Gray Man, Inc.

I just got back from my delayed and reconfigured summer ride with my brother and a buddy. We had originally planned to ride the new-ish ORBDR, but that got delayed by my rib injury. The other guys were pretty busy anyway. So, 2 months later, we scrapped the ORBDR plan and decided to just do a long weekend ride. I still had all my old OBDR maps so we picked Route 6, from Crescent Lake to Coos Bay.
Unfortunately, there were some fires we had to reroute around near the start. I sketched a second southern route, as well as a couple crossovers.


My Friday started early and I ran over to Pendleton to get Jerod and his XR650. We got to the rendezvous point a little early and found the road closed due to fire activity.



My brother met us there and we dropped south to an OHV park to unload and hit the trail.



Jerod's battery wasn't up for a cold start so we pull-started him out of the lot. Once it was running, no more problems with it for the rest of the trip.



We did our best to cloverleaf around the known closures, but just couldn't get to the trail. We were only maybe 15 miles from where we wanted to camp but one barrier, about a quarter mile from the southbound leg of a junction, made us turn around. We ended up having to ride highway for 75 miles to get to Lemolo Lake.

Once we got there, it was great. The place was 90% empty and the prevailing winds were pushing the smoke inland. As we pulled into camp, my brother got a flat on his KLX400 (DRZ). We set up camp, built a fire, and had a nice dinner.

It was a chilly night and none of us slept well. After breakfast, my brother swapped out his tube before we hit the trail.

We were westbound on asphalt again and stopped at a little spot on highway 138 to top off fuel, then another 15 miles, before catching the short red crossover in the middle of the map. Once we got onto the actual route, we were surprised to find alot of the logging roads to be paved. They were narrow, but fast. Some gravel too.


We stopped at a little brew pub as we passed through Sutherlin. The Elk burger is highly recommended. Then we topped off again and pushed west. During lunch, we all agreed that we didn't want to spend the night near the beach due to the humidity. The forecast called for fog. We decided that it made sense to stay in the hills, just before leaving BLM land. We tried several side spurs but most were shot up and/or full of dumped trash. We did eventually settle on a decent spot.



We got to camp pretty early and my brother joked that we still had time to run down to the beach to take sunset heart-hands pictures for our Instas. The theme for the rest of the night's conversation was to work in cliche phrases like "live, laugh, love" and "I choose us" wherever possible.

We enjoyed more pouch meals and turned in around 9. We were all wiped and slept great. It only dropped to about 50 that night.

After a great night's sleep, we ate breakfast, broke camp, and coasted down to the beach. We found an OHV area with beach access and got the proof shots. Even loaded with camp gear and on the wrong tires, nobody got stuck or dropped their bikes.


We crossed the bridge into North Bend to top off, then headed back up the hill for the route. Even though I had made a southern route back, much of it was highway and we saw closures. We decided the night before to just return on the actual route as far as we could.




We stopped in Southerlin again for fuel and ate at a Mexican restaurant. It was decent but not especial. Bellies full, we charged east. Oregon is still a timber state.


We ran as far as we could until we hit closures, then dropped back down to highway 138. Since the first campground was so nice and empty, we stayed there again.



We had another chilly night but survived. After breakfast, we broke camp and snapped a photo at the ramp before heading back to the trucks.



All in all, it was a really nice ride. We covered 453 miles and had very little mechanical drama (zero from the TW). We ate good and slept late.

Still not dead yet.

Here's a random sighting; I was riding with my daughter a few days ago and as we were getting on the freeway, I spotted a boat in a storage yard. On our way home, I figured out how to get to it.



My dad bought it new in 1989. The company was short-lived and he had it for about a year before becoming a dealer when the builder started a new boat company.

Here it is right after he painted their motorhome to match. Looks like summer 1990.


Anyway, kinda cool/sad to randomly see it 35 years later, 500 miles from where it was last seen.

Nothing at the moment. He just got back from a 2 week cross-country motorcycle ride, so mostly just catching up on yard work. We're kicking around the idea of working on my Dorsett over the coming winter. He's also casually looking for a '68-72 Corvette, but hasn't found anything that would make any money after it's done.

I bought a spare engine for the Dorsett. It was only $100 and the seller claimed it was a runner when he bought it. We'll see.
It's a 60hp Evinrude. The original engine is a 75hp Johnson. They're basically the same, so I figured it'd be worth the Benjamin for the spare peripheral, if nothing else.

I'm going to lift the Johnson off the transom and haul the boat over to my dad's shop tomorrow. We're going to cut the floor open and remove the transom trim to see if this thing is really worth saving.


I picked up a set of spare Subaru rims this morning for my daughter's Forester. Old tires off, beads cleaned, and a fresh coat of wrinkle paint to cover the dings and scrapes. Snow tires are on order.

It got an oil change too. It's actually been pretty trouble-free so far. She still loves it.


I bought a bunch of parts for the ugly Dodge. Standard replacement front springs (surprisingly expensive) and lower ball joints. KYB front and rear shocks get delivered on Monday.

I also impulse shopped Crutchfield for a new head unit and some JL Audio separates.

Now I just need to get it all done.

Lastly, I bought another XT225 bottom end. Figured it's just easier than splitting the case on the one with the weird shifting issue.

It's shockingly clean inside, so I'm hoping for the best. I'll rob all the other parts off of the jigsaw engine that I built from about two dozen separate ebay purchases.

Well, he has a winter project now. I dropped the Dorsett off at his place Sunday afternoon, then went out of town to work for a couple days. He started stripping it down. The first two objectives were to evaluate the transom and the stringers under the floor. Good news / bad news.

Good news is that the transom is in much better shape than expected. There's a small piece of plywood on the front, in the well, that'll need replacing. Otherwise its really solid.

The bad news is that the structure under the floor is pretty rough. He cut the floor out and exposed a bunch of foam that the previous owner had poured in. I guess that explains all the holesaw divots.

Unfortunately, and as you'd expect, that foam held moisture and did its thing. I'm going over tomorrow to work on digging the foam out. We're hoping to at least use the old stringers for patterns. Haven't decided yet exactly what's going back in. There's a lot of options and just about any of them will be an improvement.