ROGUE SNOWMOBILERS

March 24, 2008

Volume 1 Issue 8

President’s Letter 1

Pictures 2

Candlelighters Ride 3

Club Sponsors 4-5

Event Schedule 6

Groomers Corner 7

Bailey $3000 Ad 8

INSIDE THIS ISSUE:

IMPORTANT EVENTS S

MARCH 29TH

NO-HOST RIDE

HAMMAKER SNOW PARK

10:00AM

APRIL 1ST

LAST CLUB MEETING

D&S HARLEY DAVIDSON

6:00PM DINNER

7:00PM MEETING

APRIL 5TH

NO-HOST RIDE

1000 SPRINGS

10:00AM

Here we are… The last newsletter of the 2007 – 2008 Snowmobile season. What a year we have had.

This season really started last April, when you elected this board. The board met every month through late spring and summer. Our goal was to make this the most fun and the biggest snowmobile club in the state. I be-lieve that we have achieved that goal. The reason that I think we have met our first year goals is; we have had great turn outs at all of our meetings, I hope they have been as much fun for you as they have been for me. We have had wonderful meals at some of these meetings. We have also had great turn outs at our club rides (the ones we didn’t have to cancel due to weather) I would like to thank the following people for the things that got accomplished this year.

Travis (the fry guy) and Don Funk for an over the top stir fry dinner that started our first meeting. Gene Bowling for his work with the Forest Service and completing our MOU. Early in December Lynnette & Albert Bristow hosted the chili feed for the Christmas tree ride. Lori for her work on the banquet. Don Funk for stepping up and filling the empty board position (he is doing an excellent job). Scott Downing for doing the Turkey Fry again this year. Paul Hildebrand and The Bristow’s for hamburgers and hot dogs at the January meeting. Everyone who made and bought a pie at the Candlelighters pie auction.

The Mt. Bailey $3000 was a huge success again this year due to Paul Hildebrand and his many volunteers. Dave Elder for the best play day we have had in years. Dennis & Bar-bra Hamlin for their hard work on Candle-lighters snow day. I would also like to thank Lee Chastain (District Director at Large) and Dave Elder (District Director) for their hard

work at the State level.

Now I would like to give a special thank you to Brian Gabaldon for a wonderful newsletter month in and month out. Jim Gulrich for his countless hours, and that of his grooming crew for all of their hard work grooming the trails and keeping the groomer up and running. A very special THANK YOU to Kim Greenwaldt for all that she has done this season.

Another thank you goes to the members of the club, without all of you there would be no Rogue Snowmobilers. Thank you for supporting the board and me this season. We look forward to making next season even better then this one. As always if you have any suggestions or com-ments, feel free to contact a board member. This is your club, and we want to make work for you.

I hope to see a lot of you at the April 1st meeting (we will once again be serving food, Hamburgers, Steaks, etc.) and at the No-host ride on April 5th at Thousand Springs.

If I don’t see you, I hope each and every one of you have a safe and fun summer.

Thanks for a great year.

Dennis Jordan

PRESIDENTS LETTER

MARCH PICTURES

ROGUE SNOWMOBILERS Page 2

1970-72 AMF Ski-Daddler

In 1965, American Machine and Foundry (AMF) became the second large corporation (after Outboard Marine Corp) to enter the snowmobile business by introducing its 10HP Ski

Daddler for the 1966 snowmobile season.

The company was producing various recreational products in-cluding bowling equip., golf clubs, skis, boats, sailboards, bicy-cles, lawn & garden equip. and Harley-Davidson motorcycles. With all the “fun” in its line-up, snowmobiles were a natural addition.

But the boxy Ski-Daddlers of the late 60s earned a poor repu-tation for reliability and control, and the company realized that it would have to overhaul its product and promotion to survive in the skyrocketing snowmobile business.

The 1970 Ski-Daddler brochure described the Mark V as the “nearest thing to a Porsche you can ride on the snow.” Then it claimed that “the Mark VI takes off like a “Ferrari, handles like a Maserati, maneuvers like an Alfa-Romeo.” These comparisons

were absolutely laughable to anyone who know anything about these vehicles, and meaningless to those who didn’t.

Despite building about 14,000 sleds for the 70-71 model years, the Ski-Daddler was phased out in favor of the company’s upcom-ing Harley-Davidson snowmobile. Only about 1,000 Ski-Daddlers were built for 1972, and all remaining inventory of AMF brand sleds were sold to a liquidator who retailed them direct to con-sumers at greatly reduced prices.

Even as the orange Ski-Daddlers were being introduced, the basic design was being completely re-worked and re-powered with exclusive Aermacchi engines. 80 of these improved units were built as prototype ’71 Harley-Davidson snowmobiles. The Harley sleds went to market in 1972, the last year of the Ski-Daddler, and AMF tried to use the Harley mystique to market them. But that didn’t work either. The snow hogs remained on the market essentially unchanged through the 1975 model year when AMF finally gave up on the snowmobile business for good.

VINTAGE CORNER

VOLUME 1 ISSUE 8

CANDLELIGHTER’S RIDE Page 3

Another year has passed and another Candlelighters Ride is over. The weather kept the turnout down some over last year but the ones who did show said they had a very good time and look forward to next year’s event. Too bad more did not leave the valley because the day was actually very nice. There was a fair amount of sunshine with only a few light intermit-tent snow showers. We supplied hamburgers and hot dogs for everyone and side dishes were brought by the mem-bers. Travis “The French Fry Guy” also did his magic. His fries were delicious again. If you were not there you may get to sample them when you come to our last meeting of the year which is on April 1st. Barbara and I would like to thank all the volunteers that helped us. As usual, there was no shortage of help from club members. We had many members asking to help us in any way they could. This is what makes our club so great. Channel 12 news was there filming and doing interviews. I

guess, even though I did not see it, I will be buying ice cream on April 1st. Although, I only saw Dennis Jordan on the news, so maybe he should be buying the ice cream. I think they got their Dennis' mixed up! Dennis Jordan gave Chris the reporter a lesson on how to ride. Chris got on Dennis’ sled and went a few feet and hit a tree!! So, if you need anyone to give lessons to someone new, you know who not to ask. We would like to thank Michelle of the Candlelighters for arrang-ing to have the families come up to Thousand Springs for the day. We are looking forward to next year’s event and hope to have sunshine so we can get many more families there.

We have had a great month of grooming. After the snow finally settled, we were able to get on top of the snow and pull the Idaho around the mountain. Some of our new groomers actually got to see what it was like to run with the Idaho and were amazed at how well the trail cleaned up behind the cat. No major breakdowns have occurred if you don’t count the left front track jumping off and having to replace one of the boggie wheels. We have been slowly building a trail to Hamaker Snow Park now that most of the 1000 Springs area is in good shape. I’m sure that in the next two weeks, it is going to start getting thin on the Bybee Creek area. So it would be nice to have a flat packed trail that will last a couple of extra weeks into the season. If the weather cooperates, we should be running at least another four weeks.

I have been busy this year and haven’t taken the time to ride on our own trails. With my kids being so small and still just learning to ride, it seems like we are spending most of our time at the Lake of the Woods Meadow. It has been a great

snow year for the meadow. The last couple were not so great. It is difficult to teach an eight year old on a narrow trail system. I also hosted a birthday party in the snow for my friend’s daughter turning 12 years old. She wanted to invite up five of her friends to ride around the meadow. After a short safety course, the party turned out great and everyone had a super time.

I am still looking for a few more groomers. My list of experience groomers is quite limited and I rely on these individuals to train the newcomers. It takes many hours sitting in the driver’s seat to start getting good with the 12 way blade and learning the best way to run the machine for that particular day or even hour of the day. I am still hoping for more new snow to keep the season going. If you are interested in going for a ride in one of our cats, please give me a call and I will see if I can get you some chair time.

Happy trails everyone.

Jim Gulrich

621-1842

GROOMERS CORNER

Thank You to our Sponsors below for helping to support our club

ROGUE SNOWMOBILERS Page 4

VOLUME 1 ISSUE 8

Thank You to our Sponsors below for helping to support our club

Page 5

Rogue Snowmobilers Event Schedule

ROGUE SNOWMOBILERS Page 6

Board Members

Paul Hildebrand 734-2033 rvti@charter.net

Dennis Hamlin 582-0441 dhamlin@go2uti.com

Dave Elder 826-9212 oltrv1@yahoo.com

Gene Bowling 772-5659

Jim Gulrich 245-3550 bif@charter.net

Chuck Biegert 482-8707 cbiegert@starband.net

Don Funk 245-2540 dnefunk@peoplepc.com

Club Officers

President: Dennis Jordan 826-6326

V President: Brian Gabaldon 770-6514

Secretary: Kim Greenwaldt 826-2052

Treasurer Lynette Bristow 776-7533

Important Contact Information

DATE EVENT LOCATION TIME

MARCH 29TH NO HOST RIDE HAMMAKER SNOW PARK 10:00AM

APRIL 1ST DINNER & GENERAL MEETING D&S HARLEY DAVIDSON 6:00PM

APRIL 5TH NO HOST RIDE 1000 SPRINGS 10:00AM

As the end of our club season draws near, we want to take this opportunity to show our appreciation and thanks to our groomers for all their hard work. They spent endless volunteer hours in those CAT's giving us the best trails possible to ride or to get to our favorite riding spots. This year they had to battle road closures, broken down CATs and too much snow (is there really such a thing as too much??) to keep the trails open. Be-low are the names of the volunteers from the Rogue Snowmobilers, the Klamath Basin Snowdrifters and the Chiloquin Ridge Riders. If you run across any of these guys and gals, be sure to thank them in person!!

The Rogue Snowmobilers: Jim Gulrich-Grooming Chairman, Jon Allen, Sherry Allen, Chuck Allen, Jim Beagle, Larry Blower, Roy Blower, Scott Blower, Gene Bowling, Albert Bristow, Lee Chastain, Bill Christofferson, Ken Curtis, Mike Duda, Don Gold-schmidt, Dobe Griffin, Pat Gulrich, Arlen Hender-son, Dave Hoxie, Jeff Johnson, Ron Matrejean, Jack Pech, Stephen Roe, Mike Schmidt, Gary Tift, Brian Watson and John Wojtas.

THANK YOU GROOMERS

VOLUME 1 ISSUE 8 Page 7

Well this is my first column in a while, as many of you know I have been in a deep funk since I broke something in my right arm and have been unable to ride. Last weekend was our annual playday and there was no way I was going to miss that even though the doctor recommended a couple more weeks off. What a great weekend for a playday!! Fresh snow, blue skies and many friends to ride with. We started setting up the events on Saturday morning, Lee had been grooming the courses since Thursday night and all of the tracks were set up nicely. Nathan Perry had his crew setting the boundary stakes for the radar run. Thanks to Sheriff Mike Winters for the radar trailer, Dana Plankenhorn was busy with the Blind Mans Race track, Paul Hildebrand was laying out the Vintage track while Dennis Hamlin was setting up the Poker Run. Each event had club members helping on setup and operation. Some of those members were, Jim and Margo Morgan, Crystal Plankenhorn, Albert and Lynette Bristow, Sheila Hildebrand, Lori Jordan, Scott Downing, David Jordan, Clint Maguire, Nancy Chastain, Jim Gulrich, Brian Gabaldon, Gene and Bonnie Bowling, Don Funk and Kim Greenwaldt. There were many others whom I surely missed, please accept my apology. Dennis Jordan did most of the cook-ing, Steak, Chicken were on the barby and potluck side dishes rounded out the menu, it was great. The events were an unqualified success with all of the partici-pants. Over at the Radar run Nathan reports first place went to Barbra Bryson on her Turbo Polaris, 89mph, very impressive! Second place went to Jim Beagle also on a Turbo Polaris at 88. Third place was a 5-way tie between Dana Plankenhorn on a highly modified Polaris race sled, Dave Elder on a stock Arctic Cat, Chris Kearney, Jesse Merriman and Todd Ivers all at 79mph. Paul Hildebrand on his Arctic Cat at 67mph topped off the Vin-tage radar run, although his award awaits results from a tech crew inspection of his sled, very possible that he is not legal. One wonders why some one would attempt to circumvent the rules, sad but true! Second place and certified stock was Dave

Elder at 62 also on an Arctic Cat, followed by Dana Plankenhorn on a sled of questionable linage. Last was Gene Plankenhorn on an old and slow Rupp. Now in all fairness Gene is getting up there and we all need to allow for his physical and mental lapses, at least that is what the Doctor said. Margo Morgan was last but she had a little trouble running a straight line, possibly hit the sauce a little early? Across the way at the Blind Mans race Gene and Dana Planken-horn brought home 1st place, fitting as they ride that way most of the time. Second went to Steve and Patsy White, Patsy said this is the first time he ever did what she told him to!! Third went to Brandon Dollarhide and Dillon Bristow. Honorable mention to Dave and Carmen Elder, as usual Carmen�s instruc-tions were unclear causing our slow time. Scott and Tyler Downing had a great run going until they ran out of bounds right at the finish line.. Paul Hildebrand won the Vintage race although as in the Radar run we await the results of the tech tear down! Dana Planken-horn took second and Dave Elder third, many people report that Dave appeared to be faster than both Paul and Dana, per-haps the timekeeper was a little fast on starting the clock!! On a more serious note, the Vintage class is getting to be a bigger group every year and is a ton of fun. If you have an old sled, dig it out and get it running, as we will have several vintage events next season for these sleds. First place and $70.00 in the poker run went to Brandon Dol-larhide, 2nd, $40.00 went to Scott Downing, 3rd, and $30.00 went to Jeff Shaw. Certainly this playday represents what most of us love about this sport, a great time with family and friends, all in all one of the best paydays I can remember. Thanks again to all who helped and all who participated. It was a pleasure to see the many fami-lies and their children enjoying the different events certianly this is what Snowmobiling is all about. It was fun to watch the kids running the different courses on their small snowmobiles, just having a ball.

DEEP SNOW TRACKS