Ride The Tail of The Dragon

Welcome to "Ride and Rally" with "Fix My Hog," brought to you by Dennis Kirk, we ship today. What's up everybody? And welcome to "Fix My Hog," "Ride and Rally 2021." We are here in Maryville, Tennessee. and today we are gonna go hit the Tail of the Dragon and then Two Wheels Through Time. So we're gonna get the bike figured out and we'll get you from there. Rolling out of Maryville, I had no idea what to expect. Even the road down there was absolutely gorgeous and there wasn't a lot of twists and turns, so it was nice to warm up the tires and get ready to ride the Tail of the Dragon. All right, here we are at the Tail of the Dragon. We're on the north side right now at the HD Shop and we are about to mount up and hit it on. 318 curves in 11 miles was the only thing on my mind on this road heading into the north side of the Tail of the Dragon. But luckily, there were some nice views over some water on my right, before actually getting into the tail. Now, I was a little bit concerned actually, you know, going into the tail, I've heard all the horror stories. You know, cars going over the double yellow, other bikes going over the double yellow, so I really was trying to hug the center line a little bit, to the right-hand side of the lane. And, you know, luckily I went in the morning, so it wasn't really that busy. And after a couple turns, you kinda really get the feel of it, of what to expect. And those turn signs that say 15 miles an hour really do mean 15 miles an hour. The tail does have some straight parts that you can kinda open up a little bit on, but then it gets right back into the twists and right back into the turns and at the end then you're right there at the Deals Motorcycle Gap Resort. There's awesome food, tons of bikes. Everyone's having fun and really just celebrating all things motorcycle. So that was it the Tail of the Dragon. If you're thinking about doing it, I definitely do not recommend a beginner do it. You really have to understand counter steering. The ability to look through a turn, shift points, all that kinda stuff. For an intermediate or advanced rider, it's a hell of a good time, but do make sure you follow the speed limit. We did actually pass some cops that were on pull offs and kinda hidden radar gunning. So yeah, come on down and ride it, it's amazing. So, we're just gonna leave Deals Gap right now, we're gonna head to Wheels Through Time. Heading from the Tail of the Dragon to Dale's Wheels Through Time Museum, the views are absolutely incredible. The roads aren't quite as twisty, but they're a hell of a good time too. And we've made it to Wheels Through Time. It was a beautiful ride coming over from the Tail of the Dragon. And we are gonna go in and check out the museum. I just did a quick walk through and it's absolutely mind-blowing and I can't wait to take you all through it. You know, I'd never been to Wheels Through Time, obviously I've heard about it. And the only way I could describe it is this is what a Harley dealership must have looked like in the '20s and '30s. Just the amount of history here is insane. And just the amount of bikes here is insane and rare bikes. You can't encapsulate it even in one day. Overwhelming is an understatement to the amount of Harley history we have here at Wheels Through Time under one roof. I mean just the sheer number of knuckleheads, flatheads, you know, early race bikes. What they've created here has left me just speechless. I mean, they're everywhere. Classic Harleys and they all run. It's insane. Racing too is a big part and this is one of my favorite bikes there, Carl Duran's Outlaw Racer. This bike actually set multiple one-mile speed records in the '50s. All right, so like I said, one of the best parts of this museum is that everything in here runs. And I ran into Matt and he is gracious enough to prove to us that everything runs even old iron. All right, so I'm here with Matt and this is a Harley-Davidson Model XA. The Model XA. XA. And how many did they make? They made a thousand of these. They built 'em for North Africa in World War II. So basically a BMW copy. You get the cylinders out in the wind, they cool better. Shaft drive doesn't pick the sand up like chains and sprockets do. So, a thousand of these, basically a reversed engineered R71. The Army kinda said, we see the Germans riding BMWs and Zundapps, and let's find out what they're doing and do it. So Harley made about a thousand of these. Both of these have been civilianized. Funny thing, by the time they get 'em into production, they kinda had run that course of the war. So, most of 'em were sold military surplus and guys like us they buy 'em and a little chrome, a little paint, and you got your own civilian two-wheeler. So, it's a 750 CC, about 45 cubic inch, a four-speed transmission. It's actually the first Harley-Davidson with a hand clutch and a foot shift by 10 years. First Harley with rear suspension by 16 years. So pretty milestone. So we got three prime kicks and hopefully one to go. Not bad. That's awesome. Yeah, and like I said, everything in the building cranks up and runs. There's probably, you know, maybe five or six that we've never fired up and go. Some of the rarest bikes anywhere in the world. This one here's an incredible machine. It's a 1928 Harley-Davidson factory hill climber. Now, this is kind of like a crisscross engine when they debuted the 45 class in 1927. Indian and Excelsior were right on to make an overhead valve, high-compression, alcohol-burner specials, where Harley was kind of a couple years late to the party. They debuted the DAH in 1930. So like the big statue out front of the Harley museum, that's a DAH, they made 20 of them. We have number nine and 10 outta 20 here. This is the predecessor to the DAH. As far as I know, this is the only known running example of one of these. I'll crank it up for you real quick. So this thing makes an absolutely awesome noise. For a bike of this age to produce the power it does it'll be pretty impressive. I fired this bike once earlier today. That's the first time I fired it since probably February. One-kick motorcycle. That one makes the happy noises. Incredible stuff. And then the burnout bike, at least this week's burnout bike's been. My pal's, 1939 ULH. And this one hand-built, all out of parts and it's quite a hot one. So, fire it up and lay some rubber down. Two. All right, three to prime. And there you have it folks. Dale's Wheels Through Time Museum, Maggie Valley, North Carolina. Get yourself here on your bike. Ride the Tail of the Dragon. Come here and get all the Harley history that you can find. And that's it, what an epic day being a motorcycle rider, Tail of the Dragon and Wheels Through Time. If you guys ever get the chance to do this day, you know, even if you could split it up into two days, spend one whole day at the dragon and you, I mean, you could spend a week in Wheels Through Time and still not see at all. So thanks to Dennis Kirk for keeping us comfy on one of the best rides of my life. Thank you for watching "Fix My Hog" "Ride and Rally 2021." And we'll see you in the next episode when we head to Charleston. For more information on products featured in this video, visit DennisKirk.com