted. After I came back from my ride out west for three weeks I went up there and was surprised to see that most of the seeds had come up and they actually looked pretty good. I went up and tilled both sides of the rows and took my rake and hilled them up. I was up there today and they are looking like they could use some water and I may be able to find a water tank for my pickup and go on up and give them a little shot of water.

I plucked this plant out of the ground as it was showing signs of disease. As you can see it is starting to put on tubers so even if I don’t get water on them I might get some little taters that I can use for seed next year. Next year I will plant next to the ditch so I can water them easy.

I went up to Scott’s new earthship home and was amazed to see that they had already put up the roof trusses and a lot of the dirt work was done.

These are the water tanks that will store the rainwater that falls on the roof. The theory is that this earthship will be able to exist on rainwater, sun for the house needs.

Scott explaining the wall structure to friends.

Some of the crew that is building Scott’s home came over on Saturday and helped Tucker with his home. It sure is nice that they came over and I am sure it was much appreciated by Tucker. His place is looking very good and it sure is nice to see how it is coming together.

The morning was just so nice I decided to go for a ride. The blackdog was jumping up and down in the back of the shed, as it wanted to go for a run. All the other dogs have been ridden quite often so I got the black one out and off we went. I headed west on the freeway and let it find a nice cursing speed, which turns out to be about 80 mph. This is a really nice bike and it just loves to run fast like this. The freeway was almost empty so it was a lot of fun and a safe ride. I stopped at one of the rest areas and was surprised to see my hearing aid guy there with his whole family. He has four kids of his own as well as eight other kids that he and his wife have adopted from several different countries all over the world. This is three of his kids that wanted to go for a ride on the blackdog. The little girl in the back is from Ethiopia and she is an albino so she has to be protected from sun with the dark glasses as well  as sunscreen. Her little blond hair was ‘corn rowed’ which looked really cool.

I stopped in at Craig Whitely’s place and was thrilled to see that he had a Vincent on his bike stand in his shop. This is a 1937 B model I think he said. He is a serious antique bike man and he likes to ride them. This bike is going to be ridden, but needs a little work to make it safe and trustworthy.

I took a walk around Craig’s garage up at the house and took these photos of some of his bikes. That is a little trials bike in front that he says he is learing to do wheelies on.

On the left is his ‘new to him’ R60 US BMW.

a couple of R80GS’s. One of which blongs to his friend.

His main road bike is this R90S BMW.

I went up to the house and had to take this photo of this Harley in the dining room/kitchen. He has a wonderful wife. How many of you guys have a wife that would let you park your antique Harley in the kitchen?

The side room off the living room has a few bikes in it too.

There is some nice old iron in this room.

BSA

Nice old Allstate

Royal Enfield

Nice toys too….

I have a couple of these old David Bradley chainsaws myself.

Craig (center) and Jeff (on the left) and I went over to a neighbors and brought some cows over to graze the grass on Craigs place. Another friend on the right (forgot his name already)who just came back from Hawaii came by with his dogs. They were adjusting to Montana slowly. We were sitting around here snacking on chips and dip. I left the boys and headed back for home as it was getting late. I made it home just at dark. I sure don’t like to ride after dark.

My friend Mark Weeding got his Vulcan running again and is wanting to go for a ride. I think that is a wonderful idea and if all goes well, we will go out for a little ride sometime soon. I spent the day mounting new tires and I now have either new or almost new tires on all my bikes, both front and rear. I changed the oil on the Fatdog so it is ready to go a few more miles before it needs a service, or I could take any of the other too. Ahh, decisions, decisions, decisions…….. they all wants to go…..