Norton running smoothly again!

Big thanks to the Access Norton forum here, where I discovered that my bike's been running like shit and kicking back so bad it's almost broken my leg, not because of the timing being out, but because of the bloody battery! My Commando isn't running points anymore and had a Boyer ignition fitted by the previous owner.

Anyway it turns out that the boyer will advance the spark if the battery is low, causing the violent kickback I was getting. I heard about this, and since my battery's real old now I thought it was worth getting a new one anyway, so have chucked in a new battery and she's running sweet again. And didn't kick back on me either! Which was a big relief. I was pretty tentative trying to kick it at first.

The battery I put in is one of these new fangled (actually I think they've been used in cars for a lot longer?) sealed gel ones. The guy at the bike shop up-sold me on it (I'm a sucker for the up-sell). he reckoned that it would hold it's charge a lot longer, especially in a bike that isn't being used all the time. I've always been a bit shit at remembering to top up my batteries too, so I thought this would be worth a go.

I'm wondering if I can chuck my charger on this if I need too? Or does being sealed mean you can't recharge them? Wish I'd asked him that?

Motorcycle Man

Totally accidentally bumped into this bad boy here while looking for something else on the same site. Blurb from the website I nicked it from below...

“Buddy Mize. Obscure private press tribute to the kings of AMA dirt-track and road racing of the late 60's and early 70's. Wonderful “folk art” llustration on front I would kill for the original of. Total DIY piece from So-Cal. I found this missing the Lp so I have no idea what it sounds like, but from the titles it looks great. Most of the tracks are listed as “narration & theme” and are by Melva Murphy."

McCleans Island swap meet

Despite being really bloody sick I got up at 7am on Saturday morning and went to the biggest annual swap meet we have down here. I hadn't ever been before, and despite the cold shitty weather, it was easily the biggest swap meet I've ever been to. A shame it wasn't better weather, because it obviously would've been bigger and better if it was. It was raining most of the time we were there, and so a lot of the tables were actually covered up. Who knows what we walked past at times!?

I had measured up my Triumph's frame and petrol tank with the idea that I might find a tank out there, but didn't end up getting anything. It was a strange experience actually. I'd expected everything to be really really cheap, but it wasn't like that at all. Anything that was interesting seemed quite expensive. For instance, a CB100 that I asked about (admitedly it was running and in not bad condition), the guy wanted $2500 for! I know you can pick these up for about a grand, or even less, on Trademe. Didn't these sorts of things used to be great places to pick up really cheap stuff? Has Trademe killed that? Have our expectations changed? There was a bunch of interesting stuff out there, but nothing I enquired about seemed at all cheap. Maybe, and I am a bit of a swap meet amatuer, I'm not looking in the right places? Maybe you're supposed to bargain a bit harder?

Anyway it was worth going because there was a bunch of cool shit to look at. I was really crook though, and it was freezing. We stayed a couple of hours, Bad Evil bought a spade, I got a Norton badge and a shitty fake-old Isle of Man sign, mainly because I didn't want to go home empty handed.

The territory of art in society

A bit of a curve ball here, a break from the endless sea of motorcycles, a reference which I wanted to store here for later...

Reading one of my students essays today and she has referenced a book by English artist Stephen Willats called 'Art and Social Function'. I'd been talking to her about locating her work within (or around) existing contexts, histories, and trajectories. Anyway she points out that Willats “defines what he refers to as “the territory of art in society,” or “art’s social environment” as “an environment of institutions and groups of people which effectively maintain it as an identifiable activity within society.”

I've become fairly disenchanted with art over the last few years (too much working for art galleries!), which is only a problem because so many of my friends and colleagues are artists! Anyway Willats points to something here that I've been sort of vaugely thinking about a lot this year, just not in these terms. This idea, that art has a certain territory in society, is interesting. Because a territory is never stable, it's borders are attacked/defended etc, it can move or shift, and shrink or expand. My feeling is that shrinking is what it's been doing. I think our students have a very romantic view about the role of art in contemporary culture. The only people I ever really see at art galleries are other artists.

Grinderfest 2011

I went up to Auckland last Saturday to check out GRINDERFEST, a show/competition for 'garage built' bikes organised by Irish Jon of the Grease Monkeys. You can see more photos of the bikes in this show on Jon's blog here, and the Grinderfest blog here. You can see who won etc on the Grinderfest one.

I should have gone up the weekend before. I thought there was gonna be a closing party of some sort on the Saturday night, but there was really just the prize-giving in the afternoon (which I missed cause Pete's brother took me for a ride to get some lunch and we took aaagggeeess). Still it was good to see the bikes, and to catch up, albeit very briefly, with Jon and Sarah. This had obviously been a lot of work for them and I think they were pretty shagged by the end.

There were some pretty interesting machines on show, including one bike that had been built around a Subaru car engine. I guess I focused on the more 'conventional' customs in that respect. I like my bikes to look like bikes, I'm not into massive engines, ultra high speeds, or crazy concept kinda things. There were a couple of Mad Max lookin bikes, and a whole bunch of stuff that deserves mention for creativity or whatnot, but yeah not my cup of tea sorry. There were some great choppers and bobbers, some of which I took photos of. Interestingly there weren't any cafe racers that I thought were totally amazing. There was one, a bitsa kinda thing, I can't remember what it was? Brit bike of some kind? It was ok, just didn't blow me away. There was a Thruxton, which I was keen to see because I'm really keen to start fucking with mine over the summer, but to be honest, once I saw it, I didn't think should've been there. I'll quote Jon from the Grinderfest blog to explain...

"There will always be some people who just don’t get it. The biggest crowd at the end of the afternoon was round the store bought chopper (just like on TV). It was a nice bike but the only thing that I could see that was garage built were the little bits of bent tin that were holding on the indicators. Same for the Thruxton, which was a lovely bike. Hell, I’ve even got one, but getting a professional paint job and a few high end catalogue parts was exactly what we were trying not to promote" 

I think Jon puts his position fairly clearly here, and it's one that really resonates with me. It's what he means by 'garage built'. It means you built it yourself. Or with hands-on help from your friends while standing round the garage drinking some beers and talking some shit. It's not buy a new Harley, order a bunch of parts from Orange County Choppers, and get some professional you never met before to put it all together for you. It's not that I'm vehemently against that, it's just that I like Jon's attitude and approach to motorcycles. If there were more guys like him around (and obviously there are!) then there would be more cool bikes on the road (and obviously there will be now... in Auckland at least?).

I'm hoping to talk to Jon and to get something in the first HFoS fanzine anyway. I hope he got some better photos than me!?

Big thanks to Pete's brother, Andre, who loaned me his Sporty while I was in Auckland. Took some getting used to, riding a Harley I mean. But was great fun, and cool to ride something really different for a change. Still don't see myself getting a Harley anytime soon, but yeah I was certainly starting to get a feel for it... don't rev it too high eh!

Ty Segall inducted into HFoS motorcycle rock and roll!

This is just great! This whole show is available on the Amoeba website. Been watching a bunch of Ty's videos on Youtube lately... all highly recommended.

How to ride a Harley Davidson motorcycle

If guys who rode Harley's rode 'em like this I would like them a whole lot more.

The Road Racers

Home sick today and found this — a late 70s precursor to the recent Isle of Mann movie, TT3D: Closer To The Edge. One of these guys is the famous-but-dead Joey Dunlop, he kinda even reminds me of Guy Martin a bit, if only he talked about wanking all the time. Dunlop actually goes to his first Isle of Mann and wins during the making of this film (He went on to win the TT 26 times!). It's a strange mix of Irish men, Japanese two-strokes, and Country & Western music. It's great. This is part one... the rest of it is also on Youtube. Well worth watching, there's some beautiful footage.

Danny Lyon 'Iron Horse' interview

I found this on the Greasy Kulture blog. An interview with Danny Lyon in an old copy of Iron Horse. I'm a big Danny Lyon fan and there's some interesting stuff in here. The interviewer, David Snow, sounds like an idiot at times, carrying on about things being 'real' or not (actually if you read the post on the Greasy Kulture blog here, you'll see Snow chips in with comments, kinda bagging Danny Lyon actually. Could be truth to it, who knows? You definitely can tell when reading this that they are from two different worlds, and that Snow is looking for something he's not going to get from Lyon. It has a weird air to it. But yeah it's worth a read, there's insights into Lyon's practice here that I haven't found elsewhere, esp in relation to his college days and the Outlaws etc. I printed this and tried to read it. Don't! It's easier to read on screen... I ended up reading it in Photoshop!

Stuart's new bike

Holy shit. Stuart Geddes just bought this last week! It's a Norton P11, and I'm pretty jealous.