I had said before this trip that by the end of it I would probably be an experienced motorcycle mechanic. I anticipated little issues here and there but, for the most part, I had hoped that it was mostly a joke. Yesterday it wasn't.
It all started with a bad cigarette lighter. I have one on my bike that I use to plug in both my iPod and GPS system so as not to kill the batteries while I'm on the road. A week or two ago the heavy bike fell over when I was making a u-turn on a country road and knocked out the lighter. When I tried to plug it back in I apparently shorted something out.
First off, I know (or at least now "knew") next to nothing about electrical systems. I took off the blinker to look inside my windjammer, saw a wire laying around unconnect, and put it on my cigarette lighter. Problem solved. Well, not really.
Apparently this was the wrong one. It blew my new fuse immediately. To test the validity of the fuse (this is where my ignorance made an appearance) I connected the two fused posts together with a wrench.
"Do I smell smoke?"
Yep, definitely smoke. It was coming out of the blinker hole thicker and faster than I thought could have been possible. I almost panicked but I didn't have time. I knew immediately that if the fire didn't stop on its own there was little i'd be able to do. I would have been at least a minute before I could find anything that would put out a fire inside that bike.
Luckily it didn't burn that far. It completely obliterated one of the hot wires running through the bike. It ran through the dash and up the whole bike near the engine. I immediately saw dollar signs flashing in my head. My brain was adding up the cost of a tow truck (how do they tow bikes anyway?), a mechanic or electrician or whoever i'd need to find, and the downtime that would come with waiting for it to be fixed.
Right about the time I was knee deep in dispair a guy named Jim Beebe walked by. He was checking on a boat in the marina and said hello to me on the way in. One good look at the bike and he figured the problem wasn't near as bad as I thought. After he checked on the boat he'd be glad to come back and help.
Jim saved the day. He spent a couple of hours with me taking apart the bike and putting it all back together. Not only did we get the problem fixed but I learned a LOT about how my bike's electrical system works. Plus I know I could do something like this again, which is good knowledge to have.
Thanks Jim!
Posted July 8, 2005 09:36 AM @ (GMT - 6)
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