COVER STORY
Red White and Buell Part 3, First Laps!
Author: K3 Chris Onwiler; Action photos by Kendrick Kirk, DviantImage.com
Baby’s first steps
 Time, money and Murphy’s Law are always the enemies when you’re building a bike for the track. Our auctioned orphan had come a long way since we’d purchased her from site sponsor CrankyApe.com but with a trackday weekend looming on January 17th and 18th at JenningsGP in Florida, we still had plenty of work to do and not much time to get it done. The first order of business was to get some paint on the beautiful Catalyst Racing Composites bodywork (See http://www.catalystracingcomposites.com/) that we hung last month. We called on master body man and STT coach, Rob Roderick. Formerly the lead technician at a now-closed Chrysler dealer, our friend Rob was the perfect choice for this project, both because he’s very good and because he’s currently unemployed. Rob has previously done some incredible looking track bikes including AMA and WSB replicas, so we knew our glass would be in good hands. (Midwest guys looking for paintjobs can give Rob a call at 1-224-622-0459) The colors used were Dodge Sebring red, Jeep white and Corvette blue. Who’d have thought there might come a day when those proud American nameplates might be in jeopardy of disappearing? Our next order of business was prepping the bike for tech inspection. When building a bike for racing or advanced trackday riding, it will be  necessary for you to drill and safety wire many items. Rules vary, so it’s important to know which organizations you’ll be riding with and what their requirements are. We’ve received tons of support from the Buell brotherhood throughout this project and were again blessed with the gift of shared knowledge when experienced Buell racer and sometimes TrackdayMag.com editor, Don Cook, came by to help us with the safety wire job. Items wired included the front and rear brakes, oil filter, oil drain plug, oil filler cap, transmission drain plug and shift linkage. While no organization we know of requires that you wire the shifter, Don suggested that we do it because those parts are notorious for shaking loose from a throbbing Buell motor, even if they’ve been secured with Locktite. Most Firebolt racers use the stock handlebar setup, which is one of the few OEM bar setups sufficiently strong enough to withstand the rigors of racetrack crashing and still be repairable. We’d have happily used the Buell original equipment as well but ran into a problem. Due to its unique shape, the XBRR replica bodywork we’d chosen required .jpg "left side cut, right side stock") that we use aftermarket clip-ons in order to gain proper clearance between the hand controls and the fairing. As we did with the rearsets, we turned to Woodcraft ( http://www.woodcraft-cfm.com/) for a set of their 50mm split clip-ons. The 50mm size is very popular, since it fits most modern sportbikes with USD forks. Woodcraft has a variety of models in this size range, including parts with rise or offset built in to adapt them to almost any machine. For our Buell, the standard racing clip-ons were exactly what we needed. The whole point of Woodcraft’s clever split clip-on design is that you can install them without having to remove the upper triple clamp. Things weren’t so easy with our project bike though, because we had to remove the Buell’s upper clamp anyway so we could saw off the original handlebar mounts which would have otherwise interfered with the new parts. Bar angle was extremely critical, since the slightest misalignment had them either hitting the frame or the gauge cluster at full steering lock. The stock brake and clutch levers also wanted to snag the bodywork. A set of the trick and popular 2-finger levers would have solved this problem nicely but we were out of time. Since desperation breeds innovation, we sawed and filed the stock levers to create a makeshift pair of shorties that would get us through Jennings.  We’d been hoping and praying that our Penske shock would be ready in time for this trip but that didn’t work out. We’d just have to use the stock Buell shock and hope that we could get it to cooperate with the Traxxion Dynamics AK-20 cartridges we’d installed up front. Another thing we’d been waiting most impatiently for was a set of race compound brake pads. These never showed up, which nearly derailed our entire effort. The pads that came with the bike when we bought it from auction were probably the originals and had worn paper thin. We wouldn’t have taken these parts for a street ride, much less have tried to pass tech with them. Nervously, we loaded the Buell into the trailer with the hope that we’d find fresh pads somewhere between Chicago and the track. For the second year in a row, our JenningsGP adventure began in horrifically cold conditions. The ambient temperature as we loaded was sixteen degrees below zero and we didn’t even want to know the wind chill factor. It took hours just to get the pickup started. The trailer’s padlocks and hitch were frozen solid and we very nearly crashed the Buell in the ice and snow while trying to push it into the trailer. Our group this year consisted of Editors K3 and Nick “Grasshopper” Desautels, along with tuner Ken Hall of Superbike Suspension. When our rig was finally ready for the road, all three of us were just about frozen to death.  By the time we’d crossed the treacherous Monteagle pass and reached Chattanooga, the sun was up and the world was open for business. We began calling or stopping at every Harley/Buell dealer that we passed along the way in an effort to locate a set of front brake pads. We were willing to settle for stock parts at this point, since we wouldn’t be riding our machine at Jennings if we didn’t find a replacement for our worn out set. When you consider that the brakes we were looking for fit every XB series Buell built from 2003 to 2008, we were shocked to find that none of the dealers we checked with had them on the shelf. In our opinion, if you don’t at least carry brake pads, levers and oil filters in stock for the machines you sell, then you have no business calling yourself a motorcycle dealer.
At this point we were starting to get downright angry and the “aw shucks” attitude we’d been encountering at some of these dealerships wasn’t helping a bit. Located seventy-five miles north of Jennings, Tifton Harley Davidson/Buell (http://tiftonharley.com/) was our last chance. Parts man Mike Webb was clearly a professional, which offered us our first glimmer of hope for the day. His shop was out of stock on the pads but Mike found a set elsewhere and could have them for us the next day. Well, that would be Saturday. Since there were other bikes in the trailer, we intended to spend the day knee dragging and not parts chasing. Mike offered to call when the pads arrived. We agreed, not really expecting him to actually follow through. Well, true to his word, Mike had the parts by 9:30 Saturday morning and contacted us as he’d promised. We paid over the phone by credit card and Mike hid the parts outside the dealership for us to retrieve that evening. Keep in mind that this guy didn’t know us from Adam and was simply doing his job. Some folks in this industry just put in that little extra bit of effort and they’re the ones who keep customers coming back. Thanks Mike. Tifton HD is lucky to have you. After a day of fun at Jennings, followed by a dinner of Editor Lance Lau’s incredible gourmet BBQ under an almost surreal canopy of stars,  we drove the 120 mile round trip from the track to Tifton Harley Davidson for our pads and then back to our hotel in Valdosta. Brake pads finally in hand, we were at last able to relax and get some decent sleep. Come Sunday morning, we got right to work fitting the pads and replacing our Buell’s worn out street tires. Our plan is to run Pirellis on the Red White and Buell this year when pilot Rob Oliva takes it hunting for Buell contingency money. Leon of Competition Motorsports South was there with a trailer full of the gooey race compound rubber, so we grabbed a set of Diablo Supercorsa DOT racing tires, selecting the Green compound for both front and rear. Finally, our rumbling Red White and Buell was ready for its first laps! Senior Editor K3 had performed the majority of the work on this machine, so it was up to him to go out and see if anything was going to fall off. We were testing Vemar VSREV helmets that weekend and had selected one in the beautiful red/white/blue color scheme to match our project bike. K3 strapped on the Vemar lid, tossed a thumbs up and said, “New bike, new helmet, new suspension, new brakes, new tires, new bodywork and fresh paint. What could go wrong?” Bystanders scrambled to avoid the impending lightning strike. Whether due to careful planning and meticulous wrench work or pure blind luck, nothing went amiss. Well, almost nothing. Having already endeared himself to the good-natured Jennings staff on previous occasions, (Grasshopper is a loose cannon….) the boy talked the starter into throwing a meatball flag on the Buell about five laps into the session. Needless to say, K3 nearly fell off the bike when he saw that flag, as visions of dangling parts and spraying fluids flashed through his horrified brain. He pulled off the track and limped back to the pits via an access road, only to find out that his pals had been playing a little joke on him. K3 took it all in stride, commenting, “Remember boys, the best thing about payback is that you never know when it’s coming….”  Our Buell showed promise in its first session but required a careful hand to keep it on course. As cold as it had been overnight in Jennings, the bike’s suspension fluid would need a session of use to come up to temperature before Superbike Ken could adjust it. Until Ken laid his talented hands on our Buell, its sag was badly mismatched front-to-rear and the damping was far from balanced. Our handling problem was a racetrack classic that’s been faced by countless riders over the years. By installing our Traxxion Dynamics AK-20 cartridges in the forks and leaving the stock shock on the rear, we’d modified one end of the bike without attending to the other. This never produces optimum results, however a talented suspension tuner can often “dumb down” quality aftermarket components to work in concert with stock parts. Ken worked his magic and sent K3 back out for some more laps.
In the second session, our Firebolt was a much easier motorcycle to ride. While the stock shock was still holding the machine back, things had improved to the point where we could begin to appreciate the difference that the Traxxion cartridges made while on the brakes and when turning in toward each apex. Since JenningsGP is more of a rhythm track than a point and shoot circuit, the stock compound brake pads didn’t hinder us much. While the bike wasn’t set up well enough for us to push them to the limit, the Pirelli Diablo Supercorsa tires that we’d installed felt as if we could do no wrong on them. The lower bars and higher footpegs provided by our Woodcraft clip-ons and rearsets made the already-small Buell seem even more compact than it had felt in its stock configuration. Superbike Kenny and Grasshopper dubbed our Buell “the Parasail,” since none of us has ever experienced a fairing that provides the amount of wind protection that is given by the Catalyst Racing Composites XBRR replica fairings. In spite of the bodywork’s size and aerodynamic shape, we found that our knee pucks touched down miles before the paint was in danger of scraping the ground. Once we’d acclimated to the machine’s setup, we really started to have some fun. When you ride a Sportster-engined Buell, literbikes are going to pass you down the straights. Vengeance is yours when you maul them in the infield. Sounding more like Sturgis than Suzuka, our low-revving XB casually ran inside, outside or any place we wanted to put it. Beating lesser machines to death with our Buell’s superior corner speed became the order of the day. While we might have had the least horsepower in our trackday group, we may well have been turning the fastest lap times. You don’t smash the mountain down with an XB-series Buell. Instead, you steal it a few pebbles at a time. After lunch the rains came, which was probably for the best since we’d gone out to play with our new toy before we’d done a photo session.  (Hey, what could happen?) Grudgingly, we called it a day and turned our Buell over to Kendrick Kirk of Dviant Image ( http://www.dviantimage.com/) who supplied many of the photos in this month’s issue. You can tell his shots from K3’s work. Kendrick’s are the ones that look good. So far, our Red White and Buell is a success. All the work we’ve performed to this point held up to our initial test session, while every delicious aftermarket part we’ve installed has made the XB a better bike. The month of February will be a busy one for us as we enlist the grassroots power brokers of the Buell community to build some muscle into our big, bad American V-twin mill. Hopefully we’ll get it all back together in time for our next scheduled test at Barber Motorsports Park in Birmingham, Alabama on February 28/March 1. Our goal is to have installed our Penske Shock and built an extra ten to fifteen more horsepower by then, which should make the Firebolt a real treat. We have our eye on a few incredibly tasty accessories in the Buell Racing catalog as well, so in the next 28 days we should effect some amazing changes to our Red White and Buell project bike. Will we get it all done in time for Barber? Heck, at this point even we don’t know the answer to that question. Like any great motorcycle project, all the time, effort, talent, parts and money end up swinging from a thread held rather casually by Mr. Murphy, writer of the world’s most accurate and annoying law. Will old Murph smile on our pretty little Buell? Only time will tell.
|