700 Miles
 

Or That's Too Long On A Ural.

Took the Ural over Labor Day Weekend to visit my Dad in Cameron, WI. Not many pics because Saturday was an icky day. Pretty much all day.

I left home about 5:15 am Saturday morning. Figured on it being cool, so I threw my rain jacket over my armor and hit the road. I didn't figure on it being COLD and FOGGY. Made the first stop at Country Donuts in Crystal Lake, IL for coffee and a couple of French Donuts(my fav). Wolfed down the first one and stuck the other in the tank bag. Put the coffee in the cup holder and took off.

Hit Woodstock and grab the coffee cup at a stop light. Go to put it back in the cup holder and drop it.:doh: Turn on the hand warmers. (C'mon, it's Sept 2nd)

Sun comes up around Darien, WI and it has some warmth in it. Decide to turn off the hand warmers and find out that they were never on. Forgot that I have to place my finger behind the switch and press the button with my thumb to turn it on. Turn them on medium for a few minutes. Head north on WI89 to Whitewater and decide to run straight up to Eau Claire on US12 instead of the route I have mapped out.

Sun is up and it's starting to get nice out. First gas stop is in Madison, WI. Get another coffee and inhale the second donut. Swap out clear glasses for sun glasses. Get to Wisconsin Dells around 8:30 and it's dead. Breeze through town. Run through Lyndon Station, Mauston, and New Lisbon and think about stopping to eat, but I don't. A few miles outside of New Lisbon, cloud cover is increasing and it's quite dark ahead of me. Get to Camp Douglas as the clouds open up. It starts coming down in buckets as I hit my second gas stop.

By the time I'm ready to go, the rain lets up a bit. I get on the bike and see my untouched coffee.:doh: Hit the road and the sky opens up again. I pull into a wayside and throw on my rain gear. Tomah, Millston, Black River Falls, Humbird, Fairchild, Augusta, and Fall Creek. Rain, no rain, rain, no rain. Get gas again in Fall Creek.

I usually get gas at the BP but there was some 'Police Action' there, so I opted for the 66 station. Had a little UDF action there while getting gas. Take off. Towards Eau Claire, it starts to get hilly. Suddenly, I have no power for said hills. Also notice that the left cylinder is running much hotter than the right one. Only seems to be a problem in the hills, not the flats. There is still a pretty good gap in temp but I slog on.

Get through Eau Claire, Chippewa Falls, and Bloomer. I'm also hurting in places I forgot I had because it still hasn't hit 60F and both my hands and feet are wet and cold.

I get through New Auburn and my windshield starts shaking. "Aw, dammit. What fresh hell is this?" The left side mount has broken. Arrgh! Only twenty miles left, press on regardless.

Get to Dads' and park the beast in the garage. Ride with Dad in his truck to my brothers place, snooze there and back. In bed by 6:30 pm.

Check out the problems Sunday morning between projects my Dad has for me. The broken mount is five minutes prep and 45 seconds of mig welding. Spot of paint and that's fixed.

Pull the plugs. Left one is fine, right one is sooty. Problem is on that side. Clean and regap the plug. Put the plug back and notice the pipe from the air cleaner to the carb is disconnected. So, I'm thinking I sucked in some crud and it hung up the needle. Pull the carb apart and clean everything. The pipe is basically a radiator hose, is pretty beat up, and has a through cut in it. Some RTV fixed that and a credit card ordered two new ones.;) Take it for a short ride and it's all good.

This morning, after the first fill up, things fell into place. Think I must have gotten some crappy gas in Fall Creek. The bike ran great all the way home. CHT never exceeded 400F and and there was never more than 50F between them. Saw up to 28 mpg. Don't hurt. Much. So uneventful that, save for the pics, I'm done.

Mileage when I left Dads' this morning. Ended up with 1343 when I got home.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4437/...f2abfe807f.jpg

At the Wisconsin Veterans Memorial
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4391/...af5983cf5c.jpg

Splat. I felt that one.
https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4338/...9a37142847.jpg

As it's said, quite the adventure. :clap:

UDF action?

A little in Fall Creek while gassing up.

Two big ones on Sunday. As I'm pulling out for the test run, I end up behind the guy that lives across from Dad. He spots me in his mirror and pulls over at the next stop sign. We have a 10 minute BS session about the bike. Never saw another car that whole time.

Second one is with the same guy. He stops by and asks if he can bring his wife's grandfather over to see the bike. Grandpa is in a wheel chair, so I brought the bike to him. Turns out that Grandpa was a Wehrmacht grunt in North Africa and knew the BMW R71 and the R75. He had this big grin when I rolled in. So, as I'm pushing his wheel chair around the bike and answering his questions and he's answering mine, his granddaughter asks him if he'd want to go for a ride in the side car. He said, "Hell no. I spent enough time in one of those". :lol: I think I was there for almost an hour.

A couple on Sunday. I rode it over to where my Dad has coffee in the morning with his buddies so they could see it. That took a few minutes. The other was at the Culver's in Sauk City, WI, where I stopped for lunch. Guy was kind of a smartass and wanted to know how I was going to get it of the parking space. Dinner plates for eyes when I backed out.:D

I'm getting a sense of what it means, but I still can't figure out what it stands for.

Ural Delay Factor. See below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFIr8BZCaLk

Cheesy, where did you get that digital cluster? I have serious Ural envy right now!! I'm on the stock speedo that is more of an educated guess than a fair representation of forward movement.

It's the ubiquitous Chinese Universal Speedometer/Tachometer combo. I got mine from Amazon but it can be had from many places and for cheap. I did a detailed write-up in my Rpoc post, starting at #214. Kind of a PITA to do, but I like it. That said, if I was to do it again, I'd just get an 85mm od GPS speedometer, drop it in place, hook up + and -, attach the antenna, and call it done.

Mudflap just did a write up when he installed his unit here,

http://chinariders.net/showthread.php?t=19680

Thanks, Cheesy. Do you happen to have a link to your writeup? I wouldn't mind stuffing one of those on my Ural, but everything is kind of in a holding pattern until Arizona. Who knew moving could be such a headache?

Try this and start looking at #214

http://chinariders.net/showthread.php?t=17543&page=15

Thanks! Banggood.com has a sale going on, maybe I'll dig one of these units up and just have it shipped to the house in Phoenix.