Well, it's three days since I arrived home from the Big Trip, and more than a day since I completed the coast-to-coast by giving the Ural a sniff of the Indian Ocean, so it's time to set down an account of the trip for posterity.
I kept a journal during the trip and what follows will largely reproduce its contents. I'll be taking a leaf out of Chris's book and not trying to squeeze the whole run into one post, but breaking it into easily digested (and much more quickly written) chunks of a day or two at a time. I'll also look at collating my comments on the bike into a post for the Bike Reviews section, although it may prove to duplicate what's here to an unacceptable extent.
Background and Preparation
Having made the possibly rash decision to buy a Ural Gear-Up sidecar outfit in forest camo, the problem of getting the beast from the East Coast (where all the dealers currently reside) to the West (where MrsB, its new owner currently resides) remained to be solved.
Specialist bike transporters are mainly set up for solos. Combos are so rare that the possibility of finding a shipper who could truly cope with one seemed remote. Car shippers were considered only briefly. Considering the horror stories that abound of the damage that they can do to the relatively smooth and resilient exteriors of modern cars, entrusting them with the care of an outfit with a profusion of fragile, sticky out bits seemed to be a recipe for tears before bedtime and lengthy, soul-destroying litigation.
So there was only one thing for it. Either MrsB or I would have to fly to NSW and ride it back . As the one most experienced in nursing temperamental vehicles home, I drew the short straw and began to make preparations.
A cheap flight and transport and accomodation in NSW proved to be the easy bits. More difficult would be the paperwork to allow me, as a WA resident, to buy a vehicle in NSW and legally ride it out of the showroom and back home. Considering we're supposed to be one country, you'd think it would be easy wouldn't you? Not so .
I couldn't obtain NSW registration for the vehicle because I'm not a resident there. I couldn't obtain WA registration for the vehicle because it must be inspected for roadworthiness in WA. The only way to make it all happen was to obtain a NSW Unregistered Vehicle Permit to allow me to cross NSW and SA, then to obtain a WA Temporary Movement Permit to get me from the WA border to an inspection station in Perth. NSW are fairly generous with the time they'll allow on a permit (anything up to two weeks), but WA are a bit stingy, allowing only 48 hours, so a fast run from the border was going to be necessary.
Even obtaining a UVP wasn't going to be all plain sailing. I still needed a residential address in NSW to put on the application form. Here I fell back on the collective generosity of Netrider and was positively deluged with offers of assistance in this regard. My sincere thanks to those who offered, and my everlasting gratitude to the NR whose address I ended up using. You know who you are and I owe you all .
Legal technicalities aside, a route was plotted and a rough plan of attack worked out. I'd cross the continent in relatively easy stages, at least at first, allowing time to take it easy to run the bike in and perform servicing and (if necessary) repairs en route. I intended to do the run in comfort and budgeted for motel accommodation each night, although I'd take tent and sleeping bag, just in case I was met with a forest of No Vacancy signs at any stage.
Once tent, doss bag, riding gear and enough bits and pieces to allow a reasonable level of civilisation to be maintained were packed, I'd run out of baggage allowance for the flight, so, for the trip home, I'd be reliant on the bike's (comprehensive) standard toolkit and whatever I could buy or otherwise obtain once in the East. Visions of roadside engine rebuilds in the middle of the Nullabor, using only two toffee spanners and a bent screwdriver danced in my head as I left for the airport.
Saturday 28th June
Caught Virgin Blue's midnight horror out of Perth and, amazingly, managed to sleep most of the way to Melbourne where I had an hour or two's wait for my connection to Newcastle. Slept most of the way on that one too.
Had a rare moment of inspiration on arrival, and sorted out my hire car before heading for the baggage carousel, thus avoiding both the worst of the reclaim scrum and the lengthy queuing experience enjoyed by many of my fellow passengers.
The hire car was a Hyundai Getz and, if I may be permitted a little car oriented aside on a bike forum, I was vastly more impressed with it than the Ford XR6 I recently drove. Panel fits, trim quality, ergonomics, visibility, lack of mysterious rattles and noises and general pleasant driving experience were all an order of magnitude better than the homegrown product. Tip to Ford and Holden; the Koreans are kicking your arses in the sales stakes for cars that people actually buy with their own money rather than their employers' because they've moved on since 1975.
Anyway, in my surprisingly good cheapo Korean hire car, I headed up to East Maitland to meet the affable Peter Hogan, proprietor of Dbike Shop and enthusiastic sidecarrist. It makes considerable sense to buy an outfit from a dealer who knows what three wheelers are supposed to feel like. That way, you've got a fighting chance that it will be set up somewhere close to right as far as alignment is concerned.
And there it was. My (or rather MrsB's) new pride and joy, resplendent in it's forest camo which an enthusiastic detailer had attempted (unsuccessfully) to render glossy by the application of what appeared to be several gallons of polishing goop. Ah well.
First impressions were of size and solidity. A brief inspection showed the welding and foundrywork to all be to a much higher standard than I remembered on UK market bikes in the early 90s. Nothing visible really made me suck my teeth and worry about quality or potential reliability problems. Overall, it looked pretty good.
Pulling out both chokes (or, more correctly, enricheners) on the Keihin carbs and prodding the starter button caused the engine to fire on the first compression and settle to a smooth, if somewhat high, idle.
Quite reasonably, considering the trouble that a novice can find themselves in on an outfit, both the importers and the dealers for the Ural take some pains to ensure that anyone buying one has at least the basics of chairmanship before being let loose alone. Consequently, my first run was as a passenger in the chair as Peter took me to some quiet suburban streets where I could see how rusty my hackery skills might have become. The sidecar was very comfortable. Even at 183 cm and 120 kg in my riding gear, I fitted very nicely in an elbows out sort of manner.
Swapping places, I found that I was rustier than a Lancia on a salt lake, and was very tentative indeed for the first couple of trips round the block. Even 40 km/h seemed terrifyingly fast and the whole plot seemed determined to drift wide on even low speed left handers. All perfectly normal for a novice, but I used to consider myself fairly hot stuff on a more vicious outfit than this one so I was a bit disappointed with my performance.
However, a few more laps and things started to come back. Attacking left-handers with more gusto improved the feel of things considerably, although I then had a small problem with the width of the outfit, managing to clip a spoon drain at one point. However, I was improving, and even managed what felt to be a creditable throttle induced left-right-left through some traffic calming islands. Anyway, my performance was deemed adequate (or maybe just too terrifying ) and we headed back to the shop to do the deal.
Payment made, I trotted up to the local Motor Registry (only 100m up the road, rather conveniently) to see about a UVP. I'd been dreading this bit and envisaging all kinds of bureaucratic horror to be endured. My time budget was worked out to allow me to return on Monday and even Tuesday to jump through RTA hoops to get my piece of paper. As it turned out, I was in and out in less than half an hour . Credit where it's due, they did an efficient, fuss free job. Even worded the permit to allow me to ride down into Newcastle before setting off for the West (ostensibly to allow me to reach my motel but, in reality, to get some photos of the bike by the sea ).
Legalities sorted, it only remained for me to drop my hire car back at the airport, return to Dbike Shop chauffered by Renae (who somehow managed to cop my life story on the way and didn't appear to fall asleep at any point ) and pick up the combo for the brief run to my motel in Wallsend.
Needless to say, my first trip did not go particularly smoothly. I was tired and any unfamiliar vehicle demands full possession of all one's faculties, let alone a vehicle with the foibles of a combo. Without a passenger, the chair was sitting too high and pushing the bike right, the rapidly loosening new engine developed a 3000 rpm idle and, not knowing the area at all, I got lost. I've said many rude things about WA's signposting. However, I take them all back, because NSW is far worse. It might be OK if you live there and have some familiarity with suburb names and relative locations but for a stranger it's pretty much impossible to avoid several hours of aimless wandering in a quest to find your destination.
After several stops to rest a hot smelling engine and a number of hairy moments involving falling left handers and a nervous throttle wrist, I eventually found a road name that looked familiar and, by good fortune, managed to follow it in the right direction to the Hotel Formule 1.
Knackered, dehydrated and wondering seriously what I'd got myself into, I staggered up to a room that was about the minimum size you could put people into without being accused of crimes against humanity, poured several litres of water down my throat and crashed out for a solid 14 hours.
To be continued.....
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I used to like Harleys because you can rebuild them. Now I like BMWs because you don't have to.
…I couldn't obtain NSW registration for the vehicle because I'm not a resident there. I couldn't obtain WA registration for the vehicle because it must be inspected for roadworthiness in WA…
Catch 22 alive and well eh
Quote:
…The hire car was a Hyundai Getz and, if I may be permitted a little car oriented aside on a bike forum, I was vastly more impressed with it than the Ford XR6 I recently drove…
Ooh they’re not in favour right here right now ask “DadAgain”
Quote:
… I staggered up to a room that was about the minimum size you could put people into without being accused of crimes against humanity...
Pics next post eh?
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Better a diamond with a flaw than a pebble without
Catching the redeye had taken more out of me than I expected. Must be getting old. However, fourteen hours kip saw me much restored and so , after breakfast at the motel (which wasn’t really worth the $7 I paid for it, though the cheap and adequate room made up for that a bit), I wandered out to the bike in a much more positive frame of mind.
First priority was to improve the handling, especially on left handers. From the dealer, the suspension units (five of ‘em, basically interchangeable, although I’m not sure whether the spring rates are all the same) were all set to minimum preload. This was fine with two guys of comparable size on board, but with just my ample frame on the bike and noone in the chair it led to the outfit adopting a perceptible list to starboard and consequent reluctance to turn left without feeling as if the sidecar was about to come up (which is no big deal with a bit of practice but is rather disturbing when you’re (re)learning). Out came the huge tool roll and, two minutes with the C spanner later, the bike was sitting up on max preload at both ends, the chair remaining on min.
Next job was a quick trip to Supercrap to lay in emergency supplies for the big run. I’m no fan of SC but I’d passed a branch during the previous day’s wanderings so it had the major virtue that I knew where it was. On the way, my growing familiarity with the outfit, combined with the suspension adjustment made the run far more pleasant. The idle was still sky high, but at least it went round corners without the sphincter twitching moments of the day before.
Pulling into the car park, I experienced the widely recognised Ural Delay Factor for the first time. In the five meters between the bike and the door of the store I found myself talking to two or three interested folk, giving them a potted history of Urals in general and this Ural in particular in answer to their questions as to what it was and how old it was. This was to become a constant theme over the course of the week and I got my spiel down to a fine art by the time I reached home.
Supercrap provided oils, fuses, wire, tape (both gaffer and electrical), cable ties, funnels, drain pan, clean up stuff, a big rechargable hand lamp and a few other odds and sods of tools and emergency repair stuff that seemed likely to be handy at the side of the road, along with a big box to put it all in and a small tarp to both retain any spills in an environmentally responsible manner and to provide me with a smooth, cleanish work area to keep tools and parts out of the dirt. That’s the great thing about combos. You can carry all sorts of crap that would be completely out of the question on a solo, making you, potentially, much more self contained and self reliant. And when heading out across the middle of nowhere, on an unknown bike of uncertain reliability, being self contained and self reliant is as near to warm and fuzzy as you’re gonna get.
Back out to the bike, and I decided that I couldn’t live with the idle any longer and so broke out the tools again to turn the idle screws out by 180 degrees each. Much better. Lacking balancing facilities I trusted that equal adjustment on each side would keep me somewhere close to even.
More UDF, and then it was off to the foreshore to meet up with fellow Netrider MZ who was keen to check out the Ural. With suspension and idle sorted, the bike felt solid and reassuring, with no odd squeaks or rattles. The engine, whilst still feeling very new and tight, was very willing, with enormous torque at low revs and sufficient power to easily keep up with urban traffic. The gearchange was, again, new and stiff and required very positive shifting in the manner of a BMW. Gearchanges were also affected by the huge flywheel taking several seconds to spin down when the throttle was shut. Very much a case of throttle-two-three, clutch-two-three, change-two-three, clutch-two-three, throttle. Rush it and you’ll hurt it, not to mention embarrassing yourself. I really enjoyed the gentle run through the city centre and down to the coast in the vicinity of the Ocean Baths. Heads were turning in the approved manner and a couple of shouts of “Swap yer” were heard.
I liked Newcastle. It was lively and bustling, even on a Sunday morning, which was quite a revelation to someone used to WA’s tendency to go to sleep at weekends. Plenty of attractive old buildings left too, again in contrast to the overdeveloped wasteland that Perth has become. I was particularly taken with the (sadly dilapidated) Ocean Baths, a huge deco structure that reminded me of English south coast seaside resorts. I took the opportunity to get a couple of photos of the bike in front of it to get a flavour of what Folkestone or Eastbourne might have looked like had the Wehrmacht ever got across the English Channel.
More UDF ensued and I had a lengthy chat with an older chap who’d seen the pre-import outfit at the bike show in Sydney and so at least knew what he was looking at. Then I noticed a prominent headland to the south, with what appeared to be a road winding round it. It looked like a good, prominent spot to get some photos of the bike against a background of sea and coal ships as evidence of my starting point. Following the sea front south, sure enough I started to climb and eventually reached a turning that took me along a one way road around the headland. It all seemed very busy with pedestrians and traffic and lots of people seemed very interested in something going on out at sea, with much peering through binoculars and camera viewfinders. It was only after I’d been parked up for several minutes that I twigged that a couple of whales were frolicking out there. I attempted to get a shot of them, but didn’t have enough zoom on the camera or fast enough reactions to get anything even remotely decent. My best effort shows a tiny patch of disturbed water in the far distance.
While waiting for MZ to arrive, I got chatting to a Scottish guy who plausibly claimed ownership of a GL1000 outfit. Certainly knew something about what he was talking about anyway. He gave the combo a very thorough examination and, as a result, so did I.
Again, overall impressions were very good. As I noted before, welding and foundry work appeared excellent. Everything was properly screwed together, the electrics all worked (apart from the neutral light anyway), brackets appeared to line up properly (early bikes having some problems in this regard according to some web accounts), the floating caliper disc brake set up was beautifully engineered (although the disc itself did not appear to be the floater that it alooks like, being completely solid on its bobbins) and the Russians appear to have discovered nyloc nuts. I’ve already mentioned the size of the tool kit. It contains enough to enable the entire bike to be dismantled to its component parts. It also contains a puncture repair kit, tyre levers and pump, a pair of work gloves, pots of touch up paint for all four colours in the camo scheme, and a spare oil filter (supplementing the four additional spares that I’d bought). The sidecar boot is huge, with a substantial rubber mat on the floor and capable (as I found out later) of swallowing the standard tool kit, a 10 litre petrol can, two 5 l cans of oil, my camera case, a small briefcase and all my foul weather gear with space to spare. Then of course you’ve got the rack mounted on the boot lid above the spare wheel, and, if you’ve no passenger, almost unlimited space in the tub. This is a serious load carrier.
Appearancewise, the whole outfit is well proportioned and generally looks “right”. It’s certainly not graceful or beautiful but I’d regard it as very handsome for what is, after all, a utility vehicle. I was particularly taken with the solid, chunky appearance of the engine, with its substantial cylinder finning and total lack of tacky chrome covers. The only brightwork on the bike is the exhaust system and even that was already turning an attractive shade of blue near the heads. Maybe I’m weird but I really like blued pipes. I consider them an honourable scar.
MZ managed to find me after I’d reported my location by mobile. We spent an enjoyable (well, it was for me) hour or more going over the Ural and discussing the merits of East German strokers. I also prevailed upon him to take a photo of me on the bike with the ever present coal ships in the background (although, now I look, they're not ).
Eventually it was time for me to head back to my motel to exchange jeans for leathers, pick up the rest of my gear and hit the road in earnest. I’d booked the room for two nights but the smoothness of my dealings with the RTA meant I could get going the best part of a day ahead of schedule. Unfortunately I couldn’t get a refund on the room, but it was cheap enough that I wasn’t going to ulcerate about it.
I tried to be clever in heading out of town and, after some more aimless wandering, found myself on the freeway. And me with a new engine too. Bugger. Still, a tweak of the throttle got us up to a reasonable distress free 80 which was enough to not be a serious danger. Finally reached a road junction I recognised and reached Maitland without further incident, where I stopped to fill up and let the engine rest for a few minutes. What with my getting lost antics and my trip to the seafront, I was surprised to note an odometer reading of 122 kms. As it read 25 kms when I first saw the bike, that meant I’d done nearly 100 kms to end up, more or less, back where I’d started.
Target for the night was Merriwa on the Golden Highway but, having got moving westwards somewhat later in the day than I’d originally intended, I was doubtful whether I’d make it. Riding a still unfamiliar vehicle on unfamiliar roads in the dark really didn’t appeal.
Trying not to hold up traffic too much, I kept to 70 if there was nothing behind me, with brief bursts of 80 if there was following traffic with no reasonable overtaking opportunities. Fortunately the road up the Hunter Valley is well provided with overtaking lanes and so I didn’t cause a really major obstruction.
A lay-by at Greta provided the opportunity to rest the bike after a lengthy climb and also allowed photos of a reasonably decent view across the valley. Once again, I found myself explaining the Ural’s origins to an interested passerby.
Turning on to the Golden Highway, another cooling break gave me a more industrial photographic background, appropriate to a machine with it’s roots firmly in Stalin’s era. In these paranoid times I’m vaguely surprised that the presence of a strange man with a camera and eccentric transport outside a major industrial installation didn’t spark a major security alert.
One last stop for cooling and photography, followed by a brief ride blinded by the setting sun and it was dark. With the temperature dropping rapidly and no desire to meet any large wildlife I was grateful to call it a day at Denman, 50 kms short of my target.
If anyone’s in the area, I can thoroughly recommend the Denman Motor Inn. Friendly, spotless and comfortable, with a proprietress who was most impressed with the Ural and insisted that I park it under cover in her own carport. For $75 it was the best value motel I was to see for the whole trip.
After a shower and a change back to denims, I wandered out on foot to investigate the Chinese restaurant at the local RSL that my host had recommended. Found the place OK (my sense of direction must be improving). There I spent $30 on possibly the most enormous Chinese meal ever consumed by one person. Honestly, it was immense. A huge cauldron of soup, served at something approaching the melting point of lead, followed by a mountain of rice and Malaysian beef. The quality wasn’t going to win awards (though it was perfectly OK) but it was still damn good value.
Eventually waddled back to my motel room and experienced no difficulty whatsoever in getting to sleep.
Very sorry about the lack of included pics so far. I'll try to edit to include them tomorrow night. Out of time for now.
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I used to like Harleys because you can rebuild them. Now I like BMWs because you don't have to.
I should revisit Newcastle (my home town) some time. I've only had fleeting visits now and then, especially now that my folks live half an hour south of Newcastle rather than actually in it.
By the sounds of things, you visited King Edward Park (the 1-way loop around a little headland), home of the famous Mattara Hillclimb event.
Great write up Pat and the pics are fantastic. I was leaving my work in Osborne Park last Wednesday and found myself following a bike with a side car and fleetingly wondered if it could possibly be the Ural getting to know its new home in Perth. When I finally caught up a bit - it got away from me on the on-ramp to the freeway - (I was on my VL250) I saw that it was a shiny black sidecar ("Black Betty" was its name) and I figured it wasn't you afterall. I look forward to hopefully seeing you or Mrs B on these roads one day soon.
Top foties Pat. Nice one. I couldn't make it out from the shots but does it have a kickstart as well? If so have you tried it? Smile
It has, and I have. It's tucked down between the bike and the chair and, of course swings out and down, as you'd expect on a lengthways engine. Rather awkward and confined, especially if you've got big feet. The gearing's not great either, so it's not fantastically effective unless you've carefully positioned the crank beforehand.
Overall, good for emergencies and easing the engine over to set tappets, but not great for regular use. It would be a different matter with the sidecar on the other side.
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I used to like Harleys because you can rebuild them. Now I like BMWs because you don't have to.
Transcontinental Ural Capers (Pics Added)
. As the one most experienced in nursing temperamental vehicles home, I drew the short straw 
and began to make preparations.
.
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) and we headed back to the shop to do the deal.
).
