What Did You Do With Your Sidecar Today?

There is no sidecar riding here unless you have a Ural with studded snow tires. The temperature got up to 20 degrees so I went home this noon to try to start the diesel tractor to blow snow off the lane. If it gets any deeper I won't be able to get through with the 4X4 pickup truck. I added fuel deicer yesterday, changed fuel filters, left the engine heater plugged in, and charged the batteries. It still wouldn't fire up. Maybe we'll get a January thaw.

Stormy lousy weather, but a nice afternoon yesterday (on one side of the mountain). My son Thomas got yesterday his first (unlegal) rig pushing class in the woods on gravel and bad stones and a few 1 lane asphalt roads. Always on the mountain rim from rain to sun and back...He became sour, but would not admit as every young man...and could not believe it needs such a lot of force to get through horse tracks.
We discovered places in the neighbourhood we never had been to and others that we didn't recognize at all. in the last 15 years once beautiful pastures turned into urbanisation with partially the ugliest buildings you cannot imagine.

I noticed that still our Ural needs a reduction gear box for to handle safely our mountains where it was an easy game with the Jawa. those 130kg difference in weight do matter, specially with worn road tires.
Sven

PS: A GPS is not at all accurate in Mountain range. it marked our track into the officially unknown (final mark in the map had in deed been where the track Calle Charquito starts to be marked) at nearly a km south of where we went in deed, but had to return due to wet clay and worn tire thread. When we turned back it disconnected itself and lost about 20 more km.
http://es.wikiloc.com/wikiloc/view.do?id=8650040

rode Aberdeen, to check out the flooding and landslides, Olympia, Lacy and home.

Posts: 16

After an exasperating allignment process I took my RoadKing with CLE (chassis only) for my first test-flight; What a blast! Having never driven a rig I had no idea what to expect, of course I'd read up on operation in the Hough book. I took it slow to get the feel for the steering / balance. Seems like the allignment is pretty good, doesn't pull to one side or the other. Having no suspension, I noticed it does not like bumps or potholes though. I gradually brought it up to speed. I did 60 steady easy beans. By the end of my ride I'd hit 70 for a few seconds with no issues. I took it to a school parking lot to practice turning. I flew the car no problems! I could bring it up and set it down nice and smooth, hold it up indefinitely. I was laughing my a$$ off! I ended up nearly frost-bitten on my toes as the temps were in the mid 20s but it was well worth it. Can't wait for some warmer temps, I'm hooked! It was very intuitive for me, I thought my reactions would be counter to a sidecar, having ridden only solo for 35 years but I immediately got the feel for it and responded appropriately to it's gyrations. The hardest part was remembering to leave room for the hack on the right side!! Thanks for all the help from veteran members to get my rig mounted. Cheers

Peter Pan, was that last picture taken in Australia or just printed that way?

roadglider - 1/12/2015 12:47 PM
... It was very intuitive for me, I thought my reactions would be counter to a sidecar, having ridden only solo for 35 years but I immediately got the feel for it and responded appropriately to it's gyrations. The hardest part was remembering to leave room for the hack on the right side!!....

Excellent! In addition to the space on the right side, please don't counter-steer while your muscles, and brain, learn new driving techniques. We had a new sidecarist down here in our region do just that and run off the road to the left.

went for another hundred miler and took pictures

Weather was sunny and warmer. Rode 204 miles to calculate what my mpg are when cruising at 70-75...... aaaarrrggggh, 22.8. Good to know I have a 260 mile range with the Gold Wing before the walking starts. Have 6.5 gallons main tank plus 5 gallons in the auxiliary tank. Also learned that it takes 18 miles at cruising speed to transfer all the gas from the aux tank to the main tank. Have a couple of iron butt rides planned, so needed this info.

Brought home a Velorex 700 to marry to my 2002 Harley FXD today. It is summer transportation for my pooch and to keep me on the road for more of the year! 🙂

First time both pretty round dogs together in the tub. What a difference between the Jawa Velorex before and now the Ural sidecar. Compared the Ural is huge.
Our Labrador breed Negra was a good guide for our blind Golden Retriever Luke showing him where and how much to lean.
Afterwards there was a lot of slobber to clean out!
I guess the next time with a new stronger lash hook and out the gate up into the mountains will be a new experience for Luke and Negra together.
If the best of all wives doesn't want to go out there are passengers standing in a cue!
Who doesn't like soup, give him 2 plates...

Reardan Tom, wasn't that your way of thinking when Archie became your main passenger?
Best wishes to everybody.
Sven

Hi Sven,
Yep, when Barb wanted to quit the motorcycle, I got the first sidecar rig (Hal Thompson's Ural) to see if she'd like a sidecar. I didn't expect to. Well, her mind was made up but I was surprised at how much fun the rig was. And Archie took to it like it was the most fun thing we'd ever done together. There was no going back... Sold the Ural, added the Liberty to the Harley. Petey is my third sidecar sidekick and the adventure continues!!

Taking advantage of some nice weather a couple of weekends ago, Jena did some "static" training with Raskie, now 9 months old, in the sidecar while I was off visting at the new BMW/Indian dealership:

After which we took a ride out in the local countryside for lunch at the No Teeth Bar B-Q in Holly, Louisiana - which lived up to its name  (in this photo Raskie was already back in his travel kennel in the nose of the sidecar - hopefull he'll be ready to ride in seat by this summer):

And

On the way back home we routed thru Grand Cane, Louisiana, the home of Central School, which was a filming location for The Great Debaters with Denzel Washington:

This past weekend we met up with local sidecarist Hugh to ride down to visit with friends tailgating before a local Mardi Gras parade:

Not today, but on Saturday 02.14. I brought my daughter to the University, when at a red trafic light some "not so youngsters anymore" were filming something....suddenly a skateboarder came down from the sun roof to my left side, popped down from about 3,50 - 4 m height with his skate board on the middle of the side street, continued a few meter and stopped....
Damn it, although that guy must be totally crazzy, I pull my hat. (who knows how his knees and joints will look like in a few years?)
All in the vision of the buddy's smartphone and the 360 degree traffic camara.

Today my wife got a call, that all four of us are shown in a digital skateboard newspaper...
That goat bearded skater of undefinable age, Sophie, Kris and me...

Are we famous now on the cost of a crazzy atlete?
Sven :O

Went with Delma for her "last travel". She was so ill (half dead), that even travelling in SC couldnt make her tail waving.

Her first (and last) photo in rig, last year:

We trust Delma enjoyed her ride even if she couldn't waive her tail.

Yesterday was another unseasonbly warm, but wet, day here in Louisiana, so we hid under cover and freshened up the brake fluid in Mrs. SwampFox's Burgman tug: