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Bonneville Stories Part IV - 1953 Twin Engine Harley Knucklehead Dragster

14K views 28 replies 18 participants last post by  Rubone 
#1 · (Edited)
 
#3 ·
Great video!! I hope he makes it to 100. His remark about not being able to go to Bonneville once is so true. The salt was wet during my first visit. When you dropped off Lands End onto the salt there was a brine lake about hub deep and 50 yards wide. The Norton and RV were packed in salt when we left. I told my wife that if I never saw that place again I wouldn't miss it. But for some reason I've been back every year since. I sent my entry off for this year and am making plans for next year. Strange place Bonneville. It can treat you like a king or beat the crap out of you. But it draws you back year after year.
 
#4 ·
Great video!! I hope he makes it to 100. His remark about not being able to go to Bonneville once is so true. The salt was wet during my first visit. When you dropped off Lands End onto the salt there was a brine lake about hub deep and 50 yards wide. The Norton and RV were packed in salt when we left. I told my wife that if I never saw that place again I wouldn't miss it. But for some reason I've been back every year since. I sent my entry off for this year and am making plans for next year. Strange place Bonneville. It can treat you like a king or beat the crap out of you. But it draws you back year after year.
I hate to say it, but it's the one place I miss the most.
 
#5 ·
Its a good ways from Maui. I've got a couple of friends, one in Denmark and one in Ireland who are planning to make the trip (with bikes) in 2014. I have to go this year. I lost my gas record and need it back.
 
#10 ·
Funny story about 2006. The tech guys told me and my racing partner we would be covered with salt since we did not have front fenders. Well we could not do anything about it since neither of us had brought fenders. I worried about it and so did Chuck, and then we saw a V-Rod in the back of a truck that had just "run." This was our first time in line we had not raced yet. The V-Rod was COVERED in Salt, just covered! I thought, "oh shit! That guy does not have a front fender either!" Turns out it was Bud's bike that had tumbled down the course at over 100. That is why it was so salty, not because of its fenderless-ness.

Our bikes did fine with no fenders.
 
#16 ·
Despite what Frosty and I have said the honest truth is Bonneville sucks. You fry your ass for a week, break parts, get salt everywhere, ask yourself why do you do this. And then the tech inspector hands you a record cert and suddenly it all makes sense. On the long drive home your are planning for next year. Bonneville has once again sucked you back.
 
#17 ·
It IS the rawest from of motorsport gearheadedry one can experience, straight to the vein.

I love it cause a picture could be taken in 2005 and look like 1955.

Small crowds of people who are there for the real deal. No funny hierarchy of celebrities. Level playing field and camaraderie. Sure there are some asshats and guys who if it rained they would drown from their noses being so high.
 
#18 ·
24 hours of driving to get there, sunburned, nose bleeding, feet hurting, bad food, sleeping at the bend in the road for a week, dehydrated, worn out, smiling all the way home for another 24 hour drive, wondering why you do it. Waiting for next year. Ya, it sucks.
 
#19 ·
Sleeping at "the bend".
Taking showers at the truck stop.
Crusing through the pits in my chopped custom.
Messing with the "Old Crow Speed Shop" belly tanker with Max.
Hot rods, customs and bikes everywhere.
Shows at the Nugget.

Watching the meanest bigtwin flattie Ive ever seen on the special course torque steering from black line to black line making some easy test runs...

Yeah it sucks.
 
#20 ·
i meant to add last year on the way my 32 year old RV took a dump about halfway between Baker and Vegas. Got it home and next day hooked to trailer to my 315,000+ miles pickup and headed off. I stayed in a hotel instead of the Bend. My wife loved it. So I know where we'll be staying this year. Yeah. Bonneville sucked me back again.
 
#21 ·
It's too far to drive for me now.

My last year, I stuck a new small block in the coupe. Her first miles were straight on the freeway and off to the Salt for Speed Week. Hell of a way to break it in.

We had one year a full bar. A real honest to goodness bar, out side the Motor home with a neon palm trees, smoke machine and fake grass carpet. The whole mess was caution taped off and lined with tiki torches...Tents, hotrods and choppers everywhere covering the ground in the center between the motorhomes. Hooligans! We used barstool gocarts to get to the shitters!

Didn't sleep much....come to think of it I don't recall ever sleeping much any year.

I was careful to vary the speeds...
 
#22 ·
stopped there while driving from Benicia Cal - to cleveland Ohio. Expected to see a tourist trap! was amazed at the desolation, one gas station & one mexican restruant!

never been there for any events...... yet I walked out onto the salt, sat down and started catching some crazy vibes! Cant explain....kinda haunting..... Place was closed nobody there for miles, just me and that salt.....thanks for posting Mo
 
#23 ·
Now you need to go during Speed Week. The "vibes" are really there then. Just like Burt (Mr. Hopkins) said in The Worlds Fastest Indian, "this place is hallowed ground", the salt will make your eyes tear up. To think that, for $40 for the whole week you can see the fastest land vehicles on earth, meet people from all over the world, and see that ingenuity is still alive and well, Bonneville will get you hooked.
 
#25 ·
I'm tearing up right now...

There is no other place on earth like it. Hallowed ground for sure. No touristy bs, just the pure unadulterated mechanical bliss. I think Monster energy comes out with a tent and there are always things to buy in the pits.

Don't be shocked if you get to looking around in the pits and get asked to help.... :)

Not much fun for families not obsessed with cars I'm afraid. If you wear shorts, put lots of sunscreen on the lower extremities.
 
#26 ·
i made it to USFRA's World of Speed in '12 and had a ball! met a bunch of really great people, saw plenty of neat vehicles, did the whole first timers deal. yes, you do need sunscreen and a hat, water, and something to drive/ride on the salt, that place is huge. but to be honest, you have to experience it for yourself. words don't do it justice. it is not for every one. you are hundreds of yards away from the race course so spectating sucks (it is not like going to the drags where you can hang off the fence at the starting line and watch the launch). the pits are 5-7 miles long so you have to drive or ride if you want to see all or most of it. tech/registration is centered on the track but 3 miles from the staring line and the starting line is 3-4 inland (insalt?) from the paved road.
but to go wide open for three plus miles kinda makes up for it. pin the throttle, lean into the bars, wring out the motor between shifts, watch the course markers fly by and try not to yell to loudly in your helmet because it is fun. well, fun if you dig going wide open down a gravel raod because that is what the surface is like.
back to the thread, sorry for the hi-jack

 
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