Ishrub
That's my name ....built like a truck
- Joined
- Feb 18, 2016
- Messages
- 8,851
- Location
- Duffy, Canberra, ACT, AUSTRALIA
- Ride
- 2x2010 ABS Roadsters, Sprint ST 1050 ABS, 3x250s
Just a few LOL, I owned:
1973 XL250 (first bike); 1980 Yamaha XS850 (got my licence after doing a figure 8 in the parking lot); 1984 BMW K100RT (that had taken me to Alice Springs, Ayers Rock, Broome, Derby and back via the Gibb River Rd, Tunnel Ck and Wydham in the Kimberleys WA when most roads from NT to Derby were still corrugated dirt); Kawasaki GT750; Yamaha IT470; 1986 Yamaha FJ1100 (toured Townsville/ Cairns/ Cooktown); 1986 Yamaha XT600 Tenere; 1987 Yamaha FZ750 (blasted around Tasmania); 1984 Suzuki GSX1100; 1980 Suzuki GSX1100 sidecar outfit; 1982 Suzuki GS1100GK shaft tourer; 1981 Suzuki GS1000 sidecar outfi; and 1986 Motoguzzi Lemans 1000 before the 1978 BMW R100RS sidecar and 2006 Triumph Sprint 1050 ABS I still have today.
I wrote off the 1984 BMW K100RT in 1985 after a NSW registered 1972 Landrover 4x4 driven by a 72yr old gent towing a 3 axle caravan blocked the Mary River bridge near the Bark Hut by driving up the embankment when I was crossing at 140kmh. The bike went in alongside the passenger cabin and hit their front axle snapping off the forks and sent me about 80 metres through the air to land in some elephant grass on the embankment. The bike hit a gum tree about 15 feet up and disintegrated. A mate worked at a panel shop where the Landie went and their chassis was twisted sideways 7" and ripped their front wheel of the hub. Snapped and punched my arm through my jacket, 10 months off work and a few bone grafts etc. By then it had about 12,000km on it but the good news was the speedo fuel warning lights lens had fallen out and had just been replaced under warranty with a complete new instrument cluster showing less than 1000km. Full purchase price paid out by their insurers.
The 1981 Suzuki GS1000 sidecar went into the S shaped Darwin Bagot Rd overpass wall at 100kmh when the side car mounts snapped. The outfit with car tyres front and rear was completely untouched but the 1.5" solid bar leading link with laced VW car wheel rim to a Suzuki disc hub was completely destroyed but saved me from flipping over the overpass wall as the leading link kept levering the outfit back down. Only got a tiny scratch on my wrist when the bikini screen cracked and flexed but what a ride up the wall to the top of the overpass that was! The front end was engineered and cost more to replace than the bike was worth so insurance company paid pout for a write off.
A few years earlier I high sided the FZ750 on the way home from Tasmania near Pinaroo on the Vic/SA border at 140 kmh on some wet/dry sweepers after crossing the Hay Plain from Canberra that morning. The new Pirelli Phantoms I had fitted in Canberra had not had a chance to scrub in the sides on the 800km that day. I still got to Adelaide that evening riding for a few hours with one arm as luckily the throttle grip had sort of jammed like a cruise control.
I was also a volunteer rider training instructor for a few years in the Northern Territory (NT) before my guru Tony Cadet-James who worked for the Govt. Motor Vehicle Registry as a licensing inspector had his programme accepted to become the NT Govt. Rider Training scheme M.E.T.A.L. in the late 1980's ( Motorcycle Education Training And Licensing METAL - Department of Transport - NT Government - Australia ). Tony started off as a dyslectic year 7 elementary school educated sugar cane cutter in North Queensland when they still cut cane by hand with a machete and later obtained a PhD)
The NT Govt funded and built a dedicated centre with paved roads, gardens and infrastructure which still exists today. We inherited the old Police BMW R100RT's and later K100RT's after surviving for years with sponsorship by the local Yamaha/BMW Dealer Pitman's with new SR185 Yamahas and even older early 1970's Honda XL100's 4 strokes and access to a local Catholic College grounds on weekends to run the courses.
