| Author | Message | ||
     Bads1 |
Congrats to are very own Wes Orloff and his crew. 4 plus page write-up on motorcyclist mag this month. http://teammomba.com/ | ||
| Glitch |
I read that in Motorcyclist. I wish there was a video of that bike they built, going threw the curves. He said it was a hand full! | ||
| Bads1 |
Glitch I bet it was.LOL I remember the bike Eddie Lawson rode back in the early 80's and that thing was a handful to what was written about it. The bike that Wes and gang put together really kinda brought me back to it for some reason. | ||
| Glitch |
That Kawi green kinda sticks with ya... | ||
| Diablobrian |
Congratulations team Momba! That had to have been a rough challenge! You should be very proud of your accomplishment. | ||
| Hurricaneleah |
Thanks guys! the build attempt was a riot.....pretty much 3 straight days without sleep. Definitely some great memories. I have never met Mitch Boehm before and he turned out to be a super nice guy. The whole thing seems a bit surreal now....especially seeing it a magazine. The bike itself turned out pretty cool.....we could have used another 4 or 5 hours of tuning for sure. I got a chance to ride it in practice when Mitch was working through some paperwork. I'm lighter than mitch and we definitely have different riding styles (I'm not nearly as aggressive with the steering inputs as Mitch....they don't call him the butcher for nothing!). The bike actually worked pretty well for me...probably the biggest issue being the elsinore MX shocks which didn't have nearly enough damping. Forks and chassis were actually pretty decent. We will have the bike back out next season with some improvements (new rings, shocks, etc.....), would like to win one of the middleweight superbike races to put a bookend on the project. If anyones interested, we do have DVD's of the build available on the website (teammomba.com). A buddy of mine put it together and its pretty cool. All proceeds to the american cancer society. Thanks again for the interest and I hope to see you guys out there! Regards, Wes (supreme momba)  | ||
| Bads1 |
Wes whats the plans for the bike now that you have succeeded??? | ||
| Glitch |
Too cool! The Butcher  Way back when...I had a LTD440, cafe' style bars, and a Kerker 2 into 1 header, it's the first bike I had ever re-jetted. Memories... Can't wait to hear of how the bike evolves, keep us up to date. May just have to get with the 3%ers, and see if there's something similar we can do at Road Atlanta. The major snag will be the fight that ensues over who'll be the rider. What fun! | ||
| Smoke |
glitch, best bet to reduce the fight is some type of endurance race with multiple rider oppurtunities. wes, that was an awesome accomplishment for you and your crew. i really enjoyed reading about it. thanks, tim | ||
| Glitch |
Reduce the fight? That's half the fun! | ||
| Hurricaneleah |
Thanks Tim/Glitch/Dana! Dana, right now the bike is sitting in the shop just as it was built at Mid-Ohio. I did clear coat the paint just to preserve the bomb can paint job (it didn't react to gasoline very well). We recently acquired a donated 1983 GPz550 with a bent frame, so we are going to pull that engine and do another cylinder head, re-ring the bike and use the hotter GPz cams and bigger carbs from the '83. Hopefully get it running well and race it next year in some events, including Daytona. Its available to any of our team members to race or use for track days, so I think we will get some use out of it. the feedback from the project has been great. The funny thing is how many Kawasaki LTD550 fans there are out there! I would have never guessed that... Go Nicky! Wes | ||
| 99buellx1 |
What a great project, I was excited to read about it in Motorcyclist. Way to go! | ||
| Firemanjim |
I just finished the article at work yesterday and was suprised and excited to see Wes's name mentioned when I started reading(had not seen this thread at that time). What an absolute blast. Sounds kinda like the fun I had with Vik and Chop etal in the 24 Hours of Lemons race. |
