New Bike!
It was a chilly Saturday in early January and I wandered into a local bike shop to pick up a copy of the latest issue of Coastal Cruizin. That's all I wanted. No, really. The next thing I knew I was walking out the proud owner of a new bike.
For just a little
bit of background, my current/previous ride is a '98 Aero and it's a great machine. I love the way it looks, sounds and rides; but it's got well over 50K miles on it and I've had it for more than ten years. In the last few yea My wife was with me at the time and I expected her to put the kibosh on the deal right then and there, but much to my surprise she said, "Great deal? Really?" (I love that woman.) The
bargaining began. I have to say that I hate that part of buying any vehicle. Why do I have to negotiate? I just want to see a price and either pay it, or not pay it. But as we all know, that's not the way it
works, so if you want to buy, you've got to play the game and do the haggling thing. We went back and forth for a bit and by the end of it all, I was pretty happy with the deal. Before we were done,
they'd knocked 5K off the sticker price and thrown in some saddle bags, a back rest and windshield to boot. Not bad. There's nothing like the grin of someone who's just picked up a new set of wheels and I had that smile for days after I got
the VTX. (It almost matched the expression on my 24 year old son's face, when I surprised him by giving him the Aero. Almost, but not quite.)
Of course, I couldn't just leave the new bike alone and so I started the mods almost immediately, beginning with the pipes.
For almost all new bikes right off the showroom floor, the sound is almost non-existent. I did a bunch of research on the web and finally decided I'd go with a modified version of the stock pipes. A company up in Minnesota called VTX Exhaust
has developed their own baffle system for the VTX that uses the existing chrome. You send them your pipes; they put new guts in them and send them back the same day. In no time at all, they were packed up and sent off. Without any pipes on
the bike, I couldn't ride it. So, I moped around for the week it took for the round trip to Minnesota; my face pressed against
the window, waiting for the UPS truck. When it finally showed up, I had the pipes installed within twenty minutes and was
out riding two minutes after that. The sound is deep, beefy (there's that word again) and just loud enough; all for a price that's less than half that of new pipes. And since they match the factory specs, there's no need to re-jet or add a
performance kit. Cool. For my first ride on the new bike, I decided on one of my favorites. From US-1 in Rockledge, I cruised on down to Suntree
(ish) and turned east on Rockledge Drive, just north of Viera Blvd. It's a residential sort of road, so you can't wind it out, but
it's a gorgeous ride, right next to the river, with a lot of twisties in the road. If you follow that north, you'll eventually come to
Church Street in Beautiful Downtown Cocoa. Turn left and go to Delanoy, where you'll turn right. Follow that across the eastbound lanes of 520 and turn left onto the westbound side, but only for one block. At Indian River Drive, turn right and
head north again. It's pretty much like Rockledge Drive; a gorgeous, slow putt down a curvey road by the river. Take that all
the way to US-1 northbound in PSJ. You might want to stop at Old Florida Grill for a cold one, or keep going up US-1 to
Pinto's. Or stop at both places. I usually do. Then, just past PSJ, you'll come to Golden Knight's Blvd. at the Tico airport.
Turn left (west) and go just a few hundred yards to Tico Road and turn left again, heading south. Now that's a fun road. It's
got some serious curves and it's almost always deserted. You'll follow that around the airport, (it eventually turns into Perimeter Road, for no apparent reason) until you come to Grissom. I generally turn left there, and head back south.
(Grissom is a pleasant alternative to US-1.) After the pipes, the only other mod I made was the addition of some leather fringe on the brake and clutch handles.
(Unfortunately, I didn't tie them on right and they fell off on a subsequent ride. I hate when that happens.) Even though the
bike came with a very sharp black and gold paint job, I'm thinking I want a more customized look. I'll be getting some quotes in the near future on that and will keep you posted.
So, as it turned out, I walked in the shop for a magazine, and walked out with a new bike. The part that pisses me off is that I never did get the magazine, so I'll need to go back. Hmm. I've been thinking about getting a bike for my wife…
rs, I've been lusting after the VTX-1800's. What's not to like? One of the biggest V-Twins on the market, everything about
them looks beefy. I made the mistake of sitting on one in the shop. I was home. It felt great and of course when the salesman saw where I was, he said, "If you want that one, I can make you a great deal. It's a brand new '06 that's
never been ridden."
