In my younger days I went to Independence MO to visit my soon to be wife on my old KH-400. I had a long weekend, on the way back, I'd forgotten to reset the petcock from the reserve setting to the primary tank setting. I was stationed in Aurora CO and was pushing the envelope to get back in time to get some zzz's before work, well needless to say that momentary lapse in memory where I forgot to switch the tank petcock was destined to bite me. I passed this 24 hour truckstop because I was just under my 125 miles that I would choose to stop without switching to reserve. I hit about 135 miles and it was about 2 am when the bike started to sputter, reached down to turn that little lever to reserve tank and it was already there. Back then there wasn't a lot of 24 hour gas stations on I 70 east of Denver. Those were the days before cellphones, and that far out it probably wouldn't have been much good. I was about 7 miles east of a Tomahawk truck stop and didn't have any traffic to even light up the road, I wound up pushing that 400 pound bike most of the way, save some of the downhill sections, where I would kind of get the bike rolling and I would kind of side saddle til I got to the next uphill run, then push as hard as you could to get up the hill. I had to push past a couple of stations that were closed, which was very discouraging. 7 miles never felt too far on the bike, but running beside it was all together too far.
My stamina was much better then than it is now, and anyone that has been in the military, knows that late for work ain't like working for anyone else.
I have got to the point that I will check the tank petcock every time I get on a bike, even on my CBR, which hasn't even got one.
I still lean toward getting gas at 125 miles on the odometer. LOL
Doc
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