Cyril Huze Blog – World's Number One Source For Custom Motorcycle News

Miles per gallon? Maybe you know if you have a factory bike but only if your brand discloses it.  As surprising as it can be, unlike cars, federal laws don’t require motorcycle manufacturers to perform fuel-economy tests or, if they do, to reveal their numbers! Why? The reason given by government representatives is that bikes make up a small percentage of overall vehicles and are already considered fuel efficient and offering great mileage. Result? There is not an industry wide protocol for motorcycle MPG testing. So, from where come from the fuel economy figures that a limited number of manufacturers publish (Harley-Davidson since 1982 and recently Yamaha & Suzuki?). From EPA emissions tests that manufacturers are already required to perform to sell bikes in the United States. How? By measuring a vehicle’s tailpipe emissions under urban driving conditions. The test is run on a chassis dynamometer and it involves a series of accelerations, decelerations, idling, cold starts and hot starts and running at 21 mph a distance of 11 miles at a temperature of 75 degrees. IMHO, nothing to represent real-world riding conditions! So, if you don’t know for sure your MPG, you have the choice between to answer 50 miles per gallon (the answer that you are supposed to make when you have no clue) or like me,  to answer that you don’t really care because you ride for pleasure. (even at close to $4.00 per gallon!).

Chris Callen, editor of Cycle Source Magazine sent me this beautiful quoted text to share with you. It’s the weekend. Get a cold one and take the time to read attentively what he has to say. Who among Us will lead? .

“This post may not seem like it has much to do with motorcycling but stick with me for a minute. I have long believed that motorcycle people have always been on the side of freedom in its truest sense. That we bikers, have counted ourselves among the ranks for freedom fighters since the beginning of motorcycling. It is based on this premise that I offer the following small rant. Usually I find very little interest in television. I try hard to limit the time I spend in front of the idiot box and instead spend my days involved in more productive activities, most times which involve motorcycling.

Don’t get me wrong, the eighteen hour days I spend in my office chair around deadline find the noise of a television in the background but that’s usually the doing of my girl and her need for regular doses of reality. Hmmmm. Recently I heard interesting ideas coming out of the box, enough of them broke through that I began to pay attention. The program featured was “John Adams” a new mini series on HBO. This is the story of how our country was founded and like most programs I do end up watching, It offers the prospect of obtaining knowledge, not just the typical slobber inducing opiates fed to the masses through 185 digital channels.

In the story of the 30 years John Adams gave to the independence of our original colonies, many of those years spent alone in foreign lands, you get to look at what it was like for a man to make sacrifices for things he believed in. Adams gave up his family life, his home land, most of his youth and was under the constant scrutiny of the general public in whatever country hosted him while he rallied for support of separation for the colonies from England. It also provides a look at the ingredients formulated in the making of our great country. Having watched the first four of seven installments of this program I have come to a few summations. There is probably no person alive in this country that appreciates freedom the way these great men did. Except for any of our soldiers that have fought for freedom.

I am personally ashamed of the way we have let the foundation of our government crumble beneath the guise of free trade and an open market. We all need to pay closer attention to our elected officials. Now this is not a rant aimed at bolstering support towards one party over another, this is a simple statement of fact: Our government was set up to protect the interests of the people it governs. I came to this and was especially touched when John Adams and John Hancock began to work on the Declaration of independence. It may have been a while sine you read this great document so I am posting it here with this simple request. Think about what these men were making themselves independent from. that in doing so they were risking their lives, the lives of their families and estrangement from the life line provided by England to the 13 colonies. Think about what this document should mean to us today and remember it in all you do from now till November.

Quote: "When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them. He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people. He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers. He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance. He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures. He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation: For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States: For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the worl. For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury. For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences: For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies. For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments. For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us. He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people. He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation. He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands. He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions. In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends. We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor".

Let’s bring back a sense of personal responsibility and keep true to documents and principals that our country was founded on. In closing, I leave you with this quote from another great man of those times”. "If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; May your chains set lightly upon. you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen."
—Samuel Adams".

During this last month, 4 highly respected motorcycle companies have decided to support my Blog  These new Sponsors are MeanStreet, Crime Scene Choppers, Battistinis and Mammoth Choppers. They all sell creative custom parts that I use on my bike projects and that I recommend for your owns. First, I want to thank my readers who made this daily journal the World’s Most Popular Custom Motorcycle Blog dedicated to the V-Twin industry. Second, I thank all those who know me as a professional Custom Builder since more than 15 years – medias, manufacturers, builders, public at large- who appreciate my work, bikes and parts, and who always supported my efforts when trying new ideas or launching a new venture like this Motorcycle Blog. I started it in October 2006 with for objectives to bring and comment on custom motorcycles news, to review custom motorcycle companies & products, and to profile all those who are making impact in the custom motorcycle industry. I keep the content fresh by publishing 2/3 times a day tips, tidbits, perspectives you won’t find elsewhere, as well as unique insights and original articles written by me and some of the industry opinion leaders. Yes, it takes more and more of my time, but publishing brings me immense joys when I see you participate and comment, when you thank me for pointing you in the right direction to find new solutions for your custom bike, and when parts manufacturers tell me they identified my Blog as a source of new clients. One of the earliest promises about the World Wide Web was that it would put some of the power of the press back in the hands of regular people The testimonials I receive from all of you confirm that there was a need for a digital place where the entire Custom Motorcycle V-Twin community could bring new ideas and share them with an Internet-connected world. The success of this Blog is yours and I promise to continue my efforts to bring contribution to the a custom motorcycle industry that I love so much.