Projects

 John Wilder mentioned that he was going to forego blogging this week in order to get a project done.

That made me think about starting and not finishing projects, a failing of mine.  Usually because halfway through I realize that I am either missing something or don't know how to do something and have to figure it out, which figuring will take more time than I have.

So here's yesterday's project as illustration:

Yesterday I decided to finally rebuild the front forks on my Harley.  It's about a three hour job but I had the day off.  I have new chrome fork sliders and covers, plus a new handlebar clamp that holds the bars better.  It's also time to change that fork oil as the spec on the Progressive monoshocks is about 50k.

• Move the shop trailer over nearer to the garage.

• Move the bike to the pavement behind the trailer (can't do front end on the lift)

• Jack up the bike, remove brakes, wheel, fender, cowling, left fork.

• Disassemble fork and discover that I am out of the correct size fork seal, which I thought I had lots of because I keep them in stock.  Instead I have 25 of the next size down which I won't use up if I work on bikes for another ten years.

• Spend twenty minutes digging through the trailer to see if I might have a bag of overstock seals somewhere (spoiler alert: I don't)

• Realize that the new (second hand but still in the box) fork slider covers I bought are clamp on covers, not replacement.  They look terrible so I wouldn't have bought them if I'd realized.

• So now I have motorcycle with no forks or front wheel suspended on a floor jack in the street and it's going to rain.  Can't get parts because it's Monday and motorcycle shops are generally closed Monday around here, especially in the winter.

• Put the fork back together without seal or oil and reinstall on bike.  Put the wheel back on.  Take the bike off the lift and run it into the garage.  Pack all the other parts in a bin, put the tools away, clean up the shop trailer, put the shop trailer back in its spot.

• Now I have to drive three hours round trip to the nearest Harley shop, after working all day, to buy fork slider covers and seals (assuming they have the fork slider covers in stock, they'll definitely have the seals but that doesn't really help as I'd have to take it all back apart again when the covers came in) so that I can get the bike done this weekend as the next weekend I have a memorial ride to attend.

Update: Not only are they not in stock, but they are back ordered til the end of April.  Sigh.  I've ordered aftermarket and the likelihood is that they won't be as good quality.

• Second sigh. This is why I don't start projects.  There wasn't a damn thing wrong with the bike.

Gas stove igniter replacement

Not to sound callous, but this virus has been a godsend for my project list.  Turns out that NOT getting home after a long day at work and being tired is the key to being productive at home.

Had an igniter switch go bad on my GE range.  Wasn't the end of the world as all five igniters operate as one from any of the five switches, so the key to igniting the bad burner was to turn one burner to start, turn the gas on the bad burner, turn the switch off on the other burner.

Yesterday, having had the new igniter switch lying around for most of eight months, and not wanted to work on any of the projects out in my garage or back yard, I decided it was time to pull the stove apart.

First step is to take the top off.  You have to undo all the screws from all the burners (total of 15) using a T-15 torx bit.  Some of them were tight and my inexpensive t-handle torx broke.  Out to the trailer for my Snap On 1/4 drive bit and a ratchet.  Much better.

One thing that was NOT mentioned in the helpful video that I watched was that the igniter for the center burner actually inserts from above, into a metal clip, and has a wire attached to the bottom of it.  Thankfully the wire is designed to be pulled out from the bottom (momentary panic when I tugged on it and it came out without knowing that was the design).  A bit of  a hassle because you have to hold the top up, reach under and disconnect the wire, then tug and push the igniter through the top before you can lift the top off the stove.

Anyway, fifteen screws and one igniter later the top, which has two spring loaded clips at the front which are released by shoving a putty knife under the front, lifts out and is set aside.

Next the front panel had to come off.  The knobs just pull straight  out.  There were four phillips head screws on top, four phillips head screws on the front (holding the second and fourth assemblies to the panel, and four hex head screws underneath (easily accessible with the door open).

The igniter on the far right is the one I needed to replace and of course they were all hard wired together.  Obviously a single assembly from the factory, connected at the far left with sealed connectors.

Fortunately I had those in my shop trailer so back out to get the parts and ...

... snip two wires, strip four wires, discover that the red wire is hot, unplug the stove, crimp two connectors, reassemble.

Voila, working burner.

I did not enter this project lightly.  My experience has been that no project, no matter how simple, survives first contact with the enemy.  100% failure of 100% of projects to go smoothly and not require some sort of trip to somewhere to get something, generally leading to loss of enthusiasm on my part.

This one was as unbelievably simple as it gets.

EDIT: Weird.  When I added the little video to the post to show the burner lighting, it switched it around.  Mirror image.  Now the repaired burner is on the left instead of the right.  First time I've ever inserted a video so I have no idea if this is normal.

EDIT: Wow, the pictures made it a whole day.  So much for the experiment where I  upload pictures to Google Drive from my phone and then use the pictures in Google Drive to write posts in Google blogger.  I'll take care of them later today or tomorrow.

Retirement

Not really, but a glimpse of one possible future.

My job is somewhat on hiatus.  We are limited in what we can teach and there is no grading or face to face, so that has cut down significantly on the hours where we can be doing anything productive.

Household projects are the order of the day.  Installing a custom stock on a rifle; refinishing the garage door; rebuilding the engine of one of my Harley's; cleaning the house; posting stuff on the internet; playing the piano on a regular basis (since that was my justification for buying it); are just a few of the projects I have going.  There is also woodwork stripping which continues to be a long term project that I do infrequently and told myself I'd get to if we were shut down for a while.

Playing Dungeons and Dragons has taken a hit.  It doesn't have to though.  Twice a month I am in a campaign on Fantasy Grounds, so the campaign that I run could theoretically move there.  If only I knew how FG worked.  Oh, another project that is taking much more time than I thought.  Thankfully the guy that runs the current online campaign has offered to help me get it set up as well as let me use his modules, which are not cheap but are necessary (rough estimate about $50 to get running properly).

Did I mention that my computer fan kicks on all the time and my laptop seems to be overheating regularly?  It doesn't seem to be doing it this morning so I suspect that some combination of time and programs is causing the problem.  It may just need the cooling fan to be re-glued with Thermal Paste but guess what is unavailable on Amazon until sometime in late April.  If you said Thermal Paste you would be correct.  Not sure how "stuff to fix your computer so that you can continue to work from home" is not essential, but there it is.

Then the phone starts ringing.  "Can you come fix my Harley?".  Of course I can.  I have lots of time.

Yesterday, as I drove home from an unfinished six hour job that I thought would take four or five to be completely done, I started to freak out.  There isn't enough time in the day to get all this stuff done.  When am I supposed to do the school stuff, the Harley's, the household projects, not to mention setting up my campaign on FG so that we can relax a bit, aaaaaaagh!

So this morning I took a deep breath and wrote a list.  That is what I do.  I make lists.  I love lists.  I can put everything down on a piece of paper or an electronic file (I use Colornote on my phone).  Once it is all listed I can just pick one and do it.  When it's done I get to cross it off.  If I think of something I need to do that is not on the list I will even just do it and then add it to the list, for the sole purpose of getting to cross it off.  The list gets shorter and I feel better.

Meanwhile, however, the fan on my laptop just kicked on for no apparent reason and then went off again.  I think it's the fan.  I have a Solid State Drive (SSD) so I shouldn't be hearing it spinning up.

I guess it's time to hit post and shut down.  I'll go work on something on my list.

What did this have to do with retirement?  Well, nothing really but I could see retirement not being nearly as relaxing as it might seem.

Making progress

More garage cleaning, more stuff on craigslist for free.  Just so it is gone.

Interesting that there seem to be an increasing number of people who just collect free stuff.  I posted up a motorcycle wheel chock, a Harley front spoked wheel, and four trailer wheels.  All taken by people who appeared to have no interest in motorcycles, Harleys, or trailers.  Sounds like they will then try to resell or scrap the parts.  Works for me since I would have to pay to take them to the dump and/or the metal recyclers and not sure I would have made back the cost of gas for going to the recycle place.

Meanwhile, reorganized the garage today so that the bikes are accessible.  The middle one is now running (woohoo).  Need to pick up some screws to hold the air cleaner in place, then I am going to take it for a ride and make sure it keeps running (hopefully not dying far from my house).  It is going up for sale but not until I ...

Use the carburetor bank to see if I can get my other CBR running.  I had sent out the carbs to Wired George in Texas and when they came back there were issues.  Thing one, the bike didn't run and was overflowing gas.  When I took the carb bank apart I discovered that one of the needle jets wasn't in place so that bowl wasn't shutting off.  Pretty sloppy.  Thing two, when I fixed that and put it all back together, it still didn't run.  Thinking now that since the parts bike (pictured) is running I'll swap out the carbs and see if the keeper bike (not pictured but in much nicer condition) then runs.  That will tell me something.  Delays the sale but more important to have all my keeper bikes running so that I don't have projects other than maintenance sitting around waiting for me to have some free time (insert insane laughter track here).

Next, decide which of the two little motorcycle trailers is a keeper and which can go away.  After suitable work and upgrade, of course.