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Eve of Danger

Saturday, May 13, 2006
Today, my friend and I spent about 10 hours working on his Ascot, attempting to get it running. Let me catalog what we found out about the bike, which absolutely failed to start when we arrived to pick it up:
  1. The battery is kaput.
  2. The starter solenoid is busted.
  3. Half the clutch lever broke off.
  4. The left-hand mirror doesn't stay in place
  5. The tachometer doesn't work.
  6. Both front blinker stalks are broken, one dangling precarioiusly.
  7. The engine has a slight "flutter" at a certain RPM.
This is, of course, the bad news. After many, many hours of work and some mechanical fearlessness on the part of my friend, here's what we did:
  1. Replaced the battery and charged it a little.
  2. Wired a bypass to the starter solenoid with a household heavy-duty light switch
  3. Got the thing started, running, and put air in the tires.
That is the good news - especially the tires, which are in fantastic condition. This bike would make a great bike if it were new, though let me not give the impression that I'd ever take it over my Sprint ST.

My friend has put an incredible amount of work in today; we're both tired. We're about to meet up with another friend of mine for dinner and then probably go to sleep; tomorrow's going to be a long, long day. Hopefully it'll just be an exciting day.

posted by Burton at 9:13 PM

3 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

dang..all ya need now is a some gum and duct tape and it will be as good as new. :-)

9:16 PM, May 14, 2006  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

YAY! You made it home :) Good work honey!

7:44 AM, May 15, 2006  
Blogger Julien Chambers said...

The light switch just adds class... I'm hearing dueling banjos right now... :)

8:07 AM, May 17, 2006  

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