Necessity is the Mother of Invention by Peter Feistl

 

How did I sleep through the alarm? How am I going to get to Whittlesea in time? Well at least the tank is full, but the rear tyre has only got one more ‘easy’ ride so I better take the freeway!

 

Getting off the Western Ring at Plenty road and still running late meant the easy riding was temporarily forgotten until the servo was in sight. The club had already commenced their adventure and I just saw Ian performing backmarker duties so I had made ‘Sunday Outing’ with about 20 seconds to spare.

 

A respectable pace was set that had me enjoying every minute, especially as this was to be a short ride to the Eildon regions and I would break off after lunch, so I could catch up with a friend later in the day. The ride was such fun, I soon had the CBR1100XX leaned hard into corners and well throttled up the mountain roads. The thought of tyres came rushing back after a few unusual moments caused by loss of traction, so I took it easy from there. Within minutes Martin had discovered a mid-corner gravel trap and had fallen, bringing the ride to a halt.

 

Martin was OK, but his CBR1100XX was a mess. An inspection of my rear tyre revealed a 5cm canvas patch. Bugger! With our lead rider down, Ben asked me to take charge, escort the ride to the end of the Jameson road and return. 10kms later a check of the tyre revealed twice as much canvas, a tyre that has seen its use-by date expire a long way from home and time running out!

 

The group departed and left me to ride home at a very slow 60 km/h pace. I headed for Alexandria and by the time I got there, 2 layers of canvas had worn through and the inner rubber was approaching paper thinness!

 

So, at times like these, you have to make some choices….here were mine…

  • One – call your date and tell her that you are a no-show because of a motorbike,
  • Two – call your EX and ask her to help you, knowing that she recently got bogged but you didn’t help her, because you were with your girlfriend.
  • Three – call your brother and tell him to unload the trailer full of wood and come and pick you up, knowing full well he is hosting a party that you chose not to attend.

 

If you guessed that all three were not happy, you’re right! So now this is where ‘necessity is the mother of invention’ comes in.

 

As you know, Ben Warden is a switched on guy when it comes to motorbikes and he has taught me a thing or two about motorbikes. You might remember a previous article about my little bag of tricks as inspired by Ben. Well, the lipstick, lip balm and barley sugar were all useless, but rummaging through the kit, I found a roll of NITTO Electrical Tape – the good stuff – black and sticky and I think, what the heck…. 5 to 7 strips of about 30cm carefully positioned, go for a test ride and see what happens. 2 kms, 4 kms, 10 kms later and hey, this actually works at 60 km/h. Maybe I can go faster and make it to the date! WRONG – the tape gets too hot and shreds. More new tape was applied and I rode slowly to Marysville.  More tape was again applied before descending the Spur, but cornering produced unwanted heat even though the surface temperature was cold. So more tape was required just before Healesville.

 

The group rode past me as I was applying the tape for the final time and we caught up in Healesville for a tyre discussion and farewells. The ‘patch’ as applied, lasted all the way home – 80 kms - driven mainly on straight roads in normal traffic conditions. I was relieved when the driveway was in sight and surprised at how well the tape lasted!

 

As for the date, well I might have blown any chance of getting back in the good books. Now I'm working on the theory that 'ABSENCE makes the heart grow fonder' and 'Playing hard to get!'

 

And just a final footnote - the EX was prepared to jump in the van and come and pick me up. Great Gal that one, but it would have ruined a good story, great adventure and a new discovery!