Sunday, October 13, 2019

For The Record

It's running again.  I put 25 miles on it this afternoon and as far as I can tell, it's running as well as ever.  It was a challenging week though for ol' Coop while we got to  this point.


I mentioned in the last blog that I'd drained oil mid-week....that was incorrect; I've been an oil changing fool.  I drained everything I could last Sunday night as soon as it was off from the trailer.  Unlike most of the time when I drop oil on any of the machines and I wait a few hours, every oil change and there was more than one this week, lasted 24 hours.

The sequence was....
  • Sunday oil and filter drained...looked as though there were 4 quarts (2 too many) in the pan, plug pulled, turned the motor over a few cranks as water shot out.  Put transmission in 5th gear and rolled the rear wheel to move off of TDC.  Squirted some fresh oil in the cylinder and rolled the wheel another turn.  Pulled the air filter, must have weighed 2 pounds.
  • Monday, crankcase filled with 5 quarts (3 too many) of no-name 10-40 dino oil
  • Tuesday, oil dropped, all 5 quarts, obviously still traces of water.
  • Wednesday, buttoned it up with a new filter and proper level of 20-50 synthetic.  I had just put a new Iridium plug in before last weekend, put the old spark plug in.  Started the bike for the first time since home.  It took a bit but settled into an idle, sounding like it was missing the restriction of the air filter.  A stream of water flowing out between the pipe and muffler.  My nice clean garage door got shot with oily, misty water vapor.  I looked at the oil level sight glass and saw a rich mocha color.  Guessing water still in the breather, ??  Drained the expensive waterous synthetic and pulled out a very chocolate-colored oil filter.
  • Saturday, stopped at GoMoto after coffee at Diamonds and purchased a dry air filter and a couple more oil filters.  I asked Marty early week if he had any Himalayan air filters.  "We've got the normal ones, no waterproof ones."  Filled in a couple quarts of the oil I buy in bulk and use in every other one of the bikes, 10-40 Valvoline Motorcycle Oil.  With that, an old oil filter that I'd for some reason kept (don't ask me, I have no idea why...)  Installed the new air filter
  • Sunday, this morning.  Waited for 40 degrees outside between sleet, rain and sun showers.
  • Sunday afternoon, put 25 miles on the bike
  • This week a new oil filter and new synthetic, new plug back in and hopefully some more carefree miles before snow. 


Thanks to everyone for the encouraging words, offers of help, offers of deep water riding lessons, criticisms and everything else.  It's been a busy week of correspondence. :)

The Craig's ad for the pontoon boat seemed like a reasonable price for what it was but I have little to no interest in becoming a skipper, thanks for the heads-up though.  And then there was the link for the PFD......it's possible that in this context that might not look like a blowup doll .....were you on the right page.... maybe someone else was the intended for that link??  Regardless, I am into re-purposing.

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