Dalles Dual Sport

Orv and I trucked the KLXs over to the Dalles in the Columbia Gorge to do some dual sport riding with Dave B.  Dave used to live in Portland and at one time belonged to the same motorcycle club as Orv (Lobos, MC), where they met and became long time friends.  Here's Dave:

Dave is pointing to a road I had asked him to lead us on.  I had seen a video of it on some website and it looked pretty interesting.  Here you can see it heading down toward the river:

This is an old road that led to a bridge that used to cross the Deshutes river below.  There was no toll on the bridge so it was called Freebridge Road, or maybe it was called Rattlesnake Grade, I forget which.  Anyway, there was another bridge not too far away that did charge a toll, and Dave said that one day the free bridge mysteriously blew up. 

The road is now barely passable by 4WD vehicles and motorcycles because it is narrow, rocky and rutted.  I made the following video on our ride back up the road.  It seemed a lot more gnarly than how it looks in the video.  I guess the rocks and ruts don't show up so well, or else my definition of gnarly is pretty lame. 

After the Freebridge road we explored a lot of ranch land that apparently had a lot higher population at some time in the past.  Dave showed us a couple of abandoned school houses out in the middle of nowhere.  Here is one:

And here is another one:

Dave has studied the history of the area and said the kids only went to school four hours per day because they had so far to travel to get to the school, and it was usually on horseback.  It had to have been some cold windy rides during the winter in this windswept country.  The early pioneers valued  education.   Usually one of the first buildings they erected (after saloons) throughout the west was a school and a church. 

But they also had fun.  Dave knew where there was an old dance hall so we went by there.  Like everything else, it seemed to be out in the middle of vast open country with no other buildings around.:



There was a stage:

And a sort of kitchen in the basement:

And we even found the remnants of an old piano:

I bet there were some high times in that old place.  I figured the building was from the early 20th century, but we found some rigid electrical conduit with junction boxes pretty similar to what we use now.  I don't know when that began to be used, but maybe in the 50's. 

We rode almost exactly 100 miles and I have no idea where we went as I was just following Dave and Orv, but it was perfect dual sport exploring on roads that are seldom traveled.  Just what I hoped to do when I bought the KLX. 

Snow Check

I did a little solo ride on the KLX today to see where the snow level is in the local mountains.  I need to be able to get over some passes that are at least 4,000 feet high.  At 3500 feet I ran into this:

I think I could have got around that on the left, but just a little way up the road was this:

No getting around that.  Looks like it is going to be sometime in July again, like last year, before we get over the mountains.

Mustang When New

Brian found a couple of pictures of the Mustang when we (the Mustang and I) were relatively new to the world.  The first one shows the car outside of our apartment in Corona, and the car had to be really new because we bought a house within the first year after we moved to California.  It's significant that a new college graduate could afford to buy a new car and a house (making payments, of course) within a year of getting a job.  I don't think that is possible under the present economy.  The Mustang cost $2850 as I remember, and the house was only $19,500.  But then, my starting salary was less that $8,000 per year. 

This next picture was taken at our house in Corona and shows me with our new German Shepard puppy "Bonnie".  That dog used to love going places in the car, especially if it was up in the mountains.  She would lay between the front seats on the transmission tunnel and get all excited as we climbed higher into the mountains. 

Once we had children, though, the dog became pretty low priority, which is  typical, I guess. 

Mustang; The Dash Is Gutted

Brian and Colin made it down yesterday for a joint attack on the Mustang.  After some final cleanup of the carpet and pad under the dash, we started taking out the instrumentation, wind shield wiper mechanism, heater, glove box, and radio.  First, though, was getting the padding material off of the padded dash.  As I recall, the padded dash that we take for granted now was a relatively new saftey feature in the early 60s.  There were lap seat belts in the car, but passengers were still smacking their faces on the dash in an accident.  Obviously, the colapsable, padded steering wheel was yet to come.    here's a shot of Brian scraping the padding off the dash:

I've always disliked working behind the dash on a car.  It always seems to involve working in a cramped, dark space with poor access to what you are working on, and all the time having to contort your body into uncomfortable positions.  And it gets worse when you get older.  Fortunately, Brian did most of that work.  What I was working on was trying to get the steering wheel off.  According to the service manual, it requires a special tool, a steering wheel puller, and I still had one from when I owned the car and needed to take the steering wheel off to fix the turn signals.  The problem was, there was a broken-off bolt in one of the holes that the steering wheel puller bolts into.  I tried a couple of  moves to get this broken bolt out......vice grips on the small part protruding from the hole, and then heat plus vice grips, and finally, the Hail Mary last ditch effort of an Easy Out.  Nothing worked. 

Meanwhile, Brian was also doing some more clean-up on the floor pan; removing the caulking that seals seams from leaks.  It was in this process that he discovered the first bit of rust that looked like it might be serious enough to require some welding.  The worst of it was on the passenger side floor. 

Here is Brian scraping some of the caulk from the trunk area:

Before we took a break for dinner, the dash area looked like this:

After dinner, Steve, the guy who is going to get the car sandblasted and then do the paint and body work, came over to consult with us about what still needed to be done and who was going to do what.  We ended up talking about this and that for a couple of hours, but during that time I told him about my problem getting the steering wheel off.  He suggested tapping on the steering shaft with a hammer and then whacking the steering wheel with your hand from the side.  He tried it, but without the hammer tapping phase, and it didn't come off. 

Brian and Colin had to leave early today to get to one of Brendan's baseball games back up in Tacoma, so we really didn't get any work done today.  After they left, though, I thought I might as well try some more on the steering wheel.  I thought that maybe I could completely drill out the broken bolt and re-tap the hole to accept another bolt.  I got my set of taps and dies out and started to get to work.......with dred, because it meant a lot of work and not a great chance of success.  Before I got started, I thought just for the hell of it, to give Steve's suggestion one more try, but with the hammer tapping step included.  I got one of my old motorcycle swing arm bolts that I use for a drift and gave it a few hearty taps.  Then a healthy whack with my hand on the side of the steering wheel and.........oh my, I think I felt it loosen.  Another whack with my hand and sure enough, it came right off.  Big, big sigh of relief.  Nothing beats expert advice, especially when its free.  So here she is as of this morning:

Meanwhile we have generated two full 30 gal trash cans of discarded "stuff":

This is probably all the work that is going to be done until early July when Brian plans to come down for a couple of days and then we will turn the car over to Steve.  Still needing to be done is window removal on the passenger side, some under-dash stuff (wires, clutch and brake pedal brackets, etc.), door handles and locks, and then pulling the engine and transmission. 

Are we having fun yet?

Rainy Day Mustang

The past two days have been rainy, so I did a bit of work on the Mustang.  I had a couple of objectives; one was to figure out why the driver's side door didn't latch, and the other was to figure out how to remove the windows on the driver's side.  Then I can show Brian how to do the other side and we don't waste as much time figuring it out when he is here.  I also had some wiring to remove in the rear. 

I have been bragging about how good the shop manual is for the car as I have used it in the past to do engine and clutch work and it was very detailed and easy to follow.  However, I discovered that when it comes to body work, the manual is not so hot.  I think the problem is that it covers too many models with different bodies, but the same engine and transmission, so the engine instruction can be detailed, but it would be too much work to included such detail on the body of every model.  So I was pretty much on my own in figuring out how to work on the doors and windows. 

I did eventually get the driver's side door window, vent window and rear quarter window removed.  Then I could get a good look at how the door latch worked.  I discovered the problem was in the button on the door handle that you push to open the door.  The two pictures below show the inside of the door where this button is connected to a rod that goes to the latch:

Notice the difference in the position of the gold-colored triangle shaped piece in the two pictures, and how the end of the rod is higher in the second picture.  When you push on the door button, a short rod comes into the door interior and pushes on the bottom of the triangle.  You can see this rod and the contact point with the triangle hidden just behind the vertical rod to the latch.  The push button thus changes the horizontal motion of pushing  the button to vertical pull on the latch rod.  The problem with the door was that the button was stuck in the position of the second photo, so that the door was always unlatched.  A little WD 40 on the push button mechanism freed it up and the door works perfectly now.  However, we will have to disconnect the door latch rod and remove the door handle before we turn the car over to the paint and body guy. 

I also removed some wiring for the tail lights and fuel gauge, and found it easier to work from inside the car.  Carolyn thought it looked pretty funny and took these pictures:

Here are a couple of pictures of the current state of the interior:

I've never taken a car apart this much before and sometimes it scares the crap out of me when I think about all the work that needs to be done.  I have to remind myself that it's not really my project, but Brian's, and we have lots of time and there are lot of sources of information and parts.  And, it was a good way to stay occupied on a rainy day. 

The Riding Season is ON!

We have had a stretch of summer-like weather; not typical May, and certainly not like last year where we didn't have an 80 degree day until June.  I have been taking advantage of it and have had three rides in the past week.  The first was a road ride with Ross and Orv.  We made a 150 or so mile ride down the Columbia Gorge and then up the Wind River Highway over Old Man Pass and down to Cougar.  Orv rode his Suzuki SV 650 instead of his usual Triumph Tiger.  Funny history with that SV 650.  Orv had owned it for awhile and sold it to Ross, and had just recently bought it back from him.  Like getting your old girlfriend back, eh?

Here is a video I made on the twisty part heading for the pass.  The road was just opened a week or so ago and there was still deep snow alongside the road at the top. 

The next ride was a dual sport ride through the Yacolt Burn State Forest over to Washugal.  The only picture I took on this ride was of Ross with his "new" bike.  It is actually his last dirt bike, a Honda CRF 250X that he has converted to street legal status.  This is the first year that Washington has allowed off road motorcycles to be converted over to street legal status.  It's a pretty involved process and the conversion has to meet strict requirements and pass a couple of inspections, but it's an unusual and welcome step for any state to make.  The ride was basically a test run to see how the bike works as a dual sport that can be ridden on the highway.  I think the conclusion that Ross came to was that it needed to be geared higher.  It was also a mileage check, and he is getting more than 50 mpg, which is pretty good.

The third ride of the week was a two-day ride to Eastern Oregon with Ross, Mike, and Orv.  I haven't said much about "Big Mike" yet, but I have been riding with him quite a bit in the last couple of years and we have done a couple of multi-day rides that have been in the blog earlier.  Mike took over my job that I had with the Jones Creek Trailriders club, which was dealing with the Washington Department of Natural Resources........a frustrating and difficult job that he is doing much better than I did.  Mike is also a hell of a mechanic and maintains all the club's trail maintenance equipment.  The bike he rides is an 80's-era Yamaha that had a bad transmission when he bought it, so he and Ross flipped it upside down one day and took the bottom off the engine and fixed the trans.  All in a normal day's work for Mike.  He is still a working stiff, though, so he has to make time for rides on days off or vacation.  Mike has a custom set of leathers that probably cost as much as his motorcycle, and the back of his jacket has an interesting logo:

When I first saw it, I thought Mike must be a member of Sarah Palin's "Tea Party", but that's not quite the case.  Maybe Mike can explain it better than me in the comments. 

Central and Eastern Oregon has some amazing scenery and roads, and they welcome bikers over there because we stay in their towns and spend money.  One of our favorite roads is the one between the towns of Shaniko and Antelope, and here is a video of us going down that road.  Note the mistake I made when I got a little too close to Ross, who was the rider in front of me. 

Some of the scenery along the way

We stayed overnight in the town of Long Creek.  There was one motel, one restaurant, and one gas station........all we needed.  Here's the motel , i.e. "Lodge":

 It had huge rooms, and they were clean and cheap, with hot showers.......again, all we needed. 

The town is at the intersection of two highways, with a stop light, and that's about it.  At 7 pm I took a walk in all four directions from the intersection and only saw one person outside, and only two cars.  Every house and mobile home, though, no matter how poor looking, had it's satellite TV dish.  So that is their entertainment.  On the positive side, you don't see signs like this in San Francisco:

The town also seemed to have a bit of religious fervor to it:

The restaurant opened just for us in the morning and served blueberry pancakes with bacon for $3.95, and it was good. 

On the way back through the eastern side of the Gorge, we came upon fields of California poppies.  It reminded me of some years in Southern California when there was enough rainfall to make acres and acres of these flowers on the hillsides. 

The two-day ride was over 600 miles, with great roads, good weather, and good friends........all that I need. 

Mustang Update

Brian came down last weekend and we spent another day disassembling the Mustang.  One of the surprise discoveries was that the top of the gas tank doubles as the bottom of the trunk.  I recall that there were some problems and lawsuits back in the 70's (especially with Pintos) due to gas tanks exploding and burning passengers when there were rear-end collisions.  This shared trunk floor might have been partly the cause as there would have been no "firewall" between the gas tank and the passenger compartment.  The rear seat certainly would not have done the job. 

Gas tank removed from trunk

We found some mis-alignment of the front body work due to a minor bump and decided to replace some panels and a support bracket.  Cars bumpers now have to survive a 5mph collision with no damage, and it was bumpers like the Mustang had that caused rules like this to be passed.  They were more for appearance than protection. 

More engine parts have been removed:

The pile of removed parts is growing:

At the end of the day; starting to look a bit like a hulk:


We have only two more days when Brian will be able to come down to work on the car before we turn it over to the body/paint shop, and there is still a lot to do.