I agree though Bitch dog isn't taking much crap from him . He's barely over one year old and so is still learning the ropes .
Elvis is Alive ! and looks pretty Well.......... Had an old fridge magnet that read : All's Good No Complaints ! but I moved it into the " forks-knives and spoon drawer....... Thought about learning how to play the spoons...? But with the go ahead from my wife to do something ! about that DARN OLD Suburban ! Well as Nate knows after entering into Your 70's.. something really SLOW DOWN Mercy Me !. Was told by everyone to wait on having the seats re-upholstered $$$$$$ And all I can come back with is - Can't REALLY afford all that should be done - NEEDS to be done FIRST and I am running out of caulking <<LOL and just Want < to be able to sit inside the cab and pretend -I am back home again.. After 40 years with this one --after life made other plans and ran off............. I'm Still Standing --By the Grace of God surrounded with what was and are The Most Important things in life--- Family and Loved Ones... Of course there may come a day when the local paper reads ? : Old Man found --having passed sitting in a truck- ( With a BIG Smile on His Face ? ) Hope- for the good things in life Pray-- for The Best !
Attitude : it's as important as gratitude.... My 1969 Chevrolet C/10 hasn't moved in some years now, the new paint still looks great and the 6' bed carries a few tools and lots of parts and special hardware....
Hi guys, I have to do this. I don't want to, but I have to. Had a close friend (31 years old) get the Johnson and Johnson "one and done" Covid vaccine on Saturday late afternoon, early evening. He had a serious headache right after the shot. Went to bed with his fiance. Woke at 1:00 am with fever and chills. Bundled up and went back to bed. His fiance woke at 4:00 am with him having seizures next to her in bed. He died shortly after. We will be traveling to NY for the services sometime in the next couple of days. If you have ANY kind of reaction to this shot, no matter how seemingly insignificant, GO TO THE HOSPITAL IMMEDIATELY AND INSIST THAT THEY KEEP YOU OVERNIGHT. Don't call 911 because they will blow you off. Just GO or have someone take you. Don't do the typical "guy" thing and blow it off. It could mean your life. This has been a public service announcement from your friendly chiropractor. Carry on. Andy
UPDATE September 2021 : O.K., we're still here, quite a few people we know have died from this covid-19 thing, I hope all here are taking it seriously as once you get sick you're pretty much done for ~ no vaccine then and the other foolishness many bubbas are trying (Veterinary medicines) don't work . We're managing so far, Maybe one more earthquake and California really will slide into the Pacific Ocean .
Then there's the little old HONDA I've been playing with since.... January (?) I no longer remember . First I drained out the old fuel : Yes, I was drinking on the job, so sue me . This is what came out : the dark red stuff is rust :
All that plus quite a bit more are from a 2.4 gallon fuel tank . Yes, I hand polished and then waxed the tank first : The bike had a brand new Chinesium carby, I struggled mightily with it, cleaning and adjusting, I even used a Bordon Tube to adjust the float level : It turned out the Chinesium carby was defective, it took me months to find the correct KEI-HIN PD27A original equipment carby, it was made in Japan, I found it in Paksitan of all places, the stupid idiots who delivered it left it sitting on my top porch step, I'm ever so lucky I came home early and discovered it before the Porch Pirates did, it co$t me $320 , more than this cute little Tiddler will ever be worth . That solved the mid range RPM miss, the crappy Chinese carby had a casting defect so the choke could never work and some unmarked main jet of mystery size... .
Now it runs, time to clean the various oil filters : Honda Motocycles usually have centrifugal oil filters, this is why a 39 year old motorbike can still be close to as-new internally ~ few ever take the time to clean them out, looky here : With only 14,000 miles there was very little crud in there, whew . There's also an oil screen, Looks like I didn't save any pictures of it, the screen proper was gone missing, E-Bay to the rescue ! .
Okay, so it runs , you alls know how the little things drive me crazy(er) , I gotta have turn signals, the originals were faded black plastic that drooped or were hanging by the wires, I bought and installed new ones, fitted L.E.D. bulbs so maybe I'd not be run over again, they didn't blink dammit : Take the transistorized winker relay apart and clean it well, still no joy so lets look at the winker switch, it's too stiff and the horn won't toot : Parts for this thing are near impossible apart from engine and tires etc. so apart comes the switch, there's quite a few tiny little springs and ball bearings, screws etc. that desperately want to go BOING ! when you open the switch, BT, DT , this time I managed to not loose anything, hand polished all the copper contacts after scraping out some petrified grease and insect eggs, the winkers now work great , nice and bright, blink at a good rapid rate too = . Switch little bits & bobs :
Well shoot ~ I don't know how that last picture wound up first but you get the idea . I have more images of rusty silt cleaned out of the fuel tank, I wound up cleaning it a few more times as the tiny disc shaped magnets (Harbor Freight) I put in the fuel tap and carby float bowl kept loading up with super fine (think flour but red) rust silt, once I had the carby all dialed in the tank sprung a pinhole leak, I was able to get that soldered up with out damaging the original paint ~ I'm still looking for another tank to clean and have repainted, I met a guy in Arizona whilst riding this thing through Oatman and he says he can not only re paint it but can make up the factory graphics with his air brush to boot ~ I need an undented tank, once I find one and de rust it I'll re line it with redcoat or POR-15 tank sealer then have Pete re spray it, his 197? Yamaha RD400 two smoker twin's tank looked better than it did when new . So, carby O.K., I lucked out and discovered the original factory carby cover in England : I almost forgot : the original air cleaner was some foam thing, naturally it had crumbled into dust, I found a generic dirt bike foam pad at Pasadena Yamaha , trimmed it to suit, they kindly soaked it in whatever super sticky oil it needs, I found an aftermarket air cleaner to carby boot and after fully cleaning re assembled the whole mess :
The original muffler was making me crazy ~ it had a loose internal baffle and serious surface rust on the chrome : The N.O.S. ATLAS HONDA exhaust I discovered in England (made in Pakistan) has Farsi written on the box and bag , look at the older pictures . As long as I was fixing the cosmetics, might was well slip a N.O.S. cover on the seat and search up a set of all four foot peg rubbers :
At this point I'm afraid to add up all the parts $ I've spent but its fun to research the original part numbers and then go hunting 'round the world for those long forgotten parts gathering dust some where..... the Netherlands has sourced quite a few parts too . The original headlight is a typical Japanese two piece thing, glass lens glued to a mirrored steel backing with filaments in it, if you look closely you can see the chrome peeling off the steel reflector part : The chrome ring isn't much good either :
The original ABS front fender doesn't look so good and the hole that holds the cable stay won't hold the cable stay anymore so off to Jolley Old Englande yet again for a N.O.S. Honda CG125S fender from a 1998 model, looks far better to me than that original thing plus it's chrome, has Farsi in the package too : The original horn was wimpy, not safe at all even after cleaning it up polishing the chrome and so on so off to my favorite junkyard where a late model Mercedes gave up a nice BOSCH brand low tone (335Hz.) horn, took a few hours to remove the front wheel and fender , headlight etc., cleaned everything up, the usual old grease leaked onto the original semi metallic and unworn brake shoes, reassembled it all and it now looks much better :
I also located and installed a N.O.S. gauge binnacle, during the 20 - odd years this bike was left languishing it got covered in tiny little white spray paint dots, some I can remove but the cosmetic plastic bits are easier to replace -if- I can find them . I've been riding this bike more and more including the freeways, it seems to like 55 ~ 63 MPH when there's no wind or grade .
You Are ! Something Else ! Nate-- WOW How I would love to know a fraction -of what you DO !.. Confession time ? Getting OLD sucks..haha. One of our daughters who had been living in China started a conversation with me about one of my (our) first loves --- Homing Pigeons--- Started out with one ugly little feral "rat" pigeon before I started kindergarten -and the bug bit me GOOD......... And nearly 70 years later -after being bitten - --looking back at my life at all the hard work building-framing houses after the day an Old man rescued me out of a ditch I was digging ( was a laborer haha) All those years of baking my brain in the sun and giving it my all... Well my daughter said she went and bought some pigeons.. from an OLD bloodline that another OLD MAN started me Racing Pigeons with...Inbred-Line-Bred-miniscule -strict outcrossing of a bloodline of pigeons that date back to the late 1800's into the WW 1-2 era.. Scattered some old snap shots from the late 50's to mid 70's of some of my birds.. A Book within itself.. At the age of 8 I was also given A Coopers Hawk -first year bird That had injured it's wing and There was the awakening to my love For Hawks and Doves so to say- Coming to understand what I thought Was the Enemy-only to come to learn and understand`````` We often fear and hate -due to our own ignorance-- And after years and years being involved and a part of a Raptor Research Group for decades as a climber- which later led me to become a Master Falconer.. Well I was a Master but lacked the hunting heart--- It took to be a True Master --even with other Masters adding I could man- train birds like no other they knew.. The Birds I have flown-worked with again - " A book within itself " LOL............. WE know so many people who have died from COVID - Stay Safe- Stay Well -- Home is Where The Heart is.. An Open Heart makes for ``` A great Landing Board ```` ```` ~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Shop has been SUPER busy since the start of the virus thing. I think boredom got people back onto long dormant projects and as ones discovered their limitations due to either lack of tools or knowledge the projects ended up with us. Shop is designed to accommodate 15 vehicles but can accept 17 with adequate working room. It's been at 20 which is just too crowded to move jacks, welders, or even peoples bodies around without possible scrapes and scratches. My in charge nephew has moved over into the high dollar crowd so the regular shallow pockets group is being winnowed out; not to my liking. After the cars swept awards at various shows the "I gotta have one of those" people started holding out fistfuls of cash. Hard to turn down I guess but now being done for absentee owners rather than ones (my type) who themselves have picked up some skinned knuckles along the way. Still the owner but no longer in charge so I guess it's my place to stay quiet in the background. I DO make exceptions to the usual procedures for long time customers/friends since it is known I have the option of driving a FOR SALE into the ground in front of the place.
