Mostly lemon based

Category: I’m a mechanic me…

  • The MOT

    So I was all ready. I popped Cherry outside to bask in the sunlight while I checked her over. Tighted up the seat bolts, which I’d not noticed were loose yesterday. Popped her out on the paving… and noticed a drip. Hrm, I went in to get the spanners – perhaps that brake hose was a touch loose. Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip. Drip.

    I looked at the calliper closely before tightening it up. No brake fluid visible at all.

    Drip, drip, drip, drip, drip.

    Shit, the seal has gone on the brake caliper. Still, with an hour and 15 minutes I can probably change back to the incredibly grotty grimeca calliper that came with the bike. Sprinting in, I switch into my bike gear, lock up the back of the house for a quick getaway and grab tools and the folding workbench. Clamping the calliper in the vice I manage to free the (obviously never been touched) bleed nipple and I (amazingly) detach the severed brake hose and chuck it unceremonioulsy in the bin. Grabbing the bike I run it back round next to the bench. I whip the calliper off the bike and jam it, still attached, in the vice and… with some force, manage to get the (already somewhat rounded off) hose off it. Pausing to drop the leaky caliper from Claire into the bucket of brake bits I attach the hose to the grimeca calliper. Because it lost it’s copper washers when it was originally fitted it’s always had to be done up tight. I get it done up and whack it unceremoniously back on the bike. It’s still oozing fluid. Off it comes, tighter still. I stick it back on the bike.

    One squeeze of the lever and it becomes apparent that something is ‘very wrong’. The fluid gushes from the joint above the caliper (there’s two between the hose and the calliper). I go to tighten it and realise that it’s cracking. It’s not *meant* to be taken apart and done up so many times.

    Fuck.

    I run to the (thankfully) emptied (this morning) dustbin and tip it up. Out rolls the severed end of the old brake hose. I manage to jam it in the work bench with a spanner, and separate the two sections of the old hose. Amazingly, despite 10 years of neglect they come apart without snapping. I grab the new hose… and… it’s a different fucking connector.

    At this point, up to my elbows in highly toxic dot 4 brake fluid, it becomes abundantly clear that without a new brake hose my bike is going absolutely no-where. And given the condition of the two callipers I have, even then the likelyhood of a quick departure is slim.

    Almost ready to cry I ring the MOT station and cancel the MOT. So, the MOT, it didn’t happen.

    And y’know what? New brake seal kits, not cheap. So now I have to rejoin the MZRC, because it gives an insanely good discount on parts. Not that I don’t want to rejoin the MZRC, I love the MZRC, but the fact that I’m having to spend the money on that… so that it makes getting the rest of the bike sorted… that’s bad. *sighs*.

  • Concentration span of a flea

    Damnit. I was just about getting into the work. Just about. Words weren’t exactly ‘flowing’, but they were kind of plodding. It wasn’t great, but it was okay. And then I looked at the time. I looked at the time and thought, ‘ack, I wonder if all my bike gear’s still around’. So I went, and I looked, and yes, there it was. But since I’d stopped working I thought I’d go and check the ‘zeds brake. Still okay. Okay, but while I’m the garage I should get together stuff to take… that’ll be… uh, a spark plug spanner then.

    Oh, and a spare plug.

    Oh, and the D-Lock. Crap though it is.

    Oh, and where’s my bike helmet?

    Riiiight. That’s everything all together in the one place.

    Hrm. But now it’s only half an hour ’til I’m intending to leave. Balls. Too late to really get any work in. I’d forgotten how much I loved riding the bike. And it’s all coming back to me. I’m ridiculously over excited. At the same time I need to be really careful. First up, the bike’s equiped with delightful Chen Shin tyres. Not the Chin Hung that nearly killed me. Some people say these tyres are ‘okay’. I’m willing to give them a test, since they’re on there. First sign of teflon’d mahogany like grip and they’re gone (potentially so am I. But we’ll see). And second up – coming to bat now is Kate hasn’t ridden a bike for months. Lots of months. More than 6. Again. I’d only just started to get back into the swing of things with the last bike.

    So, excited though I am, I must take care, oh, and go and have a second quick look at the iffy fork and check it’s not leaking.

    Wish me luck, I need this bike to pass.

  • Isn’t technology Brilliant!

    Because, right, they’ve made the MOT test in the UK all computerised right, which means that it’s all done by computers which is Brilliant. Right. And that means that when the computer network goes down. They can’t do any tests. Which is Brilliant! Aren’t computers Brilliant. So I can’t do my bike’s MOT test today because all the test places are saying the network’s gone down. Isn’t that Brilliant….

    [end of fast show reference]

  • The clumsy girl and the day

    So, it’s morning. I’ve had breakfast, watched Azumanga Daioh, had a shower and managed to check my bike’s brakes (spongy, but better. Added more fluid. Better still, still spongy though. Hopefully passable. I can now not pull them back to the bar). And I started to think about work. Grabbed breakfast bowl/mug/cafetiere, headed down the stairs and my ankle randomly and without warning gave way.

    I managed to save myself, and all the breakfast stuff except the spoon which did what I was expecting to do and skittered down the stairs.

    So, rather gingerly made my way down the stairs, got my fresh cup of Raspberry and Loganberry tea (which fails the blue test (it’s purple, like *all* fruit teas)) and decide to nip off and cut my toenails (I realise this is excitement personified) – during which process I manage to snap the nail clipper. I mean, completely snap it. Like ‘plink-crunk’ – which left me feeling a little shocked – especially as I’ve no idea where a chunk of it has gone.

    Then while scooping up the bits of broken nail clipper, I sneezed, scrabbling for a tissue I did think… what on earth is going on today. Did I hit the ‘clumsy + chaotic’ button on my alarm clock? Feh.

    Anyway. I need to book an MOT (place opens in about 30 mins, I think); and then write like a demon. Although I am exhausted, which I blame on everyone else keeping me up late.

  • Woooooot.

    The world is peachy keen and super cool today. Why you ask… WHY?

    Well, because:

    1. I have the bits to fix my motorcycle in a little box behind me.
    2. I have completed the 2000 word essay.
    3. I have completed all my EU Packs.
    4. I have completed my learning outcomes.
    5. The bike is insured from tomorrow.
    6. The only thing between me and no-more-uni-work is my dissertation. A teeny little 6000 word story, 2500 word conclusion and proofing and making the suggested changes to the 500 word abstract and 1000 word introduction.

    So, the world rawks; James ultra-super-rawks for proofing my essay and suggesting the really bloody good changes which turned my essay from ‘okay’ to ‘fan-bloody-tastic’ (at least, as far as it can go for a tedious meta-analysis of a reflection). I’m now going to munch on an apple, make a cup of tea, and see if I can’t turn Cherry into a working bike before lunch.

  • Return to planet Earth

    Okay, I’ve ceased ranting. Mostly because I realised that the learning outcomes tied into the questions way better than the ones in the pack, which made life a lot easier. It’s now finally printed and done. That’s all of them done. All of them. All the EU Packs are *done*. I just need to go down to Bath and hand them in.

    In Canada shaped news I won the auctions for some of the parts to convert my dearest beloved Rebecca to Left Hand Drive. It might be two years away, but LHD minors are pretty uncommon here and so getting the parts is quite a challenge. I’ve even won one of the incredibly rare LHD accelerator pedals. This may seem sad to you, but it’s a little step in the direction of where I want to be.

    I also won the bits to put Cherry together. Let’s hope that Cherry gets an MOT when all the bits are put on, I really could do with being able to ride to work.

  • Poot.

    I’m shattered. I’ve done some research for the 2k word essay despite falling asleep while trying to read some of the papers I’ve got. So yeah. I’ve won an auction for a bit that I need to fix Cherry but I’m waiting for the bloke to e-mail me back to say whether he can supply the rest of the bits. I can’t see the wing mirrors that came off Claire anywhere, so I’ll have to have a proper hunt. Hopefully though, I’ll get her back on the road next week…

    Blah. Really. I just feel completely done in and want to sleep. Lots.

    I went swimming this morning though, with Nikki, Lorna and Onne; Nikki, Onne and I forming the world’s worst synchronised swimming team under Lorna’s careful direction; and Nikki learning to do Butterfly stroke (very impressive, if somewhat more splashy than the rest of her strokes).

    Then Lorna headed off and we went back and produced a roast dinner. Sadly, the Yorkshire’s were made with gluten free flour (a mistake, but it was all we had), but the rest of it went really well. We then played Mashed, Auto Modellista, and some racing game that I can’t remember the name of, but discovered that if you set the damage to ‘simulation’ instead of ‘cosmetic’ I actually have a hope of winning – or at least, not embarassing myself quite as badly as I did yesterday…

    But the poot. The poot is because I saw someone interesting on LJ, in a community, either queer Toronto, canadian lesbian, or whatever; and I thought ‘ooh, I will keep their page open and I shall look…’, only I closed it and now can’t find their post. So poot. And the house is going for insaneoheat. I wish it’d make it’s mind up.

  • MMOC website rally

    Pickytures from a fabby day are here

  • Site update.

    My god, I’ve actually updated the bikes page. No, really, I have. Go meet Cherry (who I keep typing as Cheery which is actually how she got her name (“Chirpy chirpy cheep cheap cheery cherry”) (or something)).

    The picture of Cherry is, incidentally, very flattering. And yes, I realise that for reasons which are not entirely apparent to me I’ve managed to call all my bikes names beginning with C.

  • My god, how did that get there?

    Err. I appear to have aquired another motorcycle. Um. Yes.

    Cherry, I think, from our first meeting. A Red 1996 Kanuni MZ ETZ 251. Err. Yes. She runs, and is complete, which are definately the best things about her. The layer of surface corrosion is less attractive, the rattly top end isn’t brilliant, but she’s got lots of bits, so there should be two good ETZs, and she’s pretty much ridable; I just need to put a battery in, put a new fork-seal in and a new speedo cable, she should then be fit for an MOT :-)

    Shiny* :-)

    *Shiny as in the firefly / serenity, not shiny as in shiny, ‘cos that she ain’t.