A thing that happened - loose jets

My pickup truck has been giving me trouble lately and I am in the process of hunting down the problem. It's something simple. I know it is. Still, pain in my ass.

I needed to take the truck to the muffler shop and loaded the Elite 80 in the back so I could ride it home. It was riding well most of the way but on the last stretch of road, it sort of popped and lost about 80% power. My brain began running down a list of possible problems.

I pulled over to check the exhaust. It was clear with some white puffs. That's good. Black exhaust would mean it was burning oil and something serious had happened. The engine died and when I started it again, it would not idle on it's own. I had to hold the throttle open. I nursed it the last couple of hundred feet home and parked it.

I checked the vacuum and fuel lines. I checked the spark plug cable was tight. I pulled the carburetor and opened the bowl to check the jets and found the problem. The idle jet had vibrated loose. It hadn't fallen out, but had worked itself back enough that the vaporizing vents had been covered.

While I had the carb open, I went ahead and cleaned the jets and passageways. Once I had it all back together, it ran better than it did before.

Honda Elite 80

I bought an Elite 80 for not much a few months ago. It was completely apart but I could tell from the box of parts that it wasn't a great looking scooter. The surface of the side panels were very faded. So much that when I removed the stickers the letters were left behind in relief. Look at the panel on the left below. The lower right corner of the 0 is missing because the sticker had peeled off a long time before. 

I washed the panels with soapy water and then sanded and painted them. I went with Rustoleum's basic Red. I thought about different colors but my friend Rob said "Hondas should be red" and I had to agree with him. I have an air compressor and paint gun. I wet sanded the panels between coats. 

This one is from somewhere in the middle of the process. You can see the raised letters from where the stickers were. I thought about sanding it down completely but I decided it didn't take away from anything. 

The work table looked pretty gory afterwards. 

One of the reasons I was considering a different color besides red was this white seat. I didn't like the white and couldn't come up with a good color to balance it all out. Steve suggested I paint the rims white. The whole color scheme fell into place. 

I pulled the wheels off and took them and the new tires up to my local tire shop. When the new tires were on, I taped off the rims. 

Steve was right. The rims help balance out the white seat. While it was off, I painted the muffler with high temp black BBQ pit paint. I also took all the faded black plastic pieces and used some restoring polish to make look a little less burnt out. Most of the pieces were there as I put it back together although not everything went back together as tightly as I would like. I still think it looks pretty good for a 20 something year old scooter.

Thanks Rob and Steve for your scooter decorating tips. 

A Sad Honda C-70

I found this sad neglected C-70 chained up like a prisoner at a job I was at today. The Super Cub as it is known in other countries is "the most produced motor vehicle in history" (thanks Wikipedia). This one was unlucky enough to wind up here being picked at by vultures. You can see the leg shield is missing.

The carburetor is gone too. This is terrible for the engine if rainwater gets in. It's a good way to let a good Honda engine rust away to uselessness. 

I didn't mean for this to sound so sad. It was fun to check this out up close. I was going to leave a note offering $100, but I talked to another guy who had a bike parked there and he said the owner has had several offers to buy but so far has turned them all down. Too bad. It's not going to ride down the road anytime soon. 

Better Pictures of the Beverly

Here are some better pictures of the Piaggio BV200 I picked up recently for a low enough price to make people mad. The broken mirror and the torn carburetor diaphragm is about the most damage it has. It's definitely DIRTY, but after the carb issue is fixed, I am going to strip it all down and hand scrub all the plastic and take the chassis to the car wash and pressure wash it. It's going to be sweet.

2005 Piaggio BV200

I currently ride a Bajaj Chetak 4stroke 150cc. It's a good reliable bike but once it hits 56 or 57mph it stays there. I have been thinking I'd like something in the 200-250cc range. I had an eye out for a Vespa P200 or a Honda Elite 250. On the other hand, I rode a Kymco City 50 and really liked the 16" wheels. The ride was really smooth. 

This bike popped up on Craigslist one day at a great price. It's a 2005 Piaggio BV200 (called the Beverly). I had seen a similar one in Scooter Steve's shop and remember him saying what a nice bike it was. I arranged to see the bike and got the cash together. Then I sat down and did some research on the bike. 

My first scooter was a Piaggio Typhoon 50. It was well built and ran well. Piaggio is, of course, the parent company of Vespa scooters. Vespa re-entered the American market in 2001 with the ET4 and Piaggio began offering their own models soon after. The Typhoon and the BV were two of their models. 

This BV200 has the same 198cc Leader engine as the Vespa GT200. This was exciting. I had the 150cc Leader engine in my ET4 and it ran really well and smooth. This bike also has 16 in wheels with nice wide tires. 

It was adding up to be a great bike for me, but I had to wonder why such a low price? Was the engine ruined and he wasn't saying or was the owner no good with machines and not wanting to deal with it? My favorite conversation about buying scooters goes something like, "

"What's wrong with it?"

"I don't know. It was running fine and then I parked it for several months and it wouldn't start up. It's probably something small but I don't know anything about fixing them. Now I just want it out of here."

It's just parts. Sometimes they are RARE parts, but parts make up systems and if the system fails, it's a part failing and it's just parts. 

I was sitting outside his house at 5:30 to meet him at 5:45 when he got home from work. We introduced ourselves and I asked him why he was selling it. He said it quit running and he didn't know how to work on them and he needed some money and it was time for it to go. Excellent!

"How did it stop running? Were you riding it and it died?"

"No, it ran great but I parked it for the winter and tried to start it up again recently and it wouldn't run. It needs a new carburetor."

"Why do you think it needs a new carburetor?"

"That's what the guys up at the shop told me. They said something was wrong with it and I'd need to replace it. I have the carb here in this bag"

It's just parts. It was running well and then it sat for several months and then it wouldn't start. He took it to the shop and they told him it was an expensive part he needed to replace. The cost of the new part was enough for him to just sell it cheap and be done with it. My favorite story. 

I gave him the cash and he gave me the title. We loaded it into my truck and I called Scooter Steve and told him I bought it. He asked if I was bringing it straight over. I said I guessed I was. 

I handed Steve the carburetor and began to loosen the tie down straps. Steve went into his shop and within a minute came right back out. 

"Here's your problem. The diaphragm is torn."

Steve is quick!

You can see the tear in the rubber diaphragm there. Steve had another slightly smaller caburetor which he cleaned out and bolted on to the scooter's manifold. The scooter fired right up. The engine sounds good!

I think I have a kick ass new bike. I need to hunt down a replacement diaphragm for a Walbro WVF-7p 29mm carburetor, but Walbro is a common brand and I'll probably just call the local Vespa dealer and have them look up the exact part number at least and if theirs isn't too expensive, order it through them.

The rest of the scooter is in excellent condition. It's never been wrecked or dropped. The plastic is very nice and nothing broken. Some of the matte black plastic is faded but that can be restored. After the carburetor issue has been worked out, the scooter will get stripped down and cleaned. The plastic will all get hand scrubbed, the gas tank will be cleaned out, new fuel and vacuum lines and a new set of tires and this bike will be ready to roll. I plan on riding it in the Rally next month!

Gangsta Lean

I saw this Honda Elite 80 in a parking lot this morning. I didn't think the Elite 80s had a side kickstand so I took a closer look.

The center stand was bent way forward. Jack's Scooter shop talks about this being a problem with Honda's on this page.  I had some trouble with my first Elite 150 and my project CH80 has a similar lean.

My center stand has a different bend to it. 

I'll replace mine with one off eBay and it will be fine. I am not sure the same can be said for the one I saw this morning. 

The Sticky Summer Months

This is my big blue truck I use to bring scooters home to work on. Have a closer look.   

It looks like it's just dirty and maybe it rained a little. 

This is Pecan sap. There are 8 huge pecan trees on the property where I live and one of them shades the area where I park and work on various scooters. This time of the year, right after the fig crop has finished, the pecan trees start dropping sticky sap everywhere. It begins with a light misting of sap. That's what is covering the surface of the truck in general. Last night, the trees starting dropping the big drops of sap you can see on the left. I wiped some away so you can see what it would look like otherwise. 

It's sticky enough that pebbles stick to the bottoms of my shoes. My arms stick to the truck if I lean agasint it and my jeans stick to the metal folding chair when I stand up. GROSS.

I'll point out again that there is NO WATER in these pictures. This is all sap.

 Luckily it washes right off with a spray nozzle on the end of a garden hose. I'll go get some small tarps today and get these things covered. Who needs a shop? I need a shop.