Lee Hart's Web Site

Tuesday, 1/20/1998

Tuesday went a bit smoother. I packed my bike a little better; yesterday it
was a lot heavier on the right, more than usual (the K12 has the crankshaft and shaft drive all on the right side; this makes the bike heavier on the right. The left saddlebag is smaller than the right due to the large upswept exhaust. This exacerbates the problem. The stock rear wheel is offset 4.5 mm to the right to help this problem. Many K12 riders unknowingly ride slightly tilted to the left to compensate.) Today it was still a little heavy on the right, but closer to typical for a K12. It's tough to pack it such that it balances left to right, and when I put on the 5.5" wheel w/ 180ZR17 tire the problem may get worse. That wheel is not offset to the right side.

I put in ~640 miles in less than 12 hours on US 101. I'm currently in Sunnyvale, crashing at the house of fellow WetLeatherites Angela Barkes and Tom Dietrich. Aside from gas I only stopped once (to eat). I could have ridden for another hour or two but the thousand mile days are still a bit beyond me, at least as long as I don't ride on interstate slab. Even there I think I'd need a throttle lock.

Whoever invented the squeegee that fits over a gloved finger deserves a patent. That's just the ticket for clearing my faceshield when there's a bunch of junk kicked up from trucks on damp roads. Again the heated jacket liner was very valuable. On some of the higher roads (high being relative, ~2000 feet according to my GPS) after dark my hands and feet became a little chilled but I could maintain comfort by just cranking up the control. I think I would have turned back by now if I had to put on enough layers to stay warm.

Fortunately I saw no ice, and unlike yesterday I didn't even see remnants of snow on the side of the road.

Riding US 101 through San Francisco felt like a real-life version of San Francisco Rush. US-101 seems to follow a semi-random path over the hills and around poorly marked corners