I miss my hero..

What's up guys.. Been a while. I check in now and again. Want to update you on our "progress" with the RC8R. Also want to clear a few things up. First, I read a post a while back where someone commented on how expensive the Nichols triples kit was - then said as much as they like GoGo, they can't justify the expense. Let me hear myself say this out-loud, please, I have NOTHING to do with the business/profit/sales part of that kit. I love it, I helped develop it, and I tried to tell everyone on a Superduke that I could reach, about it. But that's it. I got one free set, that was my pay for helping develop it. Then I produced that video talking about the kit, because I promised I would, for Nichols and Tri Valley - to help sell them. After that I am a customer just like you.

Next, our Superduke is still dead. I have tried many times to get Mike to sell it to me, as is, so that I can bring it back to life. I get nowhere, yet. But I still have hope. And I still have a Superduke Revival bank account waiting in the wings, funded in part by a very generous member of THIS forum - Michael L. Don't worry, I'll get Mike to sell it to me - if it kills him.. It actually kills ME every time I see that bike in the corner of the shop, lying there wounded beyond repair, and neglected. I did race it again though, at least a part of it anyway. They broke our oil pump drive gear while installing a Yoyodyne slipper clutch in the RC8R a month ago. It was late night, we had to run the next morning, so out it came from our wounded Superduke. Same part number, thankfully...

As for my update on our RC8R program... What's my biggest promise - honesty right? So hold on to your asses - I hate it. I hate our RC8R. I hate it's paint job, I hate how it handles, I hate being passed like I'm painted on the wall while the big twins rocket by us, and in fact it's gotten so bad that I actually hate anyone who stands near it. So don't stand near it!



Truth is something is wrong with ours. Must be. By now I have had some top riders run it around the track, they come back in shock that we go as fast as we do on it. It's pretty violent how it "handles". Really it's more like a hell ride at some demented amusement park built by axe murderers. The last top guy who rode it, after six runs on it - he ended up with our Ohlins steering damper dialed all the way in to the stop, then backed out ONE click. Holy shit you almost didn't need a rear stand to park the bike, it was so tight. The biggest problem we have is, you guessed it, instability. There's a lot we have done (probably to cause it) that I won't get into. Recently we have begun to realise some disadvantages we have by running an older model R - like the rear ride height link. So we're looking into updating that now. Also I think the custom triple clamp set we had made for the bike, is fundamentally wrong in design. So we are looking into changing that as well. Finally I think I'm gonna paint the bike before next round. It's just all wrong. Especially from the front. Total crap. Chris Fillmore's RC8R in recent AMA races is very inspirational. That thing is beautiful. And it didn't look like it wanted to kill him either, until Laguna this past weekend..

Regardless of all the hatred in our pits this year, somehow we are second in the Open Twins points. YEY!! ....No, not yey. second sucks. Especially if you knew who we are second place, to. I don't really want to talk about it now. But he's on a KTM, RC8R, and his bike is definitely NOT trying to kill him like ours is me. AND he is about the least likable guy in American roadracing. WTF, of all the people to be second too...

I created a blog finally, on gotagteam.com. WTF is "Go Tag Team" anyway you might ask? The "Go" should be obvious. The "TAG" is my wife's initials - who has been the core of my racing effort for a decade (although to be honest, she kind of took the last four years off from that - which is aNOTHER whole story in itself...). And the "TEAM" is the theme our effort is bulit around - Together Everyone Achieves More. Oddly, the word team also spells out each member of our small family - Tracy Eric And Matthew. So there you go, that's the gotagteam.com. I know, it sounds like a porn site, or a professional wrestling outfit. What can I say, this is my life.

For the past four years we have kind of been separated, Tracy and I. But also kind of together. Trust me this is total hell. Either divorce, or be married. Purgatory is crap for your spirit. We are actively working things out now (I think?), which is great. But during our darkest times... well a few lassies came a-knockin - one of which was just a few days into walking out on her wedding which was due to take place in less than thirty days time. Wanna know who she was getting married to? No, trust me, you don't. But he races a KTM.

Shut up now, stop trying to instigate more problems for me. I did nothing wrong. But you've got to admit, that deal was straight from the Twilight Zone.

T-shirts. I want to say thanks to all of you who bought the Duke shirts I had made. That was a new experience for me. I'm considering doing it again, only this time with a different design, and different color shirt. What was I thinking when I chose white? What an idiot - mine had an ink stain on it in the first five minutes I wore it. And that Hanes Beefy-T cotton, well it's durable as hell but the cotton is so hairy it kind of came through the print and robbed it of it's vital colors. I hate how that happened in just a few washes. I worked really hard on that design. I called the printer, who is a guy I grew up with on the east coast, and told him next time I see him I'm gonna run his dog over, twice.

Maybe the next shirt will be black. Thinner material. A different cut. And printed by a chick covered in tattoos, with spiked hair and Herman Munster boots. Yeah, that's how I'm rollin next time.


So you guys keep jammin on your Superdukes. Wish I was out there with you.

In time, I will be back.

On the hero

GoGo

ps - here's the blog http://www.gotagteam.com/blog

Hey GoGo, Nice to see you posting here again, miss all the great stories you gave us. Also nice to see you still on a KTM. Riding a KTM can be kind of a love/ hate thing at times, but you already know that Still wouldn't sell any of mine! What was that old saying? " You meet the nicest people on a Honda"... My new saying is" You meet the coolest people on a KTM " that's why I ride mine.
Ready for the next episode.
Tim

Yeah good to see you posting back on here. Always enjoy your write ups dude. Good luck with next round and keep us up to date with the championship.

nice write up fella , can't help thinking you were a bit pissed mind , I felt i should offer up some advice after reading that , but as it turns out I aint got any

yeah mate all the best, good to hear from you.

I will get in contact with the KTM race team over hear.. i now have a contact through a friend. He may be able to help in fixing any of the issues that you are having.

Love your posts dude... You should write a book. Ever read any Dan Walsh bike articles? I think you'd like em.

Meanwhile good luck sorting the RC8R beastie, but I want to read about you reviving the Superduke soon...

Yea I don't know any more about the Fillmore crash than anyone else. Except oddly it seems their motor let go (which I can only assume it did, at such a non-crash zone...) at a very similar time (accelerating from 3rd gear on up) to one of the two superbike kitted RC8Rs that I saw blow up last year. The one I know about sent the rider over the bars, just like Fillmore, and a rod through the tranny. At least that's what I was told. The other one let go at the brink of decel, off redline. Same weekend, two turns earlier. No crash.

Far as me sending my rod through someone else's tranny, it never happened. I had some punk pursue Tracy real hard while we were in purgatory, so I have first hand experience with the other end of those type of deals. I couldn't do that to my worst enemy. Which apparently, ironically, he now is. Go to my blog and read the "Anger Management" story - there's some follow up drama in there about it.

As for setup help on our RC8R, please, anything you guys can come up with is appreciated. Ours is a 2009 model, which we only recently learned has a very different rear link than the newer models. For sure this will make a difference - KTM obviously changed it for a reason... The offsets we have run so far are 24mm, 26mm and 27mm - 27 being where we are currently. They are all crap. Our bike is violently unstable. And to add to the confusion, we run Michelin slicks, which nobody does out here. For sure that is throwing us a curveball, but I can't imagine this is the core of our issues. Something just feels globally wrong with our bike.

Hey GoGo,
enjoyed reading ya thread and will chase up some of your old ones.
Not been a member for too long.
This has probably been said before.If so excuse me but that picture,somebody gotta make these into T Shirts.
Ill have 2 size Large on black shirts.

Had my shirt on today,,,,,,,,will also take a couple of new ones when they arrive,,,,,,,,,the Nicols set up is the next thing on my "to do" list,,,best mod you can do to an SD,,,,,fer sur,,,,hang in there man,,,

GoGo,

If you want stability from the front-end you're going the wrong way. Less offset = more trail = more stability (more of a castoring effect). Not sure what the stock offset of the 09 RC8R is but I'd start there and decrese it in 2mm increments until the desired stability is acheived,

Good luck, John

Thanks, exactly what I need - help!

Actually stock offset on an 09 RC8R is 28mm. First time we ran the bike we had it at 24mm. All wrong. Then we ran it at 26mm. All wrong. Last time we ran it at 27mm. All wrong.

While it IS true what you say, less offset (smaller number) gives you more trail (which in theory should make the bike more stable), it is actually a double edged sword you start swinging when you change offsets. What I mean is you are affecting more than simply your trail number when you change your offset. Unfortunately you are also moving the front wheel back, which puts more weight on the front (closer to the motor). And you are shortening the wheel base (which actually makes the bike LESS stable). And finally, if you view the bike from above, and picture the bars turning one side to the other side, you can see that the less offset you run, the smaller of an arc your front wheel turns on. Doug Chandler calls a bike with more trail when achieved via shortening it's offset - "Close". And close, in his words, is erratic and unstable.

So yes, I agree with you - more trail is achieved by shortening the offset. This is actually exactly what we did. PRoblem is the bike was horrible. Go figure.

What I have learned, this year especially, is that you can't just apply "numbers" to any given chassis and get predictable results. Just ask Rossi.. Every bike is different, every rider is different, all tyres are different, etc. etc.

I plan to abandon our custom made triple clamps, and go back to stock. That our bike is so consistently unstable with all the different offsets we have tried, suggests we have a bigger problem somewhere else.

How about putting the RC8 motor in the SD? I know it doesn't fit but my old man is a television repairman and he has this ultimate set of tools. I can fix it!

Seriously. You ran the piss outta the SDR by the middle of last season so it seemed like you had just a few small troubles to work out on that bike. Are you even lapping any faster on the RC8?
Being new to all of this I can't even imagine how frustrating it must be to have to deal with a new bike that doesn't respect you.
Kinda like raising a teenager and just when he starts to be productive and respectful, someone dumps another one on you to raise.

I still enjoy watching you ride GoGo. No matter where you are in the pack.

BTW, some of your best wordsmithing was the caption about "sending your rod through someone else's tranny."

I almost pissed myself. ( avoiding the temptation to post pics......)

Congrats on 2nd in points. I am sure that people here don't realise how significant that is considering the guy that is leading.
He really is an animal on the track. And an organ off the track apparently.

For everyone who has not seen HMC's bike here's a pic from Laguna. I spoke with Mitch Hansen on Saturday and the bike had a failure they just weren't sure exactly what broke ,or at least they weren't talking about it, GoGo white and orange is the way to go...

Good to see go-go back!

First, I think Eric needs to hit the "do-over" button and get onto one of those RC8R Race Spec like Chris Fillmore's there. Poor Chris, when he was "practicing" at ACS on it (pre-molestation state that its now in), I think he had to wipe my drool off the bike.

It looks like HMS has retained the WP suspension, but go-go, you swithced to Ohlins, no? Did you go down that path because Randolph did? Is Ohlins providing you direct setup support (like Randolph apparently got)?

My suspension bits now in the capable hands of Lindemann Engineering, I posed the question to them about the Nichols kit. I am wiling to invest in it, if they believe it worthwhile. I am looking forward to what can be done on the valving.

We got no help from Ohlins. KTM either for that matter. Not this year anyway. We chose Ohlins R&T forks because they are a LOT less expensive than the White Power race kit for the stock forks. I'm not sure but I think #54 runs White Power forks with Ohlins internals - which are also cheaper. Just guessing though, I know nothing about his bike. For the record, we run nothing on our RC8R because he runs it on his. Every time someone tells me a direction he went, I go the other way. In fact if he told me to run from a burning building, I might have to sit there and burn just to spite myself. I know, I make no sense. But I do poor work...

It took us all season but we figured our RC8R out. That bitch goes dam good now. Turns out our custom triples were designed to not only solve problems, but create a few too. Once we discovered what was wrong with them, EVERYTHING turned around. Last big jump we made was giving our bike to Jerry Piazza - to do with it/to it, anything he wanted. I can't even explain what we got back. I mean, I can, don't get me wrong.. Turns out our frame was bent up front, putting our front tyre out to the right. Then our swingarm was bent too, putting our rear tyre out to the left. We got our bike from KTM/from the Skip Barber school - "Never been down" Thanks guys... Add loose steering head bearings to that (related to our triple clamp design), a rear axle 10mm out of true (related to idiocy), Michelin tyres from 2004 (related to, I'm not sure actually) and a rider who won't take no for an answer (fell on head as an infant, a lot) - what you get is, well, a comedy actually.

For the record, if you have problems like that with your bike, and you fix them, you might not only go faster - you may even get laid more often.

Anyone on an RC8R out there, lower the rear ride height adjuster to the floor. This might feel like you're ass just fell into a bucket while you're riding out there - so raise the rear sub-frame height adjustment to the high setting. That'll feel normal again. If you have an 09, buy the adjuster from a 10 or 11 model. Big difference. You're changing two things - swingarm angle and the angle of your forks (for the love of rake and trail, again...) We have our forks pretty close to the top of the triples. I think our Ohlins R&T forks are the same length as the White Power stockers.

If you want trick triple clamps, don't make them yourself. And don't buy ours. Not for the RC8R anyway, unless you're #54. If you are you can have three free sets. The HMC guys got Attack to make their clamps. Attack told us to get bent until after October when we asked for a set, so we went deeper into finding the problem with ours. Turns out the problem with ours was we had no umbrella girl anymore. WTF! How could that affect our triple clamps!

As always - good stuff man! Thanks for taking the time to share it, and great to see you've maintained your sense of humor through your trials and tribulations with the KTMs.

So, what did you and your crew do to "fix" the custom TC, OR did you go back to the stock one? I'm assuming the frame and swingarm were repaired ... Umbrella girls are rentals anyway, if that was your only problem - pretty cheap and easy to come by.

I glean that you stayed with the stock shock (WP on the '09 RC8R). I read the blog, and re-spring aside, any re-valving done, or were you able to get where you wanted to go without that?

Tyres, tyres, tyres ... what specifically did you end up happy with? Presumably PowerOne race, but what sizes and compounds (front and rear)? DOT or slicks?

Hey if you're bored the weekend of the November 11th, there's a race weekend (club - CVMA) at CVR. A few of us SDers will be out that Friday (practice and open track day). Be great if you showed us the way around. Of course, I'd be calling the gents in Murietta (KTM), and get them to pay your way.