I love wrenching

In the last ten years the only work a professional mechanic has done on one of my vehicles is put on new tires and a wheel alignment(it won't be obvious in what follows, but I do have a small amount of talent). Its not that I particularly love wrenching as much as Rad so eloquently expressed in another post, but I like to do things myself to know they were done right.

Problem is I am slower than death at it. Here's why:

Like many others I did the barbarian jumper mod on my '06, and figured it was also a good time to a carb sync (I know, throttle bodies - in my world throttle bodies don't need synching, they have computers for that ). I am planning on doing the modified Rad/Jestal sync, so I am thinking this might take a couple of hours, which should mean eight if all goes as normal. An hour and a half later I am done with the synch, time to button it up :yahoo:

Get the tank bolted down and all the panels back on, and there lying in the tool tray is an extra plastic dzus fastener. Crap. Maybe I missed a fastener on the air cleaner assembly when I was screwing around under there? Off comes the left side panel, no joy. Was there two of these fasteners holding down the jiffy pop? Up comes the tank, nope. Was there one under the jiffy pop? Don't think so, but lets take it out and check. Nope.

Well now that the bike is all apart again, lets do the smart thing and check the manual (nice diagrams). So remember that fastener you couldn't find on the bottom of the side panel that connects it to the rear panel, the one you promised yourseld you wouldn't forget? Guess what, CRS strikes again. OK, lets finish this up. Now the wife comes rolling in the driveway, home from work early. Time to go see my son graduate from sixth grade and then off to boy scouts for court of honor.

Back home at eight, in goes the jiffy pop, fasten down the tank, pop on the panels and now sitting in the tool tray under the seat is an extra dzus fastener (black fastener, black tray, didn't really notice it until I was all done :glare: ). Laugh, go ahead. Now this one I recognize. Seems that when I needlessly raised the tank, and then went off elsewhere, when I got back I forgot the fastener on the jiffy pop. Toss my screwdriver into the tray, lets get started taking stuff off again.

Off comes the tank trim, up goes the tank, in goes the fastener, and here comes my son. He wants me to look over a paper he is working on. Didn't he just graduate? Look at the essay, make some unfriendly suggestions, and time to button this thing up (where have we heard that before). Now at this point in time, although this is my first experience taking the panels off the bike, I am honest to goodness expert on these things. Call me anytime, I know exactly how many fasteners are in each panel and what type they are. I am expert enough to know that I am now SHORT one dzus fastener. :wacko:

Somewhere in all of this I had stopped using my tool tray on the floor to store the fasteners, and had started putting them in the tray under the seat. The nice plastic tray. The nice plastic tray that bounces when things are thrown into it. It seems to me now that when that screwdriver was tossed into the tray earlier I saw something go flying out of the corner of my eye. Didn't think much of it at the time, but I am now thinking that I definitely saw something flying.

Now not wanting to jump to conclusions I decide to test this theory (way too much mythbusters). So I take another dzus fastener out and put it in the tray. Then I toss in the screwdriver as before. Nothing really happens, the fastener doesn't move much. Huh. Try it again, but this time the screwdriver hits the fastener. Hadn't really anticipated that outcome, heartrate goes up instantly, and the fastener goes flying :bye2: . Oh no my friends, I watch it hit the floor surprisingly far away, locate it quickly (lightspeed really)and back into its proper place it goes.

But **** and caboodle that missing fastener could be anywhere (although past exerience would suggest in the deepest recesses of the bike). Now my only real fear here is that this plastic fastener is laying on something that is going to get hot and will melt, could get messy. So I am going to find it.

First a thorough scan of the floor and the visible areas of the bike, you've worked on cars/bikes before you know I didn't find it.

Off comes the left panel. Thorough scan of the air cleaner area, nothing. Maybe if I shake the bike back and forth it will drop out. Nothing. Back on goes the panel and over to the right panel. Nothing, I am looking everywhere, using my mirror for the darkest recesses. Nothing. Down goes my head in defeat (some time has elapsed here), and I swear as my head goes down there lies that little black plastic SOB on a black rubber hose tucked in behind the frame. Turns out I wouldn't have even had to take the panel off to get it if I had seen it earlier.

Joy!

Pain. Sitting in the tool tray there are two small hex head bolts and one large one. Being the expert I now am it takes 1.23 milliseconds to compute that I need one small hex head bolt and one large one. Fortunately before I make any life changing decisions I recognize that I left the bolt off the left panel that connects it to the rear panel. Five minutes later the bike is together with no left over parts.

Now it is after ten at night, which means it now has taken about two hours to put the bike back together after the throttle synch. I am considering selling my chest full of craftsman tools and other goodies on Ebay for $5. Still, I have to have a test ride.

Wow, what an improvement!!! Runs a lot smoother, seems more crisp on the roll on too. Has to be the four hour synch job, couldn't be the twenty minute barbarian mod, suffer me my delusions on this one. That really sucks, 'cause now I am keeping the tools :glare:

Good one, dude....next time...have a parts box and a tools box. Or, don't worry about it....with my harley...if there were spare parts, they stayed off the bike. If I didn't put it back on then they didn't need to be on.

[SIZE=8pt]Pssst, just a friendly suggestion; Lay off the weed before a scheduled wrenching session. Works wonders.[/SIZE]

I thought that stuff was illegal in the states? Both Kali and NY?

odot said:

I thought that stuff was illegal in the states? Both Kali and NY?

Click to expand...

Like my recently updated sig line read, only if you get caught....Or turn yourself in, like any self respecting American would do anyway.

Dude! You've got issues!

Step away from the motorcycle! :lol:

As mentioned above keep a separate container for bolts and fasteners. I use the plastic "Goop" containers (Hand cleaner) after they are empty. In fact, sometimes I will use more than one to differenitate various areas of the bike I am disassembling.

Two. If you lose a fastener, give it 10 minutes looking for it max. If not found, put in a new one. You do have spares don't you? A melting fastener? Causing problems? You gotta be kiddin me! Lay off the caffeine a bit eh?

Three. Attention to detail and don't get distracted. Buy you prolly know that already. So practice it!

And last but not least - do kids really *graduate* from the sixth grade?

after reading your post I would have to agree - you are slower than death.

Zip-Lock bags and a magic-marker. (for the PARTS, not the weed)

Zip-Lock bags and any empty boxes. (for the Parts and the weed)

Man I don't what the heck was going on with me yesterday, good grief. Read this thing again and snorted soda out of my nose. Did learn one thing though, curse enough in the garage and you don't have to do dishes!

Actually, I thought it an excellent write up that seems somehow eerily familiar in a deja vu kinda way.. B)

V65,

Fun post. I enjoyed reading it. This is another in a long series that I almost missed by merely scanning the board.

I especially liked the sequence of events with the fasteners. I can't even estimate the number of times I felt I had been hyperspaced to the Twillight Zone when a fastener I had dropped seemed to have vanished. The worst Twilight Zone event occured when I dropped a needle valve for a carburetor on a 1971 CL175 when I was in college. I didn't have any money or any alternate transportation, so I spent two hours searching for that damn needle valve. Then I reached the boiling point. I grabbed the last of my cash, and took a 3 hour "cool off" walk to and from the parts store for a second rebuild kit. Fortunately, the needle valve was still lost when I got home and my head did not explode at the base.

V65.

Great story and a great read.

Of course, it did hit a little too close to home. When I do wrenching work, guaranteed Job X will take me twice as long as any other semi-functioning human, sometimes longer depending upon how many fasteners *I* find or lose!

Doods, old "margarine containers" are your friends. Parts go into the container and snap the lid on, that way when you "kick" or "bump" the container, the parts stay in. When ALL the bodywork is coming off for a project I use 2 containers, one for the left and one for the right. I know...very anal and redundant...OTH, I've not lost a fastener yet.

The ziplock bag method works great. When you accidently bump/kick it, the container doesn't go rolling out of reach. Just use the freezer bags so they don't tear when you step on them.