One advantage to the upgrade to WordPress is that I can write while on the train or in this case when I have insomnia. Will this prove to be useful?
Doubtful. But right now it appears to be a good way to waste time until I have to get up.
Watchmen: I was impressed. Quite literal however I liked that it was. Didn’t notice that it was nearly 3 hours long and to tell the truth I’m not sure it could have been shorter.
Bowling: not sure how I did it but I bowled a 197 this past Friday with Keith and Nikki. Four straight strikes from frame 8 (2 in frame 10) with a total of 6 strikes. Damn. Should have taken note of spares as well. Nikki surprised us both in game 1 with a come behind win but I destroyed them both for the other 2. I have to say, I’m enjoying the late night bowl every now and then. Much more than late night karaoke for sure.
Spent much of last week working on the motorcycle. Changed the oil the previous week and then decided that I should just go for it with the new handlebars. After twice looking at the wiring and thinking that it might be too much for me, I’d asked the guy at motorgrrl how much he’d charge. With a price tag of $85/hr and with a minimum of about 2 hours I said … fuck that.
Taking apart things is the easy part. All the connections from the right and left handlebar switches are clearly colored so that wouldn’t be difficult. There were 2 black wires but they both led to the same connection (one under, the other on top) so I just marked them with electrical tape to be safe. Once disconnected, all I had to do was to remove the throttle cables. Easier said than done.
I actually snapped off a little piece of plastic trying to wiggle the bastard out if his home but nothing that would screw up the throttle. Zen comes into play here. This is where you just have to say to yourself that there is a proper way to do it. And the proper way is tonooosen the connection at the other end of the cables.
Once I did that it was simple to get the cables off of the bars. Next up was to remove the wiring from the old handlebars. Again, an easy task … until you break the wiring cnnection on the right switch which controls the electric starter. I was so pissed.
Nothing you can do at this point, really. Just move forward. Besides, I prefer to kick it over. Never relied on the electric starter anyway. Once all the cables and wiring were off I could put on the new bars after feeding the wiring bqcknin and taping them up. They seem to get a bit scarred by the constant push and pull technique. Good old electrical tape to the rescue.
Hooking things up was pretty straightforward. The big moment had arrived so I trner the key only to findbthat there were no lights on the dash. Nothing. No headlight. Zero power.
My intuition told me that it had something to do with what I’d broken on the right switch. Was there a bad connection somewhere? Did I accidentally attach the light blue/white wire to the light blue one? Did I short something somewhere? Did I loosen a connection somewhere?
Now, I don’t know much about engines or motorcycles but I know even less about electrical work. And I wasn’t very happy about this situation in particular. It was getting late (we had dinner with Keith followed by bowling to get to!) so I decide to just pack it in and call it a day.
Sunday rolls around and we were sceduled to hit Home Depot with Kenan and Eric but all I wanted to do was to tend to the bike. Nikki said she could go it alone under one condition: whatever door she picked out, I couldn’t complain. You know want? I was fine with that.
Out to the bike. The previous day, after realizing that I was in a bad situation, I decided that I could replace the bad right switch with the one from the other bike. Good idea however that did not work. I decided to just leave that one be and use it anyway becuase even though the starter didn’t work, it was still broken on the other one.
What’s left at this point? Oh, I’d already checked that the battery was good and I’d given the fuses a once over. All looked fine. So here I am with an electical issue with a little connection tester in my hand and I’m thinking to myself have no idea where to start. Yippee.
So I start by toching connections to see if I get anything. I finally end up near the fuse box and start touching those on the ends. Voilà. The 15 amp fuse registers a hit on one side but not the other. Pulling it out i see that under the tips the goass is slightly burnt. How come i didn’t see this earlier? I go over to the other bike to see if I can grab one there but realize thatbthe entire electrical system on that one is different. Newer fuses.
I go to nik’s bike and pullne from hers (after opening the side panel and seeing that that’s where her air filter is) I replaced the bad one and …
POWER.
At this point I am ecstatic. Elated, even. I begin the process of rebuilding the bike and finally get the tank on after a minor adjustment on the choke and start her up. That felt pretty fucking good. Off to Pep Boys before they close only to find they are out of 15 amp fuses.
Sometimes I can’t catch a break.
Zen and the art of …
One advantage to the upgrade to WordPress is that I can write while on the train or in this case when I have insomnia. Will this prove to be useful?
Doubtful. But right now it appears to be a good way to waste time until I have to get up.
Watchmen: I was impressed. Quite literal however I liked that it was. Didn’t notice that it was nearly 3 hours long and to tell the truth I’m not sure it could have been shorter.
Bowling: not sure how I did it but I bowled a 197 this past Friday with Keith and Nikki. Four straight strikes from frame 8 (2 in frame 10) with a total of 6 strikes. Damn. Should have taken note of spares as well. Nikki surprised us both in game 1 with a come behind win but I destroyed them both for the other 2. I have to say, I’m enjoying the late night bowl every now and then. Much more than late night karaoke for sure.
Spent much of last week working on the motorcycle. Changed the oil the previous week and then decided that I should just go for it with the new handlebars. After twice looking at the wiring and thinking that it might be too much for me, I’d asked the guy at motorgrrl how much he’d charge. With a price tag of $85/hr and with a minimum of about 2 hours I said … fuck that.
Taking apart things is the easy part. All the connections from the right and left handlebar switches are clearly colored so that wouldn’t be difficult. There were 2 black wires but they both led to the same connection (one under, the other on top) so I just marked them with electrical tape to be safe. Once disconnected, all I had to do was to remove the throttle cables. Easier said than done.
I actually snapped off a little piece of plastic trying to wiggle the bastard out if his home but nothing that would screw up the throttle. Zen comes into play here. This is where you just have to say to yourself that there is a proper way to do it. And the proper way is tonooosen the connection at the other end of the cables.
Once I did that it was simple to get the cables off of the bars. Next up was to remove the wiring from the old handlebars. Again, an easy task … until you break the wiring cnnection on the right switch which controls the electric starter. I was so pissed.
Nothing you can do at this point, really. Just move forward. Besides, I prefer to kick it over. Never relied on the electric starter anyway. Once all the cables and wiring were off I could put on the new bars after feeding the wiring bqcknin and taping them up. They seem to get a bit scarred by the constant push and pull technique. Good old electrical tape to the rescue.
Hooking things up was pretty straightforward. The big moment had arrived so I trner the key only to findbthat there were no lights on the dash. Nothing. No headlight. Zero power.
My intuition told me that it had something to do with what I’d broken on the right switch. Was there a bad connection somewhere? Did I accidentally attach the light blue/white wire to the light blue one? Did I short something somewhere? Did I loosen a connection somewhere?
Now, I don’t know much about engines or motorcycles but I know even less about electrical work. And I wasn’t very happy about this situation in particular. It was getting late (we had dinner with Keith followed by bowling to get to!) so I decide to just pack it in and call it a day.
Sunday rolls around and we were sceduled to hit Home Depot with Kenan and Eric but all I wanted to do was to tend to the bike. Nikki said she could go it alone under one condition: whatever door she picked out, I couldn’t complain. You know want? I was fine with that.
Out to the bike. The previous day, after realizing that I was in a bad situation, I decided that I could replace the bad right switch with the one from the other bike. Good idea however that did not work. I decided to just leave that one be and use it anyway becuase even though the starter didn’t work, it was still broken on the other one.
What’s left at this point? Oh, I’d already checked that the battery was good and I’d given the fuses a once over. All looked fine. So here I am with an electical issue with a little connection tester in my hand and I’m thinking to myself have no idea where to start. Yippee.
So I start by toching connections to see if I get anything. I finally end up near the fuse box and start touching those on the ends. Voilà. The 15 amp fuse registers a hit on one side but not the other. Pulling it out i see that under the tips the goass is slightly burnt. How come i didn’t see this earlier? I go over to the other bike to see if I can grab one there but realize thatbthe entire electrical system on that one is different. Newer fuses.
I go to nik’s bike and pullne from hers (after opening the side panel and seeing that that’s where her air filter is) I replaced the bad one and …
POWER.
At this point I am ecstatic. Elated, even. I begin the process of rebuilding the bike and finally get the tank on after a minor adjustment on the choke and start her up. That felt pretty fucking good. Off to Pep Boys before they close only to find they are out of 15 amp fuses.
Sometimes I can’t catch a break.