Free chili made by the Waugh H-D employees, a 10-33% discount off parts, accessories and MotorClothes and some free gas cards was the draw for the WORMS at this event. Sandra & Allen rode down by themselves, leaving Springfield around 0930 since everybody else already had other plans. There was a light rain here and there but not much to worry about. They stopped by the Waffle House at Route 17 for some breakfast (pretty good except for the cigarette smoke in the restaurant) and then arrived before noon at Waugh H-D. The outside chili stand was the place to start and our team of chili eaters had a little bit of room from breakfast to eat a bowl. They went inside the dealership to check out the new bikes and guess who showed up? Mike made it down also, since his other event was sort of rained out. Mike came in and he and Sandra sampled some chili from the contest entrants. We all checked out the bikes and Mike picked up a MotorClothes sweater for the ride back. We left together and took the back roads over to Mike's place to get that battery from Allen's chopper (remember the last ride?). Overall it was a bit windy, a little wet, but not too cold and as always - a fun ride.
The weather prediction was grim earlier in the week but once Friday rolled around we could see that things were looking up for this ride. Unfortunately, several WORMS members had plans that couldn't be changed (like attending a wedding) but Mike and Allen managed to meet around noon (at the East Coast Harley-Davidson dealership) on Saturday for a Wings, Wheels and Ducks adventure!
The boys headed south on Route 1 in Dumfries and about 7 or 8 miles down the road Allen's chopper started acting up. Oh, what a surprise! Basically it would idle but twisting the throttle resulted in very little power. So the boys pulled over to the side of the road and after 5 minutes they figured out the problem. It wasn't fuel starvation, and it wasn't the ignition system. The positive battery terminal had broken again (this happened back in March 2009 on a ride to Woody's house). It must be the bumps on the road that's bouncing the battery up and down under the seat and thereby putting too much stress on the wires and battery posts. So Mike came up with an idea. We used the roll of tape that Allen had in the tool bag and placed it on top of the wires, then put the seat on top of that to hold the broken positive post together. It worked and the boys rode back to East Coast H-D to buy another battery for the chopper.
Not so fast however; they had a battery in stock that was the right size (and only $95) but when we took it to the chopper we soon realized that the posts were reversed! That wasn't going to work. Luckily, a battery for a V-Rod has the reverse configuration and that did the trick - but it had side terminals. The boys managed to get the wires connected to the new battery and they headed down the road again - only 1 hour lost.
Before we left East Coast H-D however, a yellow American Ironhorse chopper rolled in. The rider recognized Allen's chopper because the Ironhorse is the same bike that took 2nd place to Allen's 1st place at the recent Waugh H-D Big Damn Bike Show this summer. Quite a coincidence really. Anyway, he decided to ride with us down to Stafford and we enjoyed the company. The weather was just about perfect and we arrived at 2:30PM. It was obvious many of the visitors had come and gone but the big duck drop / drawing for the car or vacation would occur at 3:30PM so we had time to get some food and take a few pictures. Mike bought a raffle ticket but the winners came from Baltimore and some place like Philmore. It was over at 4PM and we headed back home up I-95 to get the remainder of our chores done before the sun set on a fine Saturday afternoon.
