OK. Yeah, I broke it. My own fault. No blame anywhere else.
We left Alpine on a ride to take in the River Road (the best road in the area IMHO) and rather than make folks wait any longer on me (I went back to my room at a different motel to get a sweater) I did not go to the local station and fill up. I knew we would be stopping in about 60 miles or so at Study Butte and I had plenty of fuel to make it there. BUt Study Butte is not a big place nad the station there hosted only 87, 89, and 91 octane... I really need 93 if I'm going to ride hard. Anyway, long story longer, the set up was the typical single hose for three grades deal and so you always get two gallons of regular first (because the hose takes about two gallons to fill and the last person ALWAYS bought regular) and so your mix is going to be lower than what you're paying for. You always know this and try to NOT buy gas unless your empty to minimize the effect. If you filled up every two gallons, you;d have nothing but regular in the tank very quickly despite paying for premium at every stop. So, I took about 5 gallons. That's two in the tank that I had bought the previous day in Fort Stockton where I ALSO got 91 octane. So two gallons in the tank probably around 89 octane (since it's never completely 93 unless you find that special one hose per grade pump, put the first two gallons in someone else's ride, or buy gas following another premium user) now further diluted with two more gallons of 87 and then boosted back a touch with 3 gallons of 91. More than likely, the real octane of the fuel in the tank was somewhere around 89 which is considerably shy of 93.
We then proceeded to run the River Road rather spiritedly at at one point it seemed my left leg was getting hotter than usual. But that didn;t really register with me until later. Finally we made Presidio, stopped and ate some good food, and then headed out towards Marfa. Once we hit a fairly long straight patch, I foolishly decided to air her out a bit and pulled out of the pack with a twist. Passing 130 in a few seconds she felt less crisp than she should and I backed off the throttle coasting down. About that time, I was blinked past by a ZX14 and Ted Reichelt (sp?) on his C14. More foolishly still, I got back on it and in a couple of seconds she was not only accelerating madly again, but was puking the entire molten-lava-hot, oily contents of her crankcase on my left calf and ankle. Fortunately I was wearing my near knee high Sidis and I was protected from any serious burns though I thought for a minute I was on fire because that leg suddenly got so hot. Once I realized she was puking oil I clicked her off to minimize the chance of a real fire and coasted down gently as not to slide the rear tire. She came to a dripping smoking stop alongside the road where I would get to spend the rest of the afternoon waiting on fellow COGgers to rescue me with a tow. Keith and Andre are my heroes big time.
Keith took my bike home to Dallas on his trailer and lent me his C-10 to make my way home on. How awesome is that? WELL, IT'S REAL AWESOME I tell ya.
Good times, good trip. Good fun. Good riding. Stupid mistake. Oh well. They're just pistons and they were designed to be treated badly. LOL
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