Daisy May

I'm pretty sure Jax has already mentioned that we are calling the TU250X "Daisy May" instead of referring to it as "The TU" or "The Bike." She is fond of naming our vehicles as it sort of gives them a bit of personality above and beyond their engineered traits. Daisy has been pretty good to us so far. In the two weeks we've had her I have gone through four (4) full tanks of gas and one oil change.

On the very first full tank of gas, which we spent probably a third of the gas bimbling around our neighborhood (lots of hills) two-up (never good for gas mileage, especially when starting off on hills) we got 70 miles per gallon of gas. On the next one I got 75 miles per gallon of refined dead dinosaur. The third tank yielded 77 miles per gallon of black gold. The third tank also included the first oil change. It just so happens that I have a few liters (~quarts) of Repsol fully synthetic four-stroke racing oil left over from the R6, so I went ahead and put some of the best motorbike oil in the world into Daisy May. While it seemed a bit silly at first, it really smoothed out the shifting a lot more than I expected, due to the fact that most motorbikes use the motor oil to lubricate the transmission and clutch as well as the motor. I hesitate to refer to the shifting prior to the oil change as "clunky" or "agricultural," but it is smooth as butter now.

Anyway, on to the most recent tank of gas! This one is a little misleading since at least one of the miles on the odometer was accumulated by me pushing Daisy May. Yeah. I ran out of gas. Again. You might think I would start paying attention to the shiny, yellow light on the dash that indicates the fact that I am nearly out of gas. In my defense, it came on during the day, and it is very hard to see in direct sunlight, so I didn't know when it came on. At night I can barely read the trip odometer because it is so bright, but during the day the light just looks like a bit more glare unless you are looking at it specifically to check it. On the plus side, Daisy May is a lot easier to push along the road than the R6 ever could be. On the even bigger plus side, pushing Daisy May up a hill really isn't that hard since she weighs something like 100 pounds less than the R6. On the minus side, a lot of the gas stations in Little Rock close before midnight. I counted 6 closed gas stations before I found one that was still open.

Eventually Daisy May restarted and I was able to ride the last couple of miles to the open station, but it was still not much fun. And to top it all off, I only got 71 miles per gallon again, which I attribute to me leaving late and having to take the interstate a few times on this tank. Daisy can get up to interstate speeds, but it's pretty close to her absolute top speed. If I don't have someone to follow/draft behind then Daisy has to be her own wind-break, which doesn't work terribly well at 70 miles per hour. I guess I'll just have to get out of bed on time from now on... Dang it!