47 and slipping

I'm back! well it looks that way anyway. I topped off 3 days ago and have made 3 rides to the lake and back down my favorite set of twisties. Spicewood, City Park, Bullock and Lime Creek Roads. This 4'fer contiguous are panamount to a run down the dragon (Tennessee) for those that know. About 40 miles each way. When I get to the end, I wheel it around and run it backwards. the road, not the bike. sheesh!
I counted one time, years ago.. ~200 switch back benders, back to back. plenty of hairpins. posted 15mph. many well below 30, but 40 is average speed. So this whole thing can be done in 3rd gear. its hard to stay out of 4th when the road opens up and straightens out. but its best to just hang back because a whole 'nuther set of sweepers are coming up fast.
Ok, well the point is that I didn't burn through this whole tank... yet. I just put the bike up wet at 220 miles and she had just clicked over to 2 bars on the fuel thingy.. So I am anticipating 250 before its time to pay the piper and top her off. again! she always drinks 'zactly 5gals. I carry, put a small chunk of 2x4 under the side stand so she is mostly upright. and I top her with burps to get all the air out of the top of the tank. Always same same 5gal /250 smiles. 50 per. So the.. ahem, good stuff, ahem 93 octane seems to make a difference. I will keep you informed of any changes or improvements. if that is possible. ponchout

Geepers said:

Have never bothered working out mpg on any car or bike I've owned. . Never even think about it to be honest.

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it comes in handy when you do a lot of riding in the outback.. whatever are your habits good or poor, they will save your bacon or have it for lunch.


I tend to ride places where fuel is not always guaranteed at the few dots on that map. So its good to know I can squeak a few miles out of these beast and just how many I can squeak out.
for example, last Sept. I rode the big chief 10 days north west into the mountains. no particular set destination or route, just NxW, mountains and no rain. those where my ride parameters.
on the way back, I had planned to take a short cut across the NewMexico and Texas panhandle. early start, breakfast, fuel, on the road, mind wandering about stuff, an hour later I realized I missed my turn off. No Way am I going back an hour. lets see what the map says and my gps. Well looky here there are paved ranch roads thru NM and north Tex that kinda go where I'm headed. So off I go down some lonely uninhabited road in the desert looking for a crossroad that will take me home. If you have never seen early morning fog in the high plateau desert , you have not really gotten out of your lazy boy chair much at all. It is really pretty and spooky. where are all the cows? this is suppose to be ranch country? I did manage to not miss that not well marked road sign. but I spent the next 4 hours wandering thru absolutely gorgeous high desert, eventually I did find them cows. I went thru the only 3 little towns on that road and they all had exactly 1 broken closed gas station and 1 open functioning bar, not a soul in site... 250 miles later, I coasted on fumes into a town Dalhart Tx and topped off 5.5 gals, which is ALL that this bike holds. So it is good to know if your horse is gonna get you where it is you think your suppose to be. rest easy. ponchout

gr8bond007 said:

That is an awesome route to ride...my 93 year old father lives in Llano and I enjoy riding 1431 from Cedar Park to Marble Falls then 71w on to Llano. On the Route back I enjoy 71e to Round Mountain Cut Off on to Hwy 281 to Johnson City then take back roads to Driftwood/Wimberly area and on to San Marcos... Lots of twist and turns in the hill country area.

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007, lots of twisties in them back canyon roads. I use to ride them often. less so now with my 2 little anchors. Ever day it is ez to ride 100-200 smiles of what the Zip-Splats call technical (them are those blurry kids in leather space suits- 'cause that is the noise they make just prior to termination) , I just call em the benders. here in the Tx hills, we never run out of roads and places to go. The weather is actually better in the winter, 'cept all this rain more recently. dam them climate changers. pretty soon this place is gonna be nothing but lakes and green hills full of trees and other small forest critters buggering up my roads. We already have a deer over population problem because we've hunted out all the predators and these things just breed like rabbits. I think we should re introduce bears and mt lions back to Tx were once plentiful. That would help reduce the surplus Californians excess we have somehow have accumulated. a foreign specie of parasite fleeing their overtaxed dog and bringing the same stupid ideas here that destroyed their once pristine playland, currently overrun and become 3rd whirl schittholers..