"Rescued by Airheads" by Winemaker's Journal

Rescued by Airheads

Blog: Winemaker's Journal

July 19, 2010

Excuse me if I deviate from writing about wine and food for a bit. I just returned from two weeks of motorcycling through Washington, Oregon and California, and while my travels included the winding roads of California's wine-rich Napa Valley, the Alexander Valley and Sonoma and Mendocino counties, the focus was wind-in-my-face riding rather than the wine drinking that came each evening.

And as always goes with road adventures, it's the breakdowns that always make the best stories. I mean, who really cares about peg-scraping turns screaming down the curves near Maupin to the Deschutes River, seeing Monet-like glistening algae along the sunset shores of Goose Lake at the Oregon-California border, eating bugs through the lush-forested Sierra-Nevada Range, nearly sideswiping a herd of elk in the California Redwoods or stopping to add layer after layer of warm clothes while riding the foggy corkscrew Highway 1 along the Pacific Coast. All great instant gratification thrills that don't offer a lot of excitement for those not there.

Breakdowns always make for a good story in aftermath, assuming you survive them. Probably because they likely involve human emotions of angst, danger and fear and are resolved through challenge, humility, a paradigm shift in plans and usually the help of others.

In my case, it was incredible serendipity that came to my rescue after the coil failed on my 2001 BMW R1100RT motorcycle last week. I was only 300 miles from home when my bike conked out at Madras. At the time, I had no idea what caused my bike to suddenly falter, nor the tools to diagnose the problem. Actually, the bike was still running on one of its two cylinders, offering enough power to transport me to all of the town's repair shops. I quickly found out that none had the slightest knowledge or interest in working on a BMW. The closest BMW repair was in Portland or Eugene, both about 150 miles away.

What I did find out, however, after calling a few motorcycle friends, was that the 38th Annual BMW Motorcycle Owners Association International Rally was due to start the next day at the Deschutes County Fairground in Redmond, 25 miles to the south. The rally is held only once a year somewhere in the world. Last year it was in Johnsonville, Tenn. Something was right with me and the world for me to break down here, now, I thought.

After a worrisome night in a Madras motel, I had AAA transport me and the bike back to Redmond. More than 6,000 motorcyclists were expected at this rally. Surely someone could help me. After walking around the grounds, I discovered Air Head Central, the official beer drinking hangout for the national Airheads Beemer Association. Airhead refers to the type of motorcycles members ride not the wind-swept nature of their minds, although some longtime members could likely fill both references. Their bikes have air rather than water cooled engines of the most simple but durable mechanical design. It's the type of engine BMW has used for many of its motorcycles from the 1930s until the mid-1990s. Many people believe they're the best touring motorcycles ever built in terms of reliability and smooth riding. The group's motto is "Simple by Choice" and, in this case, does refer to the motorcycles as well as their owners.

I was a little sheepish about asking for help for my newer, more complicated bike, which is known as an "oilhead." But I do have a 1973 airhead model at home and have owned others. And I totally believe in the club's belief that owners should know how to work on their own motorcycles, appreciate function over form and not take themselves, religion or life too seriously. "Stretch," one of the apparent club leaders and an ace mechanic, I was told, told me to roll my bike in.

Unlike most of the other campers who had begun to settle in at the rally, the Airheads didn't have a lot of fancy new tents and motorcycle gear. A small group of club leaders, Stretch included, had ridden their 50-year-old bikes from as far away as Florida and Alaska ahead of time and had set up a huge canvas tent that had been trucked ahead. One of their first stops on getting into Redmond was at the Goodwill to buy several overstuffed used couches, easy chairs and tables and chairs to make the tent comfy. Goodwill would get them back after the rally to sell again. A 4x8-foot sheet of plywood was laid out in the middle of the tent for anyone who wanted to work on their bike and get advice from a dozen beer-slugging Beemer gurus reclining on couches.

Stretch suspected the coil, and after a few tests with his volt meter, told me to get it out for further testing. That's about a two-hour job on my sleek, plastic-covered oilhead. Lots of faring panels to remove. On an airhead, it would have taken about 15 minutes to remove the coil. Once out, Stretch used his meter to test resistance through the sparkplug wires. He was unfamiliar with specifications on the newer bike, so whipped out his cell phone and called a member who is a BMW electrics specialist in Mobile, Ala. After reading off some numbers, he was able to determine that the coil was definitely faulty.

Another member, Garry, the group's Oregon chapter "Air Marshal," got on his phone to a friend in Los Angeles who sells used BMW motorcycle parts. The friend had the part and promised to get it to the UPS center within the hour to make sure I would get the part delivered by overnight express the next day.

Work done for the day, Stretch told me to grab a beer from the cooler. Payment for his advice would be a few dollars put into the beer kitty. Several members rode their bikes into Redmond later and came back with grocery bags full of steaks, sausages, chicken, broccoli and asparagus, sweet corn and potatoes. Stretch, Barry and Kevin cooked it all over a propane stove and grill and told me to dig in.

I stayed up late that night sitting on one of the couches, sipping beers and listening to dozens of people who came in to share stories of their adventures on the road, ask mechanical questions of the airhead gurus and reminisce about previous rallies in other parts of the country. One big happy family. Lots of laughter, but low-key. The antithesis of a Harley gettogether at Sturgis, I'm sure. I talked to a 21-year-old opera singer who rode in from Chicago and a Bellingham Police lieutenant whose son was just hired as a reporter for the Chicago Tribune. One couple stopped on on their way from Toronto to Alaska. Another fellow was traveling from Alaska to Florida.

The part was delivered to the fairgrounds at noon Thursday. I rolled the bike back onto the plywood on the tent. By then, there were three bikes in the tent, their owners adjusting valves, solving starter motor shorts and replacing alternator rotors. As soon as I had the new coil in place, the wires attached to the plugs and the gas tank back on, I tried starting the bike to make sure it worked before reattaching the complicated faring. It started right up and quietly hummed like BMWs do. The small gallery of spectators sitting on couches with coffee cups and beers applauded. Another Beemer back on the road.

By 4 p.m., the bike was all back together, my tent and gear back on the bike, all my cash was put in the beer kitty and my new-found friends thanked and thanked again. I was on my way back home full of good memories of one of my favorite breakdowns.

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