what did you wrench on today??

[Guest]

Nice work Pete!

Ed

Cheers, Ed!

 

[Burque73]

Time for a new tire! I picked up a ratchet strap on the road. Surprised I didn't see it. I was stressed and running late which is probably why I missed it.



I pulled over right away but not soon enough. It pounded the fender pretty hard. I just cut the strap and drove straight to the tire shop.



I'm not usually one to use the word carma but a few weeks ago I left a ratchet strap on the edge of my trailer and didn't notice until I got to my destination with half of a strap. :-k

 

[dorkburger]

Dang. It'd be ironic if it was yours. I once got a section of what appeared to be a piece of street sign post stuck in my van tire. Darn thing went flat instantly.

 

[habsdoc]

I once took an open end- box end combination 9/16's in a 10 ply tire on my JEEP J20 truck. Instant flat and needed to wait for a hydraulic jack to lift the over loaded truck, in order to change the tire.

 

[Buffalo Bill]

All interesting weird debris, to find sticking in a tire!
Last summer I pulled what I thought was a big nail out of a tire, turned out to be a small rat tail file!!!
Bummer it was broke in half, would have been a useful tool in my workshop.

 

[dorkburger]

I'm sure that this could be it's own thread. I once got the short end of a allen key stuck in a tire, the long end laying flat on the tire surface tap, tap, tapping on the road. My cousin once got an engine pushrod (not his) pushed thru the tread, than out thru the sidewall. It held held air at both punctures, stayed put and we drove home.

And am I the only one who has "fixed" a leaking screw puncture by replacing the screw with a bigger one?
It was cold late, and I was far from home.

 

[gordinho80]

Crazy stuff flying into people's tires! Just had the wife puncture a tire on her car a couple of days ago. Nothing was stuck in the tire, though. So I can't add anything crazy right now. I also can't recall anything too out of the ordinary in the past.

Yesterday, in an effort to make my truck a little more tolerable, I removed the torsion key bolts and removed 2" blocks from the rear leaf springs. I drive a 2001 F150 4dr (Supercrew) 4x4. The truck sits pretty high which for entering/exiting is fine for me. I'm not crazy about the bed height, as loading and unloading the bike when I do take it in the truck is a bit of a pain. Ideally, I'd like a 4dr smaller pickup like an Colorado, Frontier, etc... but finding one within my budget ($5000k ish) is difficult unless they have a ton of miles are are beat to crap. So I'm trying to get by with my truck for now. So I lowered it about 2" all around. Front sits about 2" lower, so I'm considering getting some drop shackles for the rear, bring it down another 2" to level it. Haven't tried loading the bike yet, but she is definitely closer to the ground.

Before:

After:

Subtle... but different. Maybe with the 2" drop shackles, I'll be "OK".

 

[Sandy]

Biggest thing I've ever pull out of a tire was a huge railroad spike. Picked it up riding some old rail beds on my XL350 many years ago. Thankfully for rim locks I was able to ride it several miles back to the highwsy and hitch a ride.

 

[Guest]

Found a drop or two of oil under my sprocket cover the last 2 nights. Sh!+.

 

[BurntKittyForge]

Can't get the GSX1100G to run lately. Going to have to strip the carb down for fifth time, go through again...Heard expression "patience of Job" before dunno the one for redundant ??? My fault since i never have time to do much proper working 7 days/wk and no garage.

I get a sick feeling somebody "coveted" it and messed something up so they can try to buy it...Paranoid but it makes me want to shoot it ...seriously.
Just blast a (large) hole through it and be done. Gonna tinker with it a bunch more when I can. I have a truck, a car can't justify buying something else and leaving it sitting. I'd never sell it...feeling disgusted...

I have to drive to Northern VA soon so I pulled the original non-working Becker stereo out of the Mercedes 300SD and replaced it with a $20 unit from walmart. It has MP3, blue toof, hands free phone...just no cd player. I don't have any cd's .

I have to redo the wiring there even (another redundancy job due to work schedule) I spliced the wires by twisting and on the funky original wiring pins I attached the speaker wires to the four pins by wedging a cut popsicle stick my daughter left in car...LOL it has duct tape around it, ...Mercedes gurus are sort of resto-dorks about stuff and I couldn't cut the 35 Y.O. wiring ...need to re-wire to the new stereo and replace the sh*tty original speakers.
Just a power wire, constant power wire, and wire for each new speaker ...every little thing on the car has some doofy obsolete BS, even the speakers were "R' or "L" instead front and rear, goofy amp wire that heats the new unit red hot, Oh, and some complicated BS for the antenae up-down stupid effin' ...going to just re- wire the mess and jam old wiring back sometime...atleast won't get as bored driving six+ hours...

Oh, finished up another project wedging GAF insulation boards (Home Depot) into each window pane of a sunroom (green house attached to house) made the previously sweltering room cool and usable. It's removeable, silver reflective stuff side against glass. I've moved to this room, cool 16 feet ceiling now!!! Love it , but the stuffs supposed to be covered with paneling (IF it was permanent) ...
Have pics in my phone, gotta go mow the lawn at the moment though (have a big snake in yard and can't see him when grass is tall)...

Oh, I've saved enough silica gel packs to make Liquid glass with drano (lye) and mix with pearlite (garden section hardware store) for refractory in a new propane fired forge I'm starting on , it has a cut air compressor tank for it's shell...should get it up and running soon in back corner of the yard...

I am always "wrenching" got few other projects, no time...

 

[Guest]

Seems to me that tall pickups are usually that way for style. If it clears the pavement/ground, and suspension doesn't bottom out, it is high enough.

 

[Sandy]

Spent a bunch of hours today working on my POS Ford Windstar. Needed upper and lower intake manifold gaskets replaced because of a lean code it's been throwing of and on for the last year or so. Hope that fixed it, what a PITA. Then the fun stuff, replaced chain, sprockets and rear wheel bearing on the 750. I don't spend much time in the shop these days but today was a big one. Feels good to get a couple of deferred jobs out of the way. Next up is the needle that fell off the oil temp gauge on my last ride. I have a spare gauge but it's a bit of chore to get at. Pull the fairing, pull the gauges and completely disassemble them, guess I shouldn't be so picky.

 

[steve murdoch]

Changing points plate, coils and condenser on the SuperHawk...again.
Electrics are my Kryptonite.
The inconsistent stumbling WILL be solved.

 

[Burque73]

Changing points plate, coils and condenser on the SuperHawk...again.
Electrics are my Kryptonite.
The inconsistent stumbling WILL be solved.

What a cool bike!

Your work space reminds me of my previous vocation. I refinished hardwood floors for years. One floor was trashed from a mechanic who built bikes in the living room, seemingly dragging heavy parts around leaving deep gouges in the floor and oil stains everywhere. It actually sanded out! A 12" Clark drum sander with 16 grit paper got rid of the mess. Three more cuts with progressively finer paper and three coats of oil modified polyurethane made the floor good as new!

Looks like each of your babies are snug as a bug on a rug though! :encouragement:

 

[cowboyup3371]

Adjusted the rear brake pedal and light switch on Charmayne's bike tonight

 

[Guest]

Just posted this same info on a thread that I started a few weeks ago about the high idle on my '81 GS850G. I had spent a lot of time and money trying to get my carbs to act right, and nothing helped. I was getting pretty frustrated. With that in mind.....

Woo hoo!!!!! I found the problem! Apparently, all four of the throttle butterflies have to be perfectly flat. After a vintage bike mechanic in Austin, TX ("Chris" at Limey Bikes) told me that before you bench sync your carbs, you need to make sure all four are able to make a perfect seal around their perimeter - at the same time. When Charles (from Ypsilanti) was here a few weeks ago and we were inspecting the carbs, we noticed the the #3 had a few dings on the edge, so I filed those down gently and made the edge as smooth as I could, but I did not remove the valve from the carb so that I could inspect it closely. So a few nights ago I pulled the carbs - again - and did a really close inspection to see how well they valves were able to seal; #1, #2 and #4 were perfect, but the bottom of #3 showed a fair amount of light through it. So I removed the valve from the shaft so I could see it from the edge, and sure enough, it was a bit "potato ship-y" around the edge, and there was evidence of having been mistreated by a PO. Luckily I had another one on the way from Ebay and installed it tonight. Eureka! Charles has graciously loaned me his CarbTune Pro, and I've got the four cylinders close, but I suspect there's still room for improvement.

I'm convinced that this is a really unusual situation. I mean, how many people run across a warped butterfly valve? So along with all the great advice about checking for vacuum leaks, too-tight throttle and choke cables, etc, be sure to check your butterfly valves for flatness! Hope this helps someone.....

 

[Redman]

J.............
Woo hoo!!!!! I found the problem! .....

Good. Great.

.

 

[jjbmxer]

I took luggage and a vetter windjamer with lowers off my gs1000.

 

[steve murdoch]

I took luggage and a vetter windjamer with lowers off my gs1000.

Just for fun you should put all that stuff on a scale.
Hopefully the p.o. install beefier fork internals.

 

[wymple]

Put fork seals in an XS1100, cleaned & reassembled one caliper that was sticky. Put a rear tire on my GS850G, and pulled the rear wheel off the XS so we can put a tire on it. Put timing belts on the 77 Goldwing. Enough for awhile.