Coop's Corner: A New Day Has Dawned

Sunday, March 8, 2020

A New Day Has Dawned

We Be Scootin!

It's a 1985 Honda Elite 250, CH250 the designated model. In the rest of the world, primarily Europe as I understand it, the Elite's were called Spacey's. The following year, the Helix or CN250 was introduced, wheels further apart by 14". Much if not most of the engine/running gear is shared between the two but not everything...there are a few small differences. I owned a black with gold '86 Elite 250 at the same time I owned my yellow Helix. Riding both highlighted the differences, length and seat height being the most pronounced. Anecdotally they were 'geared' slightly different and now that I've had both drive trains apart, I can see differences. I convinced myself that the Helix did 70 like the Elite did 65.

Friday

Still warming up and working the old gas through....warmed up, it's purring like the kitten she is! The mirrors were not yet on to ease it's exit from the shop door maze.

A good thing I put the Mud n Snow tires on the Elite....our driveway has been a disaster anyway and with the constant contractor/delivery traffic during our remodeling project, things have gotten much worse. We were on the edge of construction progress being stopped in fact due to delivery trucks and worker stuckness. A load of gravel on Tuesday and another Thursday helped but barely. The frost is coming out and the snow is still only slowly disappearing.

Backing up a bit, the axle bushing that I was waiting for and luckily was still even available to order arrived Thursday so Friday morning at the crack of dawn I was back in the shop and finished putting the scooter together. Some detailing ensued, sustenance for that trying experience was enhanced a great deal with a little bit of help.....

I've been so very good...we've lived above a coffee shop for 8 weeks that provides, willingly, scones that are excellent. There's the award-winning bakery across the street that opens at 5:30 AM, a place I've only been a customer of 3 times since we've been Townies. Friday morning I felt obligated to visit once more. The early morning aromas emanating from that location are intoxicating enough. There are no words that sufficiently describe the goodness and strength realized from these two beauties and they were still warm.

As the customer behind me in line reminded, "All the Recommended Dietary Allowances in one fell swoop". I was absolutely energized!

Saturday

Saturday morning at Diamond's for coffee, Steve rode his 650 Honda, just like the old 650 Honda but this is a new 650 Honda, ready to continue exactly where the other one left off. In the distance, Jeff was in on his very nice 450 DOHC Honda. Paul's Can-Am just beyond that. I was there in a Chrysler Town and Country.

Four point one miles Saturday afternoon....the beginning of a beautiful friendship and it felt oh so good to be twisting a grip.

After some other chores around the homestead, I returned to Red Wing with the hopes of another stroll along the waterfront.

Fishing the main channel's open water.....

.... and in the bay where there's still enough ice to drop the line down a hole. These photos taken from almost the same location.

A very pleasant early March day in Minnesota!

Sunday

Early this morning I dropped off my lovely partner at MSP, her flight to NYC went well and she'll be gone a week, entrusting me to take good care of all things Home. To that end, I took the laundry to the house, completed it and then....

The north facing gravel roads are soupy with mooshy grooves.

The lower part of Lake Pepin is losing ice....

The upper section is ice-free.....

Here's a shot of what's left betwixt and between.

Everything was going SO well!! Idle had settled down, I stopped for some fresh gas and coffee, the machine running far better than it's high mileage and appearance justified and then....

Not 20 feet from where I stopped to take the frozen lake photos, the scooter suddenly died. I tried everything I could think of (sans tools...I'd decided I didn't need to take them). Switches, worked, fiddled with. Sidestand even though I knew full well there was no switch there. Ignition off and on multiple times. The way it had stopped and was acting as I ran the starter seemed to be indicating no spark....I could smell gas.

Have I mentioned how much I was already missing my dear Peg??

A woman (Tracy) was out for a stroll, enjoying our incredible weather just as I had been and as most every MN rider was as well by the lovely motorcycle traffic sounds down over the bluff on Highway 61.

"Where do you have to go?"

I told her, "maybe 5 miles...up by Frontenac." It's exactly 5.5 by road, I looked it up and I was ready to hoof it. I had intentionally kept my loop close to home....just in case issues developed.

"Hand me your phone, I'll call my husband Mike and he can take you."

Mike did but I didn't make him drive down our driveway, the white Ford pickup was waaay too clean for our disaster. There will very soon be something a little special in their mailbox that wasn't accepted in that roomy cab. Thank you Tracy for making the call and to Mike for answering a strange phone number on a Sunday afternoon.

There are 2 wires going to the igniter thing....or there's supposed to be 2 wires going to the igniter thing. It took another trip through the shop door maze to remove the panel plastics for me to find this.

An easy enough fix, but not today. Plenty of time for that this week. I needed to get back to town for another walk down by the river to enjoy this CDT afternoon sun. What weather!!

The scooter is a blast and is going to be great fun, reminding me of how much I was enjoying the black '86 while it was here. These are definitely much more scootery than both the extra long Helix and Morphous are. Great explorations and adventures await!!

And lest we forget, a reminder in the public parking ramp stairwell as I returned the van to its parking spot on Level C.

6 comments:

RichardMMarch 8, 2020 at 8:42 PM
Nice looking doughnuts! With all of the other pictures you post, that’s the one that stands out to me. Something’s broken over here.

The scooter is looking pretty good. Are the old wires getting brittle or was there another reason it broke?
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Coop a.k.a. CoopdwayMarch 9, 2020 at 6:48 AM
The photo doesn't make the wire clear but before I actually touched it, to increase the distance between it and the spade connector, there were 2-3 strands that were the last stubborn connections. Rust and at least 35 years of grime and most likely at least small doses of road salt were all contributors. The PO, once he had the machine, was commuting daily to work in Rochester and from what he told me, it was daily.

I have bullet and spade connectors, hopefully the coil (available at $51+)itself is OK. Too early to tell yet about the scooter's oil consumption but nowhere that I stopped were there obvious drops of coolant or oil. It ran very well while it did.
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motormikeMarch 15, 2020 at 10:04 AM
Heart valve donuts.... next time I'm in Red Wimg...may have check my heart health…. As a Helix owner I wonder how this Elite handles with the shorter wheelbase compared to the Helix.
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FrostbikeMarch 15, 2020 at 8:25 PM
A black and gold 86 Elite, you say? I just happen to have the same!
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Others say....

"it was auspicious to approach any situation from a deferential, inquisitive place. Conceding that there is much to learn is the best blueprint for discovering something new." ----B. Fuller

The Man straightened stiffly above the block of salt fixed to the stake and looked at the young cattle ringed about him. The pasture was holding out well and the stock was looking good. This bunch would be ready to sell in another month, maybe sooner if the market was right.

A stir among the cattle down near the river brought him round to face the swinging bridge he'd built years before. Someone was coming toward him from the bridge. Someone in breeches, but it didn't look like a man, somehow. What was a woman doing in his pasture this time of night?

He bent over the salt again; maybe if he paid her no heed she'd go on past and let him mind his own business. He heard her footsteps come nearer and stop. "Good evening," she said.

Her voice was smooth with book learning but friendlier than most, and somehow almost shy. When he made no answer she went on, "I've been sitting on your swinging bridge....I thought I'd like to say thank-you...." Her voice stumbled a little, then she tried once more.

"You are Mr. ____". His name sounded strange in her voice, but she went on to tell her own.

"That's what they've called me the last sixty-eight years," he said, looking past her face to the hills fast darkening under a single star. "I reckon the woods are free for those that like to walk there."

The unfamiliar voice laughed a little. "That's what Emerson said: the grove belongs to the man who walks in it with an open heart....On that basis I guess I've owned part of your woods for a good many years.....". She made a final effort. "I've always wanted to thank you....."

Something deeply hidden stirred in him. "There's a stump up there, in the notch of the woods", he said slowly, "that before the timber grew so tall you could stand on it and see all over this country."

He kept still a minute, remembering, then, "I used to stand up there an' look at things, an' wonder how they come to be like they was, an' how the hills was created, an' all the things in Nature.... I told my wife I guessed all the religion I ever had I got standin' on that old stump, a-wonderin'..." He turned his face away from her.

She helped him out. "I know about that, a little. This afternoon I saw......." Her account of a thing she had really taken time to look at eased him, and he answered with telling of the badger den at the foot of the swinging bridge.

When she had gone, he turned to watch her. After a moment she stood clear and unmoving against the sky. You could hear the sounds of the river where she stood. She was one that could stand still long enough, he thought, really to hear what a body was saying, or a river.

Then she walked down the farther side of the slope and was gone. ------Margaret Snyder from A Chosen Valley

Fall was the end of harvest, end of the growing season, a burst of color and sun-warmth before killing frost turned the land gray and cold. Fall was a moody time, full of both life and death, a time when we were reminded of the power outside of us, reminded that the seasons happen to us. We do not invite the change to come.-------Ben Logan, from The Land Remembers

When you get those rare moments of clarity, those flashes when the universe makes sense, you try desperately to hold onto them. They are the lifeboats for the darker times, when the vastness of it all, the incomprehensible nature of life is completely elusive. So the question becomes or should have been all along, what would you do if you knew you only had one day, or one week, or one month to live. What lifeboat would you grab onto? What secret would you tell? What band would you see? What person would you declare your love to? What wish would you fulfill? What exotic locale would you fly to for coffee? What book would you write? ------- Ben Tyler

We were also cautioned about journeying far from home. As an example of the dangers, the town had a badly crippled lady named Lucy, who as a girl had traveled to New York City. As she traveled along a sidewalk, sightseeing, she was struck by the outstretched hand of a suicide who had leapt from high above. Her spine had been shattered and for the rest of her life, she was to walk bent forward at the waist, tapping the sidewalk with two black canes. Whenever the subject of travel to a big city was raised, someone would say, "Just remember what happened to Miss Tripp." ---- Ted Kooser, from Local Wonders

"Steamboats are like wedding cakes without the complications...." ----Mark Twain

"It's not about having lots of money, it's about having lots of options......." -----Chris Rock

As the very proud father of three former ponytail wearers, hopefully I can get away with this....."For the past few years it's been fashionable for young women to wear ball caps and to snap the strap on the back under their ponytails. I like the looks of that, their shiny ponytails jauntily swinging, but it's hard not to think of the rear ends of horses. There's a piece of harness called the crupper that goes just under a horse's tail to keep its nose down. If the horse lifts its head to look for a way out of whatever predicament it's in, the crupper tightens and hurts the horse. But it's foolish for parents to think that a ball cap might keep a young woman from running away. Anybody can see they're made for running." ------Ted Kooser, Local Wonders

"I tell the guy's girlfriend that the only difference between the book's main character Phaedrus and myself is that I am neither brilliant, tortured or insane, she looks at my bike and there is an uncomfortable silence." --------ahendepe (a.k.a. Vermin)