Magazines that farkle?

Are there any motorcycle magazines that regularly cover non-style-
oriented user-modificatons to motorcycles? Stuff like heated-grip liners
and bicycle computers?

I was discussing fiddling with the carbs and such on my Bandit 1200S,
when a friend suggested that instead of taking my bike for a dyno run
after every change, I could just install a wide-band oxygen sensor
instead. Then, I could directly measure my air-fuel ratio in actual
riding conditions.

Pretty freakin' cool, I said. But pretty freakin' expensive, too.

Well, suggested said friend, if I can find a magazine interested in an
article on installing and using such a thing (I recently got a Writing
Certificate in Journalism from UC), he thinks he can get it for me at a
substantial discount.

You see, said friend runs a company that makes data loggers for amature
racers. Little black boxes that can record all kinds of gnifty
information, not only on engine performance, but also on suspension
performance, brake performance, and indeed anything to which you can
attached a sensor. They have a pretty good market in car racing and
tractor pulls, but not much in motorcycles.

Indeed, if I can find a magazine interested in an article on installing
and using a data logger on a motorcycle, he might be able to set me up
with some of his equipment for a substantial discount.

I picked up a few moto magazines off a local newsstand, to see where I
might send some query letters. But of the U.S. magazines I've seen, none
of them really get into unser-modifications of motorcycles, outside of
what you can put yet more chrome onto.

So, can anyone out there recommend any mags that might be interested in
an article on installing and using a wide-band oxygen sensor and a data
logger on a motorcycle?

 

It's difficult to break into the motorcycle aftermarket and tuning
business and become a known player. You have to pay your dues getting a
business off the ground unless you have a rich sponsor who likes you
personally ;-)

Don't laugh. A certain motorcycle accessory chain was doing OK in SoCal
before the current crop of complete sportbikes made it unnecessary or
even undesireable to buy aftermarket exhausts and fairings and
streamlined seats.
As the chain fell apart, one youngster was kept in business in just one
store by his wealthy father.

If you were an established motorcycle tuning instrument company and you
gave the motomag editor a freebie, you'll get your article. One hand
washes the other. But you would already have been an advertiser in the
magazine for a while. Then you could watch your sales expand. If your
system worked, that is.

 

Each and every UK magazine.

 

(The Older Gentleman) wrote in

I'm rather intimidated by the thought of querying the UK mags for some
reason. Doesn't make much sense, in the end. Guess I need to dig up those
old copies of 'Bike' and 'TWO' to get a mailing address.

Any other mags I should look for? (I wish I could find a newsstand in
Cinci' that reliably carried British moto mags. The sad thing is, even
when I find them, I have to dig behind the chrome'n'tits magazines to get
to them.)

 

Bike is Media House, Lynch Wood, Peterborough, PE2 6EA

Subscribe?

 

Superbike & Performance Bikes[1] cater to (or at least did the last time
I read them) the sector of the market that modifies[2] (or at least
dreams about it) modern sports bikes.

For modding older bikes you want Classic Motorcycle Mechanics (http://ww
w.classicmechanics.com/).

You might also want to look for Streetfighters (http://www.streetfighter
smag.com/).

Bob



[1] AKA performing Berks
[2] although these days that quite often seems to mean colour co-
ordinated fasteners, agonising rearsets & a lurid double-bubble screen

 

(The Older Gentleman) wrote in

Oddly enough, a subscription actually costs more than the newsstand price
(for Bike at least).

And, part of what I was trying to say was, I'd like to see a greater
*variety* of the magazines on the rack here. I dunno. In the end I know
****-all about the magazine business, so there may be a good reason for
the way they're doing things.

But I'm an American, dammit, and it's my God-given right to whine, bitch
and moan, *especially* about those things of which I am most ignorant.

 

<VBG>

Ain't dat de troof.

 

We Brits can moan better. I mean, I remember when moaning was an art - a
well-turned moan could make people utterly miserable. But these days,
there's no quality in it. Nobody moans like they used to.....

 

The Horse Backstreet Choppers

www.thehorsemag.com

 

wrote in @g49g2000cwa.googlegroups.com:

http://www.classicmechanics.com/