Back to Butte

Expecting to be a tough week coming up at work so decided we had better take a little ride / camping trip again. We lazed around Saturday morning and took off for Butte around 10:30 or so. This time we took the back way over through Twin Bridges, Silver Star and then over Pipestone Pass. It has been quite a few years since we had taken this route and the scenery was nice. Great slow paced sidecar road with minimal traffic. I recently purchased a Nelson "Rigg Pak" rear motorcycle trunk via E-Bay for $60.00. Very nice quality bag (retails for $200.00) and is perfect for the Hacks' Rack. Expandable end pockets , a couple front pockets, and a rear storage pouch. Also has an additional rain cover. Has buckles which fasten it to the rack. Above; near the summit at Pipestone Pass.

The trunk is meant for a Honda Goldwing but is perfect for what I was looking for. And the price was definitely right. Darian in her normal position, blanket in place, book in hand. We took our time getting to Butte and stopped for a late Dennys' breakfast. Then over to the KOA to set up our tent. We rode around town a bit and looked for a friends place. ( We finally found him on Sunday morning). We headed to our tent soon after dark and watched a DVD movie which we brought with us. Slept in a bit on Sunday and finally crawled out around 8:00am. We relaxed with our am coffee and tore down the camp in 30 minutes or so. Wandered around Butte looking for our friend and finally found his place around noon.

We hadn't seen our friend , Otha, for a couple years and it was nice to see him again. About the time we were leaving I noticed that my tail light housing was split wide open, nearly ready to fall apart. Whether someone bumped it our the vibration finally destroyed it I'll never know. I zip tied it, screwed it and electrical taped it together to get us home. Luckily, (since the tail light has been a pain in the ass from the start) I won a NOS reproduction "Hella" early 1950's BMW tail light on E-Bay last week for $50.00. The light and housing will mount directly to the fender and finally do away with my own crappy designed bracket, which has self destructed a couple of times already in 5000 miles. I also have some tune up stuff coming, a TwinMax Carb. Synchro meter which will allow me to properly synchro. the carbs. Also found a mini air compressor for the bike, a new spare clutch cable and a pair of carb rebuild kits. I am experiencing some higher RPM stumbling so figure either the points are shot ( 8 years old) or a carb. diaphragm is going bad. We'll see when I tear into it. We hope to do another 500 - 600 mile trip over the Labor Day weekend. Maybe over into Idaho and then Grand Teton area. we'll see. Rescued a Harley guy yesterday pushing an 883 Sportster down the freeway near Dillon. We stopped and he was out of gas, he still had a mile or two to push into Dillon. The Heinrich tank spared him a water bottle full of fuel to get him into Dillon. I filled on Saturday and made the whole trip without hitting reserve. Glad I got the extra fuel capacity. A work week from hell is developing so we'll be ready for a long ride in a couple of weeks.

More Jupiter Side Car Examples

This car is a beauty. Obviously the owner has paid attention to details. He had the rig for sale last spring for $2800.00. Looks like it would have been worth it. I'm more on a budget minded project so that amount would be out of the question. I am a perpetual scrounger.

This very nice Jupiter belongs to a friend and fellow Airhead in Kalispell MT. He described it to me as being pretty "rough". I will have to disagree as it looks pretty darn nice from this vantage point. John had some great stories about his sidecar adventures. " John, just remember to always take duct tape!"

This is an acquaintance of mine, Greg Frazer, he has traveled around the world via motorcycle 4 (or is it 5) times? A great guy with a million great stories. This Jupiter was in Cuba where I believe he rented the rig and had to take the guy he rented it from with him.

Another original period Jupiter shot with a 2 stroke "something" attached to it. Eastern European bike I believe.

Mud , Sweat and Tears.

Working in the mud kind of sucks. Over the years I have been faced with some of the most miserable conditions possible. I worked on gravel crushers early on and spent many frozen days/nights out in the elements. Typically we would work even down to -20 degrees. The boss would attempt to get the crusher going in the frozen conditions. Steel behaves strangely at those temperatures and normally we would break a bunch of things trying to get the equipment running. We then would spend hours fixing everything we broke and still not get going. I've seen 4" power cables which were froze into 6"-8" of ice. Spent hours with an ax trying to free the cables from the ice prison. As a grunt laborer I would spend hours squirming into the screening plant and beat the frozen dirt and rocks out of the plugged screens. One time they didn't tell the operator I was in there and they started up the crusher. I barely escaped with my life on that one. If I had been a second slower I would not have made it out. Being beat to death/ chewed up in a screening plant would not be a good way to go.
I was helping on an asphalt plant once and we were attempting to get the hot asphalt pump going. The oil was stiff in the lines but in the tank it was at 400-500 degrees. We had been hovering over the pump for quite a while trying to get it going. As soon as we crawled down off the tank where the pump was the main feed line came apart and the 500 degree oil was spraying every where. None of us (luckily) got hit by the hot oil but it was very close.
Another crusher instance found me attempting to chain up 5' to 6' boulders which were stuck in a jaw crusher. After fishing a chain around the rock a large loader would come up and pick the rock out of the crusher chute. This platform was 15 feet or so above ground. I would always step back as the rock was picked up, but on the exposed platform there was no place really safe. A chain snapped as a rock was picked and the pin that holds the hook to the chain shot off like a bullet, just grazing my neck. Had it hit me straight on it would have been like a 45 caliber bullet hitting me. The hot steel shrapnel went down my coveralls and found its' way out my pant leg. We were 100 miles from a hospital so help was not close.
I have been fortunate to have been working the past 20 years with people that have more focus on safety. Construction is inherently dangerous but the risks can be minimized by proper knowledge and techniques. Entry level young people are very much at risk as are old school workers who have developed bad habits and run out of luck. One such friend of mine was gravely injured a few years ago just before retiring. He was the kind of guy who thought that "it won't happen to me" but he performed an improper dangerous task he had done numerous times before and it got him. He is now wheel chair bound for the rest of his life. A young son of another friend lost his life a few years ago due to a lack of knowledge of proper techniques when working high above ground. All it takes is just one wrong move or lapse of good judgement.

Adios Don

A close friend and mentor of mine passed on to better places last week. Don Masters was a one of a kind fellow and they definitely broke the mold after his creation. I spent 4 construction seasons working with Don and I learned a life time of lessons in those few years. He appeared to many as a gruff and tough man who spoke his mind whether you wanted to hear it or not. In reality Don was a soft hearted gracious person who looked after all those under his watch, as long as your work ethic was acceptable. Don disliked lazy people with a passion and "deadbeats" (as he put it) didn't fair well or long with him. My 2ND work season with Don was marred by his initial battle with cancer. He came to work every day, having chemotherapy on Friday afternoon, sick all weekend and then back to work on Monday. Don always laughed because the company we worked for thought he was a goner (16 years ago) and went as far to clean out his pickup when he went in to have his cancerous bladder removed. "I'll show those assholes " he said. And he did. He went on for another 15 years before he finally threw in the towel. I'm sure he was tired and said to hell with it, enough is enough.
One time I was with Don in West Yellowstone MT. on a project. We had driven up to a road construction site and the Flagger girl took one look at Don and came through the window hugging and kissing at him like he was a long lost Dad. She greeted him and was so glad to see him. After we drove on I asked him what the hell that was all about? A few years before Don was driving by a competing companies office and saw a long line of people waiting interviews for 4 Flagging job openings they had advertised in the paper. At the end of the line was a cute young gal who was crying and very sad. Don stopped and asked her what was the matter? She said she was a single mom and needed this job so bad, but with all the people ahead of her she had little or no chance. Don told her "get in the truck". She did and Don hauled her out to the competing companies job site, handed her a flagging vest and a hard hat and told her to report to the supervisor. She did and they put her to work thinking the office had sent her. By the end of the day they figured out what had happened but she they figured if she wanted the job that bad, they would keep her on. 3 years later and she was still working....
The first day on another big project I was the number 1 man under Don. He told me " We are going to have a lot of fun this summer, You may wish you had never been born, but you will have fun." Some of Dons' favorite sayings: "What R you assholes doing?", " I am surrounded by assholes". " I am the only guy who can reach into a barrel full of pussies and still pull out an asshole."

Don expected 110% from everyone under his watch, in return you were rewarded with a lot of hours of work
(too many usually), respect, and a work environment which was full of mostly elite co workers who were the best of the best. Don found Humor in every situation no matter how miserable. Working 80,-100 hours a week was not uncommon during the heat of the season. Don told us we could eat and sleep in the winter cause summer was the time to work. There are not too many of the old school Superintendents around anymore. Definitely a dying breed. I will never forget Don and I tell stories of his escapades all the time. All of us who worked with and for him are a kind of Veteran, as you can't really explain it unless you experienced it. Adios Don, You left impressions (and scars ) on many folks who thought highly of you.

Big Butte Hole

Last weekend looked like a great weather forecast so we couldn't resist the chance for a little ride. I took care of some work business in the AM while Darian did some stuff around the house. We hit the road at noon or so and took all the back roads from Dillon over to Butte. Had some nice relaxing miles and used the frontage road so as to not be rushed by the interstate traffic. We looked for an old friend around Butte but he shut his phone down so could not find him.

We wandered around Butte and had a nice Breakfast (@ 2:00) and decided to get a camping spot as rain was threatening. We hunkered down at a pub while the rain storms hit and tarped over the sidecar to keep our gear dry. We hit the KOA campground along with another hoard of bikers. Most appeared to be heading for Sturgis I imagine. This is a nice view of the Butte "Pit" from our camp site on Sunday morning.

Another town view from the campsite. Had a nice evening once all the storms passed. Very damp evening and all was wet in the AM. Spent a bit of time looking for our friend around Butte but had no luck. Headed out of Butte after a breakfast and decided to head back the same way we went over. We stopped at Rocker for a few minutes and saw a lot of Hells Angels Riders fueling up. I wanted to take some photos of them but decided against it. From the looks of some of those fellows I didn't think they would appreciate having their photos taken. They looked like a pretty tough bunch. It was refreshing to see some "real" bikers for a change instead of the typical yuppie bikers we usually see on the road. I think there was a Hells Angels' Rally over in Missoula the previous week so they were moving over to the Sturgis Rally I imagine.

We just had to stop at the Melstone Bar as it was time for a couple of Bloody Mary's for after breakfast. The Bar Keep definitely knew how to make them and after two I was good to go. Darian even had one, which is rare for her. I caught her in an unprepared moment in this photo, messing with her tethered earplugs or something. We had an uneventful ride to Dillon and stopped for one more cold beer (for me) before heading home. Great ride and a great weekend!

Radical & Yellow

This has got to be the cleanest hack around. Definately a lot of dough invested. Probably sees little highway touring as it is sooooo clean.

Has a single side front suspension set up.

A lot of tire on the ground.

Wild front end assembly.

"Airhead Central" at the MOA National

Made it to Billings on Friday night after the rain, hail, "stupid move" and UFO encounter. I figured that after the tough 1/2 day rain ride the rest would be easy, and I was right. Spent a nice evening with my wife, daughters and Grandson and headed out for Gillette after a 1 hour Wal Mart debacle. I possess two nice digital cameras and of course left both of them at home in my haste to hit the road. Bought a cheap digital at Wal Mart Friday night and found it didn't work at all so went back Sat. AM and bought another more expensive one. Looked at a dozen different ones and finally found one that will serve its' purpose. (barely) Made great time going to Gillette and had tail winds all the way. Winds are a big deal when piloting a sidecar. They are usually working against me it seems but this day they were on my side. Upon arriving at the BMW Rally I spent 10 minutes looking for a registration tent and after being given directions from 3 different volunteers (never found it) I gave up and found the "Airhead Central" tent. Fitted with couches , chairs and goodies purchased at goodwill it was home away from home. (The purchased furniture is then donated back to Goodwill after the rally)

The first face I see is my buddy "Boz" from southern California. He is a retired Navy Seal and a great fellow. He was running the Airhead store for a while as a volunteer. Also had a cooler full of cold beer close at hand. He has gotten engaged and will be married on Aug. 15th. (our anniversary). Congratulations Boz!

There were many side hack rigs present at the rally. More than I have ever seen in one place. This one is an extreme "K" Bike with some sort of radical sidecar. I will post a few more great photos later of this wild rig. Probably 30-40 thousand invested in this guy. Lots more photos of hacks to post later. Good night for now.

HAIL the big tough macho Harley guy

Left Dillon around 1:00 pm on Friday afternoon headed for the International BMW Motorcycle Owners Association Rally in Gillette Wyoming. 500 miles each way. Skies were cloudy and immediatly hit thunderstorms after about 30 miles. Ran right into a nice cloud burst about 15 miles out of Whitehall. I could see sun shine all around me and these damn storms sat over my head and followed me all the way to Billings. At one point I was in fairly heavy traffic, the sky had opened up and the rain was literally pouring down. My visibility was poor as I had a "half" helmet on. (my full face helmet was in the saddle bag of course) I had my left hand kind of blocking the right side of my face as the rain was hitting me hard. All of a sudden something hit me in the midsection at belt level on the right front. Now at this point I was somewhat preoccupied with ; a) staying on the road in while driving through standing water b) attempting to watch all the other on coming traffic c) cussing myself out for not wearing the full helmet which was in the saddlebag d) wondering why my rain gear was next to the helmet and not covering my soaked ass. I vainly glanced to see what part of the motorcycle had fallen off and hit me. Not much time to be doing that, as I was kind of busy staying alive. Finally I passed out of the downpour and assessed the bike. Hmmmm nothing to be seen, no parts gone, what the hell. I stopped at a gas station in Whitehall for a minute or so and looked the bike over. Saw nothing out of the ordinary. Whatever clobbered me felt like someone swinging a pillow and whacking me in the gut. I still don't have a clue what it was. Bird? Plane? Superman? A pillow? Who knows. One of the mysteries of life I guess.



. (they weren't that big but sure felt like it)

Rained off and on all the way to Bozeman. I called Darian (who was 45 minutes ahead of me in her car) and she had only a couple of drops hit her windshield so far. I fueled in Bozeman and being ever the optimist left my full coverage helmet in the saddle bag (next to the rain gear). Approaching the canyon before Bozeman Pass I could see a nasty looking wall off white heading towards me. Again as the optimist I figured I would beat the storm through the canyon. At about the time a big ass Harley chopper passed me with a rough tough looking guy driving. His "gear" consisted of a rag on his head, sun glasses and a tank top. His passenger was a young looking gal dressed the same except she had shorts on. They looked like every Harley guys dream....macho, cute bitch on the back, stretched chopper, wow was I impressed. (NOT). About the time he was 100' feet ahead of me the sky cracked open and a wall of water fell, It sucked! Seconds later here comes the hail. ( that sucked even more) Here I am again covering the right side of my face. ( with my left hand, right hand stuck on the throttle) I had the sensation of someone spraying me in the face with a fully automatic pellet gun. The "macho Harley guy" slowed and as I passed him he looked like a whipped pup. I was hurting and I had full gear on (except of course the damn helmet)The poor gal on the back was trying to make herself as small a target as possible. As I left the bruised pair behind me I just started laughing, Man OH Man, the price to pay for "looking cool". As I passed out of the main part of the storm something felt real cold. I looked down and my pants had kind of a well in my lap and it was completely full of marble sized hail stones, and I was probably doing 50 MPH. After the worst I laughed at the heavens and proclaimed" is that the best you can do?" Evidently not cause no sooner than I said that the sky split open again and away we go again. This time the rain was harder, but the hail passed this time. Blinded again I missed the first exit I came to and like an idiot tried to pull off a construction crossover and a semi truck damn near ran over me from behind. The traffic barrels were too close together so I dropped into the median at about 15 MPH, bounced through a small mound of sloppy wet gravel, through some holes and up onto the dead traffic lane. The truck driver was not too impressed with my dumb move and blared his air horn adding more insult to injury. Very stupid, spur of the moment decision on my part and it could have been my last. That driver is still probably telling his buddies about the dumb -ass , cross country side car idiot he encountered. Dumb, Dumb, Dumb.....split second lapse of good judgement (on my part) that gets people killed on the highway every day.

BMW view of Sheridan McDonald's drive up window. Maybe I should quit riding and get a safe job there? Let's see........scalding hot coffee........Solmonilla.......food poisening......botchulism......french fry fumes......obesity........mad gunmen ...... Naw, forget it............riding is definitely safer.

One mans junk, another mans treasure....

I found this old monstrous fuel tank on a BMW which could have been free for the taking. I decided to pay the $100.00 asking price for the entire motorcycle as the 10 gallon fuel tank was a rare item. It definitely didn't look like any kind of treasure to most folks. Ugly, scratched and bulbous. Missing the knee pads, top cover, cap and sat open to the weather for a couple nice Montana Winters.

Took some doing and a few bucks, but I scared up a new old stock 35 year old original gas cap. Found a well used tool box cover for $50.00. A new custom hand built cover was $450.00. Pretty easy decision there. A couple of new stick-on BMW roundels, a $150.00 paint job and here we are.

Now that is more like it. It is still bulbous and ugly to most but I find it beautiful. Beauty is definitely in the eye of the beholder they say. Besides the fact that the tank is worth around $1200.00 or more as it sits now. I rummaged through a bunch of extra unused long sitting BMW parts I have laying around and listed them on E-Bay last night. Already up to $59.99 for 4 of the 5 items and still have 6 days to go. See , now my junk will be someone else's treasure. Round and round it goes. I love the recycle theory of old motorcycle parts. Junk can always become cash with a little effort. With E-bay, my cash has become junk in a few instances. I have over paid for a few things and then when received they were still someone else's (my) junk. No treasure to be found sometimes. Oh well , now I will pass them on to someone else. Round it goes again. Gotta love it.

I will depart on a 1000 mile weekend trip tomorrow after work. The BMW Motorcycle Owners of America is holding their International Rally in Gillette Wyo. (of all places) this week so will do a Banzaii run over there this weekend. Darian has bowed out and we will meet in Billings tomorrow night to see both our daughters and grandkids. Darian will stay over and I will continue on to the rally on Sat. morning. A long way to go for one night but what the hell. If I don't go I will regret it. Sunday will be a 500 mile one day ride to Dillon. Should be a nice but somewhat long day. I will hope to see some old Airhead friends at the rally and will take some photos. Have a nice day.

More Jellystone photos

This is the spot where my tail light assembly fell off. The Earth Quake slide area can be see in the distant back ground. I always travel with a selection of spare parts with traveled with us before the side car was installed. Old BMW parts are not readily available so I save alot of old/new parts for back up use. Parts I carry: extra carburetor diaphragms, float assemblies, needle valves, spark plugs, slightly used ignition points (which can still get you out of a bind) extra ignition condenser, nuts and bolts, two extra (used ) clutch cables, cable end thimbles, ( when a clutch cable breaks, often the little thimble falls out and is gone for ever, these are hard to come by!), assorted zip ties, tie wire, electrical wire and connectors and many other odds and ends.

"Urban Camping". Definitely not for every one but suited us just fine for the weekend. Darian has the camp set up thing down to an art after all the years of practice. Even brought her little DVD player so we had a movie each night! Lots of places to eat, entertainment, fire works display, some nice biker neighbors. One guy was pulling a home made M.C. trailer made from a pick up tool box. The thing had a 4-5 foot tongue, was narrow and had a high center of gravity. was pretty darn precarious looking to me. He has pulled it all over the west so I guess it worked better than it looked. Another Guy and Gal next to us appeared to be well experienced Harley Riders by the looks of their garb. Their riding vests were covered with a wealth of various patches, pins, buttons, etc. Came to find out he bought his first Harley last Fall. They must have spent the entire Winter working on their vests. The "Harley Marketing Blitz" has created a new generation of pseudo bikers. The dealers focus more on "custom" parts and other junk, than on the bikes. The Harley thing is just a way of showing how "cool" you are. Kind of a joke in my opinion. When the biker neighbor rode off he had gear stacked up at least two feet higher than his passengers head. What a sight. He must have had a dozen bungee cords entwining the whole affair. But their vests sure looked good. Oh well more power to them. Each to their own. I'll just stick to my old Airhead and stay out of the Hog Wild feeding frenzy.

Darian in her typical position over the week end. Here along the Madison River, book in hand. We saw a lot of Bison and Elk in this area. Damn near hit a mid sized Badger which dashed out right in front of us, but a touch of the brakes and he made it o.k. I managed to exterminate quite a few bugs over the course of the trip. I firmly theorize that the accumulation of bug guts on my leather jacket lengthens the life of the leather, kind of like a conditioner. Darian continually threatens to throw the old rag away. Hell, it's just starting to have a nice patina after 20 years. In an emergency survival situation one could scrape it off, add water and have a very nice stew.

Bummer, on the way home after three great days of riding. Hebgen Lake in the rear. The old quake area was a nice ride. Overcast, a little cool and perfect riding conditions. The old beemer and its' big tank made it from West to Dillon without going into the reserve tanks. Where to go next? hmmmm, will have to think and plan for the next ride. would like to hit the MOA National in Wyoming but won't have any extra time off. Quite a ride for a two day weekend. We'll see.

Yellowstone

We had been planning a three day Yellowstone trip with the sidehack for the last couple of months. We loaded up Friday morning and were on the road by 9:30am. I have the majority of our camping gear packed up full time so it's a matter of just loading the bike and packing clothes. We ran over to Twin Bridges and then through Virginia City to Ennis. We just missed the Ennis Parade which effectively closes down the highway for about two hours. I am a patriotic guy but didn't really want to be forced to watch the parade. Luckily we passed through town minutes before it began. Between Ennis and Hebgan Lake we encountered head winds of aroud thirty to forty miles per hour. The BMw struggled to keep up speed on the hills and could only make 50-55 mph on the hills. As we reached the Madison River the terrain was such that the wind lessened up. As we rounded Hebgan Lake I decided to pull over for a break and as I pulled over I saw my side car tail light fall off. I had fashoned a bracket out of some old chromed steel I had and figured that the thing would break at the bend due to vibration. Sure enough I was correct. (as pictured above). The light was dangling by the wire loom and didn't quite reach the pavement. I had the foresight to use a like piece of steel on the back side of the fender for a stiffener. I forgot about the other piece until I removed the broken bracket and then remembered that I had a spare piece. Fifteen minutes later we were back in business. We set up a tent at a campground in West Yellowstone which was like camping in a city park due to loud kids, other motorcycles and every sound known to man. We did have a great fireworks display on Friday night. We didn't mind the "Urban" camping as that gave us plenty of options in the food department in West Yellowstone.

We hit the road Saturday AM and ran into Yellowstone and over to the Canyon area first. The North Rim Drive road was closed so we headed on over towards the Lake area. Had a great time riding as the traffic wasn't too bad and the speeds were moderate. The posted limit in the park is 45mph. Most cars were running 60-65. We took a lot of the little side roads which branch off tho different attractions along the highway. We parked near the Lake Hospital for a break early in the afternoon. (Above) I visited the Lake Hospital Emergency Room about 38 years ago to the week. I was fishing near Cooke City when I fell off a log (which was part of a trail) and fell head first. I hit my right arm on some rocks and managed to break it in two places. The ride from Cooke City to the hospital was one of the longest rides of my life as every bump in the road nearly put me through the roof. A very painful memory.

We stopped again near West Thumb and visited with some other BMW riders. two from Utah and one from Louisiana. This K-Bike sported a "P-51 Flying Tiger" Motif. We headed over towards Old Faithful and witnessed the eruption from a couple miles out through the trees. We always miss the event by a few minutes and never want to hang around and wait to see it later. Oh well, it still looks like it did the last time we saw it. We got back to camp in time for a couple hour nap and then to a nice dinner at a nice place. Over priced but great food and service.



We awoke to overcast skies this am but had a great ride back to Dillon. Above is a shot of yours truly next to Hebgen Lake this morning. Today brought little or no wind. The bike was running excellant and made it all the way home without going into the reserve tanks. Darian sightseed and read the entire weekend and was a great co-pilot. It's nice to ask for a drink (of whatever) when under way and have it handed over without stopping. All in all a nice ride and would have liked to go on for another couple of days. We will plan some trips for the winter when we can take a bit more time.

Official "Dog" Pound Member

Finally got to meet Rex Mongold the "BMW DOG" two weeks ago at Bob Clements place. My ride is now sporting the "Dog" tag. Thanks Rex, I am now an official member of "The Dog" kennel club.

Received my $50.00 Heinrich tank cover in the mail today. A pretty rustic cover as it was oxidized to the max. A few applications of "Mothers" aluminum polish and there was shiny metal living under all the oxidation. The cover has a key lock but no key. By chance the lock can be turned with any thin screw driver or such. The lock works well and it is a proper fit for the tanks locking brackets.

The cover has a bunch of dings in it. I tapped a few out carefully with a ball peen hammer. Overall the cover is good enough, considering that a new reproduction cover would cost well over $400.00. I can live with a few flaws, after all everything in life has flaws. I gave up trying for perfection with mechanical monsters years ago as perfection is a short term unobtainable thing anyway. Who cares.
I wanted to avoid the cover touching the new paint on the tank so I slit a piece of rubber tubing and worked it over the flange rim which sticks up around the tank opening. This effectively keeps the cover from coming in direct contact with the tank. It took a bit of time to adjust the tanks lock brackets but finally got the cover to sit tight and secure on the tank.

The upholstery is in pretty poor shape as it is sun rotted. No tears but the stitching is failing and is not long for this world. No upholstery people around Dillon so will get to it at a later date. Will do the Hack seat, etc. with black and probably will redo the /5 solo seats in black also. No hurry on that. I can get the work done in Arizona or Mexico a whole lot cheaper anyway. We are looking forward to a leisurely ride through Yellowstone Park this weekend. Will pack up the camping gear and rough it for the weekend. We rode through Yellowstone a few years ago on the 4th off July and found it no more crowded than normal. People probably think they;ll wait until after the 4th when the crowds are less. If everyone thinks that way...wa la... no crowds on the 4th. Don't really care if the place is crowded anyway. Just looking forward to a nice slow cruise through the Park. Gas prices are probably keeping a few tourists home. We've ridden through Yellowstone hundreds of times and never get tired of it. It is a wonderful place.