mdude

ok, mister thyni. for once my buck is on the Swedes. Forza Tre Kronor!!

hehe, brilliant wine that. try the whole range of Masi, except the cheap ones. They also have a fabtastic one from Argentina called Masi Tupungato. I find it to be even better... was on a wineclub-weekend in Toscana two months ago. Dont remember a thing.... AND: theres nothing wrog with downing a whole bottle alone, it just takes more time. And a quality magazine, and some music.

ooooh, YEAH!! look at that pair of strutting cylinders!

A bit late on this, sorry. Difficult questions, all. June is fine. But as I said; Norway isnt Spain, be prepared for the cold and the wet. If you drive like a scolded cat, you could make Nordkapp in three days from Oslo or Bergen, perhaps faster. Thats on the mainroads. It is +/- 2100 km..... doh.... Dont suspect high average speeds, I manage about 85 km/h average (in car) on my drives from Oslo to Trondheim and that is quite fast... If you want to take in a bit of scenery, take the smaller, more entertaining roads, relaxing a bit, you are looking at five to seven days I think. I have actually never driven this but I frequently drive about fourth of the distance from Oslo to Trondheim (520 km), and thats about 5,5-7,0 hours. Oslo to Bergen is about 7,5-9,0 hours, same distance but narrow roads and plenty of turns. So your choice of route will be crucial to amount of time spent. I would give myself generous time driving from Bergen to Trondheim via the fjords/coast, because its so breathtaking, and there are several alternative routes and much to see. Those roads are NOT fast, and theres frequent ferries. Then a fast, efficient haul from Trondheim up north (scenery a lot like scottish highlands). The last 300 kms will be the most interesting ones here I guess. Tip: No one from Norway actually enters the Nordkap-centre, because its a tourist ripoff and you will pay the white out your eyes to get in. The actual northernmost point is not here either. That is called Knivskjellodden (Knifes Egde Point) and is 5 kms past Nordkap. Hotels: No problem, but bring a nicely updated map, buy it in Bergen/Oslo (The Statoil Maps are very nice, bought on the gas stations), and call a day or two before to make reservations along the route as you drive. Up north hotels are not that many. In every biggish town there is a bike dealer, and most Norwegian mech's can handle any kind of bike. Hope that this is useful

why on earth do you want to keep out of bars??? theres this, and theres that......

Laverda Ghost 668. Lovely little bike with all the right fittings. It will cost you nearly nothing and run circles round 620 Monsters. My wife adores it. Noisy as hell. Bad reputation for blowing its engines, but that was fixed with the '97 engine. This one is a '96 with an '99 engine.

Nasty stories from old war heroes, this. at least its easy to recognize you guys at a rally, look for scars, crutches, and the smell of slowly decaying flesh. Myself; I frequently drink at least one pint to much, and I once crashed my hip into a table, boy that hurt.....

Hi Orson. June will be allright. When driving in Norway you have to expect some bad weather, so dress for it. I'd say that late July probably has the most stable weather, but theres such a lot of traffic in late july/early august when everyones on holiday.... old german geezers with mobile homes... And: theres a ferry from Newcastle to Bergen. When in Bergen, you are right in the middle of it all. Drive north or south along the coast and be amazed. I also think that the prices on booze on the ferry will help to smooth out all personality issues...

NOGBAD cracked it! Exciting stuff this, and a real big twin as some of you have missed. go see www.confederate.com pictures an story on both the Wraith and the Hellcat (which I think is awesome). Nice film and sound department too. I just recently read a test on it. The rider was totally freaked out of the riding position, the bike is so narrow that your legs has nothing to press onto, just like a mountainbike. Apparently very distracting when doing 120 mph on bumpy roads.

maybe a stupidly simple suggestion, but check the plug caps, I had what seems to be a similar situation some time ago and it turned out that the right plugcap had unscrewed itself. I chopped half an inch of the wire, screwed the cap back on, hey presto.....

Aha, learnt something new today. I see your drift, its wide.... you are not too far off the mark, actually... and the subject is a very interesting piece of engineering.

nope. dont know what a Crocker is, but its not old

thumbs up for imagination

In spirit, perhaps. But no.

completely different. Who makes this, and what is it called?

Do that. Mail me, and Ill give you some advice and tips. On the same trip you could be driving this, in the middle of the North Sea...

This thread has long since been hijacked, but here goes.... Steepest hill: Its in Norway. Its is a road in western Norway in the Nærøy-valley called Stalheimskleiva (kleiva = the hill). It has an 18% gradient, 13 turns in 1,5 kms, ascends 350 meters and is quite frightening when you are in the middle of it. On teh side of the road theres a 100m drop to the bottom, and not much of a crash barriere. My father once drove up there in our old Beetle, and was forced to stop when the car in front of him; a frenchman in a Citroen with a huge caravan in tow, had to stop and began to slide slowly backwards towards him down the hill. Scary stuff. I strongly strongly recommend a bike odyssey in western Norway, you'll find roads there so challenging and fun to ride on that you wont believe it. Some pics :

Nice pic. Love those bikes, theyre like a Duke 916 with colossal cajones. But Jaap: please find a technically better picture for the front page, and I want to see more details.....

then you must be one of the Good Guys

see your point: fun without detroying oneself is a good thing. Thats one reason why I bought the V11 instead of a Duke or a Fireblade.... But why can HD get away with selling such underdeveloped machinery?

-5*C and snowing.....

Dangerous subject....Let me lay my head on the track here, not wanting to offend, just giving an opinion from another continent. IMHO, speaking from Norway where Harleys are plenty but has a very strange public image, here buying a Harley has more to do with buying into the "look at me, I'm so bad" macho cowboy fraternity than to be a bike rider. If you want a cruiser theres plenty of stronger, more reliable, more advanced, better riding, much cheaper bikes coming from Japan. The price difference between any Harley and a japanese counterpart is nearly 30% (in Norway) I dont know any bike, except perhaps the Ducce Monstre, which is so strongly a fashion statement. Fashion, or brand identification is the sole motivation for buying one, isnt it? It may be that HD as a brand has a different meaning over there though I doubt that, the machism and "outlaw image" is really the core of the brand, innit? I can see that such a comfortable chair is the correct alternative in a country without turns, over here it is dynamically speaking completely out of its element. Taking 360 degrees hairpins at walking pace and frequent brake fading does not seem to me as fun. 73 hps out of 1450 ccms? Did anyone see the ghastly pics laid out in a another thread here with the hog rider tipping over? Poor bloke, in the bikes defence he locks the front brake, but everything is scraping the tarmac before he do. When you have dealers on every streetcorner its easy to overlook the shortcomings, but in recent bike magazine tests here in Scandi of the latest models, the HDs (especially the faired ones) get stick for being close to dangerous (yes really) and unstable at speed on less than smooth roads with poor brakes and a bit of unreliability to booth. To get stuck on a freezing norwegian mountain pass with 250 miles to the nearest petrol station isnt fun. And it happens. You dont see many HDs or Buells touring around here. (in all honesty, you dont see many Guzzis either...) The V-rod and in particular the Street Rod escapes the stigma. Engine codeveloped by Porsche, nice modern retroinspired design and real handling to go. Its finally a modern HD. Different kind of people buy into those models, which is nice. The Street Rod is the first HD I came close to wanting. Up until I met one coming towards me one of the last days of driving. I waved as I always do, the HD rider flipped me the finger. Nice.... Why??? I dont get that kind of thing, I really dont. So... now that I have probably made some more enemies over there, I must get more coffee

Look at this. German aftermarket exhaust manufacturer with Beemer as speciality. They have an optimized Kat that they state can be fitted to existing tubes (last on the sheet). One can probably order the Katalyst on its own. Its generally very safe to order stuff from Germany, and mostly there are english speaking guys at hand. http://www.boxer-design.de/en/Zachauspuffeer1150r.htm see also www.zach-auspuff.de but be prepared to read german.

sorry teacher, may I be excused? my brain is full

Yoohoo. Thats the way, if You cant answer any of the quizzes yourself. just make a damn difficult one.