Monthly Archives: August 2014

Honda Recon Stalls Going Uphill

Posted on by motopsyco

I noticed someone has been searching this site for information on this topic. If you have just done or had work done on your Honda Recon 250 ATV or it has been sitting long enough for mud daubers to nest in it, and it runs well other than the fact that it stalls going uphill then you need to check the upper vent hose on the side of the carburetor that runs up to the steering head area. If this hose gets pinched shut or plugged up it will cause this to happen because the trapped air prevents the float bowl from refilling when the atv is on too steep of an incline to vent through the bottom of the carb. Just find the rubber hose that leads from the left side of the carb as shown below. The other end should be up near the steering head and completely open to the atmosphere. Make sure that it is not routed in such a way that the fuel tank pinches it shut when the tank is re-installed.

<top-engine CARBURETOR HOSES RECON>

<Honda Recon Engine Carbs Vent Hose>

If you are trying to sort out why your Honda Recon stalls going uphill or any other problem you may be having with it I highly recommend a good service manual. If you are doing your own work it will save your ass a lot of trouble.

 

Mercury

Posted on by motopsyco

<Mercury a motorcycle short story>

It was a crisp cool morning, 65 degrees made it feel more like October than the middle of August. The gravel crunched beneath my tires as I traversed that last half a mile before reaching the asphalt. To my left just peeking over the trees a huge brilliant sun was shining like a cosmic blow torch burning away the foggy mist that lay gently on the forests & fields that surround my Carolina country home. Stopping at the end of the dirt road, I made sure the choke was completely off, and checked my surroundings before pulling out onto the empty back road of the kind that I love so much.

After a quick run up through the gears, it was time to weave back and forth leaning the old Honda to the left and the right as far as I could without leaving my lane to warm up the tires a little and clean the sand off of the sides of the treads. So far, so good, the road is still empty so I ride on stepping up the pace a little, confident that all is well with my steed.

Then I spy a nicely banked sweeping curve that is followed by a nice long straight running down through the pine trees, so I lean forward a bit and twist the exhilarator a little bit more. While swinging through the apex of this gentle curve, I peer down the road ahead and note that it’s completely empty for at least the next 2 or 3 miles that I can see.

Exiting the curve I simultaneously lean over & reach down, wrapping my armor plated leather fist around the top of the left fork tube, while my right hand twists the throttle all the way to the stop, and my heart pounds as the devil may care grin on my face stretches from ear to ear. In that moment all is perfect, a curious mixture of calm serenity, and the heart pounding excitement of the illusion of danger. In this moment it seems that I am thundering down the back straight at the Indy Mile aboard the legendary RS750, as the crowd goes wild. Hitting the red line in fourth I shift into fifth and screw it on for just a few seconds more.

<Real Honda Dreams the RS-750>

Real Honda Dreams

Before you know it, it’s over, it’s time to let go of the dream and the throttle. Up ahead there are houses with driveways & cages, filled with prisoners, their cell phones in one hand, breakfast in the other, and a cup of coffee between their legs as they attempt to navigate through the commute that they regard as a waste of their life. To them the road is just an obstacle course to be run, a linear prison where they are held against their will, and driving is a form of punishment. God help the innocents that get in their way.

Turning onto the multi-lane roads heading into the city, two fingers on the clutch & two on the brake crawling through traffic at forty or fifty is far more dangerous than any amount of ludicrous speed on the back roads. You watch every car & truck like a hawk, trying to anticipate any bone headed moves that might punt you into the emergency room or the morgue.

Knowing these things why do I still ride? Even sensible motorcycling is still far more enjoyable than being stuck in a box isolated from the surrounding environment, you see, hear, feel and smell what is around you. But the best times for me, are the rare moments like this morning;

I was Mercury, my feet had wings, and I could fly!

<mercury flying through the sky>

 

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Ultimate Addons Mounting System for Phones

Posted on by motopsyco

Who is looking for a way to safely mount their smartphone to the handlebars of their motorcycle, bicycle or atv? Initially when I first decided to add navigation to my motorcycle, the first thought was to find a mount for the Garmin Nuvi that I use in the old van, but quickly realized that my smartphone has some seriously good navigation apps installed on it and has the added advantage of always being with me. Keeping in mind the price of my phone and the importance of the data that it contains, any mount purchase would need to be secure, strong, & waterproof, with excellent vibration & impact resistance. After a quick bit of internet research I decided to try one of the Buybits Ultimate Addons mounts, and placed an order with Amazon. At $69.99 plus shipping from the U.K. this is not a cheap product (although it is not the most expensive either, price as of 8-9-14).

As usual my order arrived quickly and was well packaged with no transit damage!

<happy little fedex box>

Opening it up and viewing the contents I found the protective case, handlebar mount & power cord. Please note that if your motorcycle or atv is not equipped with a DIN (Hella) style power outlet you will need to install one in order to use the charger, here’s a link to the item I used.

<ultimate addons cellphone mount>

The protective case is a very impressive design, thick plastic with a generous amount of rubber inside both to cushion the phone & seal out the water. Please note this case is not for weight weenies, but if you don’t mind carrying around a few extra ounces in order to keep your device safe & dry it is worth it. A great and pleasant surprise to me was to find out that there was a viewport for the camera, the touch screen worked well, and the case is engineered well enough that all operation functions of the phone could be controlled just as if the phone were not in the case at all.

The handlebar mount itself had me worried a little bit after seeing the relatively bombproof looking case that attaches to it, the mount looked small and while not flimsy looking it seemed like it should be larger and heavier looking to hold up this big case & my oversize $500 phone. In engineering we all know that well designed products can be much stronger than they look, but the barbarian living in my head doesn’t always see that, so for my initial testing I strapped it to the rattliest, roughest riding pile of junk in the shed, a Baja MB165 minibike. My minibike is a frightening concoction, of assorted used parts loosely assembled together and then blessed (cursed?) with a couple of speed enhancing modifications including a CVT drive.

<cell phone mount on minibike>

If this don’t kill it nothing else will.

After bouncing around a little while around the field, up & down the dirt road a time or two, and at least 50 laps around the house it didn’t fall off, or even come loose. I even shot a short video that I didn’t post any where but if enough of you want to see it I can add it to this page later. An S4 in this mount actually  makes a decent video if you can get the orientation right. This was more than enough of a test to convince me the mount was going to hold up just fine. So now it was time to check the water resistance of the case so I fastened it to the front rack of this ATV and took it out to play in the rain, at night.

<ragged out p.o.s. brute force>

 

<Ultimate addons mount on atv rack>

After all of this I opened up the case and found that my phone was completely dry and safe, and while I still would not actually submerge it in pond or anything like that I am now convinced that this case properly installed and closed will keep your phone dry and safe during any rain storm you are going to encounter out on the road or trail. After all the Brits who sell this product obviously know all about riding in the rain.

It is a large bulky case, and yes in bright sunlight the screen can be hard to see, but if any of you have a touch screen phone that is easy to see in direct sunlight, I want to see it, because at this time such a phone does not exist. The charger is easy to install, but if you are cutting off the plug and hard-wiring it to your vehicle be sure to connect it to a switched circuit or install a separate power switch as the charger has an LED that is always on whenever power is present. I just installed a DIN outlet so that I could unplug it. It would have been nice if the mount were taller and had more adjustment for position. They do make one one but I admit to being a cheapskate especially when dealing with products that I am not familiar with.

Here’s a shot of it attached to the bars of my main ride with navigation open, ready for me to go get lost & then find my way back home. Having used this mounting and charging set up for a few hundred miles on four different vehicles I am happy with it.

Bottom Line: The Ultimate Addons Mounting System for Phones is well worth the cost, I’d recommend this product to anyone.

Peace Y’all

 

 

 

 

 

2014 Antique Bikes On Main Rally / Kamikaze Motorcycle Show in Chesnee S.C.

Posted on by motopsyco

July 26, 2014 the weather looks absolutely wonderful on this fine Saturday morning as Mrs. Psyco & I load up the world famous Suburban Assault Scrambler, slipped into our riding gear and hit the road for a little jaunt 3 hours to the northwest to a little town called Chesnee. The Carolina Rider a newsletter/ezine/website that I have been following since signing up for their email list a couple of years ago, was sponsoring a bike show for Japanese and European motorcycles so I thought that I’d go check it out. Plus I love old motorcycles of any make or country of origin so the whole sound of the days event sounded like a winner to me.

<Mrs. Psyco at Historic Brattonsville>

<motopsyco at Historic Brattonsville>

I plotted a backroads course into the GPS on my phone and we sailed up highway 903 through Lancaster, getting onto highway 9 & eventually 909 for a while. We did stop at Historic Brattonsville, but just long enough to take a few pictures, but we are making plans to return for one of their living history events. From there I treated 909 as my own private roller coaster rolling back & forth with the curves until we got onto Highway 5 in Spartanburg County for a while, until we merged onto I-85 for the ten mile run south to Chesnee

 

This was a decent route that gave us only about 2o miles or so on the super boring slabs, did I mention it was a fantastic day for a ride? Even the temperatures were mild for a South Carolina summer with highs only in the lower nineties in the hottest part of the afternoon, during our morning ride out & evening ride home it was actually very nice and comfortable in our gear.

<rider on the super slab>

Getting off of the slab & rolling into downtown Chesnee, my initial reaction was that I must have made the wrong turn somewhere, as I drove my 34 year old Honda rat bike into a veritable traffic jam of Twin Cams, and Yamaha Stars, awash with brand new shiny chrome and that new bike smell filled the air surrounding them. This spectacle really is more of a rally than an actual antique motorcycle meet. This is not really a bad thing but in all honesty me (& my fat wallet) usually avoid Harley rallies because I don’t feel like putting up with the bullshit from all of the part time fair weather road pirates who just don’t understand why I don’t ride what they think I should ride. I don’t encounter that problem when hanging out with the AMCA crowd on their ancient Pan Heads and Indians. Normally between antique meets, VJMC events, and the occasional Ton Up Club show I get my fill of bike show & rally entertainment. But I got to give credit where credit is due everyone that I encountered here was as nice as you could hope to meet and if that trend continues I may add a few more of these rallies to my weekend plans.

<cookie cutter motorcycles>

somewhere behind these cookie cutter cruisers and this big ole bus is a line up of nice vintage British, European, & Japanese motorcycles

I found the Carolina Rider tour bus and parked my bike in line for the show, there were several nice Brit bikes that had been lovingly restored, nearly new Moto Guzzi V7, a pair of nice early sport bikes etc. Crossing main street and heading to the next block where the swap meet vendors were a few old bikes came into sight, and there were some very unique and interesting motorcycles and parts available. It was not a huge meet and there was plenty of room left in the swap area, so if you’ve got stuff to sell I am sure they can fit you in next year.

<Antiques on main swap meet>

<Antiques on main swap meet>

For entertainment they brought in 3 trials riders with the On the Edge Action Show, one on a bicycle & two on motorcycles and they put on a fantastic show for us that was worth the trip all by itself.

<Trials Bicycle rider>

 

<Trials motorcycle rider>

I did take some video that will be posted at the motopsyco.com youtube channel as soon as I get the chance to get it edited. For the rest of this post I’m going to dispense with the storytelling & just post a few pictures & comments for you to peruse.

Of course no rally is complete without at least one of these Thoroughbred Motorsports trikes and this one had a splendid real fire paint job.

<Thoroughbred Motorsports trike>

 

 

 

 

<sport bike art>

artwork on a cool blue Suzuki

 

 

The Shadow in the foreground below belongs to Shaggy, one of the writers for the Carolina Rider, it’s a 2007 with 180,000 miles on it.

<Shaggy's bike>

Honda’s just don’t die unless they get deliberately murdered.

Moto Guzzi V7 for sale at a decent price. I admit to being tempted by this one.

<Moto Guzzi V7 Classic>

Cool swap meet items!

<antique art deco tricycle>

Hodaka

<Hodaka Motorcycle for sale>

Restorable Harley Sprint

<Harley Davidson Sprint>

The only drawback to riding my motorcycle to an event like this is not being able to bring little things like this home when I find them…

<ruff honda st90>

I have restored much worse than this.

This really neat old Indian was in the swap section as well.

<real Vintage Indian Roadmaster>

How about some fine Vintage Italian Iron?

<Ducati 350 scrambler>

Signs, signs everywhere are signs…

<garage decorations>

Since I like bicycles too I felt this was a great find.

<antique Elgin tank bicycle>

<Vintage Elgin & Hondas>

Of course there was a lot of other stuff to look at, Chesnee Classic Cycle, the main sponsor of the rally had this fantastic & extremely rare XR1000 on display in the showroom.

<Harley Davidson XR1000>

Now THIS is a badass Harley!

This Suzuki RE5 Rotary was ridden in.

<Suzuki RE-5>

This wooden Indian is also on display at Chesnee Classic Cycle

<wooden Indian Motorcycle>

Of course now you have to go listen to Kaw-Liga by Hank Williams (Sr. that is)

Here’s some Britsh machinery (& a rat KLR) lined up for the Kamikaze show.

<vintage iron>

A pair of good looking Harley baggers One excellent vintage restored, the other a great looking late model custom!

<Electraglides in black & blue>

I like the opposites in this shot, a massive VTX1800 trike & a scooter passing each other while cruising down Main Street.

<honda vtx1800 trike>

Got Ural?

<Ural Sidecar Motorcycle>

“Howl at the moon, shoot out the light, small town Saturday night!”

<antique bikes on main 2014>

 

<antique bikes on main 2014>

 

<antique bikes on main 2014>

Last but not least, here are the results of the 2nd Annual Kamikaze Motorcycle Show, first up the winner for best custom was this stunning Triumph Chopper.

<one fine custom Triumph motorcycle>

The award for best sportbike went to this immaculately preserved 84 Kawasaki GPZ750

 

<84 Kawasaki GPZ750>

and some guy’s rusty old p.o.s.  commuter Honda CB650 was awarded the best vintage trophy, go figure…

<1980 Honda CB650C>

Yes I had a blast, (and not just because I got a trophy either) and enjoyed meeting Shaggy, Bub & the rest of the crew from the Carolina Rider, plus anytime you can spend a warm summer day with a few hundred of your fellow motorcyclists, you’re bound to have a good time. I am going to recommend that my fellow enthusiasts of Japanese, British, & European motorcycles stage a mass invasion of this event next year, & all you people with the Flatheads, Knuckles & Pans should show up too. Then it really could be Antique Bikes on Main.

Peace Y’all

<a wild hawg>