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As many of you know I had a little
problem with my Blackhawk motor
during the Indian Rally at Indian
Point. While leading a ride through
the winding roads of southern
Missouri, my PP100 blew a gasket. I
thought I was done for since my
warranty ran out two weeks before. I
met with Frank, from Blackhawk
Motor Works at the rally and
explained my dilemma. Frank was more
than willing to go above and beyond
his obligation to ensure my motor
got repaired. So I scheduled my
vacation in Palm Bay, Florida, the
home of Blackhawk Motor Works.
Since Frank was going the extra mile
for customer service, I wanted to
save him some time and money. I was
allowed to pull and disassemble my
own motor. With experts no more than
arms reach away, I was confident and
learned a lot about my PP100.
Hanging around the shop really
showed me the care and
professionalism Frank’s team puts
into all their work. No matter how
busy things got in the shop, Mike
and Frank always took time for their
customers. This sometimes led to
long hours and late nights to meet
their deadlines.
I was planning to ride my Indian
from Kansas City to Seattle for a
business trip. Every year my company
sends us to a week of training
somewhere in the US and for the last
4 years I have made those trips by
flying V-Twin airlines. This seemed
to be the perfect opportunity to
road test the new 110 Stroker and
Frank agreed. This test would be a
real world test, from the Atlantic
to the Pacific, from Sea level to
the Continental Divide with all the
obstacles the road has to offer. So
it was set, I was to return to
Florida when the new motor was
finished and begin my 10,000 mile
journey.
The plan was to complete a round
trip from Palm Bay, Florida to
Seattle, Washington and back to
Kansas City, then again back to Palm
Bay, Florida. The trip from Palm Bay
to Kansas City was to take two
riding days. With a two day layover
in Kansas City then take three days
to get to Seattle from there. After
a week of training, take the next
week to return to Kansas City
via the Cascade Mountains, Glacier
National Park, and Yellowstone with
a stop in Sturgis on Day Twelve for
a visit to bike week. The last leg
of the journey, the return to
Florida for analysis, was scheduled
for Labor Day weekend. As a safety
factor, I arranged for escorts along
the trip. ‘Cowboy’ Will was to
escort me from Palm Bay to Kansas
City and my co-worker, Bill, was to
ride with me for the remainder of
the trip.
I can’t possibly describe all the
events in detail in this article but
I will touch on all the major parts.
With any new motor the break-in
period is critical and since I had
to depend on an unproven motor for
6,500 miles, oil changes were
scheduled as part of the trip.
The power of membership in the IIRA,
the information, relationships and
experience of being on the website
since the early CyberCorp days
really paid off on this trip. Let me
explain how all this ties together
for my trip and made the difference
between success and failure.
First off, without the IIRA and all
the posts on the website regarding
rebuilds of PP100, I would have
never met Frank, who made this
challenge possible.
When ‘Cowboy’ and I arrived at
American Classic Cycles (former
Indian Dealer) in Dothan, Alabama at
closing time on Day One, they went
out of their way to work us in for
an oil change. After they heard what
I was testing and discussing the
IIRA, they made me feel right at
home. Without their help, the motor
may have never survived the extreme
heat the following day had to offer.
Great bunch of folks!
I knew ‘Bear’ from Bear’s Hiway
Classic’s, when he was the mechanic
for my local Indian dealer. Bear saw
me through all my early troubles on
my 2000 Chief and some of the issues
with the Vintage. He opened his own
shop and services a lot of the local
IIRA members. I was able to track
him down on our website with a
single post since I lost track of
him after the shutdown of IMC. This
made it possible to call on him in a
pinch when I needed my transmission
replaced. It seems I cooked my
RevTech on the run from Florida to
Kansas City. Bear was able to obtain
and install a new Baker 6 speed with
only a one day notice. Bear was the
first independent mechanic to test
drive the new Stroker and to quote
him directly, “damn, that thing
really screams now…”
On Day Five, late in the afternoon,
outside of Billings, Montana, the
bike just dies going down a big hill
in the middle of nowhere. It acted
like someone just turned off the
key. After 3 years of IIRA
membership, I never needed to use
the tow service and now I’m grateful
it’s available. After going over the
motorcycle and not finding anything
obvious, it was time to climb up a
big hill to get a cell signal and
call Frank at home and interrupt his
dinner. After following his
troubleshooting advice, it is
determined that the coil failed
and needed to be replaced. Thank
goodness for Frank’s after-market
ignition. Bill, my friend and
co-worker, was able to return to
Billings Harley Davidson for
replacement parts. With the repairs
made, off we roared! All went well
the rest of the day, the higher I
got in the mountains, the better the
engine performed. Fully loaded and
running hard, the Stroker’s
performance exceeded my
expectations.
About 60 miles before Missoula, at
11:00 pm, Bill and I pulled off in
Drummond, Montana for fuel. As we
were pulling up to the pumps the
attendant just finished locking up
for the night. With only two gas
stations and a small hotel in town,
our options were limited. Knowing
our plight, the attendant reopened
the gas station for us. After
fueling up and some small talk, I
went to start the Chief. A horrible
noise started coming from the
primary, it sounded like metal
grinding. The only thing we could do
was see if we could get a room at
the only hotel in town and use the
IIRA tow service in the morning, the
power of the card. As I lay in bed
at the hotel thinking about missing
my deadline for work, getting the
bike towed to Missoula and trying to
figure out what was wrong, it
occurred to me that after learning
so much about my bike from the Iron
Indian website I might as well pull
the primary and see what was wrong.
In the middle of the night, in a
gravel parking lot with a flashlight
in my teeth I pulled the primary
with basic hand tools. As the case
came off some other parts fell on
the ground. After close examination
it turned out the keeper on the
starter pinion bolt broke and the
bolt backed all the way out.
Equipped with Blue lock-tite I
coated the bolt heavily and
reassembled everything. I finished
it up around sunrise and prepared to
continue my journey.
The rest of the way to Seattle, the
bike ran great! I continued
adjusting my ignition curve and
carburetor since the bike ran so
good in high altitudes I knew I was
running lean. I really discovered
the true power of the 110 when I was
coming out of the high desert in
Eastern Washington and beginning the
assent into the Cascade Mountains.
The road must have been the longest
hill I ever climbed. It must have
been a 20 mile steep grade and
climbed 4000 feet. As we passed
cars, trucks and RV’s labored by the
climb, Bill’s Harley started showing
signs of slowing about half way up.
The Indian pulled without strain so
I grabbed some throttle to see what
she would do. I blew by the Road
King and continued to pass
everything on the road as the
speedometer past 90 mph. As I
reached the top of the pass, I had
to stop and wait on Bill’s Harley
for what seemed like forever. Pumped
up and excited about all the power
at a twist of the wrist, we stopped
for fuel and a little bragging.
Once in Seattle on Day Six, it was
time to settle down and rest my
little mule as well as my bones. It
had been rough the last three days.
While I was posting on the IIRA
board, I got a PM from ‘Tall Rider’
offering to host me for dinner one
night. I was able to meet up with
another member of the IIRA, trade
stories and make a new friend. Since
I needed to get some work done on
the Chief during my stay, ‘Tall
Rider’ gave me plenty of
recommendations for shops in the
Seattle area. I called Frank and
discussed my progress and some of my
issues. He wanted to try a different
ignition system for the return trip.
I was running out of time and needed
to get the work done by Friday to
begin the return leg of the journey.
Frank sent the parts to me
over-night and Pro/Max Cycles in
Tacoma was willing to work me in on
short notice. The Iron Indians has a
large network of people all across
the country and everyone I dealt
with and spoke to was more than
willing to help. After Harry of
Pro/Max Cycles replaced the battery,
ignition, a cam seal, changed the
oil and filter and replaced the
starter pinion bolt keeper, he
needed to take it for a test ride,
of course. He returned all smiles
and really liked the performance! He
mentioned I might want to replace my
exhaust because it seemed a little
restrictive. Harry was a pleasure to
work with and he took great care of
me.
Packed up and ready to ride on my
next adventure, I could feel the
motor was really starting to come to
life after 3,500 miles. There were
no other mechanical problems on the
return trip but tons of stories. The
ride through the Cascades, Glacier
National Park and Yellowstone was
fantastic and I can highly recommend
that route to anyone. Since the run
to Seattle had been all Interstate
highways, my goal was to avoid all
the Interstates I could and enjoy
the US highways. After riding all
day and all night, due to a lack of
available hotel rooms (but that’s
another story), I arrived at Sturgis
on Day Twelve. Meeting more Iron
Indians over the next several days
was great but time didn’t allow
tracking down others and with no
internet access it was impossible to
guess where they were. I am
sometimes amazed at how dependant we
can become on the internet.
Before heading out on the run home
on Saturday, Day Fourteen, I made a
couple of adjustments. It appeared
that J&P Cycle was having a
clearance sale of Indian parts and I
couldn’t resist picking up a few
things. Even the people there knew
of Frank and the Iron Indians. I
replaced my driving light bracket as
it was showing signs of wear after
my 7 miles of off-roading in the
rain coming out of Yellowstone, but
that’s yet another story. I also
pulled the torque cones out of my
exhaust to let it breathe better.
Man, was Harry right, there was even
more power there. I just regret I
didn’t do this earlier, much
earlier. Besides running blind in
the rain all day the trip home was a
breeze with the added power of the
110 and the sixth gear.
After catching my breath and
clearing my desk at work, I was able
to start making preparations for the
trip back to Florida. Frank wanted
to disassemble the motor and see
what damage I had done and what
improvements could be made. I left
on Labor Day Weekend, solo, to
complete the run. I arrived at Palm
Bay, Florida on Day Sixteen with
over 8500 miles on the motor. After
Frank examined the motor, he found
nothing more than normal engine
wear. Considering what I had just
put it through, I was impressed.
Frank was now confident the 110
Stroker kit was ready for
production. With a few more
modifications, I was able to
complete the ride home in two more
days of riding. That’s a total of
10,000 miles in eighteen riding days
and one tough motor. Take care and
ride hard, maybe we will cross paths
in this adventure called life.
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