Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/126413
Two days to San Jose A lew frantic hours with MertLawwill By Dale Brown Time: Closing up on noon, .Friday, May .4. Place: C.R. Axtell's machine shop and dynomometer facility, .som ewh ere in Glendale, about 450 miles south of San Jose, CA, site of 24 a mile dirt track race on Sunday. May 6. Three characters to be involved in the San Jose drama are in Axtell's shop - Mert Law- will and two of his potent HarleyDavidson XR750 din track racers . One of the bikes sits in the dyno room, its V-twin engine enjoined to the water brake dyno by means of a chain running past where the rear wheel would normally be . Lawwill and · Axtell have been working with the dyno for nearly a day and a half, trying to get ready for the mile, where horsepower is the name of the game. Last year, Ganh Brow rode Lawwill's bike to win both San Jose miles and one at Indianapolis. This year, Skip Aksland is the pilot with PJl Lubricants sponsoring the effort. Neither Lawwill or Axtell are particularly optimistic at this point. The bike is down on horsepower as compared to runs made earlier in the year. "This run ought to do it. We'll either be smiling or cussing," says Men prior to the next dyno run. Headphones are donned to calm th e deafening roar as the bike is brought to life within the confines of the room. Powerful fans shoot a blast of cooling air at the engine and collect exhaust fumes, but it still gets a little smokey . Most of the readings are made with the engine turning 6,000 and 8 ,000 rpm. This run produces the best horsepower readings so far in the twoday session . but still five to six ponies down over previous recordings. What follows is a jetting session. Men changes jets first in the front carb , then in the rear. several times with each carb, until horsepower went up a hair. "All in all, the best run we've had so far," observes Axtell after the last one before lunch. The bike was run on the dyno after each jetting change . and a recording of temperature and humidity was made each time also. In this phase of the tuning game, Lawwill and Axtell are detectives trying to figure out where the missing horsepower is. All the possibilities have to be investigated. At one point. the fan was left on for several minutes with the engine off before it went before the dyno again . Why? To test the engine cold and see if heat ~as causing it to lose horsepower. It wasn 't . After the jetting had been decided. it was time to break for lunch. A quick ride down San Fernando Road led to a sandwich shop that is a favorite haunt of Axtell's. Time spent there is not long, and soon we're on our way pack home. On the way back, Mert quips, "The problem with a dyno is that it has no conscience. It sees the work you do . It should give you the horsepower you want." He added, "When you're producing the kind of horsepower these engines do, they tend to be a · Iittle fussy." After lunch, attention centers on getting some fresh racing gasoline. hoping that might solve the problem. I have to return to the palatial Cycle News offices shortly thereafter, and and will see Men again Saturday morning at his home. Lawwill and Axtell remained, and would continue working until 10:30 that evening. Then Men would be faced with an eight-hour drive back to the San Francisco area, with an additional 55·minute wait for gas near Magic Mountain. When I arrived at Lawwill's house late Saturday morning. it was to discover that Lawwill had driven all night and proceeded to work on the bikes immediately upon getting home. They were in worse shape than they had been the day before. One bike had had a securing bolt come loose from the clutch and put a hole in the case cover. The other machine simply refused to run properly. Men, his wife June, son Joe, 9, and daughter Marcella. 2, live in a beautiful hillside home in the Marin County community of Tiburon , overlooking San Francisco Bay. From Men's front door, you can look out and see the tip of the Golden Gate Bridge. Mert is busy working on the bike that threw the clutch bolt, assisted by a friend , Para O'Siochain. Men has already been at it for six hours or so, and will continue for another 12. I'd wager that he sometimes wishes to be paid by the hour. In another section of the garage, Shane Jones is working on still another Harley-Davidson. This one is Skip Aksland's bike from 1978 and had not been ridden this year. Jones normally devotes his time to the care and feeding of Ganh Brow's machinery,