| Author | Message | ||
     Gearheaderiko |
(he's running)MT-75's, Stock sizes made for the Blast. The only matched set of Pirelli's that will fit. Some other fronts may fit, no others for the rear as yet known. | ||
| Mmelvis |
Results for the 2005 season CCS AM # 777 Amateur Lightweight F40 Class 11th place overall out of 20 riders Amateur Ultra Light Superbike 10th place overall out of 21 riders Final Overall Points - Florida AMATEUR 199th place overall out of 348 riders Last race at Homestead (12-4-05) results 4th out of 5 riders. Seems one of the bikes in my class either wrecked or did not finish | ||
| Ezblast |
Very nice! Thats actually a great first year - I've seen worse on a lot faster bikes - lol - great job there John! GT - JBOTDS! EZ  | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
Congrats on a good year. Its nice to see the B-last wasnt last after all! | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
For anybody that wants to build a Blast engined tuber Buell, there seems to be complete bikes up for sale regularly in the classifieds. (chop,chop,sad,sad) | ||
| Slaughter |
The Blast/Tuber hybrid is MAJOR surgery - the Blast/XB is almost a drop-in. I'd make dang sure of who I picked up a Blast/tuber from - there's a lot of hackers out there - though spare XB stuff isn't easy to come by. | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
You're right, it is easier said than done (but we do know those that have done it!). Actually putting an iron head Sportster engine in the tuber frame would be more fun. That would turn some heads! }(Thanks to James for feeding that obsession) | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
James racing the Blast December 2005  (Message edited by gearheaderiko on December 20, 2005) | ||
| Jprovo |
I GOT MY RACE LICENSE!!!!! | ||
| Ezblast |
Go Race! | ||
| Mmelvis |
Gearhead: Great PIC Jprovo: Congrats, go tear up the track (Message edited by mmelvis on December 20, 2005) | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
The posting doesnt do the picture justice. It was taken by the track photographer and its not often you can actually recognize who the rider is through the faceshield! If James is able to post it clearer, I'll delete mine. | ||
| Prior |
Provo, Awesome! Been since forever since I've given you a shout! Hopefully we'll get to hang again sometime soon, until then, keep tearing it up! | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
 Matty took 2nd in his class (on the 'Team James'Gearhead Blast!) shaving a second of last months lap time. He was beaten by the (0-500cc) points leader for the year, who crossed the finish line about 2 seconds ahead of him (and probably had 10+hp on him). Hoping to see some more Blasts out there again next year as at least 2 were missing from the field and more seem to be "in the works". | ||
| Jprovo |
I'll try and post a race report in the morning. James | ||
| Prior |
What was the other guy riding? What's the race Blast running for RWHP now, and what do you figure you can massage out of her? Second is awesome, a second off of the past month's lap time is frikin awesome! Keep up the good work! | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
The other guy was riding a Honda Ascot (500cc thumper).The field is usually Ascots and maybe Blasts. The RWHP last dyno measured was 31hp, but I dont consider that accurate as the previous dyno (6 months earlier) was at 33hp and the modifications done after that made a very noticeable improvement in power and performance. (the 2nd 31hp dyno was a 'rush job' mainly to dial in the A/F ratio). I think we can squeeze another 2 or 3 hp out of it in its present form.I just need someone willing to spend the time on the dyno with it. The engine is in a mild street tune. There's much more that can be done for racing. Matty took 1st October & November! | ||
| Slaughter |
You also gotta realize that the winner - Larry Cochran is riding an Ascot grenade. He'll have to split his cases once a year with a Sawzall after it lights off. The Blast is surprising that it's so competitive without huge engine mods (yeah, suspension sucks but hey, there are ways to deal with that) | ||
| Ezblast |
Posted a link in the Links to stuff you can't find here section - After Shocks - they will work a Blast Suspension for track days, and have aftermarket - heck - their Penski for the Blast is cheaper than the Works unit - they also modify stock setups for track day usage! http://www.aftershocks-suspension.com/ Worth checking out - Dianna really liked their work and I'm thinking of checking them out as well - as soon as I get by the Holiday crunch! - lol GT - JBOTDS! EZ | ||
| Mmelvis |
Pictures of the steering damper from http://www.pro-flo.com/proflo_steering_damper.htm mounted on a Blast.        | ||
| Ezblast |
Bravo! | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
Did you paint your wheels or are they just clean? Thanks for the pictures. | ||
| Mmelvis |
gearheaderiko: The rims are my spare set I got off ebay for $130 with a set of new tires on them about a year ago. When they arrived I saw the middle was painted white on the rims. Only the spokes and the very inside are white (the cast part of the rim that is not smooth). The rest of the rims are non-painted. Who ever did the work did a nice job. Makes keeping the inside of the rim easy to clean. I have had the tires changed a couple of times on the rims and no paint chipped off yet. Also have several thousand miles on this set of rims. The only reason I got another set of rims was so I could get new tires and keep riding, just switch out to my non-painted set. have a great day | ||
| Xgecko |
what did you do to attach to the frame? and more important what's the difference in feeling...would you do it if you didn't have to for racing. | ||
| Mmelvis |
Xgecko: To attach the back part of the damper to the frame I drilled a hole the size of the stud attached to the damper 6.5 inches from the bottom of the flat part on the left side of the frame. Put stud in hole and tighten bolt. One of the pictures above if you hold you mouse over it should have a little yellow description "Back mount 6.5 inches from bottom of flat edge". In the picture you can see my marker lines I made to make sure I was centered before I drilled. You do not notice that the damper is there on the lightest setting. If you turn it up a couple of setting you can feel it when you turn. If I were not racing I would not have done this work. | ||
| Jprovo |
My Roadracing Adventure Last month I decided to take the plunge and try roadracing… It was not nearly as straightforward as I thought it would be. I still have a lot to learn. See here for the whole story: http://www.badweatherbikers.com/cgibin/discus/show.cgi?tpc=20164&post=550056#POS T550056 Two weeks after new racers school, I took in a track day at Willow Springs put on by the fine people at TrackDAZ It was a decent time, and I got some serious track time in, but I really should have asked for help from the staff sooner. I had about 7 sessions on the track with about 8 laps per session. I knew I was slow, so I ran in the street group. I used the day to familiarize myself with the track. I wasn’t going terribly fast, just working on my lines. Nearing the end of the day, I had had chopped more than two seconds off my previous lap time from a 2:14.25 to a 2:12.06. I was getting smoother, and starting to feel more confident in turn 8, but turn 1 and the 3-4-5 section were still very difficult. Part of my difficulty is that having a 40 mph deficit on the straight really makes it tough to judge entry speeds into a turn. You can’t look around at your competitors because; the turn is a whole different ballgame to them. At the end of the day, I had Gil Ramos from Track DAZ (I still hate the name!) follow me around the track, and tow me around for a lap or two… He had some good pointers, but I really didn’t have time to apply them. There was only one session left in the day, and the sun was making it difficult to see in turn two. After the Trackday, I had two weeks to think about the track, remember what I had learned in new racers school, and the advice from Gil Ramos before the next race weekend and new racers school on the 16th. It was a long two weeks. I spent the second week of December finding out if I could run the practice on the 16th before the next NRS. I could if I ran in the sport riders (street) group, and I took the number plates off the bike. I took a vacation day and arranged to sleep at Steve Brefka’s place for the weekend. On the 11th, Erik and I installed a spring pre-load spacer in the rear shock, changed fork oil, re-checked sag, and gave the bike a good once over. Sag numbers are right on the money now, but the suspension could still use some fine adjustment. On the 16th, Steve Brefka and I headed out to the track. It was colder than heck at the track. The night before the temperature had got down to 17 degrees. Steve and I had a heck of a time even starting our bikes. I killed that battery on the bike cranking it over, and had to use Steve’s generator to get it to light off. After going to tech, I realized that they had already called the first session and no one had gone out on the track. It was just too freaking cold… By the third session, five people went out on the track. One guy went out in the fourth session. No one went out in the fifth session, Sportrider A group, and I was the seventh person out on the track, and the only guy in the Sportrider B group for the first session. It was COLD out there, They had me do two laps under waving yellow just to warm my tires up before I tried to get a lean on. I was taking it easy, but by the end of the session I had turned a 2:14, matching my best time during NRS the month before. I decided that I would spend the day working on two areas of the track, turns 8 and 9, and raising entry speed into turn 1. Thad Wolf, the NRS instructor was out on the track, and I asked him to give me a hand. Thad worked with me in the 5th session, and we managed to get my lap time down to 2:06.97, and I ran a few laps in the 2:07 range. By the end of the day, I was tired and happy. I had significantly dropped my lap times by over 5 seconds. The next day was new racers school. I was uncertain if I could get my times below the Magic 2:00 mark, but I was going to do my best to get there. I also figured that with people running 2:02 best lap times in 500 singles races, I only needed to get close to the 2:00 mark to get my license. On the first session out, my best lap was a 2:06.8, so I was still making progress… During the next session, Larry Cochran fired up his Honda Ascott, and showed me around the track. We managed to get my times down to 2:03.38, and Larry had some good pointers for me. I was stoked! I had chopped another 3.5 seconds off my best lap time from the previous day! On the next session out, Larry worked with me again. I used his advice, and managed to chop another second off my lap time! I had now run a 2:02.34!!! The last session out was kind of a test for myself. Larry went off to help out some other riders, and I decided to put my head down and apply what I had learned. My best lap of the day came at the end of the session when I ran a 2:02.27. I had chopped more than 4 ½ seconds off my previous day’s lap times!! I was ecstatic, I was even happier when I was handed my Novice race license. What a day! My first “Race” was on Sunday. When we got to the track on Sunday, it had just started sprinkling, and by the time I had gotten the bike started, the first practice session had passed. At this point, I was uncertain if I should go out in the rain for practice. My first thought was screw it, my race is 6 hours from now. After I did some thinking, I figured that it was not a bad idea to get exposure to a wet track before I actually have to race on it! It was SLIPPERY out there. Not just a little Slippery, really slippery. At least I knew what to expect if it continued to rain throughout the day, and I would also pick up a few finishing positions from slick-shod GP bikes pulling out. After the practice session, the weather started clearing up, and things started to look good for the race. After SIX HOURS of nervous waiting, I finally got to go out on the track and race. 8 competitors gridded up for the race, and I was a little disappointed that I didn’t see any 500cc singles gridded up. I think I saw 2 250 GP bikes, two 250 Aprilias, an EX500, a 125GP bike and one other bike that could have been a FZR400. I was gridded in position 5, and knew that at the start, my little thumper had the torque to take some of the two strokes. At the start, I got a decent jump, but by turn 3, even the 125 had gotten around me. I don’t know if it was the cold, or the lack of competition, but my heart was just not in it, and it took to the start of lap 3 for me to get my head down and start concentrating. It was like I finally realized that I wasn’t out there for another practice session, and I had better start getting to work. By the time I finished lap 3, I thought “Cool! I might not get lapped this race!” as soon as I had that thought, the two 250 GP bikes came by me. They were running laps in the 1:38-1:39 range. My best lap was a 2:04.79, quite a bit off my previous best, but considering the cold track conditions and my mental state, not too bad. I’m pleased with finishing my first race. The results are understandable considering even the little 125 outgunned me. FYI, The RS125 weighs around 160 lbs and makes about 40 HP. So the bike had a 5 HP and 200 lb advantage! I’m looking forward to next month, maybe we can get some other 500 thumper riders in 500 novice! James | ||
| Ezblast |
Beautifull - now thats racing! How did the preload spring spacer work for ya - I did aluminum ones on my MG racer a long time ago - did you still get enough travel for the track? GT - JBOTDS! EZ | ||
| Jprovo |
The aluminum preload spacer seems to work just fine. Suspension travel does not seem to be affected, there is still a tom more room to shim before coil binding on the spring becomes an issue. James | ||
| Gearheaderiko |
The big problem with adding extra preload is there isnt enough dampening to handle it. On the street, stiffening it up makes it handle better, until (if) you really get some speed. Looking at it from a different perspective, adding preload means you've got more energy to control.It feels stiffer, but you've just added more 'spring' to it and if you cant adjust the dampening, the wheel tends to bounce more (like having bad shocks). At this point we've just experimented with different fork oils to handle the extra preload, but that cant be done (yet) with the rear. So there's been big improvement so far with new problems to solve. Sure, we could just go out and buy a WP or Penske rear shock and revalve and re spring the front end. The point is the Blast is a cheap,slow bike to start with. Spending $1000 to re work the suspension would be a waste when perhaps $50 is all that may be needed to obtain the required performance gains.It would suck to go out there with a $10,000 Blast and get beaten by someone who just threw rearsets and an exhaust on a used $2500 P3.Budget minded, sensible progress (with a little obsession). (Message edited by gearheaderiko on December 25, 2005) | ||
| Sfmc_x1 |
Awesome job James. I remember getting my novice license for the AFM a couple years back on an EX500, I almost didn't get because my motor wasnt running at 100%, I had to borrow my buddies bike and sign a contract in blood that I woudn't throw it away in a turn. In the end the instructor agreed that my slowness was a result of a bad engine and not its rider, but backhandedly commented that i shouldnt have brought a porley running bike to a NRS. but hey, I got a question for Matty and the others racing the Blast. What kind of lap times are they running at WSMC, and have they made it up to any of the tracks up north(buttonwillow/sears/thunderhill) and what kind of times are they running there? |
